Assumption President to Lead Effort to Protect Youth from Sexual Predators

By Bronislaus B. Kush
TELEGRAM & GAZETTE
April 12, 2013

http://www.telegram.com/article/20130412/NEWS/304128653/1116

Francesco C. Cesareo, the president of Assumption College, will lead a special panel of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops that seeks to protect children from sexual predators in the American Roman Catholic Church.

The appointment to chair the National Review Board was made by Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York, who serves as president of the USCCB.

Mr. Cesareo succeeds Al Notzon III, who will step down from the post at the conclusion of the June meeting of the USCCB.

The NRB advises the bishops' Secretariat for Child and Youth Protection and was established by the Charter for Protection of Children and Young People, which was adopted by the USCCB in 2002.

Mr. Cesareo has been a member of the NRB since 2012.

"The board and its chair provide valuable feedback to the U.S. bishops and we rely on their expertise and recommendations," Cardinal Dolan said in a statement. "Mr. Notzon has continued the proud tradition of stellar leadership. I have no doubt that Dr. Cesareo will do the same."

The NRB also added four new members.

They are: Michael de Arellano, associate professor and a licensed clinical pyschologist at the National Crime Victims Research and Treatment Center of the Department of Psychiatry at the Medical University of South Carolina; Fernando Ortiz, the director of the Counseling Center at Gonzaga University; Laura Rogers, a former prosecutor who served as the deputy director of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Navy's Judge Advocate General; and Scott Wasserman, a Kansas attorney who specializes in legal issues involving children.