VATICAN CITY
Baltimore Sun
Reuters
10:17 a.m. EST, March 4, 2013
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – An Italian consumer group on Monday urged Rome prosecutors to question U.S. cardinal Roger Mahony, who is in the city to attend the conclave to elect a successor to Pope Benedict, over a sexual abuse cover-up scandal in the United States.
The Codacons group said it had asked Rome prosecutors several days ago to investigate sexual abuse Mahony is accused of covering up in the 1980s, and to try to establish whether minors or Italian citizens were among the victims.
“Considering the cardinal is present in the capital, we believe magistrates must summon him before the start of the conclave, or in any case before he returns to the United States, in order to gain useful insight,” the group said in a statement.
As archbishop of Los Angeles from 1985, Mahony worked to send priests known to be abusers out of the state to shield them from law enforcement scrutiny, according to church files unsealed under a U.S. court order in January.
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