ABUSE TRACKER

NEW YORK
CBS 8

by Caitlin Nolan – Inside Edition

It took a made-for-TV movie, a friend recognizing there was something wrong and almost a decade of passed time to give Kathryn Robb the courage to finally talk about the man she says abused her.

It was another five years before she spoke about him again, finally sharing what a relative did to her for years after she went to bed in their Long Island home.

“It’s like a flood, and you’re drowning in the truth of it, and you have to shut it off,” Robb, 57, told InsideEdition.com. “It comes in layers.”

For Steve Jimenez, from Brooklyn, N.Y., four decades of therapy went by before he felt he could confront the Catholic Church about the sexual abuse he endured at the hands of a Xaverian brother in the 1960s.

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CANADA
CTV

New rules on how Catholic priests, staff and volunteers interact with some the most vulnerable people in the archdiocese — such as children — are being rolled out in Montreal.

Under the new rules, no adult working with the church can be alone with a child. Church members who work closely with minors, the sick or the elderly will be required to be fingerprinted and undergo police background checks.

The updated code of ethics comes after a one-year pilot project involving 10 parishes. The new rules take effect by 2020 and will include all 194 Montreal parishes within the archdiocese, which includes Laval, Repentigny, and L’Assomption.

Father Betrand Montpetit, a Montreal priest of 28 years, says the new rules are an important step forward.

“We want to have more credibility also, and the confidence, you must earn it,” Montpetit told CTV Montreal.

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NEW YORK
Times Union

By Matthew Hamilton on June 20, 2017

Though he said discussions continue, state Senate Republican Majority Leader John Flanagan said after leaving the governor’s office on Tuesday afternoon that the Senate will not take up the Child Victims Act legislation.

That bill, which would extend the time during which young victims of sexual abuse could bring a case against their abuser, has passed the Assembly and has the support of the governor. Senate Independent Democratic Conference Leader Jeff Klein, who is one of those negotiating the sticky end-of-session legislation, has a bill that is slightly different than the one pushed by the Assembly and Cuomo.

“It’s under discussion, but the Senate is not going to be taking that bill up,” he said when asked to clarify that the bill is dead for the year.

Klein said Child Victims Act has not been discussed on Tuesday.

Leaders also are continuing to discuss mayoral control of New York City schools. Klein expressed hopes for a two-year extension of mayoral control, though Flanagan said leaders are not yet close on a deal.

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CANADA
CBC News

The Catholic Church of Montreal will expand its pilot project that bars priests and church volunteers from being alone with children and requires them to provide digital fingerprints to work with vulnerable populations.

Around 10 churches have been taking part in the pilot project, which was launched last fall. All churches will now have to follow these rules by 2020.

The rules apply to those occupying roles deemed as “high risk” in the diocese’s 194 churches and ministries — working with minors, the sick and the elderly — and also include mandatory police background checks.

“In terms of whether or not we were going to (implement the plan), that wasn’t even in question. We’re going. This has to happen,” said Bishop Thomas Dowd, auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Montreal.

“The Catholic Church has to be the safest place for the vulnerable.”

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic News Agency

Vatican City, Jun 20, 2017 / 12:37 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- In an unexpected move in the Holy See’s ongoing financial reform, the Vatican announced on Tuesday the resignation of Libero Milone, General Auditor of the Holy See, effective immediately.

The brief Vatican statement simply said that Libero Milone had offered his resignation, and that the Vatican had accepted it.

The lack of reason given for the resignation has some speculating that it is another part of the ongoing, internal conflicts of Vatican financial reform.

Milone’s resignation comes as a surprise because of the emphasis the Vatican placed on the importance of his position when it was created. …

During his time as General Auditor, Milone’s personal computer was hacked, and he also clashed with the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See, the treasury of the Vatican. Milone showed his commitment to maintaining the separation of powers of his office when he declined an offer in April to become part of the Board of Directors of the Italian public broadcasting service Rai, saying that he wanted to maintain his independence in the Vatican.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Register

Libero Milone had only been in the new post two years during which time he faced a number of challenges, including resistance to more rigorous audits.

Edward Pentin

The Vatican has announced that Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of the Holy See’s auditor general, Libero Milone.

In a statement released today, the Vatican said by “mutual agreement” the Dutch-born financier’s “collaborative relationship” with the Holy See ended yesterday, but did not give any reasons.

It added that the search for his replacement would begin “as soon as possible.” Milone was the first auditor general after the position was set up by Pope Francis in 2014 and the office given statutes the following year.

His departure is surprising as just three months ago, he reportedly said he had no regrets since accepting the assignment in 2015. On the contrary, he said he was ready to go “all the way with great enthusiasm” and that he was “highly motivated by the privilege of being available to the Pope.”

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UNITED STATES
Religion and Politics

By Lilly Fowler | June 20, 2017

David Clohessy often looks as if he’s on the verge of tears when he talks about survivors of sexual abuse. When his vivid blue eyes start to well up, he’ll reach for his glasses and wipe his eyes. He comes across as emotional, but sincere and well-intentioned. We sit at a coffee shop near his home in Maplewood, a neighborhood of St. Louis. Clohessy is recovering from minor surgery and wears a cast on one foot. He says since his resignation in January from the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, he’s focused on his health. The sexual abuse crisis within the Catholic Church consumed Clohessy for nearly 30 years. Now his own organization is under fire for alleged malfeasance.

Barbara Blaine, a lawyer and former social worker who is an abuse survivor herself, founded SNAP in 1988 in Chicago. Clohessy joined the organization in 1991, and it became one of the premiere advocacy groups for victims of sex abuse. The group operated in obscurity until the Boston Globe’s Pulitzer-prize winning series on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church ran in 2002. After that, SNAP’s phones wouldn’t stop ringing.

Both SNAP and Clohessy have received widespread media coverage over the years. SNAP makes a cameo in Spotlight, the 2015 Oscar-winning film about the Globe investigation. Clohessy has garnered high-profile media coverage, including a New York Times profile and appearances on Oprah, 60 Minutes and Good Morning America. Today SNAP boasts 25,000 members, but foes and friends alike are unsure if the organization will be able to survive its latest scandal.

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MISSOURI
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

AP

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. • The former music director of a Springfield church has been indicted on child pornography charges.

The U.S. attorney’s office says the indictment was returned last week and unsealed Monday after Craig Wieneke, of Springfield, was arrested and made his initial court appearance.

The indictment alleges that Wieneke, 31, received and distributed child pornography over the Internet from November through April, when Ridgecrest Baptist Church in Springfield fired him because the FBI, police and the Greene County Sheriff’s Department were investigating.

Executive pastor Wayne Barron told the Springfield News-Leader that Wieneke didn’t work with children for his job.

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ARIZONA
The Republic

[with video]

Jerod MacDonald-Evoy, The Republic | azcentral.com June 20, 2017

Chandler resident Francis Charfauros, 49, wanted to be a priest when he was younger, but he said an encounter with Father Jack Niland when he was 14 and living on the small Pacific island of Guam changed that.

Charfauros is now one of many who have brought lawsuits against the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Agana in Guam for alleged sexual abuse that went on at the rectory there.

The lawsuit alleges that Niland molested Charfauros while he was living at the rectory in 1982 during a sleepover at the Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church rectory in the Guam village of Agat.

Charfauros is the 67th person to file a Guam clergy sex abuse lawsuit in local and federal courts after the statute of limitations was lifted late last year. Charfauros filed his suit in federal court in May.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Amnesty International

We write as victims and survivors of institutional child abuse, which we suffered in children’s homes across Northern Ireland over many decades.

Today (June 20 2017) marks six months since the publication of the report of the Historic Institutional Abuse inquiry.

We welcomed its main findings – that the State was responsible for widespread and systemic failings, which left us as vulnerable children to suffer physical, sexual and mental abuse in supposed “care” homes.

But six months in, with no devolved government ministers in position to act on the report, its recommendations for apologies, a redress scheme and support services for victims, have gathered dust on Stormont’s shelves.

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INDONESIA
Catholic Register

BY CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE
June 20, 2017

RUTENG, Indonesia – A group of priests in Indonesia’s Ruteng Diocese appealed to the Vatican to intervene and resolve a dispute with their bishop, whom they accuse of misappropriating more than $100,000 in church funds.

Representatives of the priests, accompanied by a bishops’ conference official, met Archbishop Antonio Filipazzi, the outgoing apostolic nuncio in Indonesia June 16 to call on the Vatican to help them achieve their demand that Bishop Hubertus Leteng heed their calls for an overhaul of how the diocese is run.

The move came after dozens of priests in the diocese on Catholic-majority Flores Island quit their posts in protest against their bishop.

Father Alfonsius Segar, one of the priests who met with the nuncio, told ucanews.com that Archbishop Filipazzi has promised to help resolve the dispute.

“He will immediately take this issue up with the Vatican,” Father Segar said.
The priest also said the nuncio will send someone to the diocese to appraise the situation.

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VATICAN CITY
DNA

Tue, 20 Jun 2017

Reuters

The Vatican’s first auditor-general, who was appointed two years ago in a move aimed at ensuring transparency in the finances at the headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church, has resigned, the Vatican said on Tuesday.

A brief statement gave no reason for the resignation of Libero Milone, saying merely that he had presented it on Monday to Pope Francis and that the pontiff had accepted it.

It said Milone’s relationship with the Vatican, where he had been expected to serve until 2021, had been concluded “by mutual accord”.

A search for a new auditor-general will begin soon.

Milone, a 68-year-old Italian who is a former chairman and CEO of the global auditing firm Deloitte in Italy, could not be immediately reached for comment.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

[with video]

AAP on June 20, 2017

A month after getting legal advice on whether to charge Cardinal George Pell over historical child sex allegations, Victoria’s highest-ranking police officer says a decision is “imminent”.

Chief Commissioner Graham Ashton told ABC radio Cardinal Pell’s lawyers will be told first, once a decision is made whether to charge him.

“A decision is imminent,” Mr Ashton told ABC this morning.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Kath.net

[A recent annual report from the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the USA: About 80 per cent of the victims of sexual abuse by priests are male and the vast majority of victims is older than ten years.
The latest annual report of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the United States shows a link between sexual abuse in the Church and “deep-seated homosexual tendencies” among priests.]

Neuster Jahresbericht der katholischen Bischofskonferenz der USA: Etwa 80 Prozent der Opfer sexuellen Missbrauchs durch Priester sind männlich, in der großen Mehrheit älter als zehn Jahre.
Washington D.C. (kath.net/LSN/jg)

Der neueste Jahresbericht der katholischen Bischofskonferenz der USA zeigt einen Zusammenhang zwischen sexuellem Missbrauch in der Kirche und „tief sitzenden homosexuellen Neigungen“ bei Priestern.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

By Allan Preston
June 20 2017

Victims and survivors of institutional child abuse in Northern Ireland care homes have said plans to help them are “gathering dust” on Stormont’s shelves while those affected are “still denied justice to their death beds”.

In an open letter signed by 260 victims and survivors, the group spoke of their deep frustration that six months after the Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry’s findings were published, no action was being taken.

In its report published in January, the Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry recommended that the Stormont Executive “create a publicly funded compensation scheme”. The Executive was already well on its way to collapsing at this point, and ministerial decisions on compensation are still on hold.

The letter from the victims reads: “We welcomed its main findings — that the State was responsible for widespread and systemic failings, which left us, as vulnerable children, to suffer physical, sexual and mental abuse in supposed ‘care’ homes.

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FLORIDA
Tampa Bay Times

By Corey G. Johnson and John Romano, Times Staff Writers
Friday, June 16, 2017

TAMPA — The second coming of the Rev. Henry J. Lyons was not as celebrated or lucrative as his previous life.

The one-time leader of the largest black Baptist organization in America — toppled by infidelities and imprisoned on fraud charges — has kept a relatively low profile while running a century-old church in Hillsborough County the last dozen years.

Lyons no longer has the ear of the President of the United States, and his empire does not include the same luxuries as during his heyday in St. Petersburg in the 1990s.

Yet the final, uncomfortable hours of Lyons’ reign at New Salem Missionary Baptist Church have a disturbingly, familiar echo.

Church leaders have accused the 75-year-old Lyons of misappropriating funds for his personal benefit, and voted Thursday evening to remove him as pastor, ending what had once looked like a story of personal redemption.

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MASSACHUSETTS
Telegram & Gazette

By Dianne Williamson
Telegram & Gazette Staff

Susan Manter was watching coverage of the Bill Cosby trial last week when the man once hailed as “America’s Dad” left the courthouse in Norristown, Pa.

“We love you, Bill!” someone shouted from the crowd.

The Holden woman cringed. Late last month, she settled a civil case against a different kind of father, a Shrewsbury priest convicted in 2012 of beating her and ripping off her clothes during horrific counseling sessions that dragged on for three years.

The cases involving Cosby and the Rev. Charles Michael Abdelahad are different, of course. Outside the courtroom, Cosby has been accused by more than 40 women in claims dating back more than a half century, virtually his entire career. Father Michael was accused of abusing only Manter.

But both of these men were charismatic, powerful authority figures. Both were immensely popular. Both used their position to violate vulnerable women because they knew no one would believe the victims. And their respected status made it easier to discredit women already faced with the cultural incredulity that comes with cases of sexual assault.

“I watched that and had flashbacks,” Manter said Monday. “I could hear people saying, ‘I love you, Father Michael.’ There were crowds of people supporting him. I can relate to how people try to make the woman the bad guy.”

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NEW YORK
Saratogian

By Joseph Phelan, jphelan@digitalfirstmedia.com,, @jphelan13 on Twitter
POSTED: 06/19/17

ALBANY, N.Y.>> On Wednesday, the state Legislature is scheduled to end its annual session, and survivors of childhood sexual abuse, along with public officials, urged the Senate GOP to allow a discussion and vote on the Child Victims Act Monday morning.

“This is an issue that’s crying out for justice. People who have committed criminal acts, particularly heinous criminal acts against children, need to be held accountable,” said Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan. “And we know if they are not, they continue to abuse, so simply because an individual reaches a certain age it’s not acceptable. It doesn’t give justice to the victim and it doesn’t keep the rest of us safe. It doesn’t protect the children of today, while it’s punishing the children of yesterday.”

Desirae Brown and her sisters were sexually abused by their father in different states. Brown and one of her sisters were abused in Utah and successfully prosecuted their father. He’s serving a 10 year to life prison sentence. Desirae’s sister Melody, however, was abused in New York. The statute of limitations for the crimes committed against her ran out by the time she was ready to prosecute. She was only 24.

Presently, current law allows adults, who suffered sexual abuse as children, up to the age of 23 to file a lawsuit against their sexual abuser. Earlier this month, a bill in the state assembly passed, allowing people up to the age of 50 to bring a lawsuit. The senate bill would eliminate the statute of limitations for prosecuting child sexual abuse crimes and filing civil lawsuits for damages against individuals, public institutions and private institutions related to child sexual abuse. It would also create a one-year revival period for previously time-barred civil actions, which alleged conduct representing the commission of certain sexual offenses committed against a child less than 18 years of age.

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UNITED STATES
Legal Examiner

Posted by Mike Bryant
June 19, 2017

A recent Centers for Disease Control and Protection(CDC) study, The Economic Burden of Child Maltreatment in the United States and Implications for Prevention, was both interesting and frightening. The CDC states that

… the total lifetime estimated financial costs associated with just one year of confirmed cases of child maltreatment (physical abuse, sexual abuse, psychological abuse and neglect) is approximately $124 billion.

The CDC notes the report looked at:

… confirmed child maltreatment cases – 1,740 fatal and 579,000 non-fatal—for a 12-month period. Findings show each death due to child maltreatment had a lifetime cost of about $1.3 million, almost all of it in money that the child would have earned over a lifetime if he or she had lived. The lifetime cost for each victim of child maltreatment who lived was $210,012, which is comparable to other costly health conditions such as stroke with a lifetime cost per person estimated at $159,846 or type 2 diabetes, which is estimated between $181,000 and $253,000.

A byproduct of Minnesota’s Child Victims Act has been our involvement in abuse cases that happened a very long time ago. So we witness the results of the devastation that hit peoples lives after they were abused. People in their 40 to 60’s that have suffered all sorts of challenges without any help at all. The Act has given them a chance at real justice that has been delayed too long.

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ITALIE/ARGENTINE
L’Express

[Pope Francis, who has advocated for zero tolerance of pedophilia, was he aware that priests of an institute for deaf-mute children in Argentina were already accused of sexual assaults on children when they officiated in the same institute in Italy. Obviously according to lawyers of children who say they have been victims of sexual assault and rape in the Provolo Catholic institute in Mendoza.]

Pope accused of protecting pedophile priests in Italy and Argentina

Une liste des violeurs présumés avait été établie et une lettre avait même été remise en mains propres au pape François par l’une des victimes.

Le pape François -qui prône la tolérance zéro en matière de pédophilie- était-il au courant que des prêtres d’un institut pour enfants sourd-muets en Argentine étaient déjà accusés d’agressions sexuelles sur mineurs lorsqu’ils officiaient dans le même institut en Italie? C’est évident, selon les avocats des enfants qui disent avoir été victimes d’agressions sexuelles et de viols dans l’institut catholique Provolo de Mendoza.

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SCHWEIZ
Blick

[The retired reformed pastor Wolfgang S. (68) from Biberstein AG has been in investigation since the end of March (BLICK reported). He is said to have sexually abused four of his grandchildren. Wolfgang S. has already admitted this in an official confession.]

ZÜRICH – Für eine Kinderkrippe in der Stadt Zürich ist der Superg-GAU eingetreten. Der langjährige Chef und Besitzer, Wolfgang S. (68), ist wegen sexueller Übergriffe auf Kinder in Untersuchungshaft.

Beat Michel

Der pensionierte reformierte Pfarrer Wolfgang S. (68) aus Biberstein AG sitzt seit Ende März in Untersuchungshaft (BLICK berichtete). Er soll vier seiner Enkelkinder sexuell missbraucht haben. Wolfgang S. hat das bereits in einem offiziellen Geständnis zugegeben. Übergriffe ausserhalb der Familie streitet er ab.

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SCHWEIZ
Blick

[Pastor abused his grandchildren. Once again a god-man is behind bars because of child abuse. Scary: Working with children is a common thread through his life.]

AARAU AG – Wieder wandert ein Gottesmann wegen Kindsmissbrauchs hinter Gitter. Beängstigend: Die Arbeit mit Kindern zieht sich wie ein roter Faden durch sein Leben.

Ralph Donghi und Beat Michel

Der pensionierte reformierte Pfarrer Wolfgang S. (68) aus Biberstein AG sitzt seit Ende März in Untersuchungshaft. Er soll vier seiner Enkelkinder sexuell missbraucht haben. Der Anwalt von Wolfgang S. bestätigte in der SRF-Sendung «Schweiz aktuell», dass sein Mandant ein Geständnis abgelegt hat.

Die Enkelkinder waren zwischen 6 und 14 Jahre alt. Angezeigt hat ihn die eigene Familie. Sein Sohn und seine Tochter wollten sich gegenüber BLICK allerdings nicht äussern.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio, heugenio@guampdn.com June 20, 2017

Monsignor David C. Quitugua resigned, effective June 18, as a member of Archbishop Michael Jude Byrnes’ team of advisors, known as the College of Consultors, according to the Archdiocese of Agana. Byrnes asked him to step down, the Archdiocese stated.

Quitugua had been on the advisory team less than two weeks, after being appointed June 7, and his removal comes after lobbying by the Concerned Catholics of Guam, which has expressed concerns about Quitugua allegedly abusing his authority as vicar general under Archbishop Anthony Apuron.

“The Archdiocese can confirm that Monsignor David C. Quitugua is no longer a member of the College of Consultors. He was asked to resign in light of the current climate in the Church on the island. It was effective June 18, 2017,” the archdiocese stated.

“I am very glad on behalf of all concerned Catholics on Guam, that David C. Quitugua resigned as a member of the College of Consultors,” said Concerned Catholics President David Sablan.

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SCOTLAND
Evening Times

Catriona Stewart @LadyCatHT
Columnist/reporter

SCOTLAND’S only child sexual abuse service for male survivors is struggling to keep up with demand.

Speak Out Scotland (SOS), based at Port Dundas, has just been awarded £146,595 from the Big Lottery Fund to help fund its work for the next five years.

But staff said their work is only the tip of the iceberg and the charity could be helping dozens of more men.

Julie Harkins, Project Development Worker, said: “It was really after the Jimmy Savile scandal broke that we started seeing more men come forward and now we also have the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry so the topic is being discussed and brought more into the public consciousness.

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OREGON
The Register-Guard

By Jack Moran
The Register-Guard
JUNE 20, 2017

A federal grand jury has returned an eight-count indictment against a missionary worker from Coos Bay who is accused of molesting six underage boys while in Cambodia between 2005 and 2013.

Daniel Stephen Johnson, 39, pleaded not guilty to the charges during an arraignment hearing Monday in U.S. District Court in Eugene. Johnson appeared via telephone from a federal prison in Sheridan, where he’s being held while his case is pending.

One of the charges listed in the indictment, aggravated sexual assault, carries a minimum prison sentence of 30 years upon conviction.

Johnson was arrested in the case in December 2014, after authorities in Cambodia handed him over to a team of FBI agents who brought him to Oregon.

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CANADA
APTN National News

June 20, 2017

Paul Barnsley
APTN Investigates

As the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement (IRSSA) nears completion, a potentially explosive case brought forward by a former national chief is slowly making its way to court.

Del Riley, who occupied the national chief of the Assembly of First Nations’ office from 1980 to 1982 – during the final days of negotiations that led to Aboriginal rights being enshrined in Canada’s newly-repatriated constitution – refused to participate in the IRSSA.

He saw the settlement agreement as too limited – so he hired the London law firm Harrison Pensa to sue the federal government and the Anglican Church of Canada.

Riley aims to expand the scope of the defendants’ liability as he seeks compensation for his time at the Mohawk Indian Residential School in Brantford, Ont.

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NEW YORK
WNYT

[with video]

June 19, 2017

ALBANY – Shaun Dougherty, a Long Island restaurant owner, and veteran, was molested by his parish priest when he was 10-years-old. The pain and anguish, he says, remains with him in adulthood.

“I died in 1980, mentally, in my soul,” Dougherty says, “I attempted to take my life. I swallowed over 300 pills in 1994.”

Dougherty was at the state Capitol Monday, along with other child sexual abuse survivors and advocates, urging passage of the Child Victim Act to eliminate the statute of limitations that’s currently set at 23, and allow survivors to file civil lawsuits against their abusers.

“There is no money amount we are going for, it’s not about that,” said Brinie Farrell, a former speed skater, who was abused by an Olympic teammate in Saratoga Springs when she was 15.

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NEW YORK
News 10

By Nick Perreault
Published: June 19, 2017

ALBANY, N.Y. (NEWS10) – For the second week in a row, victims along with local officials are asking senators to pass a bill that will help victims of sexual abuse press charges against their accusers.

The conference says they’ve supported legislation in previous years that protects children from sexual predators.

Both victims and local officials are still asking why the Senate has yet to take up a bill that would increase the time a victim has to file both criminal and civil lawsuits against their attacker.

“It doesn’t give justice to the victim and it doesn’t keep the rest of us safe,” Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan said.

“The Republican majority conference has been a leader in taking a lead with those who prey on young people and sexual predators. I don’t know why this hasn’t passed,” Senator Fred Akshar said.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY
KENNETH LOVETT
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Updated: Monday, June 19, 2017

ALBANY — A GOP state senator broke ranks from his colleagues Monday — saying he’d vote for a bill to help child sex abuse survivors.

“If it comes to the floor, I’ll support any of the versions that are out there,” Sen. James Tedisco (R-Schnectady) told the Daily News. He urged state leaders to strike a deal before Wednesday’ scheduled end to the legislative session.

Child sex abuse, he said, “can cause psychological, mental and physical problems for a lifetime.”

His position was first reported by News10 in Albany.

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NORTH CAROLINA
WSPA

By Brianna Smith
Published: June 19, 2017

The Rutherfordton Police Department and the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigations is investigating the death of Robert Rape.

Rape was found in his backyard on Briarwood Circle Saturday June 17th, shot in the chest. Investigators say Rape was shot with a shotgun.

The police department says the investigation is ongoing and few details will be released.

Rape is the grandfather of Matthew Fenner, whose case against five Word of Faith Fellowship church members recently ended in a mistrial due to jury tampering.

A new hearing against Word of Faith Fellowship minister Brooke Covington is set to take place in September.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Catholics4Change

JUNE 19, 2017 BY SUSAN MATTHEWS

Is there a new transparency issue? Why isn’t Father Louis Kolenkiewicz listed in the online Archdiocesan clergy directory? He is listed in the clerical appointments that went into effect today.

Father Kolenkiewicz is returning from a removal from ministry and his new gig as parochial vicar at the Basilica of SS. Peter and Paul prompted an article in the Philadelphia Inquirer. Given this, you’d think all the i’s wouldn’t have been dotted and t’s crossed. But as of 3pm today – his name does n

The clergy directory omission is important. Both priests and laity have come to rely on the directory as a source of information. For example, a bride may request a specific priest for her wedding. Her pastor may check the clergy list to see if the priest has full faculties. Some priests don’t want to enable those removed to falsely present themselves. They know these guys bring them down and I’m sure they resent the tarnish.

Child safety and victim advocates also routinely check this list to track information.

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AUSTRALIA
JWVictims

BY ALEXANDRA JAMES ON JUNE 19, 2017

During the first day of the Australian Royal Commission Inquiry into Jehovah’s Witnesses, victim “BCB” spoke very bravely of her sexual abuse at the hands of a local elder, Bill Neill. Click this PDF of the Transcript-(Day-147) of the Inquiry, or you can visit the ARC website here, to read her entire testimony; Barrister Stewart’s summary of her story begins on page 15147.

Recently, “BCB” contact me through this website and wanted to share more of her story and viewpoint. This is a very powerful statement of how such abuse can so easily happen in the religion of Jehovah’s Witnesses, one that I hope all readers will share:

*** ***
If you have never been a victim of child sexual abuse then of course you wouldn’t understand how difficult it is to talk about what is happening to you. Long before the abuse starts the perpetrator begins their grooming campaign. For example, the following circumstances were in place to enable an Elder to abuse me:

First, become an Elder in a religion where young children are taught from birth that it is God’s chosen religion, that God has a personal name of Jehovah whom everyone is encouraged to have a personal relationship with, and that the teachings of the religion are referred to by everyone as “the Truth”. Teach them that the Elders are chosen by Jehovah God’s Holy Spirit and must be deferred to in all matters of spirituality and morality.

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VATICAN CITY
Associated Press

BY FRANCES D’EMILIO
ASSOCIATED PRESS

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis will visit Chile and Peru in 2018, the Vatican announced Monday.

The Holy See said Francis will visit Chile from Jan. 15-18, then head to Peru, where he’ll stay until Jan. 21. The cities on the Argentine-born pontiff’s itinerary include Santiago, Temuco and Iquique in Chile and Lima, Puerto Maldonado and Trujillo in Peru, with details of his schedule to be announced later.

Puerto Maldonado is the capital city of Peru’s Madre de Dios region, an epicenter of illegal gold mining, a lucrative business which feeds criminal activity such as sex trafficking, including of minors. Francis in his papacy has repeatedly denounced trafficking and the exploitation of children.

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CANADA
APTN National News

Paul Barnsley
APTN Investigates

Despite being exposed to the worst horrors of the Indian residential schools, Garnet Angeconeb refuses to give in to bitterness or anger.

Born on the Lac Seul First Nation near Sioux Lookout, Ont., he was taken from his family to the nearby Pelican Indian Residential School when he was six years old.

He stayed there from 1963 to 1969.

During that time, Angeconeb and 18 other boys were sexually abused by a dorm supervisor. His abuser was eventually convicted in 1996 and sentenced to four years in prison.

While Angeconeb battled through his “lost years” afterwards, dealing with alcohol problems and living through the criminal trial of his abuser, he managed to graduate from high school and then earn a journalism degree at the University of Western Ontario.

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GUAM
The Worthy Adversary

Fifteen Years After Dallas, A Seven-Part Series: Introduction
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part One: The Altoona-Johnstown Grand Jury Report
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Two: Is There a Crook in the Diocese of Crookston?
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Three: A Priest Admits Abusing, Chicago Cardinal Does Nothing
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Four: Convicted Priest Deemed “Safe” by Oklahoma City Archbishop, Catholics Rightly Upset
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Five: Naughty Nienstedt and the Vatican Shred
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Six: A seminarian in Ohio attempts to buy babies. The Bishop? He pretends nothing happened
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Seven: Sister Cathy Turns Baltimore into a Troll

June 19, 2017

Joelle Casteix

This would have been Part Eight, except for one little loophole:

Guam/the Archdiocese of Agaña is NOT TECHNICALLY a member of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). The Archdiocese of Agaña is a member of the Episcopal Conference of the Pacific (CE-PAC).

Guam’s disgraced Archbishop Anthony Apuron (pictured above with the pope) used to attend USCCB meetings and the like, but I think he used the “buffet” approach when it came to what window-dressing reforms he would adopt and what he wouldn’t.

Now that the Archdiocese of Agaña is headed by Archbishop Michael Byrnes out of Detroit, I think that the bonds to the USCCB are going to become much stronger.

Onto my story:

The saga of Archbishop Anthony Apuron is long and horrific.

Catholics began protesting his financial mismanagement and mobster tactics, including improper financial dealings with a Catholic sect called the Neo-Catechumenal Way.

Then, multiple alleged child victims—who risked their reputations, their families’ well-being, and their livelihoods by coming forward and saying that Apuron abused them—came forward. They all said that Apuron sexually abused them.

Apuron is now subject of a Vatican tribunal that will do little more than, I believe, give him a slap on the wrist and allow him to live in hiding on the mainland (with a monthly retirement check) for the rest of his life.

Last year, Guam lawmakers passed a civil window that allows child sex abuse victims to use the civil courts to get accountability. Other victims came forward and exposed a web of child sex abuse and cover-up going back decades. This is the same law that that victims in New York are protesting and begging to have.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

19 June, 2017

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has released a new research report that identifies four dimensions of risk of child sexual abuse in institutional settings.

Professors Patrick Parkinson and Judy Cashmore from the University of Sydney were contracted by the Royal Commission to establish a means of differentiating between types of institutions in terms of level of risk of child sexual abuse according to their characteristics and the services they provide.

The research report, Assessing the different dimensions and degrees of risk of child sexual abuse in institutions, proposes situational, vulnerability, propensity and institutional risks as the four main dimensions.

* Situational risk provides potential perpetrators with the opportunity to be alone with a child or form relationships that involve physical contact or emotional closeness. This can lead to grooming and unlawful sexual behaviour. The research suggests that residential institutions of all kinds including juvenile detention, immigration detention centres, residential out-of-home care and boarding schools carry an elevated situational risk.

* Vulnerability risk arises from the characteristics of the children present in the institution. The research suggests that the main factors influencing vulnerability risk are the ages of the children, children with disability, children with prior experience of maltreatment and children with an incentive to remain silent.

* Propensity risk arises from a disproportionate clustering of adults with a propensity to abuse children or children with harmful sexual behaviours.

* Institutional risk takes into consideration characteristics of the institution that may make abuse more likely to occur and less likely to be identified and responded to effectively. The research suggests that these characteristics include institutions placing greater importance on the protection of reputation than on the wellbeing and protection of children. Other characteristics include a culture of not listening to and respecting children.

The report concludes that situational risk is a precondition for sexual abuse while vulnerability risk makes it more likely that a child will be targeted. The research suggests that an institution with a low situational risk can starve even the committed sex offender of opportunity or greatly increase the likelihood of detection.

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NEW YORK
Times Union

State lawmakers should not leave town this week without making a meaningful attempt to rein in the corruption that has plagued government in recent years. …

Child sexual abuse: For all the laws passed on punishing future sexual abuse, lawmakers have yet to let untold numbers of victims of past abuse seek justice. Recognizing that victims sometimes take years to come forward, the Assembly has passed legislation to extend the statute of limitations on civil and criminal cases of child sex abuse. Mr. Cuomo backs a similar measure. Senate Republicans, however, have bowed to pressure, especially from the Catholic church. They need to hear the pleas of victims who simply want their day in court.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Wirral Globe

Lynda Roughley

A former church organist who sexually abused a vulnerable young girl was put behind bars – 40 years after the offences.

Martyn Poole, who assisted at a church in Wallasey, denied molesting the girl, who was aged about 12, but was convicted after a trial.

A judge told 74-year-old Poole, “You befriended her, earning her trust and she came to look up to you as a father figure.

“You betrayed that trust on two occasions, sexually abusing her having invited her to your home when your wife and family were elsewhere.”

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BELIZE
The Reporter

By Marion Ali
Assistant Editor

A teacher at Eden Seventh Day Adventist high school in Santa Elena, Cayo, is under investigation by San Ignacio police and the Ministry of Education, on allegations of sexual misconduct with as many as four of his students.

One of the girls may have had an abortion or two over the last year and a half.

Reporter’s investigations have showed that the teacher, whose name we have withheld until the Ministry and the police have concluded their investigations, has been involved with one of the girls, now an 18-year-old third form student, for the past two years. The others, as we understand, are girls with whom he has had sexual encounters.

This newspaper has learned of the existence of text messages, purportedly exchanged between the student and the teacher, that pertain not only to them having a sexual relationship, but about her having undergone an abortion as well.

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NEW YORK
Times Herald-Record

By Chris McKenna
Times Herald-Record

MOUNT MARION – At age 60, Brian O’Leary is still deeply scarred from the sexual abuse a neighbor inflicted on him more than 40 years ago when he was growing up in Saugerties.

The perpetrator lived across the street and worked at IBM with O’Leary’s father.

For five years, he repeatedly assaulted the boy in his home and his car, a string of violations that began when O’Leary was only 12 and ended when he stopped his tormentor at age 17 – because he realized how badly he wanted to kill himself.

O’Leary was so traumatized that he told no adults about the abuse then and couldn’t bring himself to tell his parents until many years later.

His abuser died in Florida in 1984, unpunished for the crimes he committed and the emotional havoc O’Leary has carried for decades.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY
KENNETH LOVETT
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Updated: Sunday, June 18, 2017

Senate Deputy Majority Leader John DeFrancisco opposes opening a one-year legal window to revive old cases for child sex abuse survivors — yet he supports the concept for other victims.

The powerful Syracuse Republican opposes a bill designed to make it easier for child sex abuse survivors to seek justice, largely because of a provision that would give victims who can no longer sue under current law one year to bring cases.

At the same time, DeFrancisco is pushing legislation that would give patients the ability to bring medical malpractice cases beginning from when they discover the error, not from when the mistake occurred, which is current law. The bill has a provision to open a one-year window to revive old cases that are currently time-barred under current law.

DeFrancisco and other Senate Republicans also have routinely supported legislation every two years to extend the statute of limitations to soldiers exposed to Agent Orange between 1961 and 1975 — cases that would have otherwise been time-barred since 1985.

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AUSTRALIA/ISRAEL
JTA

June 18, 2017

MELBOURNE (JTA) – A Jewish woman who said she had been molested repeatedly by her former principal called on Israel to extradite the woman back to their native Australia.

Dassi Erlich, a 29-year-old mother of one who said that her alleged molestation by Malka Leifer had left her emotionally scarred, made the plea Sunday during a speech before approximately 200 participants of Melbourne’s Limmud conference of Jewish learning.

Leifer, who left Australia for Israel in 2008 shortly after molestation accusations against her surfaced, has skipped several extradition hearings in Israel because she had committed herself to psychiatric institutions for short periods, coinciding with her court dates. Leifer is wanted for questioning in Australia in connection with 74 charges of molestation, including rape, of several teenage girls, the ABC broadcaster reported.

In 2015, Erlich received one of the largest sexual abuse damage payouts in Australia’s history with the Victorian Supreme Court ordering the Adass Israel School pay her more than $750,000 for its failure to prevent the systemic abuse suffered by Erlich since she was 15. During her speech, Erlich said she had witnessed Leifer molest another girl, but “said nothing.”

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GUAM
The Guam Daily Post

Neil Pang | The Guam Daily Post

“The Catholics of Guam cannot trust or have confidence in the Chancery leadership with these clergymen still enjoying some position of authority within our Archdiocese and benefits from our contributions.” – David Sablan, president, Concerned Catholics of Guam

The Concerned Catholics of Guam is calling on the leaders of the Archdiocese of Agana to remove four priests and a deacon from administrative and ministerial duties within the church in order to “restore some trust in the leadership,” according to CCOG president, David Sablan.

Sablan said CCOG is calling for the removal of the following five men: David C. Quitugua, former vicar general; Adrian Cristobal, former chancellor for the Archdiocese of Agana; Alberto Rodriguez Salamanca, former vice chancellor; Edivaldo da Silva Oleveira former spokesman and an aide to Archbishop Anthony Apuron; and Deacon Frank Tenorio.

Sablan told The Guam Daily Post the five were closely involved with Apuron during his tenure as the highest authority within the Archdiocese of Agana.

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MARYLAND
The Worthy Adversary

Fifteen Years After Dallas, A Seven-Part Series: Introduction
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part One: The Altoona-Johnstown Grand Jury Report
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Two: Is There a Crook in the Diocese of Crookston?
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Three: A Priest Admits Abusing, Chicago Cardinal Does Nothing
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Four: Convicted Priest Deemed “Safe” by Oklahoma City Archbishop, Catholics Rightly Upset
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Five: Naughty Nienstedt and the Vatican Shred
Fifteen Years After Dallas, Part Six: A seminarian in Ohio attempts to buy babies. The Bishop? He pretends nothing happened

June 18, 2017

Joelle Casteix

Netflix’s recent documentary, The Keepers, has been a blockbuster for true crime and documentary fans (it was the talk of CrimeCon).

A gripping tale of abuse, cover-up, and murder, the series tells the story of how a group of former students are trying to find justice for their teacher Sister Cathy Cesnik, a murdered nun from Baltimore.

Representatives from the Archdiocese of Baltimore—who play a large role in the series for their part in covering up the child sex abuse of numerous girls at Archbishop Keough High School and throughout the archdiocese—did not appear in the film and only agreed to answer questions in writing in the final episode.

After the film’s release and blockbuster success, the archdiocese, led by Archbishop William Lori, began trolling the filmmakers on social media. They used silly emojis and “spoiler alerts” in posts about Father Maskell, the serial abuser in the film. They even tried to create trending hashtags like #thekeeperstruth.

Then, instead of doing outreach, apologizing, finding new victims, or helping those who are suffering, they trolled the filmmakers on a Reddit AMA.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio, heugenio@guampdn.com June 18, 2017

Superior Court of Guam judges continue to recuse themselves from hearing Catholic clergy sex abuse cases, even as plaintiffs’ lawyers have started exploring the possibility of an out-of-court settlement.

Sixteen clergy sex abuse lawsuits have been filed in local court between March 7 and May 10.

The Archdiocese of Agana is a defendant in each case, along with some priests, the Capuchin Franciscans, or the Boy Scouts of America and its Aloha Council Chamorro District.

Seven local court judges have filed disqualification forms in some of these lawsuits as of early June, based on information from the Judiciary of Guam Administrative Office.

Former altar boy Anthony Flores’ lawsuit, the earliest filed on March 7, still has no scheduled hearing yet as judges cite potential conflicts of interest.

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NEW YORK
New York Post

By Melissa Klein June 17, 2017

A Greek Orthodox priest who enjoyed kinky “cake crush” romps with a parochial school principal may now be in hot holy water over hundreds of thousands of dollars in missing money and murky credit-card expenses.

A forensic audit of St. Spyridon Church in Washington Heights found financial irregularities, according to a preliminary draft of the audit obtained by The Post. The May 19 report labeled “for discussion purposes only” is not final.

Rental income from four church-owned apartment houses allegedly paid for $99,249 in credit-card bills racked up by the Rev. George Passias, but the auditors said they could find no documentation for what the money was spent on.

Passias, 68, was pastor of the church until he was forced to resign in September 2015 over his affair with Ethel Bouzalas, 47, a married parish school principal.

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NEW YORK
The Daily Gazette

Mark Mahoney | June 17, 2017

New York state lawmakers have left a lot of important matters until the last minute before they end this year’s legislative session later this week.

If they do anything, they need to pass the Child Victims Act and give victims of child sex crimes more time to get the justice they deserve.

The Assembly earlier this month passed a bill (A5885/S6722,S6575) that would do just that.

Child sex abusers have long been protected in New York by a relentlessly early statute of limitations that often does not give a traumatized victim enough time as an adult to remember and report the abuse.

Under current law, there is a five-year statute of limitations for bringing criminal charges in certain sex-related felony crimes involving minors.

Right now, the clock on that five years starts when the victim turns 18. The new law would keep the same five-year statute of limitations, but would start the clock when the victim turns 23 years old. That means victims could be 28 years old and still have charges brought. The clock on the 2-year statute of limitations on certain misdemeanor sex crimes would also start at age 23, giving victims another five years —until they reach age 25 — to bring charges.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Tribune-Democrat

By Dave Sutor
dsutor@tribdem.com

Thomas Venditti wants Roman Catholics who are outraged by the cover-up of child sexual abuse in the Diocese of Altoona–Johnstown and elsewhere to unite in an effort to remove pedophiles and their protectors from the institution.

So the Bolivar resident has formed the Faithful Catholics Against Pedophilia.

“We are Catholics who are offended that this has happened within our church,” Venditti said.

“We’re interested in seeing the Catholic Church cleansed of all pedophiles and all those who cover for pedophilia.”

The newly formed group is still small and mostly united through social media, including a Facebook page.

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ITALIA
Rete L’Abuso

[What is really doing the Vatican to eradicate from within violence against children?]

Cosa sta facendo davvero il Vaticano per sradicare dal suo interno la violenza sui bambini? I risultati di un sondaggio online di Rete l’Abuso mettono sotto accusa l’inerzia di Bergoglio, delle istituzioni italiane e della Conferenza episcopale.

di Federico Tulli

Appena eletto, papa Francesco ha messo in cima alla agenda pontificia la lotta contro la pedofilia. Dedicando a questo tema almeno un annuncio a settimana, non mancando mai di farsi fotografare con atteggiamenti affettuosi – a volte ricambiati, a volte no – in mezzo a dei bambini, emanando una serie di decreti volti ad accentrare in Vaticano tutte le indagini e le decisioni sui casi più scabrosi e ad avvicinare le norme della Santa Sede alle indicazioni della Convezione Onu sui diritti dell’infanzia e dell’adolescenza siglata nel 1991 e ratificata nel 2014.

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ITALIA
Il Sussidiario

[A sad story of pedophilia comes from Florence: A former catechist was sentenced to eight years in prison for the sexual abuse of two children who at the time were being prepared for First Communion.]

15 GIUGNO 2017 FABIO BELLI

PEDOFILIA, EX CATECHISTA CONDANNATO – Una triste storia di pedofilia arriva da Firenze: un ex catechista è stato condannato ad otto anni di reclusione per aver compiuto abusi sessuali su due bambine che, all’epoca dei fatti stavano effettuando con lui il corso di preparazione alla Prima Comunione. Inizialmente le piccole non hanno avuto il coraggio di denunciare i fatti, poi col passare degli anni e con le vittime ormai divenute adolescenti anni dopo, il ricordo del catechista che toccava le bambine nelle parti intime durante il periodo della Prima Comunione si è fatta insopportabile. Una delle due piccole si è recata dalle forze dell’ordine ed è successivamente partito un procedimento nei confronti del pedofilo cinquantenne, che è stato condannato a otto anni di reclusione. La sentenza è stata emessa in tribunale in assenza sia dell’uomo, sia della vittima che ha sporto la denuncia, che avrà ora diritto ad un risarcimento.

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ITALIA
Rete L’Abuso

[Milan – Priest accused of abuse: The diocese acted with care and conscience?]

«La diocesi e la parrocchia di Rozzano – si legge in una nota dell’Ufficio comunicazioni sociali della diocesi di Milano – hanno gestito il caso con scrupolo e coscienza, provvedendo cautelativamente a sollevare don Mauro Galli dal ministero e a trasferirlo a Roma per completare i suoi studi. Il trasferimento è avvenuto diversi mesi prima che fosse presentata la denuncia querela da parte del legale del giovane, intervenuta solo nel luglio 2014. Tutto questo in attesa che la giustizia faccia luce con il processo penale».

Curiosa la nota dell’Ufficio comunicazioni sociali della diocesi di Milano che si precipita a precisare che sia la diocesi che la parrocchia di Rozzano hanno gestito il caso “don Mauro Galli” con scrupolo e coscienza.

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IRELAND
The Journal

WHEN ACTRESS AND playwright Noelle Brown was 35, she decided to search for her birth family.

Born in Cork’s Bessborough mother and baby home – or mother and baby institution, as she feels it should be called – Brown was adopted when she was eight weeks old. Her adoptive family was always very open about her past. But when she went looking for her own personal documentation in her mid-30s, she hit a brick wall.

Her experiences as an adopted person in Ireland have led to her play Postscript, which looks at the reality for a person like Brown trying to find their birth family in Ireland.

It’s a tale of secrets, lies, identity, and lingering questions.

Brown tells TheJournal.ie that she believes a stigma exists around adoption and mother and baby homes in Ireland which can affect people throughout their lives. She is also highly critical of forthcoming legislation around adoption in Ireland.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Fiction: Crimes of the Father, Thomas Keneally, Sceptre Books, hdbk, 400 pages, €26.59

Andrew Lynch
June 18 2017

Antipodean Booker-winner Thomas Keneally’s new novel tells the story of a liberal priest’s uncovering of paedophilia in the Catholic church during the mid-1990s.

In an early scene from Thomas Keneally’s poignant new novel about clerical sex abuse, a young Australian woman called Maureen Breslin goes searching for her Irish roots on the Donegal coast. She is particularly impressed by an outdoor Mass stone, where fugitive Catholic priests used to hold ceremonies for their followers in defiance of Britain’s Penal Laws.

Thinking about the “barefooted, shawled and huddled poor” quietly praying in stiff Atlantic gales, Maureen feels an overpowering responsibility to honour their memory.

“This stone is my inheritance, I thought. An inheritance of the oppressed, too. How could I let the people who stood here, hungry and ill-clothed, go from my life?”

Shortly afterwards, Maureen’s faith is put to its most severe test yet. She wants to enjoy normal sexual relations with her husband, but the year is 1968 and Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae has dashed any hopes that the church might ease its ban on contraception.

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NEW YORK
Post-Star

Ken Tingley

The stories are horrific.

I know, I’ve heard quite a few of them. Each time I write about the sexual abuse of children, I get another email or phone call from someone wanting to tell their story.

The victims are decades removed from the abuse — many at the hands of the clergy — and are still searching for what has so far been elusive: justice.

In New York, victims of child sexual abuse cannot bring charges after the age of 23. Considering what we know today about victims repressing these crimes, blaming themselves and fearing no one will believe them, the law is a travesty.

What is an equal travesty is that the Legislature in Albany has been unable to deliver that justice for more than a decade, and with time running out in the legislative session, the chances don’t look much better.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Darlington and Stockton Times

Andrew Douglas @EchoADouglas
Deputy News Editor

THE Methodist Church last night apologised to the victims of pervert minister and mentor John Price jailed this week for abusing four boys.

One of the victims reported the then-Reverend for his sexual advances towards him, but was told he was “being silly” and his claims were ignored by bosses.

He said in an impact statement that he bravely read to Teesside Crown Court: “I was sent away with a flea in my ear, and made to feel even more worthless.”

The court heard how the victim – now a middle-aged man, with severe psychological damage – reported the abuse three times before it was taken seriously.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic Standard

By Richard Szczepanowski, Catholic Standard
Friday, June 16, 2017

The Archdiocese of Washington – offering its support to a proposal that would eliminate in the District of Columbia the statute of limitations for prosecuting criminal cases of sexual abuse – has urged a D.C. City Council committee not adopt a companion proposal that would eliminate the statute of limitations in pursuing civil cases of sexual abuse.

“Retroactively eliminating the statute of limitations on civil lawsuits against private institutions does nothing to make a single child in the District of Columbia safer,” Kim Viti Fiorentino, chancellor and general counsel for the Archdiocese of Washington, told the Council’s Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety June 15. “Legislation that mandates comprehensive, ongoing, preventive and transparent child protection procedures and policies would serve our community well.”

Fiorentino was one of more than a dozen people to speak at a public hearing on the two proposals.

Bill 22-0021, the “Sexual Abuse Statute of Limitations Elimination Amendment Act of 2017,” would eliminate the criminal statute of limitations for first, second, third, and fourth degree sexual abuse and for first and second degree sexual abuse of a child. Bill 22-0028, the “Childhood Protection Against Sexual Abuse Amendment Act of 2017,” would eliminate the civil statute of limitations for recovery of damages related to child sex abuse claims and would provide a two-year period for people with previously barred child sex abuse claims due to statute of limitations to bring those claims to court.

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SCOTLAND
Sunday Herald

Peter Swindon @PeterSwindon
Group Investigations Writer

A SCOTTISH priest has been struck off by the Catholic Church after he admitted having a 16-year affair with a “vulnerable” woman who went to him for counselling when he was a parish priest in Australia.

A senior bishop has also issued a “full and sincere apology” to the victim after the priest admitted he “allowed the situation to develop inappropriately” when the woman was feeling “grief, fear and loss of sense of her worth”.

The priest, Alistair Maclellan, now 79, first propositioned Sue Mason in 1999 when she sought “spiritual guidance” after her father was diagnosed with terminal cancer.

They had a long-term sexual relationship which ended when Mason, 63, caught him having late night chats with another woman on Skype. Maclellan has since returned to Scotland.

Despite Mason’s heartbreak she has insisted she still loves her abuser and blames the Catholic Church for enforcing a vow of celibacy which prevents priests from marrying.

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

Sex abuse victims have been “utterly marginalised” by an inquiry set up to help them, one of the victims claimed.

The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) is examining the extent to which religious groups and local authorities failed children.

Earlier this week a latest victims group – Survivors of Organised and Institutional Abuse (SOIA) – withdrew from the process.

The IICSA said it had “taken on board” a number of issues raised by SOIA.

SOIA said the group had taken the decision to withdraw “with regret” but said the inquiry was “not fit for purpose”.

Set up in 2014, the inquiry has been beset by controversy, with three chairwomen stepping down, lawyers quitting and victims losing faith in the process.

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GUAM
The Guam Daily Post

Neil Pang | The Guam Daily Post

“There is no reason to believe that survivors will stop coming forward and filing civil lawsuits. … If history is a prologue to the future, the litigation will end in a combination of three ways after the Archdiocese of Agana publicly produces the personnel files: private settlements, public trials with jury verdicts and or filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.” – Patrick J. Wall, attorney and former priest

The last few weeks have seen a momentous development in Guam’s clergy sex abuse crisis when the attorney representing more than 80 percent of the alleged victims told a federal court judge he intended to put the cases on hold as he and his clients entered into settlement talks with Hope and Healing Guam.

This brief reprieve was shaken somewhat last week when, during a status conference before U.S. District Court Magistrate Judge Joaquin Manibusan, attorney David Lujan told the court he was unable to file his motion for a stay until the Archdiocese of Agana provides him with copies of its insurance policy and audited financial statements stretching back to 2010.

These signals of potential settlement talks come at a time when, since the start of this month, damages being sought by accusers of clergy abuse, as filed in federal and local courts, now exceed half a billion dollars.

As of the latest case filings on June 2, total minimum damages from the 76 pending cases come out to $530 million, and the total does not yet take into account 13 cases pursuing damages in amounts to be proven at trial. With the Archdiocesan Finance Council reporting net book assets at about $132 million, which includes churches and schools under the archdiocese, Guam’s Catholic Church now finds itself facing claims that easily surpass its current assets by more than four times.

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OHIO
The Worthy Adversary

June 17, 2017

Joelle Casteix

Joel Wright (being led away in handcuffs above) was a legally blind seminarian at Columbus, Ohio’s Pontifical College Josephinum in 2016 when he was arrested for attempting to buy a one- and four-year-old child off of Craigslist to rape and molest.

A native of Steubenville, Wright had wanted to be a priest for many years. In fact, Wright’s mother claimed the he had been rejected by 45 other seminaries due to his blindness and other physical handicaps.

Despite what the church calls “rigorous psychological testing” for every candidate going into the seminary, media accounts say that Wright was placing ads on Craigslist as early as 2014, offering parents $150 to watch their children, a “red flag” behavior that was reported to church officials. Although Steubenville police were informed, Wright was allowed to remain in the seminary in Columbus.

Columbus Bishop Frederick Campbell remained silent throughout the entire scandal. No statement. No apology. No promise that he would reach out to the Josephinum to make sure this never happens again.
Although the Josephinum operates only with Campbell’s permission and seminarians must meet his standards, Campbell did not offer any condolences to possible victims, or promise that anything would change to make sure that men like Wright would not be allowed to become priests in Columbus.

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MARYLAND
ABC 2 News

[with video]

Christian Schaffer
May 30, 2017

In addition to the allegations against Father Joseph Maskell, several of the women interviewed in “The Keepers” also say they were abused by a local gynecologist, Dr. Christian Richter.

At one point in episode four of the documentary, Teresa Lancaster — who in 1994 sued Dr. Richter, Father Maskell and the Archdiocese under the name “Jane Roe” — is seen viewing a VHS tape of a news clip from an interview with Dr. Richter.

The story Lancaster was viewing was from WMAR’s news broadcast on August 25, 1994; it focuses on the filing of the lawsuit by Lancaster and Jean Hargadon Wehner, who at the time identified herself only as Jane Doe.

She says Father Maskell took her to the doctor’s office “on several occasions,” and Maskell raped her in the examination room while Dr. Richter was in the room.

In the interview, the doctor admits that he knew Father Maskell. Maskell died in 2001; Richter died in 2006.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

John Boyne

Perhaps the best way for a novelist to portray evil is through detachment, allowing the story and characters to engage the reader at such an elemental level that a deep emotional response is unavoidable. The evil of child abuse within the Catholic Church is, of course, not a phenomenon limited to Ireland. The Oscar-winning film Spotlight depicted atrocities in Boston parishes while Canadian novelist Linden MacIntyre’s The Bishop’s Man took on similar events in Nova Scotia. And now the great Australian writer Thomas Keneally – he of Schindler’s Ark – examines abuse within the Sydney diocese in this compelling novel and inevitably finds the clergy to be more interested in protecting the institution than caring for the child.

Keneally makes the decision to set his novel in 1996, before the truth of the scandals was as widely accepted as today. It’s a wise move for it allows us to witness both the scepticism of parishioners and the cynicism of the church as it employed lawyers to discredit victims to minimize both the financial and reputational damage.

The novel opens with a middle-aged priest, Fr Frank Docherty, returning to his home city of Sydney from Toronto to deliver a lecture on priestly paedophilia to an audience of his peers. By chance, the taxi driver who brings him to his Order’s house is a victim of childhood abuse and, as she drops him off and sees the “nineteenth century mansion… with the Celtic cross at the apex of the façade” her previously calm demeanour vanishes and she orders him from her car in a barrage of profanity, but not before he, upset by her distress, leaves his card in the back seat.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY
KENNETH LOVETT
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Updated: Friday, June 16, 2017

ALBANY — Gov. Cuomo on Friday said he does not see the Child Victims Act and other big-ticket items passing before the state legislative session ends next week.

Just two days after giving victims hope by introducing his own bill designed to help survivors of child sex abuse seek justice as adults, Cuomo threw a cold dose of reality on them.

The governor said while he supports the Child Victims Act and would be open to working on compromise legislation, he doesn’t see it happening.

“I’m not optimistic about passage of a Child Victims Act, but hope springs eternal,” he said.

The Legislature is scheduled to end its annual session on Wednesday.

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IRELAND
Leinster Leader

Conor McHugh
16 Jun 2017

A new President has been appointed to St Patrick’s College, Maynooth, the national seminary.

Monsignor Hugh Connelly has departed from his position after he completed the usual 10 year term in the role.

He will take up the position of chaplain in the Irish College in Paris. A fluent French speaker, he is reportedly very fond of languages.

Monsignor Connolly was widely popular among students and teaching colleagues on both sides of the campus of Maynooth University.

And he managed to weather some controversy there amid allegations seminarians using a gay dating app.

Meanwhile the Reverend Professor Michael Mullaney has been appointed to replace Monsignor Connolly as President of Saint Patrick’s College, for the next three years, with effect from September 1 next.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Patsy McGarry

Fr Michael Mullaney has been appointed president of the national seminary, St Patrick’s College in Maynooth, for the next three years as the Catholic bishops announce plans to separate out the seminary from the Pontifical University there. The Pontifical University is a separate entity from NUI Maynooth.

In time, a rector will be appointed to oversee the seminary with a separate office of president appointed to run the associated university.

Last August the college had been at the centre of controversy when it emerged the Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, said he was no longer going to send seminarians there because of its “poisonous” atmosphere. He said students were accessing gay dating apps and anonymous letters were being circulated accusing seminarians of misconduct.

In June 2016, Fr David Marsden, vocational growth counsellor at St Patrick’s, resigned unexpectedly due chiefly to concerns about theological formation there.

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SCOTLAND
Scottish Catholic Observer

The Independent Review Group (IRG) established as a result of the McLellan Commission Report into safeguarding within the Catholic Church in Scotland recently held a successful inaugural meeting.

May 27 saw the group meet for the first time, and saw working groups founded, which will develop and assess the future activities of the group.

An autonomous body that works separately from the Church, the IRG will look at the standards of safeguarding and do independent audits at the reccomendation of the McLellan Commission.

“This group has been set up six months ahead of schedule and the experience members bring to this vital role is considerable indeed,” said Helen Liddell (pictured above with Archbishop Tartaglia), who was appointed chair of the IRG by the Bishops’ Conference of Scotland in December last year. “I am very grateful to them for their willingness to serve.

“The IRG is committed to ensuring the safeguarding procedures in the Catholic Church in Scotland meet the highest standards and it will conduct its business with transparency, vigour and compassion,” added the former MP and Secretary of State for Scotland.

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FRANCE
Le Figaro

[Paris: Teacher suspected of sexual abuse of several children.]

Par Alicia.Paulet Mis à jour le 16/06/2017

Une enquête judiciaire a été ouverte mercredi en raison de soupçons d’agressions sexuelles à l’école primaire catholique Sainte-Jeanne-Elisabeth (VIIe arrondissement). Pas moins d’une demi-douzaine de fillettes auraient été victimes d’attouchements.

Une semaine seulement après la fermeture de l’école L’Angélus située à Presly (Cher), une autre école se retrouve au coeur d’un nouveau scandale. Un instituteur du groupe scolaire catholique sous contrat Sainte-Jeanne Elisabeth, situé dans VIIe arrondissement de Paris, aurait abusé sexuellement plusieurs de ses élèves. Une information judiciaire pour «agression sexuelle sur mineur de moins de 15 ans par personne ayant abusé de ses fonctions», confiée à un juge d’instruction, a été ouverte ce mercredi par le parquet de Paris.

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FRANCE
RTL

[Several schoolgirls from a private Catholic school in Paris denounced the behavior of a former teacher. An investigation was opened by the Paris public prosecutor’s office for suspicions of sexual assault.]

Ce sont en tout sept jeunes filles de 6e qui se sont résolues à dénoncer, ensemble, les agissements de leur ancien enseignant. Elles auraient décrit “des câlins, des embrassades sur la joue, de façon régulière, notamment pendant des classes vertes” de l’année précédente, alors qu’elles étaient toujours en classe de CM2.

L’école concernée est Sainte Jeanne-Elisabeth, un établissement privé catholique sous contrat avec l’État situé dans le VIIe arrondissement de Paris. Le chef de l’établissement, qui avait recueilli le témoignage des collégiennes, a fait “un signalement aux autorités” le 31 mars dernier. Une enquête préliminaire a été ouverte pour “agressions sexuelles sur mineurs de 15 ans par personne ayant abusé de ses fonctions”, a indiqué à l’AFP une source judiciaire, confirmant une information du Parisien.

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SCHWEIZ
SRF

[In the 1990s, a teacher at the Gymnasium in Immensee had a love affair with a student and also sexually abused her.The case became known when the victim made the accusation a month ago in an article of the “Tages-Anzeiger” and made it public.The teacher did not deny the relationship. Any sexual actions are punishable by law.]

Das Gymnasium Immensee ist mit einem Missbrauchsfall konfrontiert. Eine Anlaufstelle hilft bei der Aufarbeitung.

In den 1990er-Jahren soll am Gymnasium Immensee ein Lehrer eine Liebschaft mit einer Schülerin unterhalten und sie auch sexuell missbraucht haben.

Der Fall wurde bekannt, als das Opfer vor einem Monat in einem Artikel des «Tages-Anzeigers» Vorwürfe erhoben hatte und diese öffentlich machte.

Der Lehrer stritt die Beziehung nicht ab. Allfällige sexuelle Handlungen sind strafrechtlich verjährt.
Die Schule hat die Stiftung Linda in Aarau als Anlaufstelle beauftragt. Bei ihr können sich allfällige weitere Opfer oder Täter melden.

Die Stiftung Linda ist auf Fälle von sexuellem Missbrauch spezialisiert. Sie setzt sich zum Ziel, Opfern aber auch Tätern zu helfen.

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SCHWEIZ
Aargauer Zeitung

[A reformed pastor has been arrested in the Canton of Aargau for suspected sexual abuse of children. The 68-year-old accused has been in detention since the end of March. He made a partial confession.]

Ein reformierter Pfarrer ist im Kanton Aargau wegen des Verdachts auf sexuellen Missbrauch von Kindern verhaftet worden. Der 68-jährige Beschuldigte sitzt seit Ende März in Untersuchungshaft. Er legte ein Teilgeständnis ab.

Der Verhaftete war in diversen reformierten Kirchgemeinden in den Kantonen Aargau, Solothurn und Schwyz tätig. Das sagte Elisabeth Strebel, Mediensprecherin der Aargauer Staatsanwaltschaft, am Freitag auf Anfrage. Sie bestätigte einen entsprechenden Bericht der Sendung “Schweiz aktuell” von SRF.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

AAP

A Catholic boys boarding school in NSW’s central west has formally apologised for historic sexual abuse at the school.

St Stanislaus College in Bathurst held an apology service on Friday night for students abused between the 1970s and 1990s.

“We wish to speak directly to the victims first – this is their apology,” the school’s head Dr Anne Wenham said in a statement on the school’s website ahead of the service.

“We cannot come close to ever living the pain and suffering that the victims of sexual abuse at Stannies and their families have experienced and continue to experience.”

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WEST VIRGINIA
The Journal

JUN 17, 2017

DANYEL VANREENEN
Staff Writer
dvanreenen@journal-news.net

MARTINSBURG — The West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals overturned a 2015 Berkeley County Circuit Court on Wednesday, making it possible for the case against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to proceed to trial, according to counsel for the plaintiffs.

The case against the church was initially investigated after a church leader and member was found guilty and sentenced in July 2013 to 35 to 75 years in prison for sexually abusing two minors — 4 and 3 years of age at the time of the abuse.

Christopher Michael Jensen, 25, of Hedgesville, was initially accused of sexually abusing young children in 2004 when he was 13-years-old. Living in Provo, Utah at the time, Jensen was arrested at his middle school and charged with two felony counts of sexual abuse for pinning two 12 and 13 year old females against a wall and fondling them inappropriately and without consent.

Court documents said Jensen’s Sexual Behavior Risk Assessment indicated that he was highly likely to reoffend, but his charges were reduced to two misdemeanor counts of lewdness involving a child. Jensen’s grandfather, a Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints leader in Utah, was present for Jensen’s court proceedings, and the church allegedly knew of Jensen’s criminal history.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Manchester Evening News

BY ANDREW BARDSLEY
16 JUN 2017

A judge branded a former trainee church minister who injected teenagers in the genitals for his own ‘twisted’ gratification a ‘sexual monster’.

John Beaumont, 58, was today sentenced to 13-and-a-half years in prison for the sexual abuse, which happened after he convinced his three victims that they may have suffered radiation poisoning following the Chernobyl disaster.

In a victim impact statement, one of the victims said Beaumont can ‘rot in hell’.

After being arrested, Beaumont continued to deny the abuse and branded the victims ‘liars’, saying they lived in ‘fantasy land’.

Beaumont, a former minister in Scotland, told his victims that he was medically trained and had been instructed by the military to carry out medical examinations on them to test for radiation poisoning.

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IOWA
Press-Citizen

Stephen Gruber-Miller, sgrubermil@press-citizen.com June 16, 2017

A former church youth leader is pleading not guilty to multiple accusations of child sexual abuse and related charges.

Benjamin C. Tweedt, 32, of North Liberty on Thursday entered a written plea of not guilty to all charges against him, online court records show.

Police say Tweedt, a former youth leader and mentor at Parkview Church in Iowa City, fondled or had inappropriate sexual interactions with at least four children between the ages of 11 and 13 from 2006 to 2013. He was arrested in April, but was released after posting bond.

The church, which reported the allegations to police in February, says Tweedt was a volunteer but was never an employee.

Police said most of the abuse occurred during one-on-one visits with children in Tweedt’s capacity as a volunteer with the church. North Liberty Police Chief Diane Venenga said the abuse happened in homes and church retreat locations in North Liberty and Coralville.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Nottingham Post

By rod malcolm | Posted: June 16, 2017

A 57-year-old retired teacher has been jailed for life arranging the sexual abuse of children in Philippines over internet.

Paul O’Neill, of Wroxham Drive, Wollaton Vale, pleaded guilty to 30 charges of procuring children as young as four for sex acts, including rape, and will serve 12 years before he can apply for parole.

He was a teacher at The Becket School in West Bridgford. He retired last August after 25 years working at the school. The offences do not relate to The Becket School.

He appeared at Nottingham Crown Court today (Friday, June 16) and followed the proceedings using a hearing aid.

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IOWA
KCRG

NORTH LIBERTY, Iowa (KCRG-TV9) – The North Liberty Police Department were made aware of an incident regarding a youth church leader and mentor at Parkview Church in Iowa City having inappropriate contact with victims.

Upon investigation Benjamin Craig Tweedt, 32, of North Liberty, has been charged with one count of Sexual Abuse Third Degree, two counts of Lascivious Acts with a Child, three counts of Indecent Contact with a Child and two counts of Lascivious Conduct with a Minor.

It is alleged that Tweedt had multiple one-on-one sessions as a mentor/youth church leader with four victims over the past 10 years. The investigation revealed that inappropriate sexual contact was made with the victims during the meetings.

As soon as Parkview Church was made aware of the incident, they immediately removed Tweedt from any further participation with the student ministry.

If anyone has additional information about Tweedt and crimes against children, please contact the North Liberty Police Department Investigations at (319)626-5724.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Telegraph

16 JUNE 2017

A Sunday school teacher was jailed for life today for a string of sickening child sex offences against girls as young as four in the Philippines – despite being 7,000 miles away.

Married father-of-two Paul O’Neill, 57, who taught maths at a Catholic secondary school, arranged for youngsters to be raped and abused by adults, watching live on a webcam and directing the offences from his home in Wollaton Vale in Nottingham.

At Nottingham Crown Court O’Neill admitted 30 charges, involving 12 girls aged from four to 15, including three child rapes, arranging or facilitating the commission of child sex offences, causing a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity, conspiring to rape a child, and arranging child prostitution.

In a case thought to be the first of its kind in the UK, O’Neill, who was a minister with special responsibilities for children with the New Apostolic Church, was charged despite not being present or physically taking part in the abuse.

Prosecutors described O’Neill as a “virtual sex tourist” with a “very dark secret”, and said he “relished” the financial imbalance between himself and his poverty-stricken victims.

The offences took place between 2008 and 2016, and involved girls between four and 15.

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

A former teacher who paid men to abuse children as young as four in the Philippines while he watched online has been jailed for life.

Paul O’Neill, 57, from Nottinghamshire, ordered the abuse in advance, giving specific instructions on what he wanted to see, Nottingham Crown Court heard.

He admitted three counts of rape and a further 27 sexual offences. He was told he would serve a minimum of 12 years.

The CPS said the virtual rape case was thought to be the first of its kind.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

By JOE SHEPPARD FOR MAILONLINE

A retired maths teacher who used webcams to direct and record the ‘horrifying and chilling’ rape and sexual abuse of girls as young as four in the Philippines has been jailed for life.

Sunday school teacher Paul O’Neill, 57, from Nottinghamshire was told he must serve a minimum of 12 years but may never be released for the unprecedented crimes committed against at least 12 victims over the internet.

The paedophile – who has now quit his post as ‘minister with special responsibilities for children’ with the New Apostolic Church – pleaded guilty to 30 child sex offences in what is believed to be the first prosecution of its kind.

Nottingham Crown Court heard that the father-of-two preyed on poverty-stricken families from his home, becoming a ‘virtual’ child rapist during years of sickening abuse.

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NEW YORK
Democrat and Chronicle

Gary Craig and Will Cleveland, Democrat and Chronicle June 16, 2017

A regional appellate court has admonished the Monroe County District Attorney’s Office, saying that the appeals court has had to recently reverse several verdicts “based upon prosecutorial misconduct.”

The court did not, however, reverse the conviction in the case at issue: The sexual abuse conviction of former pastor Joe Flowers Jr., who authorities maintained repeatedly sexually abused a boy younger than 13 years old.

In its ruling, the appellate court said the recent cases of concern were mostly cases that “involved charges of sexual abuse against a child” and the same prosecutor.

The prosecutor is not named, but former Assistant District Attorney Kristina “Kitty” Karle, who is now in private practice, confirmed it is her. She is now running for District Attorney in Ontario County.

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MARYLAND
Commonweal

By Peter Jeffery
June 16, 2017

In November 1969, Sister Catherine Cesnik, a popular, twenty-six-year-old teacher at an all-girls Catholic high school in Baltimore, disappeared. Two months later her frozen body was found in a nearby landfill, her skull fractured and her clothes partly removed. No one was ever charged in her murder, which is now the subject of The Keepers, Netflix’s latest foray into true-crime original programming. The Keepers follows a pair of Cesnik’s former students who have devoted their retirement years to pursuing the case. The two women have amassed vast quantities of evidence, apparently more than the police know, but the drama of the documentary lies in the tantalizing possibility that Cesnik was killed just as she was about to expose the most outrageous and bizarre case of clergy sexual abuse I have ever heard of.

If the allegations are true, a gun-toting priest-psychologist, working as a guidance counselor at the school, not only took advantage of the many troubled students who came to see him, but—abetted by a local gynecologist—also pimped them out to a large circle of men, including local politicians, uniformed police officers, other priests, and teaching brothers. The teenage victims, who barely understood what was happening, were bullied into silence: terrified by threats that they might end up like Cesnik, mortified with shame when they were diagnosed with “whore personality,” they were told they had to submit to these acts before God could forgive them. The abuse was accompanied by Latin prayers and signs of the cross to make them seem like rituals. Only decades later, long after the statute of limitations ran out, did the victims begin to come to terms with what had been done to them, recalling horrifying memories they had suppressed and speaking out.

The early episodes of The Keepers seem to build a strong case that Cesnik was killed by the pedophile priest to keep her from telling what she had been hearing from some of the victims. That priest, Fr. A. Joseph Maskell, was also the chaplain of the Baltimore police, where he had a highly placed brother, and where he is alleged to have found clients for his covert procurement operation. Were the police protecting him? Was the Church? The non-Catholic state’s attorney who won’t pursue the case seems unaccountably blasé about the many boxes of evidence that have disappeared.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Gavin Coote

Victims of sexual abuse at Australia’s oldest Catholic boys’ boarding school have welcomed a formal apology, but say there is a long way to go in the healing process.

A formal service was held last night at St Stanislaus College at Bathurst in central west New South Wales to apologise for historic acts of abuse.

At least 160 students were abused by former staff and priests at the school between the 1970s and 1990s.

Dozens of people gathered at the school’s performing arts centre to hear an apology on behalf of the school and the Catholic Church.

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MISSOURI
BishopAccountability.org

Summary of Case: Leonard R. Chambers was ordained in 1965 for the Diocese of Springfield-Cape Girardeau. He was assigned to more than twenty parishes during his career, assisting and serving as administrator early on, then assigned as pastor for the first time in 1974. Chambers held a number of diocesan positions, serving as president or chair of several.

In August 1982 Bishop Bernard Law placed Chambers on leave after the parents of a teenage boy complained that the priest had molested their son. Chambers admitted to the abuse. He spent ten months at the Servants of the Paraclete’s treatment facility in Jemez Springs, NM, after which he was returned to ministry. In the mid-1990s Springfield-Cape Girardeau bishop Leibrecht placed restrictions on Chambers, prohibiting him from being alone with minors. When Chambers was found alone with a minor in 1998, Leibrecht forced him to retire. Chambers is not indexed in the Official Catholic Directory after 2002. He is last known to have been living in Joplin, MO.

Ordained: 1965

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NEW YORK
Gothamist

BY EMMA WHITFORD IN NEWS ON JUN 16, 2017

Governor Andrew Cuomo alleviated some advocate concerns on Thursday by introducing a Senate bill that would give victims of child abuse a larger window of time to seek justice. The program bill could still face an uphill battle in the Senate, which has been historically hostile towards efforts to expand the statute of limitations for sex abuse victims. But advocates hope the governor’s end-of-session move could push its hand.

Research shows that a majority of childhood victims wait at least five years before speaking. Under current law, most New York victims have only five years after they turn 18 to bring civil or criminal charges against their abusers—thanks to statute of limitations laws that are more prohibitive than most U.S. states, according to the victim abuse network Safe Horizon.

Cuomo’s bill, which mirrors a law passed 139-7 this session in the State Assembly, would extend the statute of limitations to age 28 for victims of felony criminal cases, and age 50 for civil cases. The bill would also create a one-time, one-year “look back” window, in which victims of any age would be permitted to bring civil suits against individuals or institutions.

Cuomo indicated months ago that he would prioritize heightened protections, but advocates noted his silence on the issue in recent weeks, as time ran out in this legislative session.

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NEW YORK
Times Union

By Rick Karlin, Capitol bureau on June 16, 2017

Gov. Andrew Cuomo, on a conference call primarily about Penn-Farley train station plans in New York City, said he wasn’t optimistic about the chances for an extension of mayoral control in the NYC schools, passage of a Child Victims Act or extension of sales tax increases happening by the end of the session.

Cuomo also noted that he’s offered his own Child Victims bill in addition. His bill mirrors that sought by the Assembly but it hasn’t moved in the Senate.

Senate Independent Democratic Conference Leader Jeff Klein has offered a compromise that would include the use of a special commission to review abuse allegations before they went to court.

Despite that, Cuomo expressed doubt that a bill would be passed this session, which is set to end on June 21.

“I’ve put in a bill. There’s been talk about a compromise bill,’’ said Cuomo.
“I’d be open to a compromise. I’m not highly optimistic about passage of the child victims act.’’

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FLORIDA
Palm Beach Post

Ryan DiPentima Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 15, 2017

A Florida minister who was found guilty of traveling to meet an underage boy for sex received his sentence on Tuesday.

David Donald Hoppenjan, 53, will serve 21 months in state prison and will be designated a sexual offender upon release, according to the Pensacola News Journal.

Hoppenjan, who was a pastor at First United Methodist Church of Pace, was arrested in a sting operation conducted by local and state law enforcement officials in September.

He was one of 22 men arrested as a part of Operation Undertow, in which undercover agents posed as teenagers online and set up meetings with them. Hoppenjan went to two locations to meet with who he thought would be a 14-year-old boy, according to the Santa Rosa Press Gazette.

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CONNECTICUT
CT Post

By Daniel Tepfer Wednesday, June 14, 2017

BRIDGEPORT — The pastor of the Fountain of Youth Cathedral won the hearts of his congregation — then stole their church, police said.

Bishop Franklin L. Fountain may eventually have to answer to a higher authority but in the meantime he will face a Superior Court judge.

Fountain is charged with first-degree larceny and second-degree forgery after police said he forged deed documents and sold the Madison Avenue church to himself for $1.

City property records show Fountain is now the owner of the church and property valued at $1.5 million.

“Isn’t this all ridiculous,” Fountain, 55, said Wednesday after being released on a promise to appear in court. “I am the pastor and I deserve respect and I expect that this will all be worked out.”

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GERMANY
DW

A man has admitted in court to sexually abusing seven boys while heading a Buddhist community in southern Germany. The abuse, which took place over a period of 10 years, involved boys aged 4 to 13.

At the start of his trial in the southern German city of Augsburg on Friday, a Zen Buddhist priest fully admitted to sexually abusing a total of seven boys over the course of a decade.

The 62-year-old man is accused of 22 cases of sexual abuse, several of which have been deemed as “severe abuse” by prosecutors. He could face up to 15 years in prison.

The defendant’s lawyer, Hermann Christoph Kühn, read off an explanation of the crimes at the beginning of the trial, which the man later confirmed to be true.

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MINNESOTA
The Worthy Adversary

June 16, 2017

Joelle Casteix

In 2013, Minnesota passed a landmark bill that allowed victims of child sexual abuse to use the civil courts to expose their abuser, no matter when the abuse took place. We are hoping to get one passed in New York right now.

Ensuing lawsuits showed that the Archdiocese under Archbishop John Nienstedt (pictured above) and his predecessors actively covered up the sexual abuse of minors for decades. It was bad. Really bad.

Then, allegations began to swirl about Nienstedt himself—allegations that he lived an openly gay lifestyle, propositioned seminarians, and caused all kinds of problems while he was a priest in Detroit and Rome. His favorite gay bar? The Happy Tap in Windsor, Canada. And he loved to have a good time.

In 2014, an independent law firm was hired by the Archdiocese to investigate numerous allegations against Neinstedt. Ten seminarians came forward providing affidavits saying that if they refused Nienstedt’s sexual advances, he would interfere with their careers. Sound familiar?

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Judy Courtin

Never has the fight for justice been so acknowledged and celebrated than at the state funeral on June 7 of Anthony Foster. This remarkable man, who died from a brain haemorrhage on May 28, two days after he collapsed, was only 64. His sudden death is shattering for his beautiful family and it leaves the entire community grieving.

Chrissie and Anthony Foster after a hearing of the parliamentary inquiry. Photo: Justin McManus
For 21 years, Anthony and his beloved wife Chrissie fought for justice, not only for their daughters Emma and Katie but for all victims of institutional child sexual abuse. They could not have predicted in 1996 that they would still be fighting the Catholic Church in 2017.

Throughout those years, Anthony and Chrissie were valiant in their lionhearted fight with what continues to be a legalistic and cold-hearted hierarchy. Denials, obfuscations and the protection of assets and reputations have remained paramount.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Augsburger Allgemeine

[At the trial in Augsburg, a accused Zen priest has confessed to having abused several children. The victims are boys. He also said he made child pornography.]

Beim Prozessauftakt in Augsburg hat der angeklagte Zen-Priester gestanden, mehrere Kinder missbraucht zu haben. Bei den Opfern handelt es sich um Jungen. Von Jörg Heinzle

Er hat alles verloren: Seinen guten Ruf als Zen-Priester, seine Ehefrau, seine Freiheit. Seine leiblichen Kinder haben sich von ihm abgewandt. Außerhalb des Gefängnisses hat er nicht einmal mehr eine Meldeadresse. Seit diesem Freitag steht Genpo D., 62, vor der Jugendkammer des Landgerichts. Der Vorwurf: Er soll mehrere Kinder – in allen Fällen Jungen – sexuell missbraucht haben.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Saarbruecker Zeitung

Freisen. Gläubige in Freisen sind enttäuscht von der vagen Antwort Dr. Stephan Ackermanns auf ihren Brandbrief. Melanie Mai

Der Bischof hat geantwortet. Oder besser gesagt: Domvikar Marco Weber. “Lapidar”, wertet diese Antwort Liane Bonenberger, die stellvertretende Vorsitzende des Pfarreienrates der Pfarrgemeinschaft Freisen-Oberkirchen. Sie hatte im Mai im Namen des Pfarreienrates nicht nur einen offenen Brief vor der Freisener Kirche ausgehängt, sondern auch an Stephan Ackermann persönlich geschrieben. Darin fordert sie mehr Rückendeckung für Pfarrer Hanno Schmitt, der seit den Missbrauchsvorwürfen gegen den ehemaligen Freisener Pfarrer öffentlich angefeindet wird und gar Drohbriefe erhält (wir berichteten).

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

Andrew Bolt, Herald Sun

ABC reporter Louise Milligan has peddled an implausiby lurid claim: that Cardinal George Pell caught two choir boys drinking altar wine after Mass at St patrick’s Cathedral and made them give him oral sex.

Melbourne University Press has even published Milligan’s book claiming detailing this allegation, which police have spent more than a year investigating.

And now a priest who was always with him at Mass at this cathedral says it simply could not have happened.

But first: from the very start this allegation seemed almost literally unbelievable.

Pell, an ambitious man then in his late 50s, would suddenly do something so reckless and criminal – something he’d never been accused of before?

Pell would force two boys to do this, knowing how much higher the risk was of being reported and found guillty?

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MASSACHUSETTS
Boston Globe

By Tom McCarthy JUNE 15, 2017

Editor’s note: When we heard that “Spotlight’’ director Tom McCarthy would be picking up a screenwriting award at the Nantucket Film Festival just days after the Globe had decamped from its longtime Dorchester digs for new quarters in downtown Boston, something clicked. Who better to write about this venerable building, immortalized by his cinematic vision? What had he expected when he first walked into our newsroom a few years ago? What surprised/delighted/vexed him about what he found? And how on Earth had he managed to capture this place and its people so accurately? This is his answer.

I spent the better part of a year wandering the endless maze of hallways and stairways that make up the Boston Globe’s soon–to-be-abandoned headquarters on Morrissey Boulevard. The purpose of my frequent visits was research for my 2015 film, “Spotlight,” which chronicled the investigation by the Globe’s Spotlight team into the Catholic Church’s cover-up of the priest abuse scandal.

My co-writer Josh Singer and I had more luck managing the endless hours of interviews and source material than we did navigating the 800,000-plus square feet of the massive structure we came to refer to as the “SS Globe.” Time and again we found ourselves walking in circles or emerging through the wrong exit or making our way down the up escalator. (In truth, the escalator was often non-operational, so that worked in our favor.)

In our defense, even the Globe’s former editor, Marty Baron, quipped that he communicated with the Spotlight team by e-mail in part because he had a hard time locating the Spotlight offices, which were tucked away on the mezzanine level of the building.

Our saving grace was the generosity of spirit of the good people who worked there. We were constantly being directed, redirected, and even escorted by the industrious crew of that mighty ship. Their contribution was all the more notable because we had been clearly identified not only as snoopy Hollywood screenwriters but also as unrepentant fans of both the Yankees and Phillies.

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NEW YORK
Spectrum News

By Terry Stackhouse
Thursday, June 15, 2017

Advocates for victims of child sexual assault are urging lawmakers to pass the Child Victims Act, which would make it easier for survivors to file lawsuits, before the end of the legislative session next week.

“I know what it is to go through that and every day I still have to tell myself to be strong,” said Gary Greenberg, a survivor of child sexual assault.

The Greene County businessman founded Protect NY Kids, a PAC backing candidates who support legislation ending statutes of limitations on child sexual abuse cases. He supports a bill that would extend the statute of limitations for child sexual abuse cases and create a one-year window for past victims to file civil suits.

At the Capitol Thursday, Senate Democrats held an event to rally support for the Child Victims Act.

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SCOTLAND
Independent Catholic News

June 15th, 2017

Source: SCMO

In December 2016, the Catholic Bishops’ Conference in Scotland announced that Helen Liddell would Chair the Independent Review Group (IRG) set up as a result of the McLellan Commission Report into the current safeguarding policies, procedures and practices within the Church in Scotland.

The IRG is an autonomous body which will function separately from the Church and will review safeguarding standards and carry out independent audits as recommended by the McLellan Commission.

The Group met for the first time on 27 May and established working groups to develop and scope the future activities of the IRG. The current membership of the Group is listed below. Further members may be recruited if requirements for additional expertise are identified by the working groups.

Commenting on the IRG Helen Liddell said: “This Group has been set up six months ahead of schedule and the experience members bring to this vital role is considerable indeed. I am very grateful to them for their willingness to serve.”

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SCOTLAND
Herald Scotland

Brian Donnelly @BrianDonnellyHT
Senior News Reporter

A SENIOR Catholic monk has admitted there was an “alarming failure” by brothers to protect children in care, a public inquiry into child abuse heard.

Brother Laurence Hughes, provincial of the De La Salle Brothers, also accepted there was a “disturbing lack of awareness” of abuse in schools run by the order in Scotland.

He also apologised at the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry in Edinburgh for abuse inflicted by both those who were convicted of offences and other brothers who were not convicted.

As well as Michael Murphy, known as Brother Benedict or Brother Ben to children in his care at St Joseph’s List D School in Tranent, East Lothian, being convicted of 15 charges of assault and indecent assault involving eight boys spanning the decade up to 1981, Brother Hughes accepted it was possible further abuse was carried out against children.

In the order’s report to the inquiry Brother Hughes said wrote: “The congregation acknowledges that abuse may not be confined to those with convictions.”

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NEW YORK
Adirondack Daily Enterprise

ALBANY (AP) — Survivors of child molestation are urging lawmakers in New York to loosen the statute of limitations on lawsuits for past abuse.

A statement released Wednesday and signed by several survivors called on top lawmakers and Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo to hold negotiations on the bill before the legislative session ends next week.

The proposal would eliminate the criminal and civil statute of limitations for several child sexual abuse crimes and create a one-year window for past victims to file civil suits.

Victims now have until they turn 23 to sue, but supporters say it can take years before victims feel comfortable stepping forward to report their abuse.

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NEW YORK
Buffalo News

By Jay Rey
Published Wed, Jun 14, 2017

The young boy who was sexually molested by an older student while on a Buffalo school bus in 2015 was sitting immediately behind the bus driver when it happened, according to a lawsuit filed by the boy’s mother.

The molestation happened not once, but at least five times on the bus over the course of eight days, according to the lawsuit.

And on one of those occasions there also was an aide on the school bus.

Those are some of the new accusations that emerged from a lawsuit filed by the boy’s mother. The suit was filed against First Student Inc., the transportation provider; the Buffalo Public Schools, which contracts with First Student to provide busing to both public and private schools; and the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo and Our Lady of Black Rock School, where both boys attended.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

TESS LIVINGSTONE
The Australian
June 16, 2017

A priest who says he accompanied George Pell every time he was at St Patrick’s Cathedral has challenged one of the most salacious allegations against the former archbishop of Melbourne — that he abused two teenage choir boys in a backroom of the Cathedral — in an interview with Victoria Police.

The priest, who was on the then-Archbishop’s staff from September 1996 to January 2001 told police late last year it was “physically impossible for Archbishop Pell to have been alone with anyone in the Cathedral, before, during, or after the celebration of Sunday Mass or on any other occasion’’.

The cathedral abuse allegation, raised on ABC’s 7.30 a year ago, forms one of the most provocative chapters of journalist Louise Milligan’s book Cardinal: The Rise and Fall of George Pell, published by Melbourne University Press. In it, Milligan compares Cardinal Pell with an “Easter Island statue of a man, gliding through the cathedral, papering over emotion, lest he snap’’.

The priest, who has refused to become embroiled in a defence-by-media, answered police questions related to an alleged incident after a Sunday Mass at the Cathedral between July and December one year. Cathedral publications and photographs show the building was closed for restoration for most of that year until a Saturday night in November, when a Vigil Mass was held to celebrate Christ the King.

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