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Pa Catholic Church Child Sex Abuse Scandal Has Ties to Hampton Roads

WAVY
March 17, 2016

http://wavy.com/2016/03/16/pa-catholic-church-child-sex-abuse-scandal-has-ties-to-hampton-roads/

[with video]

A Catholic Church child abuse scandal unfolding in Pennsylvania has ties to Hampton Roads and other areas in Virginia, according to investigators.

Three ex-leaders of a Franciscan religious order were charged Tuesday with allowing a friar who was a known sexual predator to take on jobs, including a position as a high school athletic trainer, that enabled him to molest more than 100 children.

Giles Schinelli, 73; Robert D’Aversa, 69; and Anthony M. Criscitelli, 61, were successively the provincial ministers of a religious order of the Roman Catholic Church in western Pennsylvania from 1986 to 2010. In that role, each assigned and supervised the order’s members.

Each was charged with conspiracy and child endangerment. Prosecutors said the three have been given until Friday to surrender.

Schinelli is now a pastoral administrator at the San Pedro Center, a Catholic retreat in Winter Park, Florida. D’Aversa is pastor of St. Patrick Catholic Community in Mount Dora, Florida. Anthony Criscitelli is pastor of St. Bridget Parish Community in Minneapolis. A message left for Schinelli at the retreat was not returned. People answering the phones at the churches where D’Aversa and Criscitelli work said they were either traveling or not available for comment.

Brother Stephen Baker, the friar at the center of the abuse allegations, worked at St. Bede’s in Wlliamsburg between June 1972 to August 1973, St Thomas More in Lynchburg from August 1972 to October 1973, Holy Trinity Church in Norfolk from October 1973 to June 1974 and stayed at the James Barry Robinson Home for Boys in Norfolk from October 1973 to June 1974. Baker is accused of abusing more than a 100 children just in Pennsylvania.

Baker killed himself in 2013 — with two knives to the heart — after church officials in Youngstown, Ohio, announced they were settling lawsuits by 11 former students who said Baker abused them at schools in Ohio from 1986 to 1990.

More than 100 abuse claims were subsequently filed by former students of Bishop McCort High School in Johnstown, where Baker worked from 1992 to 2000. Millions in dollars in damages have been paid out.

According to the indictment, four Franciscan Friars, including Baker, had Virginia ties. They are Friar Cletus Adams, Friar Martin Brady and Brother Christian Neetz.

Friar Adams was at James Barry Robinson Home for Boys from 1968 to 1970 and at St. Mary’s Church in Alexandria in 1969.

Friar Brady was also at James Barry Robinson High School from 1968 to 1972. Friar Brady is accused of abusing two brothers in Virginia.

Brother Neetz was at the high school in Norfolk from August 1968 to June 1970 and at St. Thomas More in Lynchburg in 1972. The indictment says it’s unknown when he left.

Saint Bede’s, Saint Thomas and Holy Trinity in Norfolk answer to the Catholic Diocese of Richmond. They may have also visited Saint Nicholas in Virginia Beach and Saint Mary in Alexandria.

In the document, it says Baker worked at Saint Bede’s in Williamsburg for some time.

10 on your side spoke with the church’s current pastor, Rev. Msgr. Timothy E. Keeney who says this is a tragedy and if anyone was abused at his church and he urges them to come forward.

“The first time I ever heard about Brother Stephen Baker was yesterday and the Diocese called me up and said there is a Saint Bede’s connection,” said Keeney. “There is no living memory of this man or what he did because he was a brother he wouldn’t have celebrated masses. It could be that he just volunteered to do some kind of ministry.”

It is unclear how many other Virginia victims are out there. All four men are now dead, but they were named in the indictment because their superiors in the Franciscan order, who are still alive, are now facing criminal charges in Pennsylvania.

“There has never been anybody who has come forward from Saint Bede that they were abused by this man while they were abused,” said Keeney.

The order issued a statement saying it cooperated with the investigation and was “deeply saddened” by the announcement. It also said it “extends its most sincere apologies to the victims and to the communities who have been harmed.”

“There is a need for transparency and criminal prosecution is a great road to get there,” said Boston-based attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who represented nearly 40 former McCort students who have settled claims that Baker sexually abused them. He also represented the 11 Ohio victims, whose settlements prompted the McCort victims to come forward.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that there are hundreds and hundreds of Brother Stephen Baker victims out there,” he said.

Attorney General Kathleen Kane, who announced the charges, said the men “were more concerned about protecting the image of the order, more concerned with being in touch with lawyers than in protecting the flock they served.”

Though the grand jury probe focused on Baker, prosecutors said evidence was uncovered that at least eight other Franciscan friars had been transferred to other locations following abuse allegations.

“No reports were ever made to law enforcement,” Kane said. “As the grand jury found, the ultimate priority was to avoid public scrutiny at all costs.”

In the case of Baker, the grand jury said Schinelli, the earliest of the provincial ministers charged, assigned Baker to the high school despite a 1988 sexual abuse allegation and recommendations that he not be permitted to have one-on-one contact with children.

Baker was appointed as a religion teacher and assistant football coach, but worked his way into a position as athletic trainer even though he had no formal training, the grand jury said.

Many victims indicated they were abused by Baker when he treated them for sports injuries or was stretching them.

Baker was removed from the assignment at McCort in 2000 after what D’Aversa believed was a credible accusation of child sex abuse, though the allegation is not detailed in the grand jury report.

Neither D’Aversa nor Criscitelli notified school or law enforcement officials why Baker was removed, the report said.

Baker was given a new position as vocations director for the Franciscan Friars, Third Order Regulars, Province of the Immaculate Conception. Under that assignment, he led youth retreats in several states.

He was able to continue attending high school functions and had access to McCort facilities until 2010, the grand jury said.

Criscitelli further allowed Baker access to children by letting him work at a shopping mall, the report said.

The charges come two weeks after a grand jury report accused two former bishops of the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese of covering up or failing to act swiftly enough on abuse claims against more than 50 priests from 1966 until 2011. No charges were brought in that investigation because the statute of limitation had run its course,abusers had died and victims were too traumatized to testify, prosecutors said.

Although many Franciscans worked in the diocese, they were directly supervised by their order.

In the prosecution announced Tuesday, the grand jury found that the diocese did nothing criminal in its handling of abuse allegations against Baker, Kane said.

Officials at the diocese and Bishop McCort, which is no longer a diocesan school, did not know of the allegations against Baker until 2011, the grand jury found.

The child endangerment charge brought against the three Franciscan leaders is the same charge brought against Monsignor William Lynn, the former secretary for clergy in the Philadelphia Archdiocese. He recently had his 2012 trial conviction overturned for a second time when a court said jurors had heard from too many other church victims not directly involved in the case. Lynn remains in prison while prosecutors again appeal to the state Supreme Court.

 

 

 

 

 




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