MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests
For immediate release: Monday, Feb. 17, 2014
Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests ( 314 862 7688 home, 314 503 0003 cell, SNAPdorris@gmail.com )
Recalcitrant Twin Cities church officials have been forced to finally make nine more predators’ names public by a safety-conscious judge and victim. But Catholic officials must go further. They have shielded these predators for years. Now they must warn citizens and Catholics about them, not just in Minnesota but in every state they worked.
It’s irresponsible for Twin Cities Catholic officials to do what protects them – suspend these predators, when caught, from local parishes – while doing little or nothing to protect others.
Archbishop John Nienstedt, Bishop Lee Piche and Bishop Andrew Cozzens must use their tremendous resources – pulpit announcements, parish bulletins, diocesan websites, newspaper ads and personal visits to the places these predators worked.
We’re especially worried about Fr. Freddy Montero, who is now reportedly living among even more vulnerable families in Ecuador – who almost certainly don’t know his criminal past.
We challenge archdiocesan officials to disclose how many child molesting clerics “remain under investigation” and when each of these so-called investigations began. It’s been clear for a long time that Catholic officials move extraordinarily slowly when they’re confronted with clergy sex abuse reports and eventually only announce a finding of “substantiated” when they’re virtually forced to do so.
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