ABUSE TRACKER

INDIANA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Wednesday, April 20, 2016

For more information: David Clohessy 314-566-9790, davidgclohessy@gmail.com, Barbara Dorris 314 503 0003, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org

Abuse case sparks controversy
Victims write to Indy congregants
Group says child was abused by older teen
It wants open public meeting and more training
SNAP: “We suspect police weren’t promptly called”

A support group for abuse victims believes a child was recently molested by a member of an Indianapolis church and urging congregants to prod church staff to be more forthcoming about the incident.

Leaders of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, are writing to hundreds of members of Southport Presbyterian Church church says the organization “strongly suspects that law enforcement wasn’t promptly or properly notified” about the alleged abuse of a youngster in the church by an older teenager.

SNAP is “begging” church members to share any information or suspicions about possible child sex crimes or cover ups with police or prosecutors immediately,” saying it’s their “civic and moral duty.”

“All of us must share what we know, believe or have heard about possible child sex crimes with the experienced, impartial professionals in law enforcement,” the letter says. “When church members or staff take it on themselves to try and handle sensitive matters like sexual misconduct quietly and internally – even if they’re well-intentioned – it’s almost always a recipe for disaster.

“Several concerned individuals have asked for our help, so we thought this letter would be a positive first step,” said Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, the organization’s outreach director. “We work to protect the vulnerable, heal the wounded and deter the cover ups, and we hope some congregants will help us do this here.”

Church officials, SNAP says, should

—pay for “on-going counseling for the victim(s) from independent sources chosen by his/her family,”
—provide mandatory training for all staff and volunteers on how to prevent abuse and respond appropriately abuse reports, and
—hire an independent outsider or outside agency to “launch a thorough inquiry into which church staff and/or members knew what and when” and “include clear recommendations for making the church a safer place for all, now and in the future.”

Church members, SNAP says, should ask their youngsters “if anyone in the church – congregant, volunteer or staff member – ever touched them in a way that made them feel uncomfortable” and should “reach out to former church members and staff” and ask the same question.

“Often, when a youngster is hurt by a predator in a church, his or her family stop coming to services,” the letter contends. “Rarely do they explain why. So think about families who once came to church regularly and suddenly stopped coming. And contact them in a sensitive, loving way.”

“In every case of suspected child sex crimes, it’s safest and easiest to do nothing. But that’s irresponsible and endangers kids and helps predators,” said David Clohessy, SNAP’s director. “That temptation – to passively sit back and trust others to take action – is what we hope our letter will help overcome.”

Instead, SNAP advocates calling “independent, experienced and unbiased secular officials with any information or suspicions at all,” Clohessy said.

“It’s our job to share what we know or suspect about abuse with law enforcement,” the letter says. “It’s THEIR job to investigate and, if appropriate, to act. So do not assume that what you have seen, heard or suspected about wrongdoing is too vague, too old or too insignificant to be helpful.”

Church members should “ignore church staff or elders who caution against ‘gossip,’ because while “gossip is sometimes hurtful” silence about child sex abuse reports is “much worse” because “those who commit or conceal child sex crimes count on silence.”

And congregants should “resist talk of forgiveness,” SNAP advises. “Forgiveness is healthy but only AFTER the innocent are protected, predators are exposed and wrongdoers are held responsible. Premature forgiveness endangers kids and protects predators.”

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INDIA
Scroll.in

Officials of the Catholic Church in the Tamil Nadu region of Udhagamandalam have denied that they have reinstated a priest who recently served a prison sentence for sexually abusing a minor in the United States.

A lawsuit filed on Tuesday in a federal court in Minnesota, US, claims that the Diocese of Ootacamund (or Ooty, as it is known colloquially) has put Indian children at risk by reinstating Joseph Jeyapaul, a priest who spent one year in a US jail for sexually abusing a girl during his posting at a church in Crookston, Minnesota, between 2004 and 2005.

Jeyapaul returned to India in late 2015 after serving his sentence. In January, the Diocese of Ootacamund, as the church refers to its administrative district in Udhagamandalam, lifted his suspension from the ministry after getting approval from the Vatican. News of his reinstatement prompted a 26-year-old American woman, who was allegedly raped by Jeyapaul in 2004, to file a lawsuit against the Diocese. The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, a US-based advocacy group, also condemned the Vatican’s decision to lift the suspension of the “predator priest” as an “irresponsible” move that would endanger more children.

An official at the Ootacamund Diocese, however, told Scroll.in that Jeyapaul has not been reinstated in a manner that would endanger children. “He is not reinstated, he has just been granted a residence for his stay,” said Father Selvanathan, the media spokesperson for the Ootacamund Diocese. “He will not hold any post or have any responsibilities.”

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INDIA/MINNESOTA
New Zealand Herald

Thursday Apr 21, 2016

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) A Catholic diocese in southern India is consulting attorneys about a lawsuit filed against it in the U.S. after it re-assigned a priest who was convicted of child sex abuse in Minnesota.

The federal lawsuit was filed in Minnesota this week on behalf of Megan Peterson, who says the Rev. Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul abused her in 2004 when he served at her church in Greenbush, Minnesota. Peterson was 14 or 15 years old at the time.

Peterson said at a news conference Tuesday in Minnesota that she felt “abused, degraded and re-victimized all over again” when she learned that Bishop Arulappan Amalraj lifted Jeyapaul’s suspension in February after consulting with the Vatican.

“Children deserve to be protected in India and nobody is doing this at this point,” Peterson said.

Her lawsuit seeks unspecified damages in excess of $75,000 from the Ootacamund Diocese in India’s Tamil Nadu state.

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CANADA
The Telegram

Barb Sweet
Published on April 20, 2016

Mount Cashel civil trial recessed until June

The confidential seal of the confessional cannot be broken by a priest, but there are other options for a priest who hears of a sexual abuse allegation there, a witness suggested in Newfoundland Supreme Court today.

The priest risks ex-communication if he divulges what was said to him in confession, Fr. Thomas Doyle, a canon lawyer from the Washington D.C. area, told claimants’ lawyer Geoff Budden in the Mount Cashel civil trial.

The seal means nothing the confessor says in confession can be revealed in any way.

The John Doe lawsuit against the RC Episcopal Corp. of St. John’s seeks compensation and involves four test cases that claim the church should be held liable for the physical and sexual abuse of boys at the orphanage by certain Christian Brothers during the period late 1940s to early 1960s. The test cases represent about 60 claimants in the case being pursued by Budden and Associates.

The church contends it did not run the orphanage, therefore is not responsible for actions of the lay order Christian Brothers there.

Doyle said the most ordinary option taken by priests being told of abuse has been to tell the confessor to avoid the situation and to take penance.

Another option – in the case of a boy telling a priest in confession about being abused at an institution — would be for a priest to advise the boy to go to an authority at the institution and reveal what happened.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Register

by EDWARD PENTIN
04/20/2016

VATICAN CITY — Just over four months since the Vatican announced that the Vatican would be subjected to an external audit by one of the world’s leading accounting firms, the Secretariat of State has said that it is pulling the plug on the initiative.

The Vatican announced the decision to suspend the audit, carried out by accountancy giant PricewaterhouseCoopers, in a letter sent to all Vatican entities this week.

On Dec. 5, the Vatican revealed that Pope Francis’ had brought in the auditing firm on the advice of the Vatican Secretariat for the Economy in a bid to reform Holy See finances and make them more transparent after a number of scandals. The audit began immediately after the announcement.

News of the audit’s suspension comes as an article appeared in today’s Italia Oggi newspaper alleging that a possible replacement for Jean Baptiste De Franssu, the current president of the Institute for the Works of Religion (IOR), colloquially known as the Vatican Bank, had turned down an offer.

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AUSTRALIA
Manny Waks

I am writing this post having just completed one of the four weekly therapy sessions which I am currently undergoing in Israel.

Earlier this morning I read an article in The Guardian entitled “What does depression feel like? Trust me – you really don’t want to know”. Much of it resonated with me, perhaps more than any other article I’ve read about depression. I set off for my therapy session feeling empowered, positive and happy.

Just before entering my session, a friend forwarded me an email from the Board of Trustees of Yeshivah, which included the updated recommendations of their Governance Review Panel (GRP) and the proposed governance restructure at Yeshivah. I couldn’t get myself to read it at that stage; I preferred to push it off a little. I’ve become accustomed to the negative impact these emails have on me so I try to read them when I’m in a safe space.
​
As I lay on the treatment bed and commenced my session, I spoke to my therapist about how uplifted I had felt this morning, mainly as a result of reading The Guardian article. I then mentioned the Yeshivah email. What happened next was quite unexpected. My heart started beating uncontrollably, my legs were shaking and I was overcome with emotion. All indications had been that the GRP were going to recommend the ongoing involvement of the Trustees in the new governance structure and I knew when I got this email that my worst fears were being confirmed. My body reacted involuntarily to the realisation that after everything that had happened over the last few years, and despite the pleas of so many victims, the seven remaining Trustees of Yeshivah are still refusing to simply go. Rather, they are proposing to formally embed themselves in the running of the Yeshivah Centre for the next few years, and in the case of Rabbi Chaim Tzvi Groner, for life (as per the previous GRP recommendations, which I didn’t expect would change).

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UNITED STATES
New York Times

By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
APRIL 20, 2016

I have interviewed many survivors of child sexual abuse over many years, but this was the first time I had ever interviewed a survivor who was also a politician. State Representative Mark Rozzi sat behind his office desk at the State Capitol in Harrisburg, Pa. As he spoke he fidgeted with a small figurine he kept on his desk — a little dog with four heads, all snarling — a gift from a fellow survivor. We were discussing his long fight trying to pass legislation to make it easier for survivors to press charges and file lawsuits against their abusers.

Well into the interview I asked him to tell me what had happened to him as a child. “The abridged version,” I said. I had read his story elsewhere, but needed to hear it directly from him, even though I knew it would not play a big part in the article I planned to write. I figured that as a politician, he would have a well-practiced, pithy rendition.

Twenty-five minutes of unrelenting trauma later, we had still gotten only as far as high school. Then, just as Mr. Rozzi was saying, “I’m going to tell you something I have never talked about to a reporter” — at that very moment — there was a knock at the door and his executive assistant came in to tell us that another legislator was waiting in the vestibule. Interview over.

As I rushed to gather up my notebook, laptop and recorder, I realized I had no idea what he was about to reveal, but I had just gotten the answer to another question I am often asked: Why does the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church never seem to go away? Why is it still a story? It has been 31 years since National Catholic Reporter, an independent Catholic publication, broke the first story, about a serial abuser in Louisiana. It has been 22 years since I reported my first article about abusive priests (out on an Indian pueblo in New Mexico, for The Washington Post). Why is the news media still covering this?

The answer lies with the victims. Many, like Mr. Rozzi, are resilient and accomplished. (He is a businessman, a husband and a father, as well as a legislator.) Some are basket cases, unable to hold down a job or romantic relationship. But no matter where they are on this spectrum, the abuse they suffered is often so searing that it is the formative experience of their lives. Even if they have supportive family and friends, a financial cushion and plenty of time in therapy — all big “ifs” — they never entirely leave it behind.

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

GLORIA GALLOWAY
OTTAWA — The Globe and Mail
Published Monday, Apr. 18, 2016

The federal government must pick up the tab for more than $20-million in compensation to survivors of Indian residential schools after its lawyer allowed the Catholic Church to renege on its obligations, according to the former national chief whose advocacy resulted in the largest class-action settlement in Canadian history.

Phil Fontaine, who has spoken publicly about the abuses he suffered as a child at one of the schools, helped to negotiate the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement and says the government must ensure that its terms are met.

“The government is ultimately responsible for meeting all of the financial obligations,” Mr. Fontaine told The Globe and Mail on Monday in response to the news that miscommunication by a federal lawyer allowed the Catholic Church to walk away from its promise to try to raise $25-million to pay for healing and reconciliation programs for the survivors.

“I don’t know about legally, but there’s a moral obligation here,” Mr. Fontaine said. “We’re dealing with close to 80,000 survivors and it’s important for them that they be treated fairly and justly.”

The 50 Catholic organizations – known legally as the Catholic entities – that ran many of the schools collected a combined $3.7-million as part of a seven-year campaign in which their lawyer says they made their “best efforts” to raise $25-million as spelled out in the settlement agreement. The entities also had to pay an additional $29-million in cash and to provide $25-million in “in-kind” services – obligations that have been met.

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CANADA
CBC News

By Hilary Bird, CBC News Posted: Apr 19, 2016

Northern aboriginal leaders say they are furious that a court ruling let Catholic groups off the hook from fundraising tens of millions of dollars for healing programs for former students of residential schools.

The 2006 Indian Residential School Settlement required Catholic groups to pay compensation for its role in the abuse and trauma inflicted on thousands of aboriginal children.

The agreement required the Catholic entities to pay $29 million in cash to the now defunct Aboriginal Healing Foundation, $25 million in “in-kind” services, and to try and fundraise $25 million for healing programs for former students.

Pierre Baribeau, a lawyer for the Catholic groups told CBC that raising $25 million was simply a goal and that the settlements agreement states the Catholic groups were only obligated to put in their “best efforts.”

The Catholic entities were able to raise about $4 million of that $25 million goal.

“We had a very difficult time convincing public corporations to consider giving money to a Catholic-related foundation,” Baribeau said.

“Unfortunately, we did not get as much as one would have expected. The efforts were there and a lot of money was put into the campaign also.”

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

JULIEN GIGNACERIC ANDREW-GEE
The Globe and Mail
Published Tuesday, Apr. 19, 2016

Vivian Ketchum, 51

Attended Cecilia Jeffrey residential school in Kenora, Ont., in the early 1970s.

News of the Catholic entities’ unfulfilled financial obligations made Vivian Ketchum “extremely angry,” she said. The money, she believes, could be used for a 24-hour youth crisis centre in Kenora, where indigenous youth suicide is epidemic.

“Why walk away from the table? Our youth are dying,” she said. “That’s basically what I’ve got to say.”

Ms. Ketchum was 5 or 6 when she was taken – under circumstances she doesn’t remember – from her home in Northern Ontario to the nearby residential school in Kenora.

She said she was abused by a “house mother,” who hit her with a shoe when Ms. Ketchum hid from a dentist appointment she feared. The blow broke one of the girl’s pinkie fingers.

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

GLORIA GALLOWAY
OTTAWA — The Globe and Mail
Published Sunday, Apr. 17, 2016

A miscommunication by a federal lawyer allowed the Catholic Church to renege on its obligation to try to raise $25-million to pay for healing programs for the survivors of Indian residential schools.

Of that amount, the Church raised only $3.7-million, and a financial statement suggests less than $2.2-million of that was actually donated to help former students cope with the trauma inflicted by the residential schools.

The legal misstep occurred when Ottawa was pressing the Church to pay the entirety of a related cash settlement stemming from the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, the largest class-action deal in Canadian history.

The failing fundraising effort by the Church, which represented almost a third of its obligation under the settlement, was playing out as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was travelling the country hearing gut-wrenching stories about what occurred behind the walls of the institutions that operated in Canada for more than 100 years.

The landmark settlement agreement required 50 Catholic groups that ran the schools, known in court documents as the Catholic entities, to pay a combined $79-million for their role in the abuse.

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

A clergyman abused by a former bishop has said he will not cooperate with a review into the Church of England’s investigations.

Peter Ball, 84, was jailed in October for offences against 18 teenagers and young men in the 1970s, 80s and 90s.

One of his victims, Rev Graham Sawyer, said he had taken the decision because “bullying and silencing” were not in the terms of reference of the review.

The Church said the Ball case “was a matter of deep shame and regret”.

In February, it was announced Dame Moira Gibb was chairing an independent review of the Ball case to consider what information was available to the Church, who had it and when.
‘Worrying signal’

Mr Sawyer waived his right to anonymity before Ball, former Bishop of Lewes and Gloucester, was sentenced to 32 months in prison.

He said he objected to the fact the treatment he received from current senior officials in the church would not be covered by the terms of reference of the inquiry.

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MINNESOTA
Jeff Anderson and Associates

Bishop Amalraj, with permission from Pope Francis, returned Jeyapaul to ministry after his sexual abuse conviction in Minnesota

Joseph Jeyapaul Timeline
Peterson Complaint 4-18-16
5-8-2010 Jeyapaul Support Letter – 500 signatures
Jeyapaul – Petition to Enter Guilty Plea
Jeyapaul Photos

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UNITED STATES
Crux

By John L. Allen Jr.
Editor April 19, 2016

Some Catholics cheered last week, while others were either depressed or outraged, when news broke that Tony Spence, editor of the Catholic News Service (CNS) since 2004, had resigned unexpectedly. The move followed a controversy over three Tweets he posted about religious freedom bills, which critics saw as promoting a pro-LGBT agenda.

CNS is the official news agency of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, and Spence told media outlets he was informed on Wednesday, April 13, by general secretary Monsignor J. Brian Bransfield that he had “lost the confidence” of the conference.

The ouster came after several Catholic blogs and news outlets seen as sharply conservative took Spence to task. Spence, 63, had served in the bishops’ conference for twenty-five years in a variety of roles, and now says he’s returning to his native Tennessee to ponder other options.

Those inclined to a political reading of things may see Spence’s situtation in tandem with other notable departures at the bishops’ conference, including the resignation of the late Sister Mary Ann Walsh as the bishops’ spokesperson in summer 2014, and the more recent exit of Helen Osman as the conference’s Secretary for Communications.

All three had reputations as moderates, perhaps leaning a bit to the left. Some will style these transitions as a long-overdue opportunity for clarity at the conference, while critics will see them as an ideological putsch, but in any event a change in direction seems fairly evident.

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ESPANA
La Verdad

ALICIA NEGRE | MURCIA
19 abril 2016

Roberto P. S. admitió este martes ante la Audiencia Provincial de Murcia que abusó de nueve niños de siete años durante 2011. Lo hizo durante su etapa como profesor de Religión en el colegio católico San Vicente de Paul de la pedanía murciana de El Palmar.

El acusado llegó a un acuerdo de conformidad con las partes y, tras asumir los cargos, será condenado a un año de prisión por cada niño. La Fiscalía le reconoció las atenuantes de reparación del daño y dilaciones indebidas.

Una condena de nueve años de cárcel que, sin embargo, tras la última reforma del Código Penal, no le obligará a entrar en prisión. La norma, tras la reforma, establece que las condenas que individualmente no superen los dos años, podrán ser suspendidas siempre que el reo no cuente con antecedentes penales -Roberto P.S. no los tiene- y que las circunstancias lo aconsejen. El tribunal deberá fijar un plazo y, en el caso de que el procesado vuelva a delinquir, tendrá que cumplir estos nueve años de cárcel.

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SPAIN
The Local

A Spanish Catholic teacher who admitted to molesting nine young children won’t set foot in jail because of a legal loophole.

Catholic school teacher Roberto P. S. admitted before a Murcia judge on Tuesday that he did indeed molest eight girls and one boy, all seven years old at the time, a spokeswoman from the court confirmed to The Local.

But the religion teacher won’t have to go to jail unless he re-offends because of a reform to the criminal code.

Under an agreement reached between the prosecution and defense, because Roberto P. S. testified, he received a jail sentence of one year per child, or nine years total, according to broadcaster Cadena Ser.

But because he received individual sentences of one year, rather than one nine-year sentence, he qualified for a suspended sentence for each one, under a reform to the criminal code.

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ARGENTINA
La Nacion

[They apprehended a priest accused of sexual abuse of minors.He was denounced by the mother of a three-year-old girl who presented injuries. They also they arrested a school principal.]

José E. Bordón

SANTA FE.- Conmoción en el norte santafecino. Un sacerdote de Reconquista y el director de una escuela de Avellaneda, ambas ciudades del departamento de General Obligado, fueron detenidos en las últimas horas acusados de delitos contra la integridad sexual: en todos los casos, las víctimas son menores.

El sacerdote, identificado por las autoridades como Néstor Monzón, de la Parroquia María Madre de Dios, en el barrio Hospital de Reconquista, quien fue formador de adolescentes en el Preseminario Diocesano, fue detenido cuando regresaba a su parroquia.

El fiscal que investiga el caso, Rubén Martínez, confirmó: “La denuncia fue realizada por la madre de una menor de 3 años, en el Centro de Orientación de Víctimas de Violencia Familiar y Sexual de la Unidad Regional 19a de la policía provincial. Según consta en la denuncia, la niña y su primo, también de 3, fueron manoseados por el sacerdote en su zona anal y genital, en la misma residencia católica en la que vive”, relató.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Yorkshire Post

KNOWING that the man who subjected him to the most appalling abuse during his childhood is at last behind bars might just offer some comfort to Roy Blanchard. The fact that he has waited four decades to see such justice delivered, however, suggests it will be a crumb at best.

For in the intervening years, Mr Blanchard has been condemned to serve his own life sentence. His experience derailed his education and as an adult he grappled with alcoholism, doubtless in an attempt to drown his demons and the memories of the terror that clouded his formative years.

The man responsible for all this, Kenneth Endersby, was a monster. Even worse, he was a monster whose position as a choirmaster afforded him protection from the Church of England. When told of the abuse, local vicar Raymond Ward condemned Roy as a liar and a “filthy, disgusting and degenerate boy”.

The Church has since taken great strides toward ensuring that any inappropriate conduct is exposed, rather than concealed. It is also important to acknowledge that abuse arises in a variety of settings and that the Church is full of kind people who perform sterling work on a daily basis.

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ARGENTINA
La Gaceta

[The Church has revived research on priest Justo Jose Ilarraz and the interdiocesan Court of Santa Fee will be responsible for taking statements from victims who denounced the priest for sexual abuse.]

PARANÁ.- La Iglesia Católica argentina reactivó su investigación sobre el sacerdote Justo José Ilarraz, quien está siendo procesado por la Justicia entrerriana, acusado de haber abusado sexualmente de varios menores de edad hace 30 años. Además, citó a testigos para que se presenten a declarar en mayo ante el Tribunal Interdiocesano de Santa Fe.

Ilarraz fue acusado por ex seminaristas de haberlos sometido a abusos sexuales mientras estudiaban en el seminario de Paraná que dirigía el sacerdote, entre 1985 y 1993, cuando los pupilos eran menores de edad.

La decisión de la Iglesia de avanzar con la investigación interna se produjo dos semanas después de que el Tribunal de Apelaciones de la Justicia de Paraná confirmara el procesamiento de Ilarraz.

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AUSTRALIA
Goulburn Post

LOUISE THROWER
April 20, 2016

ARCHBISHOP Christopher Prowse on Friday apologised for what had happened to “innocent men, their families and communities” at Brother William Standen’s hands.

The Christian Brother has pleaded guilty to 17 charges of indecent assault and one act of indecency against boys aged 12-14 while he was a dormitory master at a Catholic School from 1978-81. He is awaiting sentence.

The Archbishop’s apology followed Standen’s sentencing hearing on Sydney on Friday.

While the Christian Brothers operate autonomously to the Archdiocese, the man appointed to head up a newly created protection body said the Archbishop felt impelled to act.

“His position is that the abuse occurred and there are people in the Archdiocese who were were either victims or were impacted by it,” Matt Casey said.

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TEXAS
KURV

Prosecutors and defense attorneys gathered in court Tuesday for a pretrial hearing in the 1960 Irene Garza murder case. Attorneys for the man charged with killing her, former McAllen priest John Feit, filed several routine motions, but also asked the judge to grant them access to Sacred Heart Catholic Church, where Feit heard the 25-year-old Garza’s confession the night she was raped and killed. 92nd District Court Judge Luis Singleterry granted the request. However, no decision was made on a bond reduction requested by the defense.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

Joshua J. McElwee | Apr. 19, 2016

VATICAN CITY
A group of prominent global Catholic theologians, priests and bishops who have been criticized by the Vatican’s chief doctrinal office have come together to call for a new process for theological investigations in the church that would be marked by openness and transparency instead of deep secrecy.

In a letter sent to the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith last month, the theologians argue that current procedures for investigations — characterized often by a lack of adequate defense or possibility of appeal — are “contrary to natural justice and in need of reform.”

The writers sharply criticize current practice. They say that current norms are outdated and follow a model based on “the absolutism of sixteenth and seventeenth century Europe.” They identify that:

*The person under investigation is not allowed to meet or speak to their accusers;
* The doctrinal office often acts as “investigator, accuser, judge and jury” and also imposes any penalties and hears any appeals;
* The accused is often not in direct contact with the Vatican — the doctrinal office rather works through the person’s religious superior or bishop, and;
* Procedures can “drag on for years, with sometimes negative consequences for the mental and physical health of the accused.”

The last point carries special significance, as many who have been investigated by the Vatican describe the process as particularly debilitating.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Yorkshire Evening Post

TONY GARDNER
Wednesday 20 April 2016

AN ‘arrogant’ choirmaster and former magistrate has been jailed more than half a century after he began the relentless sexual abuse of a choirboy at a church in Leeds.

Kenneth Endersby was allowed to evade justice for decades after the vicar at St Stephen’s church in Kirkstall helped him cover up the abuse when it first came to light.

How Leeds church helped cover up abuse scandal

ABUSE VICTIM: “I can still remember the churning in my stomach the very first time he attacked me.”

Victim Roy Blanchard was called a liar and a “filthy, disgusting and degenerate boy” by Rev Raymond Ward after his family reported Endersby to the church when he was aged 15 back in 1970.

Rev Ward also made veiled threats to Mr Ward’s mother, telling her that life would be made very difficult for her family if she went to the police.

Mr Blanchard, now 64, bravely waived his right to anonymity to talk to the YEP about the devastating impact the abuse has had on his adult life and the torment he has suffered at not being believed for so many years.

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ILLINOIS
Daily Northwestern

Mariana Alfaro, Web Editor
April 20, 2016 •

Journalists Walter Robinson and Sacha Pfeiffer, winners of the Pulitzer Prize for their Boston Globe series that uncovered Roman Catholic Church sexual abuse cases, said they never expected to discover such deep networks of corruption when they first started working on the story. Last year, their work was adapted into the Academy Award-winning film “Spotlight.”

Robinson and Pfeiffer spoke Tuesday night to about 250 students after a screening of the film hosted by A&O Productions and Studio 22. During the Q&A session, moderated by Medill Prof. Mei-Ling Hopgood, Robinson and Pfeiffer spoke about their experiences writing the story and collaborating with the film’s actors and creators more than a decade after.

“This may be … perhaps the first major investigative story of the Internet age,” Robinson said. “It went viral. Within a day or two we were getting phone calls and emails literally from all over the world … the story just exploded.”

In the film, Michael Keaton plays Robinson, who led the Boston Globe’s 2002 coverage of the scandal, which resulted in international outrage against the Catholic Church and the resignation of Boston’s Archbishop. Rachel McAdams plays Pfeiffer, a portrayal the journalist said was “uncanny.”

Pfeiffer said the film reminded her of the power of Hollywood because she continues to receive emails from viewers worldwide who might have been unaware of the scandal before, even though the story was published more than a decade ago. Even the Catholic Church, she said, had a more positive reaction to the film than to the original story.

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JAPAN
South China Morning Post

Associated Press

Former students at a prestigious all-boys parochial school allege they were molested or raped by religious brothers who taught there decades ago. One former student says he was raped in the chapel by two brothers when he was 11

The Roman Catholic Church’s sex abuse scandal has stretched into one of the least Catholic countries: Japan, where former students at a prestigious all-boys parochial school allege they were molested or raped by religious brothers who taught there decades ago.

Three former students at St Mary’s International School in Tokyo said they were sexually abused by brothers there. One described “health checkups” in which a brother touched boys’ testicles. Another says he was raped in the chapel by two brothers at age 11.

That former student received an in-person apology from one of the men, Brother Lawrence Lambert, in 2014. The former student’s account of the meeting suggests Lambert might have initially confused him with yet another victim whose assault went unreported.

The former student said the school sent Lambert away after the 1965 attack, only to have him return to serve as elementary-school principal for nearly two decades.

Allegations from former students have been published in an English-language Tokyo newspaper but otherwise have received little attention in Japan. There are only about 500,000 Catholics in the country of 127 million, and the school is aimed at foreigners like the three former students rather than Japanese.

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WISCONSIN
Kenosha News

BY DENEEN SMITH
dsmith@kenoshanews.com

A Twin Lakes pastor charged with child enticement sent extremely sexually explicit text messages to a person he believed was a 13-year-old girl he met online before attempting to meet her in person, according to court documents.

Joshua C. Scheil, 28, pastor of Hope Lutheran Church in Twin Lakes, was charged with use of a computer to facilitate a sex crime, attempted child enticement and causing a child under 13 to view or listen to sexual activity.

A representative of Hope Lutheran Church said the church could not comment on the charges, referring calls to the South Wisconsin District synod offices. A call to the president of that office was not returned.

Scheil has been pastor of the Twin Lakes church since July 2013. Twin Lakes police said no local complaints have been brought to the department’s attention.

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CANADA
The Telegram

Barb Sweet
Published on April 19, 2016

If the archbishop of St. John’s knew of a serious problem or something criminally wrong going on at an orphanage or such institutions, he had the right to visit the facility and intervene, an expert in canon law testified at the Mount Cashel civil trial Tuesday at Newfoundland Supreme Court.

Father Thomas Doyle was accepted as a witness for the plaintiffs in the civil case — four former residents of the orphanage who have testified previously at the trial.

The John Doe lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Episcopal Corp. of St. John’s seeks compensation and involves four test cases that claim the church should be held liable for the physical and sexual abuse of boys at the orphanage by certain Christian Brothers during the period of the late 1940s to early 1960s. The test cases represent about 60 claimants in the case being pursued by Budden and Associates.

The church contends it did not run the orphanage, and therefore is not responsible for actions there of the lay order Irish Christian Brothers.

The church is expected to call its own canon law expert, but Doyle, a Washington, D.C.-area canon lawyer, interpreted the Catholic laws as giving archbishops power and responsibility over clergy and lay people in his archdiocese, to safeguard their spiritual and moral welfare.

“The archbishop’s responsibility reaches to anyone in his territory. In this case it would certainly include the boys at Mount Cashel as well as the Christian Brothers,” Doyle told the court during questioning by Geoff Budden.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Courier Times

By SUE A. FUGATE

The thought of child sexual abuse, past or present, stirs fear and anger. The recent grand jury report about crimes that date back as far as the 1950s in the Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown is the latest revelation.

I won’t pretend to know the pain a survivor of abuse experiences or the helplessness their families feel, but as a mother of two, I do empathize with their suffering and support their need for healing.

In the name of healing, some legislators have proposed to change Pennsylvania law and, in effect, open a window that would waive the civil statute of limitations for some — but not all — abuse survivors. To that, I respond as an attorney. I can’t ignore the law, nor should any elected official pledged to serving the public good.

Unless we face some uncomfortable truths, the Legislature will end up creating two classes of child victims in the name of emotional expedience. It will financially penalize innocent families — members of churches and parish communities — who had nothing to do with past evil actions by a criminal few.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Mail

By EMILY CRANE FOR DAILY MAIL AUSTRALIA

Hundreds of church child sex abuse cases dating back decades are being reported to police again because the victim’s names were never given to authorities to properly investigate.

The Catholic church in NSW has stopped a controversial procedure known as ‘blind reporting’, which meant police were never given the victim’s name when the church passed on a child sex abuse allegation.

The practice of blind reporting meant many abuse allegations could not be investigated.

Documents obtained under freedom of information by NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge show NSW Police has received 1,476 blind reports of child sex abuse in NSW since 2009 – many of which relate to the Catholic church.

The church is now going back over their blind reports and giving the names of victims to police.
‘By accepting the Catholic church’s practice of blind reporting, police allowed victims to be denied justice and abusers to escape conviction,’ Mr Shoebridge told Daily Mail Australia.

‘One of the key problems with blind reports is that the police’s own protocol says when they get a blind report they don’t investigate it. They just file it as criminal intelligence and that means perpetrators are not being brought to justice.’

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INDIA
The Indian Express

A 26-year-old American woman on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against an Indian Bishop for reinstating a Catholic compatriot priest accused of sexually abusing her during his posting in the US between 2004 and 2005.

Attorney Jeff Anderson filed the federal lawsuit in Minnesota against Bishop Amalraj for reinstating Joseph Jeyapaul to ministry after consulting with the Vatican.

The victim said she felt “abused, degraded and re-victimised all over again” when she learned that Amalraj had lifted Jeyapaul’s suspension in February. She told reporters at a news conference in Minnesota that reinstating the Indian priest would endanger kids in India.

Jeyapaul who served as a priest in the Crookston city of Minnesota in 2004 and 2005 was arrested in India in 2012 and extradited to the US on charges of sexually abusing two girls in a congregation.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Northern Echo

Joe Willis, Regional Chief Reporter

AN alleged sex abuse victim has spoken of his anger after the Catholic priest he claims abused him apparently committed suicide hours before he was due to answer bail over historic child sex allegations.

Father Ernest Sands, 67, was found dead at his remote cottage in North Wales last Monday (April 11).

The Northern Echo has learnt prosecutors were looking to charge Mr Sands with the indecent assault of five boys aged between 11 and 15 and the priest was due to answer bail later that day.

The offences are alleged to have taken place at St Joseph’s College, in Upholland, near Wigan in the late 1970s and 1980s where Mr Sands was a music teacher.

Father Sands was a renowned musician who wrote several well-known hymns including one, Sing of the Lord’s Goodness, chosen for the enthronement of the Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, in 1991.

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ILLINOIS
North by Northwestern

By Danielle Cohen April 19 2016

They may be the subjects of Spotlight, the 2016 Best Picture Academy Award winner, but journalists Sacha Pfeiffer and Walter Robinson consider themselves anything but Hollywood royalty.

When asked about their Oscars experience, Pfeiffer and Robinson both stifled a laugh onstage Tuesday night in Ryan Auditorium. They recounted their trek up five balconies in Los Angeles’ Dolby Theater to get to what they called “the worst seats in the house.”

Though the two were quick to crack jokes at their complete outsider-ness to the Hollywood world, they also took the opportunity to discuss the importance of their work in a Q&A moderated by Medill Professor Mei-Ling Hopgood. Their conversation, which included questions submitted by students, followed a screening of the award-winning film. Both portions were sponsored by A&O Productions and Studio 22.

For the uninitiated, Spotlight recounts the Boston Globe’s coverage of sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church and the investigative team, called – wait for it – Spotlight, that broke the news. Pfeiffer and Robinson were two journalists on that team.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY STEPHEN REX BROWN NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Wednesday, April 20, 2016

One of the city’s district attorneys is in favor of extending the criminal statute of limitations on charges of sexual abuse of children — but the others refused to take a stand.

Queens District Attorney Richard Brown’s support of overhauling the oft-maligned law barring criminal charges after the victim turns 23 years old comes as the state Senate considers a bill to do just that.

“We have long been supportive of extending the criminal statute of limitations for young victims of sexual abuse,” Kevin Ryan, a Brown spokesman, told the Daily News.

But other district attorneys were more reluctant to tackle the issue.

The offices of Brooklyn District Attorney Kenneth Thompson, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. and Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark all referred The News to the District Attorneys Association of the State of New York.

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MINNESOTA
Washington Post

By Associated Press April 19

MINNEAPOLIS — A Catholic priest who was deported to his native India after completing his jail sentence in Minnesota for sexually abusing a child is the subject of a new lawsuit against a diocese in India that allegedly returned him to ministry with Vatican approval.

Attorney Jeff Anderson filed the lawsuit in federal court in Minnesota on Monday on behalf of Megan Peterson, who says the Rev. Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul abused her starting in 2004 when she was 14 or 15 and he was a priest at her church in the northern Minnesota town of Greenbush. Her lawsuit seeks unspecified damages in excess of $75,000 from the Ootacamund Diocese in India’s Tamil Nadu state.

“This is not only shocking, it’s a total break of the pledge Pope Francis has made that he will not return to the practices of the past,” Anderson said.

Peterson said at a news conference Tuesday that she felt “abused, degraded and re-victimized all over again” when she learned that Bishop Arulappan Amalraj lifted Jeyapaul’s suspension in February after consulting with the Vatican.

“Children deserve to be protected in India and nobody is doing this at this point,” Peterson said.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

By Jean Hopfensperger Star Tribune APRIL 19, 2016

Megan Peterson was astounded to learn that the Vatican had reinstated a priest from India who was convicted last year of sexually abusing a teenage girl in northern Minnesota.

She took her fight to remove that priest, the Rev. Paul Jeyapaul, to federal court Tuesday, filing a lawsuit to prevent him from “harming the children of India.”

Jeyapaul is among a handful of foreign Catholic priests to be successfully extradited to the United States to face charges of sexually abusing a minor. He pleaded guilty to criminal sexual conduct against a teenager at his Minnesota parish in 2015.

Peterson accused Jeyapaul of rape and sexual abuse in a civil suit that was settled out of court in 2011.

“This Pope has said that bishops who cover up [sexual abuse] and the offending clerics have no place in the church,” Peterson said at a news conference in St. Paul Tuesday. “I feel like this is a slap in the face.”

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MINNESOTA
Valley News Live

ST. PAUL (Valley News Live) – A federal lawsuit was filed Tuesday against an Indian Bishop for reinstating a priest convicted of sexual abuse in Minnesota. The federal lawsuit names the Diocese of Ootacamund, India, as defendants.

A press conference was held at the law office of Jeff Anderson & Associates. They say Bishop Amalraj, with permission from Pope Francis, returned Father Joseph Jeyapaul to ministry after his sexual abuse conviction.

Survivor Megan Peterson will spoke publicly about the lawsuit, saying Jeyapaul’s return to ministry endangers kids in India.

In 2015, after his extradition from India, Jeyapaul pleaded guilty to criminal sexual conduct involving the sexual abuse of a minor girl while he worked in the Diocese of Crookston in 2005.

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MINNESOTA
New York Daily News

BY MICHAEL O’KEEFFE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Tuesday, April 19, 2016

A Catholic diocese in India has put children at risk by reinstating the priest who allegedly assaulted a sexual abuse survivor, according to an explosive lawsuit filed Tuesday in Minnesota federal court.

The suit filed by veteran sex abuse attorney Jeff Anderson on behalf of former New Yorker Megan Peterson, who recently moved to Wisconsin, names the Diocese of Ootacamund in southern India as the sole defendant.

“This is about protecting children in India from the callous antics of the bishop of Ootacamund,” said Peterson, a member of the advocacy group SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests).

Peterson, who grew up in Greenbush, Minn., says she was a devout 14-year-old altar server and church choir member when the Rev. Joseph Jeyapaul first raped her in his parish office.

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UNITED STATES
Washington Post

By Editorial Board
April 19

IN THREE years at the helm of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis has been a source of inspiration for millions of faithful around the world. In one critical respect, however, he has fallen short of his own promise: to come fully to terms with decades of child sex abuse by clergymen and the institutional cover granted to them by bishops and cardinals.

Francis has pledged “the zealous vigilance of the Church to protect children and the promise of accountability for all.” Yet there has been scant accountability, particularly for bishops. Too often, the church’s stance has been defiance and obstruction.

In his trip to the United States in the fall, Francis told victims that “words cannot fully express my sorrow for the abuse you suffered.” Yet his initiative to establish a Vatican tribunal to judge bishops who enabled or ignored pedophile priests has come to naught. Not a single bishop has been called to account by the tribunal, which itself remains more notional than real.

Meanwhile, church officials have fought bills in state legislatures across the United States that would allow thousands of abuse victims to seek justice in court. The legislation would loosen deadlines limiting when survivors can bring lawsuits against abusers or their superiors who turned a blind eye. Many victims, emotionally damaged by the abuse they have suffered, do not speak until years after they were victimized; by then, in many states, it is too late for them to force priests and other abusers to account in court.

Eight states have lifted such deadlines, known as statutes of limitations, for victims who are sexually abused as minors. Seven states have gone further, enacting measures allowing past victims — not just current and future ones — to file lawsuits in a finite period of time, generally a two- or three-year window.

In many more states, however, the bishops and their staffs have successfully killed such bills, arguing that it would be unfair to subject the church to lawsuits in which memories and evidence are degraded by the passage of time. Quietly, they also say the church, which has suffered an estimated $3 billion hit in settlements and other costs related to clergy sex abuse scandals nationwide, can ill afford further financial exposure.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Michael Sean Winters | Apr. 19, 2016

The forced resignation of Tony Spence as editor-in-chief of the Catholic News Service is regrettable in the extreme. Spence has been a bulwark for maintaining the editorial independence of CNS, which is its value, even when that independence has rankled some of the bishops. If CNS were to lose its well-earned reputation for independent reporting, it would be worthless.

I normally would not write about a personnel matter. I was not at the meeting at which Spence says his resignation was demanded. Employers often have unspoken rationales for the decisions they make in these situations. But, it seems to me that this incident warrants attention for some reasons that transcend the particulars of the case.

The forced resignation came on the heels of stories in several right-wing blogs that called attention to the fact that Spence had sent out tweets offering a negative judgment on some legislative efforts to restrict LGBT rights. As the editor of a news agency, the tweets were ill-advised and confirmed me in my decision to use my Twitter account solely to send out links to my articles. But, a tweet can be taken down and an employee told not to tweet anymore. I do not see this as an offense worthy of firing. And, let’s not kid ourselves: If Spence had tweeted support for the anti-LGBT laws, I am confident he would still be at his desk this morning.

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MINNESOTA
CBS Minnesota

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — An Indian priest who was convicted of sexual abuse against a minor in Minnesota is now back in ministry.

Father Joseph Jeyapaul was convicted last summer for sexually abusing a girl when he was working at the Blessed Sacrament in Greenbush and St. Joseph’s in Middle River in 2004 and 2005.

Jayapaul was ordained in India and was assigned to the Diocese of Crookston, Minnesota.

Now, county attorneys say with permission from the Vatican, Jeyapaul is back to work in India.

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CANADA
CBC News

A Barrhaven high school teacher has been charged with sexual assault and sexual interference after several incidents involving one of his students earlier this year, Ottawa police say.

A police investigation into Naoum Abi-Samra was launched when the force received allegations the 57-year-old had “made sexual comments and inappropriately touched one of his students,” a media release issued Monday states.

He had been working at Pierre-Savard high school in Barrhaven since September 2012, but was suspended when the central east French Catholic school board, Conseil des écoles catholiques du Centre-Est (CECCE), became aware of the allegations on March 11, according to Celine Bourbonnais, the board’s spokesperson.

Prior to working at Pierre-Savard Abi-Samra taught at another CECCE school, but the board would not say which.

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NEW HAMPSHIRE
ABC News

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
CONCORD, N.H. — Apr 19, 2016

A Roman Catholic priest who served as the face of the church in New Hampshire during the sex abuse scandal was granted parole Tuesday on two of his convictions for stealing $300,000 from a hospital, a bishop and a dead priest’s estate. But he’ll still serve at least two more years in jail to complete his full sentence.

Monsignor Edward Arsenault pleaded guilty to three theft charges in 2014. He was granted parole on the first two charges but will not be eligible for parole on the third for two more years.

Prosecutors said Arsenault, who has also been ordered to repay the money, billed the church for lavish meals and travel for himself and often a male partner. He was convicted of writing checks from the dead priest’s estate to himself and his brother and billing Catholic Medical Center $250 an hour for consulting work he never did.

Arsenault held senior positions in the New Hampshire diocese from 1999 to 2009. He had been the top lieutenant for then-Bishop John McCormack, handling both a clergy sexual abuse crisis in New Hampshire and orchestrating the church’s new child protection policies.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By the National Reporting Team’s Natasha Robinson and Alison Branley

Hundreds of cases of child sex abuse going back decades may be reopened after the Catholic Church publicly abandoned a controversial practice known as blind reporting.

Blind reporting occurs when an organisation passes on an allegation of child sex abuse, but strips the report of the name of the victim, meaning police are unable to investigate the report.

NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge has obtained documents under Freedom of Information (FOI) laws that, for the first time, reveal the extraordinary extent of blind reporting, which has potentially allowed hundreds of perpetrators to continue to abuse children.

The ABC has spoken to child sex abuse victims who are angry the allegations they reported to the Catholic Church some years ago were never fully reported to police.

The figures obtained by Mr Shoebridge reveal during the past eight years, NSW Police have received 1,476 blind reports from NSW organisations.

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TEXAS
KRGV

MCALLEN – A former priest facing charges in a 1960 murder case appeared in court today for a pretrial hearing.

John Feit is accused of killing McAllen school teacher Irene Garza. Garza disappeared after going to confession at Sacred Heart Catholic Church. Her body was found in a canal a week later.

In March, a judge set the 83-year-old’s bond at $1 million. Defense attorneys for Feit had filed for a bond reduction. However, the bond reduction wasn’t mentioned in this morning’s hearing.

Instead, defense attorney went over several other motions, which were all approved without any objections from prosecutors. They requested permission to examine all the physical evidence and get a copy of the witness list.

Feit’s attorneys asked the judge for a signed order granting them access to the church and the San Juan pastoral center. The defense lawyer said they were declined access earlier.

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NEW HAMPSHIRE
NECN

A New Hampshire priest has been granted parole on two charges dealing with the theft of $300,000 from a hospital, a dead priest’s estate and the state’s Roman Catholic bishop.

Monsignor Edward Arsenault pleaded guilty to three theft charges in 2014. He was sentenced to serve concurrent four-to-10 year sentences on two of them; two years were suspended from the minimum of each. He was paroled on those charges Tuesday.

He now starts his third sentence. He would be eligible for parole in two years.

Arsenault held several senior positions in the New Hampshire diocese from 1999 to 2009, when he became president and CEO of Saint Luke Institute in Maryland, resigning in 2013.

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CANADA
The Telegram

Barb Sweet
Published on April 19, 2016

Newfoundland Supreme Court Justice Alphonsus Faour will make a decision this afternoon on whether Father Thomas Doyle is acceptable as an expert in canon law.

Lawyers argued back and forth late Monday and this morning in a voir dire about whether Virginia, U.S., canon lawyer Doyle should be qualified to testify as an expert in the civil trial.

The trial is to determine whether or not the RC Episcopal Corp. should be held liable for physical and sexual abuse of boys by certain members of the lay order Christian Brothers at the former Mount Cashel orphanage during the era, late 1940s to early 1950s.

The church contends it did not run the orphanage.

Budden and Associates, lawyers for claimants in the case, are seeking to have Doyle testify.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Main Post

[“Church should stand behind the victims”]

Plötzlich ist alles wieder da. Wie ein Blitz aus heiterem Himmel tauchen die Bilder in ihrem Kopf aus dem Jahr 1977 auf. Sie ist wieder das Mädchen von sieben Jahren. Sie sitzt wieder auf dem Schoß des Pfarrers. Sie hört sein Lachen, riecht ihn, spürt seine Finger, die sich in ihre Unterhose, zwischen ihre Beine schieben.

Sie sieht ihren Vater auf der gegenüberliegenden Seite des Tisches. Er unterhält sich mit dem Pfarrer. Auch er lacht. Er bemerkt nichts. Das kleine Mädchen wehrt sich nicht. Es lässt alles geschehen, fühlt sich hilflos. Es weiß aber, dass das, was der Pfarrer tut, keinesfalls richtig ist.

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MINNESOTA
KSTP

Jennie Lissarrague
Updated: 04/19/2016

The Diocese of Ootacamund, India, is being named in a federal lawsuit after a priest convicted of sexual abuse was reinstated to active ministry.

Prosecutors say the Rev. Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul assaulted a Minnesota girl multiple times in 2004 and 2005, starting when she was 14. Jeyapaul was a priest at the Blessed Sacrament Church in Greenbush, near the Canadian border, at the time.

The attorney’s office says Jeyapaul fled to his native India in August 2005 and continued to serve as a priest. He was arrested in India by Interpol in 2012 and extradited to the U.S. in November 2014.

At that time, an additional fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct charge was filed against him for an Aug. 15, 2005, incident at the Diocese of Crookston.

Jeyapaul pleaded guilty to the fourth-degree charge on May 22, 2015, and was sentenced to one year in prison. The first-degree criminal sexual conduct charge was dismissed.

A church spokesman in India said the suspension of Jeyapaul was lifted in January of this year after the bishop of the Ootacamund Diocese in southern India’s Tamil Nadu state consulted with church authorities at the Vatican.

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MINNESOTA
KFGO

Tuesday, April 19, 2016 by Jim Monk

MINNEAPOLIS (KFGO-AM) – A federal lawsuit has been filed on behalf of a woman who says she was sexually abused by a Catholic priest in the Crookston Diocese.

Megan Peterson claims that Father Joseph Jeyapaul had sexual contact with her on “multiple occasions.” The complaint says Jeyapaul abused Peterson beginning in 2004 when she was a teenager.

“He had sexually abused Megan and at least one other child in Crookston”according to Peterson’s attorney, Jeff Anderson of Minneapolis. “And now the Vatican and the bishop in India are prepared to return him to ministry. So this complaint was filed to stop that return and protect those children in India, who we know are at risk.”

The lawsuit seeks damages from Jeyapaul’s home diocese in India. Anderson earlier filed a similar lawsuit against the Crookston Diocese. In 2011, that case was settled for $750,000.

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MINNESOTA
KVRR

Jason Cerjak, Weekend Meteorologist, jcerjak@kvrr.com

CROOKSTON, Minn. –
A lawsuit has been filed on behalf of a woman who says she was sexually abused by a priest in the Crookston Diocese.

Megan Peterson claims Father Joseph Jeyapaul had sexual contact with her multiple times as a teenager in 2004.

Last year, Jeyapaul was deported after he pleaded guilty to a criminal sexual conduct charge in Roseau County.

The lawsuit seeks damages from Jeyapaul’s home diocese in India.

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VIRGINIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

PRESS STATEMENT

For Immediate Release: Tuesday, April 19, 2016

Statement by Barbra Graber (540-214-8874), mennonite@snapnetwork.org) Anabaptist Mennonite Chapter of SNAP, Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

A statement released on Friday by Eastern Mennonite University (EMU) officials to its students and staff is misleading and depressing.

Their statement comes after a courageous survivor, Lauren Shifflett, wrote a moving account last week of the suffering she endured when EMU vice-president Luke Hartman stalked and abused her during the time she was an EMU student and while he worked at Skyline Middle School in Harrisonburg. He also stalked her while he was VP.

EMU keeps misleading the public by claiming things are in the past. Hartman was a university VP until a few months ago when he was arrested for solicitation of prostitution. A stalking event occurred in 2014 and drove Shifflett, out of fear, to report to congregational leaders at Lindale Mennonite congregation in Harrisonburg, VA, yet Hartman remained in his high position for another year and a half until his arrest in January 2016.

School officials claim they took “disciplinary actions” against Hartman but apparently kept them secret and even now refuse to say what they were. School officials also claim they “learned about [Hartman’s] past behavior” but again, are keeping it secret.

We urge anyone who has seen, suspected or suffered sexual crimes, misconduct or cover ups at EMU or Lindale church (where Hartman has attended) to get help from independent sources.

Institutions have many interests in managing sexual assault internally. Reporting to school or church officials gives them the chance to manipulate victims, threaten whistleblowers, discredit witnesses, destroy evidence, and use lawyers and public relations staff to fixate on “damage control” instead of pastoral outreach to any victims who may still be in hiding.

Such wrongdoing should be reported to the independent professionals in law enforcement and to other independent sources of help like family, friends, specially trained therapists, local crisis centers, and survivor support groups like SNAP. Independent experts are much better able to identify a range of options and paths towards justice and healing.

Lauren’s account posted on the website OurStoriesUntold.com on April 12 and has received nearly 20,000 hits in less than a week. She has received over 150 personal and public messages of gratitude applauding her courage and strength.

We call on EMU’s president and Mennonite Church leaders to be more honest about the Hartman case and to clearly admit that at least one young woman was severely hurt because of the predatory actions of a top school official and the secrecy of other top school and church officials.

You may contact Lauren through her SNAP advocate Barbra Graber at barbra.graber@yahoo.com.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Today

Ruth Gledhill CHRISTIAN TODAY CONTRIBUTING EDITOR 19 April 2016

A survivor of sexual abuse by a Catholic priest who has been reinstated by the Vatican is to sue the priest’s diocese.

The New York Daily News reported that Megan Peterson’s attorney Jeff Anderson is to file a federal lawsuit against the diocese in India.

Anderson will claim in the suit that the Ootacamund diocese has endangered children by reinstating Father Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul.

Peterson, who says she was a choir member and altar server aged just 14 when she was first raped by the priest in his parish office, told the Daily News in February that she believed the decision to reinstate Jeyapaul gave the paedophile priest a green light to molest children in his native India.

Jeyapaul, who fled to India in 2010 after he was charged with assaulting Peterson and another girl, was arrested in 2012 by Interpol and extradited. He pleaded guilty to sexual assault of the second girl in a plea deal.

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UNITED STATES
The Worthy Adversary

April 19, 2016 Joelle Casteix

The answer is simple: they thought no one would notice.

When Indian priest Rev. Joseph Jeyapaul pleaded guilty in 2012 to child molestation in the Diocese of Crookston, MN, Jeyapaul’s victims and their supporters (including SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) believed—at first—that they had won a huge victory.

Not only had Jeyapaul fled the US in 2010 when criminal charges were filed, but it took Interpol to bring the Catholic cleric back to the United States from India in 2012.

After pleading guilty, Jeyapaul served a year in prison and was deported back to India … where a year after his return, he has been reinstated as a priest with the approval of the Vatican.

Victim files federal lawsuit

As a result of the reinstatement, one of Jeyapaul’s victims, Megan Peterson, 26, is filing a federal lawsuit—a last-ditch effort to demand transparency about Jeyapaul and an explanation as to why the Vatican and US and Indian bishops are breaking their promises of reform and child safety.

From the NY Daily News:

A former New Yorker who says she was sexually abused by a priest reinstated by the Vatican earlier this year – even though he had pleaded guilty to criminal charges – is expected to file a federal lawsuit against the cleric’s diocese in India.

Minnesota attorney Jeff Anderson will file suit on behalf of Megan Peterson in federal court that claims the Diocese of Ootacamund endangered children by reinstating the Rev. Joseph Jeyapaul to ministry.

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PENNSYLVANIA
The Foundation to Abolish Child Sex Abuse – FACSA

It was a good day last Wednesday when the full PA House passed overwhelmingly HB 1947.

While the bill did not include all we had wanted and had worked for, it does :

Open a window with no end date for many survivors (those under 50 whenever the law is enacted)

Help expose more predators who have been hiding behind the short time limitations that have been part of PA laws for way too long

Put predators on notice that there will be NO time limits when they will feel safe from being identified and prosecuted if they sexually abuse a child.

But for HB 1947 to become law it has two more steps to go through:

to be passed by the Senate
to be signed by Gov. Wolf.

The House has sent the bill to the Senate, where, once they reconvene after the primary elections on 5/9, it will likely be sent to the Senate Judiciary Committee where its fate is uncertain.

FACSA had a meeting with the committee chair, Sen. Stewart Greenleaf, over a year ago. At that time he was not in support of any legislation that opened a civil window that would allow victims, no matter how long ago the abuse happened, to file a civil suit against the perpetrator, or those who may have covered up the crime. Without support of the chair, this bill could languish in his committee much like it lanquished for almost a decade in the House Judiciary Committee.

Once again, we are asking you and all those you can marshal into action, to do what you can to help move this bill through the state Senate.

Please contact Sen. Greenleaf and the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee and ask them to consider and vote out to the full Senate HB 1947 with no changes that would not fully eliminate the criminal statues of limitations nor would add further restrictive limits on when a victim can file a civil suit. Names, phone numbers and email addresses of the committee members are listed below. A new added feature this time is that when you click on the email link, it will open an email window that has the subject and message pre-filled in. You can edit at will. Add your name and address and phone number and anything you want to say. Keep it clear, keep it short, keep it simple.

Please contact your local Senator and ask them to actively lobby in support of HB 1947 as written to be considered by the full Senate and to support it once it reaches the Senate. Find you local state Senator HERE.

If you have the time and inclination, please send an email to each Senator requesting the same. There contact information is listed on our website HERE.
Thanks so much for whatever you can do to help achieve #SOLReform.
~~~~~~~~~~

Stewart Greenleaf Majority Chair sgreenleaf@pasen.gov (717) 787-6599
Daylin Leach Minority Chair senatorleach@pasenate.com (717) 787-5544
John Rafferty Jr. Majority – Vice Chair jrafferty@pasen.gov (717) 787-1398
Joseph Scarnati III Majority – Ex Officio jscarnati@pasen.gov (717) 787-7084
Richard Alloway II Majority alloway@pasen.gov (717)-787-4651
John Eichelberger Jr. Majority jeichelberger@pasen.gov (717) 787-5490
John Gordner Majority jgordner@pasen.gov (717) 787-8928
Guy Reschenthaler Majority greschenthaler@pasen.gov (717) 787-5839
Randy Vulakovich Majority rvulakovich@pasen.gov (717) 787-6538
Gene Yaw Majority gyaw@pasen.gov (717) 787-3280
Lisa Boscola Minority boscola@pasenate.com (717) 787-4236
Lawrence Farnese Jr. Minority farnese@pasenate.com (717) 787-5662
Art Haywood Minority senatorhaywood@pasenate.com (717) 787-1427
John Sabatina Jr. Minority sabatina@pasenate.com (717) 787-9608

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MISSOURI
Lake Expo

by Al Griffin

LACLEDE COUNTY, Mo. — A local pastor accused of statutory rape and statutory sodomy saw the first day of his second trial, on Monday.

Travis R. Smith came to court on April 18, 2016, as proceedings got underway in front of Judge Kenneth Hayden, presiding in Courtroom D on the second floor of the Laclede County courthouse. Special Prosecutors Michael Gilley and Douglas Kinde, both of Camden County, represented the State of Missouri.

The case is being heard in Laclede County on a change of venue, after an earlier attempt ended abruptly when the defense counsel requested a mistrial because a potential member of the jury made comments about the defendant within earshot of other potential jurors.

Defendant Smith, represented by Shane L. Farrow of Jefferson City, faces multiple felony charges of Statutory Rape and Statutory Sodomy arising out of incidents that allegedly occurred while Smith acted as youth pastor at a church in Pilot Grove, Mo. Attorneys Gilley and Farrow conducted the Voir Dire examination of the potential jury panel, agreeing upon twelve jurors and one alternate before noon.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Today

Florence Taylor JUNIOR STAFF WRITER 19 April 2016

Days after his presence at the Together for the Gospel conference was heavily criticised, CJ Mahaney preached about the biblical mandate for churches to defend their pastors.

T4G was heavily criticised for allowing Mahaney, one of its founders and now pastor of Louisville’s Sovereign Grace Church, to preach because of previous accusations that he and other leaders of Covenant Life Church (CLC) in Gaithersburgh, Maryland, were complicit in covering up crimes committed by its youth leader Nathaniel Morales.

On Sunday, days after the controversy, Mahaney preached from Hebrews 13:17: “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account.”

He said that church members should have “a joyful disposition to trust and protect the pastoral team.

“Any slanderous comment about the pastoral team should be challenged, and if necessary resolved,” Mahaney said. “Why? Because the pastors are just sensitive souls, because pastors are so sensitive? No. That protection is needed in order to preserve the trust, in order to protect the unity of this church. That’s why that’s needed ultimately, for the advance of the gospel from this church.”

Mahaney’s appearance at the T4G conference was challenged by variuos groups, including SNAP, an advocacy and support group for survivors of clergy sexual abuse.

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NEW YORK
United States Attorney’s Office, Southern District of New York

Neighborhood Safety Patrol Member Bragged In Recorded Conversation of 150 Gun Licenses

Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Diego Rodriguez, Assistant Director-in-Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), and William J. Bratton, Commissioner of the New York City Police Department (“NYPD”), announced today that ALEX LICHTENSTEIN, a/k/a “Shaya,” was arrested and charged in Manhattan federal court with bribery and conspiracy to commit bribery in connection with his efforts to pay bribes to obtain gun licenses through the NYPD’s License Division. LICHTENSTEIN was arrested by FBI agents and officers from the NYPD’s Internal Affairs Bureau (“IAB”) on April 17, 2016, in Pomona, New York, and will be presented before U.S. Magistrate Judge Henry B. Pitman in Manhattan this afternoon.

Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said: “As alleged, Alex Lichtenstein sought to bribe police officers with thousands of dollars to obtain gun licenses. Just a few days ago, claiming that his prior connections in the License Department were no longer able to help, Lichtenstein allegedly attempted to bribe another officer. As alleged, Lichtenstein offered the officer $6,000 per license, bragging that he had already used his NYPD connections to obtain 150 gun licenses. Corruption in any part of government cuts at the very fabric of our society. But it is particularly damaging when it undermines public safety. I thank the FBI and the New York City Police Department, particularly its Internal Affairs Bureau, for their dedication and commitment to this ongoing and important investigation.”

FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge Diego Rodriquez said, “The requirements for obtaining a legal gun license are there for very specific reasons, and the details of this case illustrate why those regulations are needed. This bribery scheme allowed a man to obtain a gun who made a threat against someone’s life. It’s further alarming that Lichtenstein bragged about beating the system and potentially put the general public in danger.”

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UNTIED KINGDOM
ITV

A Catholic priest who faced historic allegations of indecently assaulting boys has been found dead on the day he was due to answer bail.

Father Ernest Sands, who was 67, was found dead in Wales on April 11th.

Lancashire Police had earlier arrested him in connection with allegations involving five boys in the 1970s. The boys were aged between 11 and 15 at the time.

In a statement, Lancashire Police said:

A 67-year-old man was arrested last year in relation to historical offences of indecent assault.

As a consequence of the investigation, charges were being sought in relation to five male victims aged between 11 and 15 at the time.

– LANCASHIRE POLICE STATEMENT

There are no suspicious circumstances and a file has been passed to the coroner.

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INDIA
The Hindu

VARGHESE K GEORGE

Joseph Jeyapaul had served a year in jail in the U.S after he pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a16-year old girl while working in the Diocese of Crookston, Minnesota.

The decision of the Catholic Church to reinstate a priest in Udhagamandalam who was suspended after his conviction in a case of sexual abuse in the U.S is prompting one of his alleged victims to file a federal lawsuit charging the Church with “creating public nuisance.” The Ootacamund Diocese also is a defendant in the case, which was scheduled to be filed on Tuesday.

Joseph Jeyapaul had served a year in jail in the U.S after he pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a16-year old girl while working in the Diocese of Crookston, Minnesota. He returned to India late last year after serving the jail term. The Vatican has recently decided to lift his suspension from priestly duties and the Ootacamund Diocese has said he would be assigned to church duties soon.

Megan Peterson, a 26-year old woman who had accused Jeyapaul of raping her when she was 14, is moving the lawsuit against the Church and the Diocese. Her charges were dropped in the plea bargain, and Jeyapaul served the jail term in another case. Ms. Peterson also won a $750,000 settlement from Diocese of Crookston in 2011.

“This is a pretty unusual lawsuit and it may take years. But Megan is a courageous and determined person and no matter how long it will take, she will pursue it,” David Clohessy, director of SNAP or Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, told The Hindu. Ms. Peterson is a member of the network. She was scheduled to address a press conference after the case was filed.

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ROME
Crux

By John L. Allen Jr.
Editor April 18, 2016

By consensus, while emeritus Pope Benedict XVI was a great teaching pontiff, ecclesiastical governance on his watch often left something to be desired. Space does not permit a full listing of meltdowns and crises, but here are a few highlights:

* The appointment in 2007, followed by the swift fall from grace, of a new Archbishop of Warsaw who had an ambiguous relationship with the Soviet-era secret police.

* The eerily similar appointment in 2009 of an Austrian bishop who had suggested Hurricane Katrina was a punishment for the wickedness of New Orleans, and who was likewise gone within days.

* Lifting the excommunications of four traditionalist Catholic bishops in 2009, including one who denied that the Nazis used gas chambers, with little apparent regard for how that move would be perceived.

* The surreal “Boffo case” from 2010, pivoting on the former editor of the official newspaper of the Italian bishops. (If you don’t know the story, it would take too long to explain, but trust me … Hollywood screenwriters couldn’t make this stuff up.)

* The Vatileaks scandal of 2011-12, which featured revelations of financial corruption and cronyism, and which ended with the conviction and pardon of the pope’s own former butler for stealing confidential documents.

Less spectacularly, there was a chronic sense during the Benedict years that the pope’s administrative team, led by Italian Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, was occasionally out of its depth. Decisions were delayed, and when they came, the logic for how things shook out was sometimes opaque. …

Anti-Abuse Efforts

When the abuse scandals in the United States broke in 2002, reaction in the Vatican was divided between what one might loosely call the “reformers” and the “deniers.” The fault lines broke down in terms of these debates:

* Is the crisis largely a media- and lawyer-driven frenzy, or is it a real cancer?

* Should the church cooperate with civil authorities, or is that surrendering the autonomy the church has fought titanic battles over the centuries to defend?

* Should the church embrace the use of psychology in screening candidates for the priesthood, or is that smuggling in a secular mentality in place of traditional spiritual principles of formation?

* Should the church support aggressive programs of abuse prevention and detection, or does that risk “sexualizing” children along the lines of secular sex education?

* Is the crisis truly a global phenomenon, or is it the fruit of a “moral panic” largely restricted to the West?

* Should the Vatican sign off on “zero-tolerance” policies, or does that rupture the paternal relationship that’s supposed to exist between a bishop and his priests?

When the American scandals erupted under St. John Paul II, the deniers had control in the Vatican and the reformers were an embattled minority. By the end of Benedict’s papacy, the situation was the exact reverse: The deniers hadn’t gone away, but they’d been driven underground.

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AUSTRALIEN
Focus

[An Australian priest compared pedophile priests to adulterous women.]

Das Elternrundschreiben der St. Mary’s Grundschule in Melbourne erschien wie gewohnt Anfang des Monats. Die März-Ausgabe jedoch sorgte für einen gewaltigen Aufschrei: Denn der Priester äußerte sich zum Thema Pädophilie – und zog einen unerhörten Vergleich.

Der katholische Priester Bill Edebohls bat in dem Schreiben um Gnade für pädophile Kollegen. Dabei kritisierte er die “Royal Commission”, die in Australien untersucht, wie Kirchen, Schulen und Sportvereine mit Vorfällen von sexuellem Missbrauch umgehen. Die “Royal Commission” konzentriere sich im Falle von pädophilen Priestern nur darauf, dass die Opfer Gerechtigkeit erfahren, nicht aber auf den Heilungsprozess der Täter. Diesen werde zu oft Gnade für ihr Verhalten verwehrt. Medien und Anwälte würden “die Notwendigkeit für eine Gerechtigkeit, die in Gnade getränkt ist” in diesem Fall nicht verstehen, schrieb Edebohls.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Ken Briggs | Apr. 18, 2016

The Pulitzer Prizes were announced today, just weeks after the movie version of the Boston Globe’s prize-winning religion coverage won an Oscar and its highly touted experiment in full-blown Catholic reporting folded. That trial balloon, called Crux, was an enterprise edited by John L. Allen Jr., who left NCR to take it on. Four days after the Globe ended it, citing failure to attract enough ad revenue, Crux found a new home at the Knights of Columbus.

That outcome guarantees Crux’s financial survival. The Knights run a huge insurance company that generates revenue for a host of Catholic causes and is a principal funder of Vatican projects. Its embrace of a highly regarded Catholic news site adds to the agency’s stature and reach.

The question is what this does to Crux’s identity. It was begun by a national secular newspaper that had admitted kowtowing too much to the Boston archdiocese before exposing the shocking priest sex scandal in a series that won a Pulitzer. Allen, chosen to be its editor, arrived as a high-profile Vatican reporter and author with great energy and competence though often from a perspective that clearly advocated Catholicism and its central hierarchy.

So it was a somewhat uneasy alliance to begin with, the Globe hoping to run with its Pulitzer and movie successes to spur readership and an editor understandably eager to broaden Catholic coverage with the resources of a major newspaper. The partnership lasted 18 months, praised by the Globe’s higher-ups for its content, judged unviable by its revenues.

However unusual the journalistic arrangement, Crux at least could be held to its prevailing standards of objectivity and independence. Its very existence could be and was argued, but it was in place.

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UNITED STATES
Headlines from the Catholic World

Denver, Colo., Apr 19, 2016 / 03:36 am (CNA).- Clay Olsen speaks to thousands of youth about a subject most people would rather not touch: pornography.

As the founder and CEO of Fight the New Drug, an organization that educates people about pornography addiction, Olsen travels the country giving presentations to young people about how pornography is affecting their brains, their relationships and ultimately the world.

Olsen told CNA that after one particular presentation, a young man asked a question that perfectly illustrates how drastically pornography has changed.

“He asked me very sincerely whether Playboy was pornography or not,” Olsen recalled.

“His definition of pornography had shifted so dramatically…that Playboy doesn’t even make the cut.”

Importantly, this young man is the rule of his generation, not the exception, Olsen said. The effects of constant access to the Internet, made possible by the availability of personal laptops, tablets, and smartphones, has drastically changed how young people consume pornography in a way that many adults dangerously underestimate.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
Tony’s Kansas City

Check this portion of a statement just released which continues to hold former Bishop Finn accountable for a Kansas City Catholic crisis . . .

SNAP: Victims blast Catholic officials for honoring criminal

Under the headline “Hometown Team,” the latest issue of Catholic St. Louis portrays Bishop Robert Finn as one of several local priest who have climbed the clerical ladder to become prelates. But it makes no mention of Finn’s status as the only US bishop to be convicted for concealing evidence of child sex crimes from police and prosecutors.

In a nutshell, this is one key reason why the clergy sex abuse and cover up scandal keeps roiling the church: because those who endanger kids, hide predators, stonewall prosecutors, deceive parishioners are almost never defrocked, demoted, disciplined or even denounced by their Catholic colleagues or supervisors.

Ignoring wrongdoing essentially encourages more wrongdoing.

Archbishop Robert Carlson should apologize for the deceptive and hurtful portrayal of Bishop Finn as some kind of “local boy who makes good.” And he should discipline the editor of Catholic St. Louis.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Emma Younger

A Catholic priest drugged a student with a sedative-laced soft drink before raping him in his office at a boarding school in Melbourne’s outer north-west almost 30 years ago, a court has been told.

Michael Aulsebrook, 60, is on trial in the Victorian County Court for raping a Year 7 student at Salesian College in Rupertswood in Sunbury in the late 1980s.

He was working as a teacher and boarding co-ordinator at the college at the time.

Aulsebrook has pleaded not guilty.

Prosecutor Andrew Grant told the jury Aulsebrook invited the boy into his office to play computer games one night after the other boarders had gone to bed.

After about half an hour, the boy was given a glass of soft drink and he passed out, he said.

The jury was told the boy woke up to find Aulsebrook raping him on the floor of the office.

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CALIFORNIA
Courthouse News Service

By JULIE BAKER-DENNIS

SAN DIEGO (CN) — The national Jehovah’s Witnesses organization must produce any documents in its possession relating to perpetrators of child sexual abuse, a California appeals court ruled.

Jose Lopez sued Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York and the Linda Vista Spanish Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses in June of 2012 for the sexual abuse he allegedly suffered when he was seven years old at the hands of his Bible instructor Gonzales Campos.

In 1986, Lopez’s mother allowed Campos to give her son bible study lessons after an elder from her congregation recommended him because he was “good very good with children.”

According to the complaint, after Campos had given Lopez several lessons, he sexually molested him.

The abuse was reported to an elder of the church after Lopez told his mother, but nothing was done after the elders spoke to Lopez about where he was touched.

This was not the first time there had been allegations Campos had sexually abused young boys.

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UNITED STATES
The Slate Online

By Missy Langdon – Opinion Editor

Last week here at Shippensburg University, we had the “Take Back the Night” event, at which victims of sexual assault spoke out about their awful experiences. I am sure anyone who attended that event had a heart full of grief for anyone who had to go through that in his or her life, as well as a mind full of ideas on how to stop it.

There is an entire legal matter in regard to sexual assault that also needs to be addressed, and that is the statute of limitations. The statue of limitation states how long you have to file a crime. For rape it is 12 years and for assault it is two years, according to lawyer.com. After these time limits, the victim is unable to come forward and receive justice. Is this really fair?

The statute of limitations is basically putting a time limit on grief and fear. I would imagine that a huge factor in a victim’s decision to not come forward and get justice would be fear. Fear of their attacker finding them again. Fear of having to face the situation. Maybe even fear of having to speak about and relive the event, whatever it may be. I just do not think it is fair to put a time limit on someone’s grieving and healing time.

On a positive note, the U.S. House of Representatives voted on April 13 to abolish the statute of limitations in regard to child sex-abuse crimes and it got an astonishing 180-15 vote, moving the vote to the Senate next, according to Philly.com.

It would be a huge step forward in our society if we were able to get an extension, or even completely get rid of these time limitations on how long a victim has to come forward about a horrific crime. Some people would argue that after such a long amount of time it is unfair to the person being accused, but is it really? If he or she is found guilty, even if it is 30 years later, it means that they are guilty. Time does not make someone “un-guilty” of a crime; time only gives them more time to hope that they will not get caught.

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday, April 19, 2016

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 503 0003 cell, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org)

It may be the most irresponsible Vatican move we’ve ever seen: Catholic officials in Rome have lifted the suspension of a recently convicted predator priest. We are stunned and saddened by such blatant recklessness and callousness

But we’re grateful that one of the priest’s victims is filing a new lawsuit, using a new approach, to try and protect kids from this admitted child molesting cleric.

[New York Daily News]

Tomorrow, in Minnesota, an unusual lawsuit will be filed against Fr. Joseph Jeyapaul and his Catholic supervisors. Weeks ago, Fr. Jeyapaul’s bishop in India announced that the CDF had lifted Fr. Jeyapaul’s suspension and that next month, he’ll be reassigned.

[BishopAccountability.org]

This is a novel legal approach – charging Catholic officials with creating “public nuisances” by hiding and helping predator priests. In several states (especially Minnesota), it’s working. We hope more victims start to use it. Something new and more must be done to prod Catholic bishops to better safeguard the vulnerable and to stop enabling heinous child sex crimes.

Many other horrific clergy sex abuse and cover up cases involve

–local bishops, not Vatican officials, putting kids in harm’s way,

–credibly accused pedophile priests, not convicted ones, being put back on the job around kids, and

–irresponsible actions years before, not years after, repeated policies and pledges by church officials to keep child molesting kids out of ministry and away from kids.

So for these reasons, we consider the Vatican’s incredible recklessness and callousness in this case perhaps the worst we’ve ever seen.

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MINNESOTA
WDAY

[with video]

By Kevin Wallevand on Apr 18, 2016

Fargo, ND (WDAY TV) – WDAY 6 News has learned a Federal Lawsuit will be filed in Minnesota against a Catholic Bishop in India, in connection with alleged sexual abuse against a priest while he served in Northwestern Minnesota a decade ago.

News of the federal lawsuit is coming from the office of Twin Cities attorney, Jeff Anderson, who has represented several victims of clergy abuse.

Monday, in Fargo, the woman who says Father Joseph Jeyapaul abused her at her home church in Northwestern Minnesota spoke out about the decision in India to return Jeyapaul to ministry there.

This afternoon, outside the Fargo Diocese offices, women from the group, Snap,an abuse survivors group, tried to get the word out about Father Jeyapaul and his planned return to parish work in India.

Megan Peterson remembers the priest well, from her home church Northwest Minnesota, tomorrow she will be part of a Federal lawsuit against him.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Culture

April 18, 2016

The Vatican has indicated that no disciplinary action will be taken against the founder of the Society of Christian Life until an apostolic visitation of the lay movement has been concluded.

Luis Fernando Figari, who founded the movement in Peru in 1971, has been accused of multiple charges of sexual abuse of members. Figari stepped down as leader of the movement in 2011, but has continued to live in a house of the Society in Rome.

Last week Alessandro Morono Llabres, the group’s new leader, demanded Figari’s “immediate separation from our community,” saying that an internal investigation had concluded that the founder was “guilty of the abuses of which he is accused.”

However the Crux news site reports that the Vatican is awaiting a report from Bishop Fortunato Pablo Urcey, who was appointed last year to conduct an apostolic visitation of the movement. That report is believed to be imminent. Until the Vatican investigation is concluded, however, Figari will remain at the Society’s house in Rome, at the Vatican’s request.

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KENTUCKY
Daily News

LEWIS COUNTY, Kentucky – Former Greensburg minister Duncan D. Aker Jr. was sentenced in Lewis (Kentucky) Circuit Court Friday to one year in jail on five counts of first degree sexual abuse.

Aker pleaded guilty to five counts of first degree sexual abuse on March 4 as part of a plea agreement in which charges of four counts of first degree sodomy were dropped.

Under the terms of the agreement, Aker, 64, will serve a year in jail (with credit for time served) and then be on probation for five years. He will also have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life and complete a sex offender treatment program.

With time served, that will make him eligible for release about May 3.

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ZIMBABWE
ZimEye

[with video]

Terrence Mawawa, Gutu | In yet another incident of sexual abuse, a pastoral elder of the Reformed Church in Zimbabwe(RCZ) raped his 12 year old niece claiming he wanted to merely feel the experience of having sex with the minor.

The man from Jaravani village in Gutu (name withheld to protect the juvenile’s identity), raped his niece after his wife had gone to the borehole to fetch some water for domestic use last month. The 57 year old man appeared before Gutu Magistrate Edwin Marecha facing rape charges. He pleaded with the courts for clemency saying he was a first time offender and a senior RCZ member.

The man claimed before Magistrate Marecha he only wanted to have first hand experience of how it feels to have sex with a minor.

“I can confirm that I called her(name supplied) in the kitchen when my wife had gone to the borehole. I forced her to sleep on the floor and removed her pants then I had sex with her. I did not enjoy the act as I expected because my manhood did not penetrate her small private parts. I continued until I ejaculated ,” said the accused during the court trial.

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WEST VIRGINIA
WVVA

[with video]

A former youth volunteer at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Bluefield, West Virginia, entered guilty plea Monday morning. He could face between 170 years and 489 years for the 37 counts.

A trial was to begin Monday afternoon for Tim Probert of Bluefield, West Virginia. His list of criminal charges included 38 felony abuse charges, 22 counts of sexual abuse by custodian, six counts of First Degree Sexual Abuse, seven counts of Third Degree Sexual Assault, Distribution and Display of Obscene Matter to a Minor and Use or Sexually Explicit Content with the Intent to Seduce a minor.

In previous stories reported on WVVA, Pastor Jonathan Rockness has told us that Probert has not been involved with the youth group at the church for years and he has since resigned as a member of Westminster Presbyterian Church.

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MINNESOTA
WDAZ

[with video]

GRAND FORKS, ND (WDAZ-TV) – A sexual abuse survivor is speaking out, and asking regional religious leaders to take action.

Joseph Jeyapaul was recently convicted of sexually abusing a teenager in 2005 when he was serving in the Crookston Diocese. He was deported back to India and a Bishop.

The Pope recently lifted his suspension and a bishop in India may assign him to a church there.

While there is no indication Jeyapaul is coming back to the U.S. his previous victim doesn’t want him to preach at all, anywhere. She is trying to find more potential victims to help build her case.

“I personally would like to say that you’re not alone, help is available, healing is possible,” said victim Megan Peterson.

“There may be children in this community who have been hurt and we’re saying to the bishop, aren’t you at least going to ask, aren’t you going to do anything?” said SNAP outreach director Barbara Dorris. “We’re not asking this bishop to tear down churches or do something, you know, huge, all we’re asking him to do is to put a notice in the newspaper.”

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MINNESOTA
WDAY

[with video]’

By Kevin Wallevand on Apr 18, 2016

Fargo, ND (WDAY TV) – WDAY 6 News has learned a Federal Lawsuit will be filed in Minnesota against a Catholic Bishop in India, in connection with alleged sexual abuse against a priest while he served in Northwestern Minnesota a decade ago.

News of the federal lawsuit is coming from the office of Twin Cities attorney, Jeff Anderson, who has represented several victims of clergy abuse.

Monday, in Fargo, the woman who says Father Joseph Jeyapaul abused her at her home church in Northwestern Minnesota spoke out about the decision in India to return Jeyapaul to ministry there.

This afternoon, outside the Fargo Diocese offices, women from the group, Snap,an abuse survivors group, tried to get the word out about Father Jeyapaul and his planned return to parish work in India.

Megan Peterson remembers the priest well, from her home church Northwest Minnesota, tomorrow she will be part of a Federal lawsuit against him.

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AUSTRALIA
Leader

April 18, 2016

Nicholas Payne
Mordialloc Chelsea Leader

PARENTS of students at two Catholic schools are refusing to allow their children to take important sacraments with the schools’ priest.

About 60 per cent of year 2 students at St Patrick’s Parish Primary School in Mentone and St John Vianney’s Primary School in Parkdale will attend other churches as the parents’ push for administrator Father John Walshe to resign continues.

The students were due to take part in sacraments of reconciliation and eucharist.

The Parent Committee Mentone Parkdale — the group calling for Fr Walshe’s dismissal — said “more than 60 per cent” of year 2 families from the schools would go elsewhere, including “32 out of the 44 at St Patrick’s”.

“People don’t want Fr Walshe celebrating Mass with their children,” committee member Andrew Pope said.

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MICHIGAN
WXYZ

[with video]

Jonathan Carlson

DETROIT (WXYZ) – Father Kenneth Kaucheck was forced to resign from the priesthood 7 years ago over a decades old allegation of sexual misconduct.

He was accused of carrying on a relationship with a 16-year-old girl he was counseling at a Clawson parish back in 1976.

The Archdiocese of Detroit barred Kaucheck from public ministry.

While the teen was of age in 1976—and thus—the priest never charged with a crime, it still violated church protocol and raised concerns.

Paula Schnoblen is with the Macomb County based group Turning Point, which advocates for victims of domestic and sexual abuse.

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MINNESOTA
Inforum

By Dave Olson on Apr 18, 2016

FARGO – In hopes of preventing a Catholic priest from returning to the ministry after his conviction for sexually abusing a 16-year-old girl while serving in the region more than a decade ago, a support group is seeking possible victims in the Fargo area.

Megan Peterson and Barbara Dorris, members of a group called Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, also known as SNAP, distributed fliers in a south Fargo neighborhood on Monday, April 18, near the headquarters of the Fargo Diocese.

SNAP is protesting plans by the Catholic Church to remove its suspension of the Rev. Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul, news reported by numerous media outlets in February. SNAP is concerned lifting the suspension could return Jeyapaul to ministry duties in his native country of India, possibly putting him in contact with children.

When Jeyapaul was a priest in the Crookston (Minn.) Diocese in 2004 and 2005, he was administrator of Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church in Greenbush, as well as St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in Middle River and St. Edward’s Catholic Church in Karlstad. He was accused of sexually abusing two girls in his congregation during that time.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

April 19, 2016

A Catholic priest sedated and then raped a boarding student before telling the boy to get out of his office because he was disgusted by the child, a trial has heard.

Michael Aulsebrook​ was the boarding co-ordinator at Salesian College Rupertswood in Sunbury in 1988, when he is alleged to have raped an 11-year-old boy who he had invited to his office one night to play computer games.

Mr Aulsebrook, 60, has pleaded not guilty to one charge of rape.

In his opening address to a County Court jury on Tuesday, prosecutor Andrew Grant said the alleged victim remembered being given a soft drink as he played computer games, while the priest sat next to him.

The student believed he was drugged, as he woke to find himself lying on the floor with his pants around his ankles and Mr Aulsebrook raping him, Mr Grant said.

Afterwards, the jury was told, the man told the boy: “Get out of my sight, you disgust me.”

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INDIA/UNITED STATES
The Indian Express

A 26-year-old American woman will file a lawsuit against a Catholic Indian priest and his church in India for allegedly sexually abusing her during his posting in the US between 2004 and 2005.

The move comes in protest against the recent Vatican decision which announced Diocese of Ootacamund located in Mylapore is reinstating Joseph Jeyapaul to ministry.

Minnesota attorney Jeff Anderson will file suit on behalf of the victim in federal court that claims the Diocese of Ootacamund endangered children by reinstating Jeyapaul.

Jeyapaul who served as a priest in Crookston township of Minnesota in 2004 and 2005 was arrested in India in 2012 and extradited to the US on charges of sexually abusing two girls in a congregation.

He was later deported to India last year, after serving his sentence of one year and one day.
In a statement, advocacy group SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) announced that one of the sexual abuse survivors would sue the priest and the diocese.

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WEST VIRGINIA
Bluefield Daily Telegraph

By SAMANTHA PERRY Bluefield Daily Telegraph

PRINCETON — As rows of victims and their family members watched in stoic silence, a former church volunteer quietly uttered the words “guilty” when asked how he was pleading to a myriad of child sexual abuse charges before him.

Timothy Probert, 57, of Princeton, pleaded guilty Monday morning to 37 charges related to the sexual abuse of teen boys while he served as an elder and youth volunteer at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Bluefield and as a mentor for the Working to Eliminate Child Abuse and Neglect (WE CAN) program.

Probert entered the plea before retired Fayette County Judge Charles Vickers, who was assigned to the case in 2015 after Mercer County Circuit Court judges Omar Aboulhosn, Derek Swope and William “Bill” Sadler recused themselves citing conflicts of interest.

Probert pleaded guilty to seven counts of first-degree sexual abuse, three counts of third-degree sexual assault, one count of second-degree sexual assault, one count of first-degree sexual assault, 24 counts of sexual abuse by a parent, guardian or custodian, and one count of delivery of a controlled substance.

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

A Roman Catholic priest arrested on suspicion of child sexual abuse has been found dead on the day he was due to report to police.

Father Ernest Sands, 67, was found dead on 11 April, it has emerged.

Fr Sands, who lived in Oswestry, was arrested last year by Lancashire Police on suspicion of sexually abusing five boys at a Catholic seminary.

A Lancashire Police spokesman said the death was not suspicious and his alleged victims had been informed.

The offences were said to have taken place in the late 1970s and 1980s against boys aged from 11 to 15.

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UNITED STATES
Huffington Post

Matthew Fox

Radical theologian Matthew Fox is the author of more than 30 books, including Letters to Pope Francis and Meister Eckhart: Mystic-Warrior for Our Times. He lives in Oakland, CA.

Not content to create a strategy for priestly pedophile cover-ups during two papacies, the former Vatican Secretary of State also steals from a children’s hospital

Recently news of Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone’s chutzpah emerged again in Barbie Latza Nadeau’s article “Vatican Bling-Bling: Hospital Funds Diverted to Cardinal’s Villa“ when we learned that, in jaw-dropping contrast to his boss Pope Francis (who lives in a 750-square-foot apartment in a guesthouse at the Vatican), the Cardinal created a penthouse for himself by refurbishing two Vatican-owned rooftop apartments. One of the apartments belonged to a children’s hospital. He shares the elegant space with three nuns who wait on him day and night. According to the Italian newspaper Il Tempo the renovation was worth one million euros (but he got a 50% reduction). Actually, it seems the renovations were paid for twice, thus no discount occurred at all. The Vatican Tribunal opened a criminal dossier on the matter last week.

Where did the money come from to furnish so lavish a penthouse for the “prince of the church” who takes his title so literally? From a fund intended for the Bambino Gesu children’s hospital. …

Why is this story bigger than a story about another greedy establishment figure? The reason is this: Cardinal Bertone was not just another Cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church. Under Pope John Paul II he was plucked out of obscurity as a priest canon lawyer by then-Cardinal Ratzinger, head of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith (formerly the Sacred Inquisition). His assignment? To deflect investigations of pedophile clergy, including and especially the nefarious Father Maciel of Mexico who started a series of seminaries and abused over 20 seminarians. News of this abuse was beginning to leak out and Ratzinger wanted a lid put on the leaks. Maciel also had time to launch his own very well-funded order, The Legion of Christ, which was committed to obedience-based religious ideologies (including a vow never to speak badly about the founder, a unique vow indeed).

Maciel raised untold sums for the Catholic Church and, on the side, was secretly married to two wives and fathered four children, three of whom he sexually abused. Maciel was a favorite of Pope John Paul II, who took him on his airplane when he traveled and personally ordained 50-some of his priests at a gala affair in St Peter’s Square attended by many fawning aristocrats who admired both men.

Bertone’s sins are not limited to greed, alas. To follow Bertone’s career is to see the shadow side to two papacies, the details of which I have recorded in my book The Pope’s War: Why Ratzinger’s Secret Crusade Has Imperiled the Church and How It Can Be Saved.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY MICHAEL O’KEEFFE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, April 18, 2016

A former New Yorker who says she was sexually abused by a priest reinstated by the Vatican earlier this year – even though he had pleaded guilty to criminal charges – is expected to file a federal lawsuit against the cleric’s diocese in India.

Minnesota attorney Jeff Anderson will file suit on behalf of Megan Peterson in federal court that claims the Diocese of Ootacamund endangered children by reinstating the Rev. Joseph Jeyapaul to ministry.

Anderson and Peterson will speak about the lawsuit at a news conference in St. Paul Tuesday, according to a press advisory released by Anderson’s law firm.

Peterson, a member of the advocacy group SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), said she could not comment on the lawsuit until after it is filed, but she told the Daily News in February that she believed the decision to reinstate Jeyapaul gave the pedophile priest a green light to molest children in his native India.

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MICHIGAN
Battle Creek Enquirer

TOM WATKINS, GUEST COMMENTARY

Pope Francis inspires me with his message of hope and human decency. His words take me back to my childhood when I was in awe of the church and its teachings.

I learned about love, decency and justice from the nuns, priests and lay people who taught and guided me in my early years of Catholic school education.

Pope Francis gets it even as it seemed to me that the Catholic Church lost its moorings in past decades, spending more time on social moralizing, even as it neglected the teachings of Jesus about caring for the poor and the “least among us.” Pope Francis is a true champion of the poor and a force for positive change in the world.

Yet, to date, the pope has yet to do enough to wash away the child sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church.

While Pope Francis has said many things that need to be said about this scandal, he has not gone far enough to address the tentacles of evil that remain. If there are “unforgivable sins,” sexually abusing a child is one. It is wrong morally, spiritually and legally. Yet if there is such a thing as a “worse sin” or a greater crime, it is reserved for those higher up in the church hierarchy, who concealed and covered up this evil. …

“Spotlight,” the Academy Award winning movie about child sexual abuse by priests in America, shone a bright light on this scandal within the Catholic Church.

The BishopAccountablity.com website that tracks reports of sexual abuse in the Church concludes that more than 17,200 Americans have alleged they were abused by more than 6,400 clerics from 1950 to 2013. These are startling numbers and show the depth of the problem and cover-up.

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COLORADO
Clay Center Dispatch

DENVER (AP) — The state Senate has given preliminary approval to a bill to double the amount of time sexual assault victims can seek charges from 10 to 20 years.

Senators gave the measure unanimous approval. One lawmaker pointed out that there is no statute of limitations on forgery.

The bill was inspired by two Colorado women who claim Bill Cosby assaulted them decades ago. The women recently testified that the bill would empower traumatized victims by giving them more time to come forward.

Cosby has denied assault allegations made by women across the country.

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MINNESOTA
KEYC

By Kelsey Barchenger

Two local Diocese of Winona parishes are being sued following claims of sexual abuse involving church ministry.

A letter to Sacred Heart Church members in Waseca was sent out last week, informing members of alleged sexual abuse involving two minors sometime between 1958 and 1961 by Sister Benen Kent. Kent died in 2003.

A second lawsuit has been brought against the church for alleged abuse by Fr. Joseph Mountain from 1988 to 1995. Mountain is no longer serving in any parish in the Diocese.

The Loyola Catholic School has also been named in a suit, however the Diocese says the claims don’t involve anyone who currently works at the school or ministry.

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MASSACHUSETTS
Irish Times

Patsy McGarry in Boston

The media has been criticised at a conference in Boston for contributing to the decline of the Catholic Church in Ireland.

Speaking in Boston College at the weekend, Baroness Nuala O’Loan said “in a country in which the media was once sympathetic to the Catholic Church, it is now aggressively hostile”.

“Papers like The Irish Times now run columns in which things are said about and imputed to Catholics which would not be tolerated in the context of Islam or Judaism, or of homosexuals or humanists,” the former police ombudsman for Northern Ireland said.

“Journalists seem, on occasion, to have abandoned the careful, nuanced use of language in favour of wild sweeping assertions which fuel the lack of understanding of what Catholicism is about, and encourage virulent anti-Catholicism,” she said.

She was at the “Faith in the Future: Religion in Ireland in the 21st century” conference organised by Boston College’s centre for Irish programmes.

“Easy assumptions are made and generalities are the order of the day. For the most part people do not challenge some of the wilder statements, such as those about paedophile priests or widespread savagery in Catholic schools, possibly because they do not want to be seen to do so,” she said.

She acknowledged that it was the media which ultimately forced the Church and State authorities to begin to deal with child sexual abuse. “It became open season for the media though. This led to a situation of profound injustice, as the normal protections of the law, in terms of the assumption of innocence until guilt was proved were abandoned. The victim had to be believed, so the priest must be lying in his denials. Some were, but some weren’t lying. Men who had done no wrong were not, and in some cases still are not, properly treated during the period of investigation.

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CANADA
The Telegram

Barb Sweet

Published on April 18, 2016

Videotaped evidence from only one witness at the Hughes Inquiry nearly 30 years ago will be allowed as evidence in the Mount Cashel civil trial on now at Newfoundland Supreme Court.

Geoff Budden, lawyer for claimants in the trial, had sought to admit videotapes of parts of testimony from four witnesses at the inquiry — a former resident who was abused, the commission investigator, an RCMP officer and a priest. All are deceased.

Lawyer for the church Mark Frederick had objected to the tapes being played on the basis of fairness, in part because of the fact those people can’t be cross-examined.

This morning Justice Alphonsus Faour ruled in a detailed explanation that the testimony of the priest could be admitted and that the others failed to meet the criteria for admissibility.

The 1989-90 Hughes Inquiry was appointed in the wake of the scandal that emerged in the late 1980s about abuse of boys at the orphanage in the 1970s and 1980s, with the mandate to examine justice system failings.

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FRANCE
Lyon Capitale

[Preynat case: Members of the survivors group called La Parole Liberee have written to the 600 priests of Lyon.]

Par Justin Boche

Le collectif La Parole Libérée qui regroupe les victimes du père Preynat a décidé d’écrire une lettre aux 600 prêtres du diocèse de Lyon pour appeler leur aide.

Le 25 avril prochain, le cardinal de Lyon Philippe Barbarin doit rencontrer les curés placés sous son autorité. L’occasion pour La Parole Libérée de faire entendre leur voix auprès des autorités religieuses grâce à leur lettre. “Nous vous proposons et vous remercions de profiter de cette réunion du 25 avril organisée par le cardinal pour initier un renouveau, faire de notre Église une institution engagée, bienveillante, et référente morale, prête à assumer et à combattre ses erreurs avec honneur, dignité et responsabilité pour le salut de son âme. Il nous semble que vous prêtres, comme nous victimes, sommes pris au piège de l’omerta imposée par l’institution et il nous faut mener une action forte et déterminée pour rompre avec un passé impur”, ont-ils indiqué au début de leur courrier rapporte le quotidien Le Parisien.

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MINNESOTA
First Things

by Michael West
4 . 18 . 16

Saint Paul Lives Here (In Minnesota)
by Zach Caia
WIPF and STOCK, 66 pages, $7.50

After years of controversy over the mishandling of sexual predators among the priests of his archdiocese, Archbishop of Minneapolis-St. Paul John Nienstedt resigned last June. Now facing criminal prosecution, the diocese is legally bankrupt. These are among the precipitating events of Zach Czaia’s first book of poems, Saint Paul Lives Here (In Minnesota).

A writer of fiction as well as poetry, Czaia has previously written an appreciation of his fellow Minnesotan J. F. Powers’s novels and stories, which share a style and subject matter with many of these poems. Narratively driven and possessed of clear ­protagonists, they exhibit a seasoned plotter’s sense of timing, pacing, and wholeness.

An especially absorbing sequence of poems, the “Father X” poems, portray a charismatic and trusted priest who was later stripped of his ministry for soliciting a prostitute and sexually abusing a girl in a former diocese. Like Powers depicting his eminently fleshly and fallen clerics, Czaia speaks to the paradox of an embodied, sinful, human priesthood: “death poured out of his mouth along with the gospel.”

Like Dante, Czaia is both loyal son and scourger of ecclesiastical princes, speculating in one poem—“If Dante Were Alive Today”—which circle of hell his archbishop and the archdiocese’s vicar general would be placed in. And equally like Dante, Czaia is too smart not to realize the pitfalls of such a project, how it opens him up to criticism, looking foolish, or worse. As he writes in the same poem, “And I know people in glass homes shouldn’t throw stones./And yes, this poem is a stone/and I aim to hit.”

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TEXAS
KRGV

EDINBURG – A former Catholic priest charged with murdering a Rio Grande Valley woman nearly 60 years ago is set to appear in state court on Tuesday.

John Feit will go before Judge Luis Singleterry at 9 a.m. His attorney wants his bond reduced.

The 83-year-old is in custody under a $1 million bond. Feit is charged with the murder of former beauty queen Irene Garza in April 1960.

Court documents allege Feit killed the 25-year-old when she visited Sacred Heart Catholic Church in McAllen to offer confession.

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WEST VIRGINIA
Bluefield Daily Telegraph

By SAMANTHA PERRY Bluefield Daily Telegraph

PRINCETON — A former Bluefield church youth volunteer pleaded guilty Monday morning to charges he sexually abused teen boys.

Timothy Probert, 57, of Princeton, pleaded guilty to 37 charges, including first-degree sexual abuse, third-degree sexual assault, second-degree sexual assault, first-degree sexual assault, sexual abuse by a parent, guardian or custodian and one count of delivery of a controlled substance.

Probert, a former youth volunteer at Westminster Presbyterian Church and mentor for the Working to Eliminate Child Abuse and Neglect (WE CAN) program, entered the plea before retired Fayette County Judge Charles Vickers.

Vickers was appointed to the case last year after Mercer County Circuit Court judges Omar Aboulhosn, Derek Swope and William “Bill” Sadler recused themselves citing conflicts of interest.

Probert originally faced 50 charges relating to the sexual abuse of children. His trial was scheduled to begin Monday.

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MINNESOTA
Crookston Times

By Jess Bengtson

Posted Apr. 18, 2016

Crookston, Minn.
The cold rainy weather didn’t hold back SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) members Barbara Dorris and Megan Peterson from handing out fliers outside after Mass at Cathedral of Immaculate Conception in Crookston Sunday morning.

Dorris and Peterson had a goal of reaching out to anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered harm from former Crookston Diocese priest Father Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul during this employment there between 2004-2005, and any other church staff or cover-ups by church officials.

Peterson, 26, was sexually abused by Jeyapaul when she was 15-16 years old while she was a member of the St. Joseph Parish in Middle River, Blessed Sacrament in Greenbush and St. Edwards Parish in Karlstad. Five years after the incident with Peterson, Jeyapaul was suspended from ministry and two years later was arrested. In 2014, he was extradited from India and he pled guilty to the charges. In 2015, Jeyapaul was freed due to time served and expelled from the U.S.

In 2011, Peterson settled a civil abuse and cover-up case against the Crookston Diocese for $750,000, said an email from the SNAP Network detailing Jeyapaul’s charges.

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IRELAND
RTE News

A west African man who claims he was abused by an Irish missionary priest today welcomed the filing by the priest’s order of a defence in a High Court civil action arising from the allegations.

Mr Elvis Kuteh began his lawsuit in January 2013, claiming that Henry Moloney had sexually abused him while he was a boarder at a school run by the Spiritan order in Sierra Leone in the late 1970s.

He is suing the Spiritans for damages.

The defence filed late last week was not opened in court but it is understood the order denies all of Mr Kuteh’s claims.

Mr Kuteh, a 50-year-old psychiatric nurse from Sierra Leone, travelled from his home in London to Dublin to pursue his action against the order.

It is believed to be the first time a litigant alleging clerical child sexual abuse in Africa has sued in the Irish courts.

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PHILIPPINES
Crux

By Crux Staff
April 17, 2016

For most Filipinos, the interesting thing about Rodrigo Duterte, the seven-term mayor of Davao City, as a presidential candidate is that he comes off as their country’s version of Rudy Giuliani, known as “the punisher” for his get-tough policies on crime.

Duterte, famed for turning Davao City from the “crime capital” of the Philippines into one of Asia’s most secure cities, recently surged to the top of opinion polls in a tight five-way race for the country’s presidency ahead of national elections May 9.

Yet seen through Catholic eyes, there’s another compelling fact about Duterte’s life story: If he does prevail, he may well become the first survivor of clerical sexual abuse in the Church ever to become a national head of state.

Duterte never went public with the charge he’d been abused by a priest until last year, when he found himself under fire for allegedly publicly “cursing” Pope Francis for his January 2015 trip to the Philippines.

Duterte insisted his irritation wasn’t directed at the pontiff, but at the “incompetence” of government officials who, he charged, failed to manage the traffic gridlock and other headaches created by Francis’ trip, which drew a crowd estimated at six million people to the streets of downtown Manila.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
George Washington University – GW Today

April 18, 2016

To Martin Baron, exposing widespread sexual abuse by Catholic priests and the extraordinary lengths the Boston Archdiocese went to cover it up does not make him a hero.

The former editor of the Boston Globe told an audience of GW students he is “allergic” to the notion of heroics. “The word ‘hero’ gets thrown around a lot.”

“We were doing our jobs,” he said. “Truly, this is the work journalists are supposed to do, particularly against powerful institutions. The more powerful the institution, the greater the obligation to pursue wrongdoing when we discover it.”

Mr. Baron, now executive editor of The Washington Post, spoke to School of Media and Public Affairs students Thursday night, along with his former Globe colleague Walter Robinson, after a special screening of “Spotlight” in the Marvin Center Amphitheatre.

The Oscar-winning film was based on the work of the two (played in the film by Liev Schreibner and Michael Keaton, respectively) and their small team of investigative journalists who produced a groundbreaking series of stories in 2002 on the Catholic Church’s systematic concealment of child sexual abuse in Boston.

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MINNESOTA
Daily Globe

By Jonathan Streetman on Apr 17, 2016

CROOKSTON — SNAP, a support group for victims of abuse, is making its presence known outside area churches in an effort to stop the re-assignment of a former Minnesota priest.

The Rev. Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul served as a priest in the Crookston diocese in 2004 and 2005. During that time, Jeyapaul was accused of sexually abusing two girls in the congregation.

Jeyapaul, who had since returned to his home country of India, was arrested in 2012 and eventually extradited from India back to the United States to face charges. While one set of charges was dropped, Jeyapaul was convicted in Roseau County in June 2015 of sexually abusing a 16-year-old Minnesota girl and sentenced to one year and one day behind bars–equivalent to time served during the proceedings–and immediately deported back to India.

Now Jeyapaul could be re-assigned to the clergy in India with the recent lifting of his suspension by the Vatican, less than a year after his conviction.

In response, SNAP, or Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, members are handing out leaflets and actively seeking out other individuals who may have been abused by Jeyapaul during his time in Crookston. SNAP members Megan Peterson and Barbara Dorris handed out the fliers Sunday morning just outside the parking lot of the Cathedral of Immaculate Conception in Crookston.

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NORTH DAKOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Monday, April 18, 2016

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 566 9790, 314 645 5915 home, davidgclohessy@gmail.com)

The callous comment yesterday by Fargo Bishop John Folda shows that Catholic officials still puts their comfort and careers ahead of kids’ safety.

Folda says his diocese has “no connection with” Fr. Joseph Jeyapaul and would not comment on the convicted cleric, since it “involves a priest outside his diocese,” according to one newspaper.

[Daily Globe]

If no murderer in the Fargo diocese is sentenced to death, will Folda “not comment” on capital punishment? If an abortion facility opens just across the river from Grand Forks, will Folda “not comment” because “his diocese has no connection” with it. If Pope Francis starts ordaining women or insisting that all masses be said in Latin, will Folda “not comment” because the pontiff is “a priest outside his diocese.”

Folda, like nearly all religious figures, often expresses opinions and takes action on matters outside the physical jurisdiction to which he’s tied. The question is not “What are the four boundaries of my diocese?” The question is “What’s the right thing to do?”

We don’t for sure but strongly believe that Fr. Jeyapaul was in North Dakota. And we believe it’s very likely a victim, witness or whistleblower who could help put Fr. Jeyapaul behind bars again is now in North Dakota.

First, Grand Forks is just an hour away from two of Fr. Jeyapaul’s parishes.

Second, it’s the biggest city near each town where Fr. Jeyapaul was assigned.

Third, when he was at meetings at the Crookston HQ, he was a 25 min. drive from Grand Forks.

Fourth, Fr. Jeyapaul very likely went to big, special church events in North Dakota (like a building dedication or ordination) and very likely substituted for an ill or vacationing North Dakota colleague

Fifth, many abuse victims move away from the town where they were abused and many young people move from rural areas to bigger cities.

Finally, let’s assume we’re wrong and that Fr. Jeyapaul never left Minnesota for a minute. Still North Dakota Catholic church officials and members have the ability – and we believe the duty – to spread the word about him, seek out others he hurt, and help protect the even-more-powerless kids in India from him by helping police and prosecutors here pursue him

“But I didn’t bring him here, hide him, or pay him,” Folda will likely claim.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.