NEW JERSEY
Digital Journal
By Brett Wilkins
Apr 27, 2013
Mendham – A New Jersey memorial dedicated to child victims of clergy sex abuse that was destroyed twice in as many years will be re-dedicated on Sunday.
NJ.com reports that the memorial, located outside St. Joseph Church in Mendham, Morris County, was smashed with a sledgehammer in 2011 and vandalized again last month.
The memorial, which is composed of a statue of a young girl and another of a young boy alongside a millstone, was placed outside St. Joseph, where former Rev. James Hanley once sexually abused at least 15 boys. In 2003, the Diocese of Paterson defrocked Hanley and agreed to pay nearly $5 million to 21 of his victims the following year. Hanley, one of dozens of clergy from the Diocese of Paterson to be accused of sexually abusing children, never served any prison time for his crimes.
One of the boys sexually abused by Hanley, James Kelley, killed himself at the age of 37. Kelley’s suicide inspired Bill Crane, another of Hanley’s victims, to lead efforts to place the monument outside St. Joseph.
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