Próvolo case: Legal team expects justice for Church sex abuse victim

BUENOS AIRES (ARGENTINA)
Buenos Aires Times

Nov. 22, 2019

By Carly Graf

Victims of alleged sexual and emotional abuse at the hands of priests and educators at the Instituto Antonio Próvolo in Mendoza may finally find justice Monday.

After nearly three months of gruelling closed-door testimony, plaintiff lawyers from the Mendoza-based human rights organisation Xumek asked Tuesday for the maximum sentence possible under Argentina’s current penal code for those in the dock.

If judges agree, that could see sentences of 50 years in jail for 61-year-old Argentine Horacio Corbacho, and up to 15 years for Nicola Corradi, an 83-year-old Italian priest who ran the institute, and the site’s former gardener Armando Gómez, 50.

Collectively, they are accused of rape, sexual abuse, the corruption of children and mistreatment at a Catholic school for deaf children.

In total, the priests face a total of 28 charges. Victims total around 20 minors.

A fourth person was charged, 57-year-old administrator Jorge Bordón. He agreed to a plea deal just over a year ago, trading an acknowledgment he’d participated in at least 11 acts of abuse for a shorter trial and a 10-year sentence.

Though trials started in August, the wait for victims and their families has been much longer. The first victims came forward in 2016, leading to the prompt arrest of Corradi, but according to Sergio Salinas, one of the plaintiff’s attorneys, the abuse dates back at least to the previous decade.

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