Chile Prosecutors Widen Probe into Clerical Sex Abuse
By Anne-Gerard Flynn
The clergy sex abuse crisis for the Roman Catholic Church in Chile is widening beyond a Vatican investigation. On June 13, Chilean police and prosecutors raided Church offices in two Chilean cities for documents related to the Church's probe into the crisis carried out by Vatican investigator Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta. On June 19, Chilean prosecutors questioned Sciciuna at the airport as he was preparing to depart, according to Reuters, about abuse cases involving 25 Marist brothers and 30 alleged victims that Sciciuna has been investigating during his recent visits. During a press conference earlier in the day, Sciciuna, president of a board of review handling abuse cases within the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said the Vatican was committed to working with civil authorities. In response to a reporter's question during the conference, he said whether the 2,300-page report he produced after his visit to Chile in February would be made public was up to Francis and added the Church's "freedom and autonomy" should be respected. Offices raided June 13 included those of Bishop Alejandro Goic Karmelic of Rancagua. Goic suspended 14 of his diocese's 68 priests May 19 after Chilean news channel Tele 13 alleged there was a sex-abuse ring made up of clergy and known as "La Cofradia" ("The Brotherhood"). Goic had been presented with evidence of the ring's existence earlier in the year, according to the report, but failed to act, something he acknowledged and apologized for after the report aired. The investigation was said to report that the ring had its own hierarchical structure and carried out, as well as covered up, the sexual abuse of minors by members of the group. Goic, 78, resigned as president of the bishops' commission for abuse prevention. His resignation as bishop was also accepted June 28 by Pope Francis. Francis also accepted the resignation that day of Bishop Horacio del Carmen Valenzuela Abarca, 64, of Talca. All of Chile's 34 active bishop had offered to resign May 19 after Francis met with them in Rome and berated them in the wake of Sciciuna's report. According to media accounts, the report said the Chilean church hierarchy had covered up or minimized abuse cases, destroyed evidence, pressured church investigators to discredit accusers and shown "grave negligence" in protecting children. The mandatory age for bishops to submit their resignation is 75. Valenzuela, was one of four bishops trained for the priesthood as a young man by Father Fernando Karadima. Karadima was found guilty in a Vatican investigation in 2011 of abusing boys in Santiago in the 1970s and 1980s. He was sentenced to a life of prayer and solitude. His victims have accused Valenzuela and the other bishops of covering up Karadima's abuse. Francis had accepted the resignations of those bishops - Juan Barros Madrid, whom he had once defended and appointed bishop of Osorno in 2015, Gonzalo Duarte of Valparaiso and Bishop Cristian Caro of Puerto Montt, June 11. Francis has said he may accept more resignations, but his efforts in acknowledging he made "grave errors" in judgement due to what he has termed misinformation or lack of information about clerical sexual abuse in Chile as well as meeting with victims, dispatching an investigator and berating the bishops seem to still put the Vatican in a catch-up role. Juan Carlos Cruz and three other men had publicly accused Karadima of sexual abuse as early as 2010. Their criminal case against the priest was dismissed in November 2011 because of the statute of limitations, but the judge on the case termed their allegations "truthful and reliable." In February 2015 after Francis appointed Barros in Osorno, Cruz wrote an eight-page letter to the Vatican's ambassador in Santiago, outlining the abuse he suffered at the hands of Karadima, once a popular and respected priest in Chile, and alleging that Barros witnessed it and did nothing to stop it. Irish abuse survivor Marie Collins, a former member of the Vatican's Commission for the Protection of Minors, flew to Rome in April 2015 to meet with Cardinal Sean O'Malley of Boston, commission chair, and give him a letter from Cruz about Barros. Despite widespread and ongoing protests against Barros, Francis continued to defend him, including telling a Chilean journalist on Jan. 18 during his trip to Chile, "There is not one shred of proof against him. It is all calumny." Two days later in a public statement, O'Malley told Francis that his words "were a great source of pain" for abuse survivors. Francis dispatched Scicluna to Chile in January though he continued to defend Barros - who has also maintained he was not involved in a cover-up maintain - and to say no victims had come forward against Barros. On Feb. 5 the Associated Press published the letter Cruz had given to Collins in which he wrote "Holy Father, it's bad enough that we suffered such tremendous pain and anguish from the sexual and psychological abuse, but the terrible mistreatment we received from our pastors is almost worse." The Vatican investigation interviewed 64 Chilean abuse survivors and its report is said to have indicated documents were destroyed that showed pedophile priests had been transferred among dioceses and that the pope had been misled. Francis stated in April in a letter to the Chilean bishops that he had made "grave errors" in judgment in the Chilean clerical sex abuse scandal and requested that they come to Rome in May. The June raids by civilian authorities, which included the Church's judicial office in Santiago, may be to investigate allegations within the statute of limitations. According to Reuters quoting a Chilean newspaper, Chilean prosecutors have also submitted a formal request to the Vatican for information it has gathered about priests and Church workers accused of sexual abuse, and are investigating investigating "at least 40" cases of abuse within the Church from across the country. It is estimated that more than 80 Roman Catholic priests have been reported to authorities in Chile for alleged sexual abuse since 200.
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