ABUSE TRACKER

ATLANTA (GA)
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

March 13, 2020

By Sarah Kallis

The Georgia House passed a bill on Thursday that would allow more survivors of childhood sex abuse to file charges against their abusers and organizations that covered it up.

House Bill 479 would raise the age limit for victims to file abuse charges from 23 to 38. Under current law, if victims realize childhood abuse has caused them psychological problems, they have two years to take legal action. HB 479 would extend that time limit to four years.

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ST. BONAVENTURE (NY)
The Bona Venture

March 12, 2020

By Sean Mickey

St. Bonaventure University is considering renaming its administrative building, Hopkins Hall, after learning of a credible claim of sexual abuse.

The university was unaware of the claim until its connection was uncovered by The Bona Venture.

Msgr. James F. Hopkins is listed in the Diocese of Erie public disclosure list, which was last updated on April 5, 2019.

The list names individuals credibly accused of actions that “disqualify that person from working with children.”

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ALBUQUERQUE (NM)
Associated Press

March 12, 2020

A creditors committee of clergy abuse survivors believes the Archdiocese of Santa Fe moved assets to hinder creditors before it filed for bankruptcy protection, a lawyer said.

Attorney James Stang told a federal judge Monday that the committee may seek standing in the case to challenge the movement of assets, the Albuquerque Journal reports.

“The committee is ready to move forward on standing motions to avoid fraudulent conveyances that we believe occurred when the archdiocese corporately reorganized,” Stang said. “We believe there’s a basis for us bringing those fraudulent conveyance actions.”

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
The Guardian

March 12, 2020

By Melissa Davey

Judges ask for further written submissions which the bench will consider before delivering their decision at a date yet to be determined

Melissa Davey

The full bench of the high court in Canberra has reserved its decision about whether to grant Cardinal George Pell special leave to appeal his case for a final time, after listening to two days of arguments from his barrister and the prosecution.

The seven judges asked for further written submissions from the legal parties and have given them two business days to deliver. The bench will then consider those materials before returning to deliver their decision at a date yet to be determined. Once they return to court, if the court does grant special leave, the bench may then immediately decide whether to accept the arguments from Pell’s team and acquit him, or they could dismiss the appeal in which case the verdict would hold.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
WHYY radio (NPR affiliate)

March 12, 2020

By Aaron Moselle

More than three years after his release from state prison, Monsignor William Lynn is scheduled to face a familiar, but unwelcome sight: a Philadelphia jury.

Lynn, the first U.S. Catholic Church official to be convicted of covering up clergy sex abuse, will also face familiar allegations next week, when the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office begins retrying the 69-year-old on one felony count of child endangerment.

While he was secretary for clergy, city prosecutors say Lynn recommended the Archdiocese of Philadelphia transfer a priest, who had been credibly accused of abusing children, to St. Jerome parish in Northeast Philadelphia. And that priest, Edward Avery, sexually molested a 10-year-old altar boy there in the late 1990s.

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NEW ULM (MN)
Associated Press

March 10, 2020

A bankruptcy judge on Tuesday approved a $34 million settlement between the Diocese of New Ulm in Minnesota and nearly 100 people who say they were sexually abused by priests and others.

Bishop John LeVoir apologized to sexual abuse survivors during the hearing, where U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Kressel gave final approval to the settlement. Several survivors of clergy sexual abuse testified tearfully at the hearing, the Star Tribune reported.

“I apologize again on behalf of the church to all who have been harmed by clergy sexual abuse,” LeVoir said.

The diocese serving Catholics in southern and west-central Minnesota also agreed to implement 17 child protection protocols.

Attorney Jeff Anderson of St. Paul, who represents many of the survivors, told The Associated Press that both the settlement and the hearing were “powerful.”

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AUSTRALIA
Eternity News (blog)

March 12, 2020

By John Sandeman

On day two of the High court’s Pell hearing Victoria’s Director of Public Prosecutions, Kerri Judd, is setting out to establish that the guilty verdict is sound, the jury did consider all the evidence and the Court of Appeal got it right as well.

(Yesterday Pell’s lawyer Brett Walker SC argued that a balance of improbabilities had been set out by defence witnesses and that this evidence was not fully taken into account.)

The morning opens with the question of whether the video evidence of the complainant should have been viewed by the Court of Appeal. And ultimately whether they were swayed by it.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Associated Press

March 12, 2020

By Rod McGuirk

Australia’s highest court on Thursday said it will deliver a verdict at a later date on whether to overturn the convictions of the most senior Catholic to be found guilty of child sex abuse.

Cardinal George Pell’s lawyer, Bret Walker, told the High Court that if it found a lower court had made a mistake in upholding Pell’s convictions, he should be acquitted.

Prosecutor Kerri Judd told the seven judges that if there were a mistake, they should send the case back to the Victoria state Court of Appeal to hear it again.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Associated Press

March 10, 2020

By Rod McGuirk

Australia’s highest court on Wednesday began hearing an appeal by Cardinal George Pell against his convictions for molesting two choirboys in a cathedral more than two decades ago.

Some events in Pell’s career and the criminal case:

July 16, 1996: Auxiliary Bishop George Pell is appointed archbishop of Melbourne. He molests two choirboys that December inside St. Patrick’s Cathedral, according to testimony from one of the victims.

March 26, 2001: Pell becomes archbishop of Sydney.

Oct. 21, 2003: Pope John Paul II makes Pell a cardinal.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

February 2, 2020

By Luke Henriques-Gomes

Victoria’s Director of Public Prosecutions rejects Pell lawyers’ argument in submission to high court

George Pell’s appeal to the high court “glosses over” evidence that supports his conviction for child sexual abuse, Victoria’s Director of Public Prosecutions has argued.

Pell, who has won the right to have Australia’s top court review his conviction, argues in legal submissions that the Victorian court of appeal erred when it found that jurors were not unreasonable to believe the testimony of his victim.

But in its own submission to the court, Victoria’s Director of Public Prosecutions said Pell’s appeal “glosses over evidence supportive of the account of the complainant”.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Herald-Sun via CathNews

March 12, 2020

By Shannon Deery

Much of yesterday’s High Court hearing focused on the issue with Bret Walker, SC, arguing Cardinal Pell routinely spent 10 or more minutes on the steps after Mass.

Mr Walker told the court if it was accepted that this occurred, it would have been impossible for him to offend.

For four-and-a-half hours Mr Walker spelled out Cardinal Pell’s appeal arguments, discussing evidence and acute legal points at length, before a full bench of the court.

But the court kept coming back to Cardinal Pell’s post-mass routine, and whether or not he would have had the time to commit the offences of which a jury found him guilty.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
The Tablet

March 12, 2020

By Mark Bowling

Australia’s highest court has reserved a decision whether Cardinal George Pell will be allowed to appeal his conviction for child sex offences.

After two days of arguments from Cardinal Pell’s barrister and the prosecution, a seven-judge panel of the High Court of Australia has called for further written submissions.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Reuters

March 12, 2020

By Sonali Paul

Australia’s highest court on Thursday deferred ruling on an appeal to overturn the conviction of former Vatican treasurer George Pell for sexually assaulting two teenaged choirboys in the 1990s.

After two days of legal arguments, the High Court of Australia said it was still considering whether to allow the appeal, the last avenue for the 78-year-old cardinal to clear his name.

If the court does agree to consider the appeal, the seven-member panel of justices will then move straight into deciding whether to acquit Pell or uphold his conviction, a process that will not require another public hearing. A third option – sending the case back to a lower court – is also possible.

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ROSARIO (ARGENTINA)
Crux

March 12, 2020

By Inés San Martín

As bishops from Pope Francis’s native Argentina figure out how to pay their own salaries instead of taking funds from the state, a new poll shows that while seven in ten Argentines declare themselves to be Catholic, six in ten don’t know what activities the Church is doing in the country and seven in ten attend Mass less than once a month.

At first glance, the results of the study, commissioned by the bishops after they announced the progressive end of public funding for the Church late last year, aren’t all bad news: 67 percent of Argentines identify as Catholic, and most know the main missions of the Church: Evangelization, education and guidance, providing spiritual and emotional support, and material aid.

In addition, seven in ten Argentines believe that the basic sense of religion is to give meaning to life in this world.

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WESTERN AUSTRALIA
The Australian

March 11, 2020

By Victoria Laurie

West Australian Catholic Bishop Christopher Saunders has stood down from his senior role administering the Broome diocese amid claims of serious but undisclosed sex abuse allegations.

The Catholic Church in Perth issued a communique from the Vatican, dated 10 March, indicating that Bishop Saunders, 70, had “voluntarily stood aside from the ordinary administration of the diocese.”

The church move was in response to a Channel Seven TV report that police have been investigating historic allegations by two men that they had been victims of sex abuse by Bishop Saunders.

According to the Seven report, WA police have interviewed past and present members of the Bishop’s staff, including priests, who allegedly laid complaints against his behaviour. No charges have been laid against him.

WA Police minister Michelle Roberts confirmed to The Australian that she had “directly referred correspondence in relation to Bishop Saunders to police.”

When confronted by a reporter in Broome outside his church, Bishop Saunders said: “Without any reservation, without any doubt whatsoever, that has never happened, and it never would happen.”

He is one of the Kimberley’s most prominent religious figures, respected as an advocate and outspoken commentator on indigenous affairs and education in the region.

He spent his early life at missions throughout the northwest of the state before moving to the Kimberley. He arrived in Broome as a deacon in 1975 before becoming a priest the following year.

He served at La Grange Mission, 200 kilometres south of Broome and then at Kalumburu Mission, in the far north Kimberley, until 1988. As Bishop, he has been a regular visitor to far-flung Aboriginal communities.

Former Broome mayor Ron Johnstone, a friend of the bishop, said the airing of the allegations would be “a shock to Broome and the Kimberley.”

“Bishop Saunders is a visionary who has done fantastic work for the community,” he said. “He is a generous spirit, and I will not desert him in his hour of need,” he said.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
The Australian

March 12, 2020

High Court delays final verdict

The High Court will weigh whether to acquit George Pell of child sex abuse after the prosecution dramatically shifted its position on key evidence on Thursday.

Bret Walker SC for Pell on Wednesday submitted that Pell, 78, be acquitted of molesting two choirboys in 1996 and 1997.

In a dramatic day, Victorian Director of Public Prosecutions Kerry Judd QC shifted position on the timeframe for when Pell could have molested the boys in St Patrick’s Cathedral in Melbourne.

Instead of arguing that there was a five to six minute window of opportunity for offending, Ms Judd said it could not be stated for certain how long the private prayer time lasted that, according to the prosecution case, ultimately created the chance for the cardinal to strike.

Melbourne University law professor Jeremy Gans said the second day in the High Court had been a “good day for Pell’’ and there was a chance the Pell may be acquitted.

It is also possible the case will be referred back to the Victorian Court of Appeal.

The High Court rose late yesterday to consider the appeal, with special leave yet to be formally granted.

It appears to be a mere formality that the appeal will be formally heard.

Ms Judd on Thursday abandoned the prosecution’s previous position over the amount of time that private prayer was held after Solemn Mass.

She said the five to six minutes of private prayer time may now have been longer, depending on what unfolded in the cathedral on the day.

The private prayer had occurred after the procession started to leave the church, the High Court was told.

The altar servers did not start clearing the altar for several minutes after mass ended to give parishioners time for private prayer to be conducted.

On the amount of time allowed for private prayer, Ms Judd said: “They are approximate times. It was not a precise five or six minutes.’’

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
BBC News

March 12, 2020

Australia’s top court has reserved its ruling on whether Cardinal George Pell’s bid to quash his sexual abuse convictions has been successful.

The ex-Vatican treasurer is serving a six-year jail sentence after a jury found he abused two boys in a Melbourne cathedral in the 1990s.

He is the most senior Catholic globally to be jailed for such crimes, but maintains his innocence.

Pell has challenged the verdict in the High Court of Australia.

During hearings on Wednesday and Thursday, defence and prosecution teams sparred over whether the jury had fairly considered all evidence.

The seven appeal judges then reserved their decision until a later date. They did not specify when.

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NEW ULM (MN)
Learfield Wire Service

March 11, 2020

Ninety-three victims of clergy sexual abuse will share 34-million dollars under a settlement with the Diocese of New Ulm. The reorganization plan was approved during a bankruptcy hearing Tuesday in Brown County. The settlement includes 17 new child protection protocols enacted by the diocese. Bishop John Le Voir said, “the Diocese of New Ulm and the Catholic church must do everything possible to protect the vulnerable so that this tragedy never happens again.” Around 26-million of the 34-million-dollar settlement will come from insurance, the diocese will pay seven-million cash and all the parishes will contribute a total of one million dollars.

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WEST VIRGINIA
National Catholic Reporter

March 12, 2020

By Peter Feuerherd

A group called Lay Catholic Voices for Change has sent a letter to Bishop Mark Brennan of Wheeling-Charleston, West Virginia, asking that the diocese investigate charges of sex abuse of minors by former Bishop Michael Bransfield. The letter also asked that Bransfield be ordered not to use the title bishop emeritus to describe himself.

Bransfield served as bishop of Wheeling-Charleston, which includes the entire state of West Virginia, from 2005 to 2018. He retired after reaching the mandatory retirement age of 75. Information from a church investigation released in June of last year said he misused millions of dollars from diocesan funds and sexually harassed adult seminarians.

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“ProPublica y el Houston Chronicle analizaron las listas publicadas por 52 diócesis de Estados Unidos que abarcan los 30 principales en términos de la cantidad de clérigos vivos acusados con credibilidad y ubicados en estados a lo largo de la frontera entre México y Estados Unidos. Los reporteros encontraron 51 curas que luego de acusaciones de abuso pudieron trabajar como sacerdotes o con hermanos religiosos en una gran cantidad de países, desde Irlanda hasta Nigeria y Filipinas”, reporta la investigación.

Ciudad de México, 11 de marzo (SinEmbargo).– La iglesia católica envió a distintos países a decenas de sacerdotes que eran acusados en Estados Unidos de violar menores de edad; todos fueron incorporados a iglesias y se les permitió ofrecer servicio e incluso trabajar con niños, de acuerdo con una investigación realizada por un equipo de Houston Chronicle y ProPublica encabezado por Katie Zavadski, Topher Sanders y Nicole Hensley.

“ProPublica y el Houston Chronicle analizaron las listas publicadas por 52 diócesis de Estados Unidos que abarcan los 30 principales en términos de la cantidad de clérigos vivos acusados con credibilidad y ubicados en estados a lo largo de la frontera entre México y Estados Unidos. Los reporteros encontraron 51 curas que luego de acusaciones de abuso pudieron trabajar como sacerdoteso con hermanos religiosos en una gran cantidad de países, desde Irlanda hasta Nigeria y Filipinas. Al menos 40 habían trabajado en Estados Unidos lo largo de la frontera sur, incluidos 11 en Texas. Ningún país fue un destino más común que México, donde al menos 21 sacerdotes acusados creíblemente encontraron refugio”, dice la investigación.

“El padre José Antonio Pinal, un joven sacerdote de México, llegó a su primera parroquia en el norte rural de California en 1980, recién salido del seminario. El sacerdote se hizo amigo de la familia Torres, ayudando a los padres, también in

“Pero en las oficinas del sacerdote en la Iglesia Católica del Sagrado Corazón en la pequeña ciudad de Gridley, Torres dijo que Pinal, que entonces tenía 30 años, le dio alcohol, le mostró películas con sexo y desnudos, y lo toqueteó y lo violó. El adolescente le dijo a otro sacerdote en 1989 y los abogados de la diócesis le aseguraron a la familia que a Pinal no se le permitiría estar cerca de los niños, dijo Torres”, agrega.

Treinta años después, en la primavera de 2019, la Diócesis de Sacramento puso el nombre de Pinal en su lista de sacerdotes acusados con credibilidad. La lista contenía cinco denuncias de abuso sexual contra Pinal que datan de fines de la década de 1980.

“Pinal había ‘huido a México’, según la lista, y la diócesis le había prohibido realizar trabajos sacerdotales en público en los 20 condados que conforman la diócesis. Pero una investigación realizada por ProPublica y el Houston Chronicle muestra que la Iglesia Católica permitió o ayudó a docenas de sacerdotes, incluido Pinal, a servir en el extranjero como sacerdotes después de ser acusados de abuso en los Estados Unidos”.

Los periodistas usaron redes sociales y localizaron fácilmente a Pinal, quien vive actualmente en Cuernavaca, Morelos. En una entrevista en su casa y en una serie posterior de intercambios de correos electrónicos, Pinal negó repetidamente abusar sexualmente de Torres o que huyó de California. “Pero en algunos de los correos electrónicos se refirió a lo que sucedió entre él y Torres, y en un correo electrónico enviado el miércoles por la noche, sobre un viaje que realizó con Torres, Pinal dijo: ‘Fue un desastre, pero lo que sucedió fue consensuado’”.

“Pocos meses después de las acusaciones en California, Pinal reanudó el trabajo sacerdotal, ministrando en pueblos indígenas en Tepoztlán y sus alrededores, una pequeña comunidad cerca de la Ciudad de México conocida por los sitios arqueológicos, y sirvió durante décadas en parroquias de la Diócesis de Cuernavaca”.

Con 68 años, Pinal ofrece el ministerio desde casa, “donde tiene cartas que muestran que la iglesia en Sacramento lo mantuvo en la nómina ya que lo ayudó a encontrar una nueva asignación. Pinal disfrutó de una cálida correspondencia con el entonces obispo de Sacramento y los funcionarios a cargo del ministerio hispano, quienes en los meses posteriores a las acusaciones le aconsejaron que trabajara en México por un largo período (5-6 años) antes de regresar a Estados Unidos”.

Y las cartas fueron firmadas por el obispo “con cariño”.

Katie Zavadski, Topher Sanders y Nicole Hensley, de Houston Chronicle y ProPublica, dicen: “Desde 2018, muchas diócesis católicas y órdenes religiosas en Estados Unidos, incluida la de Sacramento, California, han publicado listas de clérigos considerados creíblemente acusados de abusar de niños. Otros actualizaron y ampliaron listas que ya habían hecho públicas”.

“Pero las 178 listas publicadas a partir de enero y compiladas en una base de datos de búsqueda por ProPublica revelaron una red de información incompleta y a menudo inconsistente. Muchas veces las listas no especificaban el estado y ubicación actuales del sacerdote. Y aunque las diócesis frecuentemente afirman no saber nada sobre el paradero de un sacerdote, los reporteros de ProPublica y Chronicle los encontraron en los sitios web de las iglesias, en publicaciones religiosas y en las redes sociales. Los líderes de la iglesia a menudo no informaron las denuncias a la policía, no aplicaron restricciones permanentes dentro de la iglesia, ni hicieron caso u ofrecieron advertencias sobre los sacerdotes que enfrentan acusaciones. En al menos cuatro casos, los líderes de la iglesia facilitaron el traslado de los sacerdotes al extranjero”, dice el reportaje.

LA VISITA SUSPENDIDA

Apenas la semana pasada se dio a conocer que la visita a México de una misión del Vaticano para recabar testimonios e información sobre abusos sexuales y encubrimiento en la iglesia católica mexicana ha sido pospuesta y, de momento, no tiene nueva fecha.

La Conferencia del Episcopado Mexicano (CEM) indicó el viernes pasado en un comunicado que la visita, prevista del 20 al 27 de marzo, no se realizará debido a la situación sanitaria provocada por el nuevo coronavirus, COVID-19, por lo que la Santa Sede “ha suspendido toda actividad en el extranjero”.

La misión de Charles Scicluna, secretario adjunto de la Congregación para la Doctrina de la Fe, y monseñor Jordi Bertomeu podría haber alarmado a algunos en la jerarquía mexicana, ya que sólo un día después de su anuncio, el representante del Vaticano en México, Franco Coppola, reveló en rueda de prensa que cuatro obispos mexicanos estaban bajo investigación, unas pesquisas que, según aclaró a AP posteriormente, se iniciaron en mayo presuntamente por haber encubierto casos de pederastia.

La CEM señaló que la Nunciatura Apostólica mantendrá habilitado el correo electrónico para que quien lo desee les escriba sobre el tema: nunciatura.mexico@diplomat.va .

Coppola abrió esta vía directa de comunicación en diciembre y ya ha recibido decenas de denuncias, la mayoría por encubrimiento. Algunas de las víctimas de abuso, que ya se mostraban escépticas ante la misión, mostraron sus dudas hacia

“¿Por qué planean la visita de este calibre cuando varias semanas antes ya se hablaba del coronavirus?”, se pregunta otra de las víctimas, Jesus Romero Colin. “No sé si estaban midiendo el clima mediático y de las víctimas a ver cuántas iban a tener”.

Scicluna, el principal investigador del Papa en casos de abusos sexuales, vive en Malta, de donde es arzobispo y hasta el momento no se ha anunciado ningún contagio por coronavirus en la isla. En México, sólo se han confirmado siete.

México es el segundo país con mayor población católica y la visita había generado ciertas expectativas debido a que aquí se han acumulado por años denuncias de abusos y encubrimientos.

Los enviados papales eran, además, quienes formaron parte de una comisión similar que fue enviada a Chile en 2018, la cual supuso tal exposición de la jerarquía religiosa del país sudamericano que todos los obispos chilenos en activo pusieron su cargo a disposición de la iglesia y el Papa tuvo que pedir perdón por lo ocurrido en el país sudamericano.

Desde el año pasado, México ha regresado a los reflectores tras la aparición de nuevas víctimas de abusos de los Legionarios de Cristo, que en un informe en diciembre reconocieron haber detectado un centenar de pederastas. Algunos de ellos ya fallecieron, como el fundador de la orden, Marcial Maciel, que abusó de 60 adolescentes y fue obligado a retirarse.

Al margen de todos esos casos, que no pasaron por la CEM, el episcopado ha abierto investigaciones por abusos sexuales a 217 sacerdotes en la última década, según sus datos propios.

“No sé qué estén planeando”, comentó Ana Lucía Salazar, quien fue abusada por el sacerdote Fernando Martínez cuando tenía ocho años. “No creo que sea por eso”, dijo tras enterarse del comunicado.

Otra víctima de un legionario, Biani López-Antúnez, dijo a la AP que, si bien el coronavirus representa una emergencia sanitaria, “en México la integridad física, emocional y psicosocial de nuestros niños debe ser un tema prioritario”.

“No podemos quedarnos de brazos cruzados esperando al Vaticano mientras nuestros niños siguen siendo violentados por sacerdotes”, señaló.

–Con información de AP

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SOUTH BEND (IN)
CRUX

March 11, 2020

By Jack Lyons

When Bishop Frank Caggiano wanted to launch a tech-savvy initiative for the evangelization of young adults, he recruited a handful of laypeople experienced in youth ministry.

Together, they assembled a polished, multi-faceted program, including catechetical videos, through which teens could explore their faith online.

Then he asked some teens what they thought.

“The first thing out of their mouth: ‘Bishop, videos? Oh, come on. Podcasts!’” Caggiano said, who leads the Diocese of Bridgeport.

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AUSTRALIA
WAtoday

March 11, 2020

By Marta Pascual Juanola

One of Australia’s highest-ranking Catholics has voluntarily stood aside amid serious allegations.

On Wednesday afternoon the Catholic Church issued a statement saying Broome Bishop Christopher Saunders, 70, had stepped aside from the administration of the diocese and Monsignor Paul Boyers had been appointed to take care of the day to day running of the parish.

Police sources would not confirm the nature of the allegation, but agreed they were serious and local police were briefed about an incoming media presence in the town on Wednesday morning.

Bishop Saunders is one of Australia’s longest-serving bishops well-known for his interest in Indigenous affairs and involvement in Aboriginal study groups.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

March 11, 2020

By Michael McGowan

As police reportedly investigate serious allegations, Perth Archbishop says Saunders had ‘voluntarily stood aside’

One of the highest ranking members of the Catholic church in Australia, bishop of Broome Chris Saunders, has voluntarily stood aside from his position amid serious allegations.

On Wednesday the Perth archbishop, Timothy Costelloe, said Saunders had “voluntarily stood aside” from his position after the Vatican announced an internal investigation into the diocese.

It comes as Seven News reported on Wednesday that Western Australia police had been investigating claims of sexual misconduct made against the bishop since October 2018. The Guardian has confirmed there is an ongoing investigation into a complaint of an historical sexual assault, however no charges have been laid.

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AUSTRALIA
7NEWS

March 11, 2020

By Chris Reason

One of the highest-ranking Catholics in Australia has been under police investigation for 18 months, 7NEWS can reveal.

Reverend Christopher Saunders, the Bishop of Broome, has been with the Church for the past 44 years.

However, since October 2018, the 70-year-old bishop has been under investigation for alleged historical sexual assault complaints.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Standard

March 11, 2020

By Mark Zimmermann

A recent summit of Catholic leaders from across the United States was convened “to continue to respond to the twin crises in our Church, a crisis of abuse and a crisis of leadership failure,” said Kim Smolik, the CEO of the Leadership Roundtable that organized the gathering.

The 2020 Catholic Partnership Summit that met Feb. 28-29 at the Fairmont Hotel in Washington, D.C, had the theme, “From Crisis to Co-responsibility: Creating a New Culture of Leadership,” and drew 260 Catholic leaders from 63 U.S. dioceses, including bishops, diocesan staff, Catholic university presidents, corporate leaders, abuse survivors, philanthropists and more than 30 young adults.

Speaking in a press conference call with three other summit participants, Smolik noted that the Leadership Roundtable was founded after the 2002 sexual abuse crisis “to transform the leadership and management culture in our Church.”

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UNITED STATES
The Mighty

March 10, 2020

By Rachel Undoed

This topic is probably the hardest part of my story of survival. Or maybe it is just taking the longest to heal. I’ve had to speak so much about other aspects of the abuse to officials, lawyers, investigators and so on. But this topic… it still drags me deep down and I speak of it to almost no one, because acknowledging it, “admitting” it, means I am admitting to be immersed in a dark world, whether I chose it or not.

Being used in what the world calls “child pornography” brings a whole separate level of shame than other things I have experienced at the hands of my abuser. It leaves a thread connecting my past forever to my present. A thread that just cannot fade over time, and that prevents a certain level of closure I so desperately yearn for. When people speak of “leaving the past in the past,” or when therapists have me remind myself that “it’s over,” there is a deep part of me that can not fully hold onto that. With this, it feels like it will never be over.

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NEW ULM (MN)
Star Tribune (Minneapolis) (TNS)

March 11, 2020

By Dan Browning

After tearful testimony by several survivors of clergy sexual abuse and a heartfelt apology from Bishop John LeVoir, the Catholic Diocese of New Ulm and area churches won approval Tuesday of a $34 million settlement with nearly 100 claimants.

Just as important to the victims: The diocese agreed to adopt 17 protocols designed to protect children from abuse going forward and to turn over its files on credibly accused priests.

Nineteen people — abuse survivors and their supporters — stood inside a Brown County courtroom to witness the resolution of the Diocese’s bankruptcy case and hear a formal apology from LeVoir from the witness stand.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC Kimberley

March 11, 2020

By Erin Parke, Sam Tomlin and Ben Collins

One of Australia’s most senior Catholic Bishops has voluntarily stepped down after the Vatican ordered a review into the diocese of Broome, amid an ongoing police investigation into an allegation of sexual misconduct.

Bishop of Broome Christopher Saunders, 70, voluntarily stepped down on Monday, pending the review.

Archbishop of Perth Timothy Costelloe said in a statement the Emeritus Bishop of Wollongong, Peter Ingham, had been appointed to oversee the diocese effective from Tuesday.

“Bishop Christopher Saunders … has voluntarily stood aside from the ordinary administration of the diocese for the duration of the visitation,” he said.

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ROCKVILLE CENTRE (NY)
Channel 12 TV

March 10, 2020

Members of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, are renewing calls for Bishop John Barres to resign and for him to release the names of all of the priests credibly accused of abuse.

The group is speaking out after a priest was sentenced to one to two years for indecent assault in Pennsylvania.

Barres was the bishop who appointed the priest to the parish where the abuse took place. That priest was removed from his prior parish after abuse allegations there.

Attorney Mitch Garabedian has represented hundreds of survivors of sexual abuse by priests over the years.

“There’s no reason that Bishop Barres should not have just gone to the police when he first learned of these accusations instead of practicing a cover-up,” said Garabedian.

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MICHIGAN
MLive.com

March 11, 2020

By Justine Lofton

A former Catholic priest who allegedly abused his power to sexually abuse children while working in the Upper Peninsula was arraigned on more criminal sexual conduct charges on Tuesday, March 10.

Gary Allen Jacobs, 74, was arraigned on two additional criminal sexual conduct cases that he reportedly committed in the early 1980s while serving as a priest under the Catholic Diocese of Marquette in the Upper Peninsula, the Michigan Department of Attorney General announced.

In January, Jacobs was charged with seven counts of criminal sexual conduct in three separate cases that allegedly occurred in Ontonagon and Dickinson counties, the release said.

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LANSING (MI)
WZZM-TV, Channel 13

March 11, 2020

Former priest Gary Jacobs was arrested in January in New Mexico. He was returned to Michigan for his arraignment.

A former priest under the Catholic Diocese of Marquette in the Upper Peninsula was returned to Michigan for an arraignment on two additional criminal sexual conduct cases that he committed back in the 1980s, according to Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel’s office.

Gary Allen Jacobs was formally arraigned on Tuesday in Ontonagon County. He was originally charged in January on seven criminal sexual conduct charges in three separate cases that happening in Ontonagon and Dickinson counties, a press release from the attorney general’s office said.

Since January, two new victims have come forward making sexual assault reports against the 74-year-old, who now lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico. In both cases, he was charged with three criminal sexual conduct counts stemming from incidents that happened between Jan. 1981 and Dec. 1984.

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BROOME (AUSTRALIA)
Catholic News Agency

March 11, 2020

Australian Bishop Christopher Saunders of Broome has temporarily stepped back from his duties following allegations of historical sexual abuse. The Vatican has begun an investigation into claims that Saunders sexually abused boys several decades ago.

Archbishop Timothy Costelloe, SDB of Perth, metropolitan archbishop of the province, announced that Saunders voluntarily stepped aside on Tuesday, March 10, in a letter to the diocese.

Bishop Peter Ingham, emeritus bishop of the diocese of Wollongong has been named as the Apostolic Visitor of the Broome diocese while the investigation continues.

“The Holy See, conscious of the particular situation in the Diocese of Broome and concerned for the pastoral care of the clergy, religious and laity of the Diocese, has appointed Most Reverend Peter W Ingham, Emeritus Bishop of Wollongong, Apostolic Visitator to the Diocese, effective today,” wrote Costelloe on March 10.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
The Tablet

March 11, 2020

By Mark Bowling

The High Court of Australia has heard from Cardinal George Pell’s lawyer that trial evidence presented to jurors raised reasonable doubt that Pell sexually abused two choirboys after Sunday Mass more than two decades ago.

Prime amongst the questions of doubt raised by top appeals barrister, Bret Walker SC, is how Cardinal Pell could have sexually assaulted the boys in the priests’ sacristy of Melbourne’s St Patrick’s Cathedral, when according to the congregation’s master of ceremonies, the cardinal was on the front steps greeting parishioners.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Catholic News Agency via National Catholic Register

March 11, 2020

The legal team for Cardinal George Pell laid out their case for appeal before Australia’s High Court Wednesday.

Cardinal Pell himself remained in his prison cell, not permitted at the proceedings, while his lawyers presented arguments before the seven-judge court in Canberra March 11.

Cardinal Pell is seeking to appeal the 2-1 split decision of the Court of Appeal in Victoria to sustain his 2018 conviction on five counts of child sexual abuse over two separate instances.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
AFP

March 11, 2020

Lawyers for disgraced Cardinal George Pell claimed Wednesday he remains behind bars for child sex abuse based on “wrong” and “egregious” legal decisions, as they concluded a last-ditch appeal in Australia’s top court.

The 78-year-old former Vatican treasurer is trying to overturn a six-year sentence for sexually assaulting two choirboys in the 1990s.

Pell, who once helped elect popes, is the highest-ranking Catholic Church official to be convicted of child sex crimes.

He was not present for the two-day hearing at the High Court in Canberra, but supporters and protesters gathered outside, waving Australian flags and carrying rival signs that read “keep the faith Cardinal Pell” and “Burn in hell Pell”.

The court’s seven judges could decide to reject the appeal — leaving Pell to serve the remainder of his sentence — or allow it, giving him the prospect of walking free. They could also send the case back to a lower court to reconsider.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

By John Ferguson

March 10, 2020

Lawyers for sex abuse survivors have quietly weighed further legal action against George Pell and the Catholic Church as the cardinal’s home diocese of Ballarat fights to fund payouts and run its day-to-day operations.

Legal sources have revealed that several people have surfaced to discuss allegations against Pell, 78, with potential civil action also flowing from some of the criminal charges that did not go to trial.

As Pell’s last-gasp High Court deliberations begin on Wednesday, The Australian can reveal that his incarceration has prompted inquiries from several people considering taking legal action against the cardinal.

The diocese of Ballarat or the church’s insurers are most at risk of having to fund any claims relating to his younger days in the church. Diocese of Ballarat business manager Andrew Jirik confirmed that other than Pell, the church still had dozens of outstanding abuse claims it was processing, and the church believed it could fund payments.

“We don’t know when this is going to end,’’ he said.

“We’d have dozens (of abuse claims) still outstanding.’’

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AUSTRALIA
SkyNews.com.au

March 11, 2020

Sky News host Chris Kenny says there has been an “incredible and understandable amount of public interest in this country and around the world,” over Cardinal George Pell’s child sex abuse conviction.

George Pell will remain behind bars in Victoria on Wednesday, while his legal teams appeals his case in Canberra.

The High Court appeal will be Pell’s last chance to have his conviction overturned, as the 78-year-old’s fate lies in the hands of a full bench of high court judges.

Over the two-day hearing they will assess whether the jury‘s verdict was unreasonable when finding Pell guilty on five charges of abusing two choir boys in the 1990s while he was Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Reuters

March 11, 2020

By Sonali Paul

Lawyers for George Pell began a final bid on Wednesday to overturn the former Vatican treasurer’s conviction for sexually abusing two choirboys, arguing in Australia’s highest court that he could not have committed the offences.

Cardinal Pell, 78, began serving a six-year prison sentence a year ago, becoming the highest ranking Catholic clergyman worldwide to be jailed for child sex offences.

The High Court of Australia began a two-day hearing on Wednesday that marks Pell’s last avenue of appeal. The seven justices could throw out his application. If they proceed, they have the options of acquitting Pell, rejecting his appeal or sending the case back to a lower court.

Pell was convicted by a jury in December 2018 and sentenced in March 2019 on one charge of sexual penetration of a child under 16 and four charges of an indecent act with a child under 16. The offences occurred in the 1990s when Pell was archbishop of Melbourne.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Sydney Morning Herald

March 11, 2020

By Chip Le Grand

The case of George Pell, now before Australia’s highest court, has returned to the problem that has plagued this extraordinary legal saga in the five years since a former choirboy first told his story to police – when exactly, could the alleged abuse have taken place?

In putting forward Cardinal Pell’s arguments to have his conviction for historic child sex offences overturned, Bret Walker SC led the High Court through the needle the prosecution was required to thread to show Pell had an opportunity to commit these appalling crimes.

To anyone who has followed this case through its protracted judicial course, Mr Walker’s recounting of select evidence to the full bench will be familiar:

How could the then Archbishop of Melbourne have sexually assaulted two boys in in the priests’ sacristy of St Patrick’s Cathedral in 1996 when, according to Monsignor Charles Portelli, the congregation’s master of ceremonies, Pell would have been on the front steps, greeting parishioners after Sunday Mass at the time of the offence?

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
The Australian

March 11, 2020

By Olivia Caisley and John Ferguson

George Pell’s habit of talking to parishioners on the front steps of St Patrick’s Cathedral for at least 10 minutes after solemn mass and the alleged improbability of his sexual assault of two boys are the defining factors­ in his High Court appeal.

On Wednesday his silk, Bret Walker SC, outlined what he claimed was a series of problems with the Victorian Court of Appeal­’s majority judgment, argui­ng that Pell’s convictions were wrong.

Amid doubts over the Court of Appeal’s use of video evidence while reviewing the convictions, Mr Walker said the cardinal would spend between 10 and 20 minutes on the steps greeting parishioners after mass — effect­ively providing him with an alibi.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Australian Associated Press via Canberra Times

March 11, 2020

Karen Sweeney

Disgraced Cardinal George Pell is one day closer to knowing his fate, but he still has to cross a major hurdle before release from prison even becomes an option.

After a full day of arguments, his specialist appeals barrister Bret Walker SC is yet to convince the High Court’s full bench of seven judges that Pell’s case is deserving of a final chance at appeal.

That means they could drop the case at any time, without deciding one way or another.

“We’re not here to prove anything … except to show, to demonstrate, that there was unexplored possibilities that meant it was not open to the jury to convict,” Mr Walker told the court on Wednesday.

It was a case worthy of their consideration, he said.

The hearing is scheduled to run for two days and he wrapped up his arguments with a minute to spare before the end of day one.

He spent hours breaking down the case, facing tough questions from Australia’s top legal minds, while arguing for Pell to be immediately released from prison and that his five convictions for sexually abusing two choirboys at St Patrick’s Cathedral in the 1990s be quashed.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

March 9, 2020

By David Marr

On Wednesday the court sits to decide Pell’s fate. Legal argument will be dense, but watchers of the case think he may yet be acquitted

The word around the bars is: George Pell will walk free. These barristers don’t have a heads up. They’re only talking among themselves. But those who have followed this prosecution as it has made its slow and dramatic way to the high court must face the possibility that the cardinal is about to be acquitted.

Historic child sex assaults make difficult cases. The facts are frequently bizarre. So often there is no corroborating evidence and the word of the accuser is simply pitted against the denials of the accused. These trials test the criminal law.

But Pell’s accuser was undoubtedly convincing. We will never know everything he had to say about events at St Patrick’s Cathedral in late 1996 and early 1997 – he gave all his evidence in camera – but we do know that after convincing the police and prosecution authorities in Victoria, he convinced a jury and then two out of three judges of the court of appeal that Pell raped him.

Pell’s lawyers disagree, of course, but acknowledge how compelling the unknown young man’s evidence has been. Indeed, it’s the lynchpin of their case. Pell’s counsel, Bret Walker SC, argues the jury and the court of appeal were so swept away by the cardinal’s accuser – by his testimony and his demeanour in the witness box – that they downplayed the evidence in Pell’s favour.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
AAP via The Guardian

March 11, 2020

The full bench of Australia’s high court will hear arguments from Cardinal Pell’s legal team on Wednesday in what could be his final bid for freedom

The disgraced Cardinal George Pell’s future could be decided by Australia’s highest court this week, but he won’t be there to see it.

The full bench of the high court will hear his legal team’s final bid for his freedom in Canberra on Wednesday.

The 78-year-old was jailed for six years last year for sexually abusing two choirboys at Melbourne’s St Patrick’s Cathedral, shortly after being appointed archbishop of Melbourne in 1996.

He was convicted by a jury in 2018 of the rape of one 13-year-old choirboy and sexual assault of another. The first boy gave evidence against Pell while the second died in 2014.

Pell maintains his innocence.

Victoria’s court of appeal last year upheld the verdict in a 2-1 ruling.

The high court has not formally granted Pell’s application for appeal, instead referring it “for argument”.

That means after the hearing, which is scheduled to continue on Thursday, the court may refuse the application for special leave, or approve it and either allow or dismiss the appeal.

Pell’s lawyers are arguing the appeal on two grounds.

First, they say the court of appeal majority – the chief justice Ann Ferguson and president Chris Maxwell – made an error in finding Pell was required to prove the offending was “impossible” in order to raise reasonable doubt against the surviving boy’s evidence. (The third judge, Mark Weinberg, found in favour of Pell’s appeal.)

Second, they argue the majority found there was a reasonable doubt as to the existence of any opportunity for Pell to have offended, so they made an error in concluding the guilty verdicts were not unreasonable.

They want Pell’s convictions on five charges to be quashed, which would mean he is released from prison immediately.

Last month it was revealed the high court had also raised legal questions over the use of video evidence in Pell’s previous appeal, rather than relying on written transcripts alone.

Victoria’s three most senior court of appeal judges watched the recorded evidence of 12 witnesses, including the complainant, visited St Patrick’s Cathedral and examined robes.

While Pell has been in court for all his hearings so far, he will remain in Barwon prison, near Geelong, this week.

The proceedings also will not be live-streamed like his previous appeal was, meaning he’ll have to rely on information being fed back through his lawyers.

Viv Waller, who represents the surviving choirboy, said he understood appeals were part of the checks and balances within the criminal justice system.

“Both my client and I are deeply respectful of that process,” she said in November.

Lisa Flynn, who represents the father of the boy who died, says he’s hopeful the high court will uphold Pell’s convictions.

“This has been a very drawn-out process for him,” she said, adding that his faith in the legal system will be lost if Pell is freed.

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AUSTRALIA
Pearls and Irritation (blog)

March 11, 2020

The Full Bench of the High Court sitting in Canberra this week is listed to hear the Appeal in M112/19 Pell and The Queen on Wednesday 11th March.

When the Pell ‘appeal against conviction’ pursuant to S. 276 (1) (a) of the Criminal Procedure Act 2009 (Vic) lost 2:1 in the Supreme Court of Victoria: Court of Appeal in August 2019, much comment was devoted to observations that the determining majority, comprising Chief Justice Ferguson and Court of Appeal President Maxwell, were not lawyers with long, specific expertise in Criminal Law. Busy retired and recalled Appeal Justice Mark Weinberg, by contrast, was expert in the field. Such comment seemed aimed at inducing a general preference for the Weinberg position, set-out in a remarkably long dissenting judgement, detailing in embarrassing application just what was wrong with the Crown case against George Pell – in the learned Appeal Judge’s opinion.

There was a feeling amongst those who took the trouble to digest the Weinberg dissent that he had set-up a metaphorical Catherine Wheel and let fly. He had done the Applicant-Pleaders’ job for them. So it appeared, at least to the untutored eye, when the Appeal documents were filed in the High Court and detailed submissions seemed gratifyingly-consistent with the Weinberg approach.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
AAP via CathNews

March 11, 2020

By Karen Sweeney

The 78-year-old was jailed for six years last year for sexually abusing two choirboys at Melbourne’s St Patrick’s Cathedral, shortly after being appointed Archbishop of Melbourne in 1996.

He was convicted by a jury in 2018 of the rape of one 13-year-old choirboy and sexual assault of another. The first boy gave evidence against Cardinal Pell while the second died in 2014.

Cardinal Pell maintains his innocence.

Victoria’s Court of Appeal last year upheld the verdict in a 2-1 ruling.

The High Court has not formally granted Cardinal Pell’s application for appeal, instead referring it “for argument”.

That means after the hearing, which is scheduled to continue tomorrow, the court could refuse the application for special leave, or approve it and either allow or dismiss the appeal.

Cardinal Pell’s lawyers are arguing the appeal on two grounds.

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic News Service

March 10, 2020

By Carol Glatz

Since summit, Vatican continues to develop significant measures

Since Pope Francis convened a historic summit at the Vatican one year ago to address clergy sex abuse and accountability, much has been done, but advocates say more is needed.

Dozens of experts, abuse survivors and their advocates came to Rome the same week as the summit’s anniversary to emphatically reiterate the need to never let ignorance, complacency or denial ever take hold again and to make the Church safe for everyone.

The advocacy groups held media events and worked on talking to as many Vatican officials and religious leaders as possible to highlight still unaddressed concerns such as abuse by women religious, transparency in past and current Vatican investigations of known abusers and the likelihood of ever seeing “zero tolerance” for known predators.

However, significant measures have been rolled out piecemeal over the year. Here is a rundown of the most major changes:

• Pope Francis approved a sweeping new law and set of safeguarding guidelines for Vatican City State and the Roman Curia in March, just a month after the Feb. 21-24 Vatican summit.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

March 10, 2020

By John Ferguson

Lawyers for sex abuse survivors have quietly weighed further legal action against George Pell and the Catholic Church as the cardinal’s home diocese of Ballarat fights to fund payouts and run its day-to-day operations.

Legal sources have revealed that several people have surfaced to discuss allegations against Pell, 78, with potential civil action also flowing from some of the criminal charges that did not go to trial.

As Pell’s last-gasp High Court deliberations begin on Wednesday, The Australian can reveal that his incarceration has prompted inquiries from several people considering taking legal action against the cardinal.

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NEW ORLEANS (LA)
WVUE

March 10, 2020

WVUE-TV, along with The Times-Picayune | New Orleans Advocate and two other television news outlets filed a motion on Monday asking a judge to release court records on how the Archdiocese of New Orleans handled a retired priest who is accused of being a child molester.

Attorneys for the plaintiff suing the priest, Lawrence Hecker, and the archdiocese already have the documents, but the archdiocese is arguing to prevent their release.

The media has argued that Orleans Parish Civil District Court Judge Nakisha Ervin-Knott should release the documents.

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AVON (NY)
Livingston News

March 10, 2020

By Matt Leader

For the young people of Avon in the early 1980s, Joseph Larrabee was a different kind of priest.

“He was a younger guy, probably mid to upper 20s,” recalled Travis Regan, a 1984 graduate of Avon Central Schools. “Cool guy – really cool to hang out with. Just something you never really thought a priest would be.”

Regan was a 15- or 16-year-old rising junior in the summer of 1982, a period of time when he and his circle of friends saw a good deal of Father Larrabee, who’d recently been reassigned from St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Dansville to Avon’s St. Agnes Parish.

Regan recalls Larrabee as an adept social operator, good at inserting himself into existing friend groups and ingratiating himself with a younger crowd – both in church and outside it. But according to a pair of lawsuits, filed last month in Livingston County Supreme Court, those qualities hid Larrabee’s underlying nature.

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NIGERIA
face2faceafrica

March 10, 2020

By Mildred Europa Taylor

A self-styled pastor who raped church members, including children after “holy baths” has been jailed for 34 years in the UK.

60-year-old Michael Oluronbi repeatedly raped his church-goers, including six girls and a boy over a period of 20 years, asking them to partake in the “spiritual baths.”

Oluronbi, who has been based in the UK but originally from Nigeria, claimed those baths would cleanse them of evil spirits. His wife Juliana Oluronbi, who helped him abort the pregnancies of some of his victims, was also jailed for 11 years.

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INDIA
UCA News

March 9, 2020

Demonstration part of a global campaign to give Catholic women more decision-making roles

Catholic women demonstrated outside Mumbai’s cathedral demanding gender equality within the Church as part of a global campaign marking International Women’s Day on March 8.

Six women stood holding posters outside the Holy Name Cathedral after Sunday Mass seeking more roles for women in the decision-making processes of the Church.

The demonstration was part of a global campaign to claim equality and dignity for women in the Catholic Church, said Virginia Saldanha, a theologian who was part of the demonstration.

She said Voices of Faith, an international voluntary group, launched the global campaign as part of its effort to empower Catholic women to take more decision-making roles.

The group has urged its network members across the globe to join each country or create their own programs to “call for equality and dignity for women in the Catholic Church.”

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter

March 10, 2020

By Joshua J. McElwee

About 150 Catholic women in India have delivered a petition to Cardinal Oswald Gracias, asking that he take concrete steps to better include women in decision-making roles in the global church.

The women are partly responding to a February NCR interview with Gracias, in which the cardinal acknowledged a bias among the members of the Catholic Church’s all-male hierarchy against giving women more leadership roles. In that interview, he also said he and his peers must “shed this prejudice.”

The three-page memorandum praises Gracias’ words in the interview, but asks for “changes in the policies, practices and structures of the Church so that women can participate fully in … leadership.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Courier

March 9, 2020

By Craig Smith

The Boys Brigade has raised a civil action against a prominent former Fife lawyer and football club chairman convicted of sexually abusing two boys more than two decades ago.

Julian Danskin, who is now 68, was sentenced to 18 months in jail in 1999 after he was found guilty of offences towards two ex-BB members over a seven-year period while he was captain of the 1st Methil company.

The Courier has now learned the organisation is seeking damages from Danskin through the Court of Session in a case likely to be heard later this year.

Danskin’s solicitor Nigel Cooke, from principal acting solicitors McKenzies Solicitors, said: “All I am in a position to say is that the action raised by the Boys Brigade against Julian Danskin will be vigorously defended.”

The disgraced former solicitor and one time chairman of East Fife Football Club was found guilty of three charges of a sexual nature following a two-week trial before a jury at Kirkcaldy Sheriff Court in 1999.

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PERU
Catholic News Service

March 10, 2020

By Junno Arocho Esteves

Peruvian Cardinal Pedro Barreto Jimeno of Huancayo said he believes Sodalitium Christianae Vitae and any other religious movement mired in sexual abuse should be dissolved.

In an interview with Peruvian radio station Radio Santa Rosa March 9, Cardinal Barreto said that while “there are good people in Sodalitium,” the cases of sexual and physical abuse, as well as financial irregularities, cannot be ignored.

“Personally, I think that when a religious organization has committed a crime, because it has to be said that way — from the point of view of sexual abuse and the economic side where there are also problems — it has to be dissolved,” he said.

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BORONGAN (PHILIPPINES)
Catholic News Agency

March 10, 2020

The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines has highlighted the value of women, noting that abuse of women is “an affront to God.”

“God made man and woman according to his own image and likeness. Every offense against the dignity of women is a direct offense against God himself,” said Bishop Crispin Varquez of Borongan, chairman of the CBCP’s Commission on Women.

“Every woman is entitled to the respect of every man and other women; no woman should ever be treated as a mere object for another person’s satisfaction.”

The prelate issued a statement following International Women’s Day on Sunday. He decried the terrible actions women often face, such as prostitution, sexual abuse, violence, and discrimination.

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GUAM
KUAM News

March 10, 2020

Another claim of child sexual abuse has been filed using the initials JJJ to protect her identity, she alleges that when she was around 9 or 10 years old she was sexually molested and abused by Father Kieran Hickey. He is now deceased.

JJJ alleges that while he was a priest at St Jude’s Church in Sinajana he would repeatedly sexually molest her. JJJ is seeking no less than $5 million in damages as well a jury by a jury of six.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

March 9, 2020

By Josh Robertson

Anglican Church officials wrongly told a woman who was sexually abused more than 60 years ago they had to hold off resolving her complaint, then offered a payout and an apology if she agreed to a gag clause.

The church’s Brisbane diocese has admitted to again failing Beth Heinrich over her 1995 complaint, which culminated in then-governor-general Peter Hollingworth publicly blaming her for a priest sexually exploiting her as a 15-year-old.

Its apology for causing her “additional trauma and distress” through “unacceptable delays” came a day after the ABC questioned its latest missteps in the case, which led to Dr Hollingworth’s public downfall but still fuels calls for him to be stripped of millions of dollars of public benefits.

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LANSING (MI)
Lansing State Journal

March 10, 2020

By Kara Berg

A former youth group leader at a Lansing church pleaded no contest to sexually assaulting three teenage boys.

Jessica Leese, 36, initially was charged with seven counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct and one count of fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

March 10, 2020

By Nicole Mills and Steven Schubert

The principal of a Catholic school in country Victoria has praised the “unbelievably courageous” child sexual abuse survivors who brought a former teacher to justice for his crimes.

Warning: This article contains a description of child sexual abuse.

Trinity College Colac principal Paul Clohesy attended the court hearings of former teacher Kevin Wilmore Myers, who pleaded guilty to 12 charges involving nine victims spanning from the 1980s to 90s.

Myers was sentenced in the County Court to 15 years in jail for the historical child sexual abuse offences.

Myers, now aged 74, worked as a science teacher at Trinity College Colac, where he met most of his victims.

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NEW JERSEY
NorthJersey.com

March 9, 2020

By Nicholas Katzban

A former Morris Catholic High School teacher arrested on sexual assault charges allegedly engaged in years-long relationships with two female students that included sending nude pictures and a sexually explicit gift to at least one victim.

In an affidavit filed in Denville municipal court on Sunday, local police said Carlos Franco-Leon, 42, of Rockaway Township, also arranged a rendezvous at a nearby hotel with one girl and engaged in sexual activity with another in the classroom. The girls’ names and ages were not released by police.

On Sunday, Morris County Prosecutors announced the charges against Franco-Leon, who had also been volleyball coach at the school. He left Morris Catholic in 2018 and later became the varsity girls volleyball coach at Roselle Catholic High School in Union County, but has been suspended from that job as well, a spokeswoman for the Archdiocese of Newark said over the weekend.

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AUSTRALIA
Port News

March 10 2020

By Caroline Schelle

Pedophile teacher Kevin Myers molested schoolboys and then lied about his family dying to get sympathy from a Victorian judge.

The predator worked as a science teacher at Trinity College in Colac when he abused boys aged between 13 and 17 in the early 1980s.

The 74-year-old admitted sexually assaulting seven boys during his time at the Catholic school.

Myers claimed his wife and child died in a car accident, and that his sister died of bowel cancer.

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WASHINGTON (PA)
Observer-Reporter

March 10, 2020

By Barbara Miller

A woman who said she was victimized by a St. Hilary Elementary School teacher around 1973 when she was in sixth grade filed suit Monday in Washington County Court.

The woman, who is identified only by the initials “D.W.M.,” calls the male teacher “John Doe,” although a footnote in the complaint said his name will be made available during confidential pretrial evidence gathering known as discovery.

Named as defendants in the suit are St. Hilary parish, 320 Henderson Ave., Washington, and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Sydney Morning Herald

March 10, 2020

By Chip Le Grand

The full bench of the High Court has set aside two days to hear the case of George Pell. If his lawyers are correct, the guilt, reputation and legacy of Australia’s most influential living clergyman will turn on six minutes.

In its final argument submitted in preparation for Wednesday’s hearing, Cardinal Pell’s legal team drew the court to the greatest doubt that lingers over Pell’s conviction for child sex offences.

When, after saying a Solemn Sunday Mass at St Patrick’s Cathedral, would the archbishop of Melbourne find himself alone in the priests’ sacristy with two choirboys for the five to six minutes required to assault them?

And, when this grotesque abuse of trust was being perpetrated, where were the seven altar servers who, at the completion of the mass, file into the sacristy to bow to the crucifix?

These questions mean little to anyone unfamiliar with the arcane liturgical practices of the Catholic Church. They also go to the heart of the central issue before the High Court; whether it was open to the jury, on the whole of the evidence, to find Pell guilty.

The listing of the case in the cavernous Courtroom 1 of the High Court building in Canberra, indicates that all seven judges are presiding. There are three possible outcomes.

In November last year, the two most junior members of the bench, Justice James Edelman and Justice Michelle Gordon, referred a decision on special leave to the full bench. This means that, even though the court has cleared its calendar to deal with Pell, it hasn’t yet decided whether to grant leave.

The second is the court may grant leave and dismiss the appeal.

In either of these scenarios, Pell would remain a convicted child sex offender and serve the remainder of his minimum, three year and eight month prison sentence.

La Trobe University law professor Patrick Keyzer, a former associate to retired High Court chief justice Gerard Brennan, believes this is the most likely outcome.

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CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Associated Press

March 10, 2020

By Rod McGuirk

The most senior Catholic to be convicted of child sex abuse will take his appeal to Australia’s highest court on Wednesday in potentially his last bid to clear his name.

Cardinal George Pell was sentenced a year ago to six years in prison for molesting two 13-year-old choirboys in Melbourne’s St. Patrick’s Cathedral while he was the city’s archbishop in the late 1990s.

He was convicted by the unanimous verdict of a Victoria state County Court jury in December 2018 after a jury in an earlier trial was deadlocked.

A Victoria Court of Appeal rejected his appeal against his convictions in a 2-1 majority decision in August last year.

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RAPID CITY (IA)
KOTA-TV

March 9, 2020

By Jack Caudill

The trial of a former Rapid City Catholic priest accused of stealing from church collections is now in the hands of the jury.

The jury got the case of 41-year old Marcin Garbacz after closing arguments Monday morning..
Garbacz is facing a total of 65 charges, including wire fraud, money laundering, transportation of stolen money and filing a false tax return.

In his closing statement Monday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Benjamin Patterson told the jury that they believe Garbacz stole nearly $260,000 from parishes in the Rapid City Diocese, depositing the money in his bank account, then taking that money across state lines when he moved to Missouri and didn’t declare the money on his tax return.

Patterson said, “The scheme to defraud is astounding. The evidence is overwhelming.”

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PITTSBURGH
Associated Press

March 9, 2020

A judge in western Pennsylvania has thrown out the conviction of a retired Roman Catholic priest accused of having assaulted a boy almost two decades ago.

Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Anthony Mariani said Monday he believed the Rev. Hugh Lang hadn’t received a fair trial. He said prosecutors should not have been allowed to submit evidence that Lang did an Internet search for defense attorneys before the release of a grand jury report on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.

A spokesman for the county district attorney’s office vowed an appeal to Superior Court, saying officials believed the decision was “contrary to the law.”

The 89-year-old defendant was convicted last year of indecent assault and other charges involving a preteen boy in 2001 when he was pastor of St. Therese of Lisieux Parish in Munhall. Authorities alleged that during altar boy training, Lang molested and photographed the child. Lang testified that he didn’t know the alleged victim and denied any abuse.

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PITTSBURGH (PA)
KDKA-TV (CBS affiliate, Ch. 2)

March 9, 2020

By Andy Sheehan

After being convicted by Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Mark Tranquilli in December 2019, a retired priest accused of sexually abusing a boy in Munhall almost two decades ago will be getting a new trial.

On Monday, Judge Anthony Mariani overturned the conviction handed down by Tranqulli that Hugh Lang molested an 11-year-old back in 2001.

Mariani ruled that Tranquilli allowed evidence that should have been inadmissible and convicted Lang on a felony charge that was past the statute of limitations.

“I am ordering a new trial,” Mariani said from the bench. “I do not believe this was a fair trial.”

Tranquilli was reassigned to administrative duties last month after KDKA first reported he allegedly referred to a black woman juror as “Aunt Jemima”.

President Judge Kim Berkley Clark has temporarily removed Tranquilli from the bench and reassigned Lang’s case to Mariani for sentencing. But now other Tranqulli rulings are also in doubt.

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ROCK ISLAND (IL)
Quad Cities Online

March 10, 2020

By Linda Cook

Sometimes, John Onderko celebrates Mass alone in his home in Rock Island.

Other times, he hears confessions from people who knew him from the old days, before he was barred from priestly duties by the Roman Catholic Church over sexual abuse allegations. A priest for 58 years, Onderko served from June 1981 through June 1993 at St. Mary’s in Moline, then was reassigned to LaSalle, Ill., and served at numerous other parishes in Illinois.

Onderko, 83, no longer can publicly represent himself as a priest or engage in any priestly functions. Yet he maintains his innocence. Where other accused priests have quietly retired or admitted their guilt, Onderko is suing the Diocese of Peoria, saying he was denied due process and stripped of priestly duties by a church eager to quell public outcry over the global sex-abuse scandal.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

March 10, 2020

By Barney Zwartz

Father Vincent Ryan was a vile and depraved man, a sex abuser with no compunction, who was guilty of sexual assault of altar boys and even trying to make prepubescent boys have sex with each other. So it is difficult to make sense of the slight, elderly, occasionally bewildered and apparently remorseful priest – yes, despite everything he is still a priest – in Sarah Ferguson’s new ABC documentary Revelation.

In the first of a three-part series, Ferguson tries to get into the mind of a paedophile who abused 33 boys aged six to 17 – with the connivance, one could almost say, of the leadership of the Catholic Newcastle-Maitland diocese, who knew what was going on and simply moved him from parish to parish.

In 1997, Ryan was jailed for 14 years for his crimes, which he committed over 20 years from 1975. Last year, he was tried on two new charges and, according to the documentary, for the first time in an Australian court ABC cameras were allowed to film the trial. Although the first episode does not contain the verdict, Ryan was sentenced to another three years’ jail.

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PENNSYLVANIA
PennLive.com

March 9, 2020

By Ivey DeJesus

One of five Dauphin County sisters who were sexually abused as children by a priest in the Harrisburg Diocese has been selected as a member of the committee that will oversee the diocese’s federal bankruptcy case.

Lara Fortney-McKeever along with two other survivors of clergy sex abuse have been appointed by the U.S. Bankruptcy Trustee’s Office to serve on the committee.

The other two survivors are Mark J. Padula Jr., and Patrick Duggan.

The court on Friday also named Rob Kugler as the lead legal counsel to the committee. Kugler, a Minneapolis attorney, has represented sexual abuse survivors in lawsuits against the Catholic Church.

The committee – known as the Official Committee of Tort Claimants – will represent the interests of all other parties and survivors in the case, and will have a saying in critical decisions, including determining what monies and diocesan assets will be tapped to make final determinations on settlement.

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NEWTON (MA)
Digital Journal

March 9, 2020

Eighteen years after The Boston Globe brought to light widespread clergy abuse in the Archdiocese of Boston, Voice of the Faithful, founded within weeks of the Globe’s revelations, continues to address the scandal. VOTF members and others will gather later this year to promote their visions of a just Church. The organization’s 2020 Conference: Visions of a Just Church will take place on Saturday, Oct. 3, 2020, at the Boston Marriott Newton Hotel in Newton, Mass.

Offering her own vision of a just Church, the conference’s featured speaker will be internationally acclaimed theologian and Catholic studies scholar Phyllis Zagano, Ph.D. Dr. Zagano has lectured widely in this country and abroad, and she is a member of the Papal Commission for the Study of the Diaconate of Women. She has published hundreds of articles and reviews in the popular press and peer-reviewed journals and is the author or editor of twenty books in religious studies, including groundbreaking work on women in the diaconate, several of which have received awards from the Catholic Press Association and College Theology Society.

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AdamHorowitzLaw.com (law firm blog)

March 9, 2020

Feel like playing along with a little experiment?

Let’s imagine you wanted to set up a panel on the Catholic abuse and cover up crisis.

BUT. . . you want to make sure it’s totally ineffective.

How would you do it? Here’s our recipe.

First, we’d appoint only Catholics. More insularity in an institution that’s been insular for centuries can’t help.

Second, we’d pick only men. More male dominance in an institution that’s been dominated by men for centuries can’t help.

Third, we’d tap only ordained clerics. More clerics in an institution that’s been crippled by clericalism for centuries can’t help.

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NEW ORLEANS (LA)
NOLA.com

March 9, 2020

By Ramon Antonio Vargas

The Times-Picayune | New Orleans Advocate and the city’s three leading television news outlets filed a motion Monday asking a judge to publicly release court records detailing the Archdiocese of New Orleans’ handling of a retired priest who stands accused of being a serial child molester.

Attorneys for an alleged victim suing both the priest, Lawrence Hecker, and the archdiocese already have the documents in question, but the archdiocese has claimed the records are confidential and subject to a protective order preventing their release.

The media outlets’ motion argues that Orleans Parish Civil District Court Judge Nakisha Ervin-Knott should release the documents because they contain information that community members could use to protect themselves.

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LIMA (PERU)
Catholic News Agency

March 9, 2020

A Peruvian cardinal has said that the Vatican has been asked to dissolve the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, a Peruvian religious community whose founder sexually and psychologically abused members, and committed other abuses of power.

“I personally think, when a religious organization has committed a crime, and it must be said that way, from the point of view of sexual abuse and the financial matters, that there are problems and it must be dissolved; and that is the point where we are on this road, and I know that the Holy See is on that road,” Cardinal Pedro Barreto Jimeno said March 10 during an interview with Peru’s Radio Santa Rosa.

“There are good people within the Sodalitium, so we cannot put them all in the same bag. The underlying problem is that the founder is, not only seriously questioned, but I repeat, with much regret, he is a perverted person and such a person cannot transmit and encourage the sanctity of life that Pope Francis himself in an apostolic exhortation manifested.”

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BELLEVILLE (IL)
Belleville News-Democrat

March 7, 2020

By Teri Maddox

Bishop Edward K. Braxton of the Catholic Diocese of Belleville has sent a letter to priests and deacons, asking them to pray for a former Mascoutah priest who died Friday while serving a prison sentence for child pornography and methamphetamine.

“From the perspective of the Christian faith, his death is a call to each of us to pray for him in the hope that God in his love and mercy will give him a share in the eternal life that is promised to those who strive to be faithful followers of Jesus Christ,” Braxton wrote.

The bishop noted that he had visited the former priest, Gerald R. Hechenberger, when he was in St. Clair County Jail, and that Braxton had serious concerns about his well-being due to health problems.

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PITTSBURGH (PA)
KDKA

March 9, 2020

By Chris Hoffman

The conviction and sentencing of a retired priest accused of sexually abusing a boy in Munhall almost two decades ago have been vacated.

A judge threw out Father Hugh Lang’s conviction Monday.

The 89-year-old had been previously found guilty of molesting a then 10-year-old boy in 2001 while serving as a priest for St. Therese in Munhall.

He had been accused of making the victim take off his clothes, touching him inappropriately and taking naked photos of him.

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PITTSBURGH (PA)
WPXI

March 9, 2020

The sentence for a local retired priest who was found guilty of sexually abusing a boy was vacated Thursday.

Father Hugh Lang, 89, will get a new trial, but a date has not been set.

Lang, a former priest at Saint Therese in Munhall, had been found guilty in November of felony unlawful contact with a minor, along with three other misdemeanors.

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UNITED STATES
Jezebel

March 8, 2020

By Garrett Schlichte

The Catholic Church has a well-documented, albeit severely under-addressed, history of child abuse that has occurred at the hands of its priest for decades. Dioceses have attempted to hide it, to payout survivors of abuse, and now, according to a report released by ProPublica in conjunction with the Houston Chronicle, it would appear priests who’ve been credibly accused of abuse have been finding work in new dioceses abroad with the Church’s blessing.

Starting in 2018, U.S. dioceses began compiling and releasing lists of priests in their churches who have been credibly accused of sexual abuse. ProPublica and the Chronicle analyzed 52 of those lists, 30 of which had the highest number of credibly accused clergy, and found that 51 people on those lists were able to find work in the Church abroad, some still working with children.

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NEW YORK (NY)
The New York Times

March 8, 2020

Readers wonder if it has a role to play in today’s Catholic Church; another defends the tradition.

To the Editor:

Re “What Is the Power of Celibacy?” (Op-Ed, Feb. 25):

Celibacy is a gift to the church from those who are called to it, like those called to the religious life as monks or nuns. In the Bible, and in subsequent centuries, it was not a condition for priesthood. There were even married men elected to be bishop.

Making it a condition for priesthood, even for those not called to it, results in a priesthood that does not represent the church at large and results in the many evils we have seen brought to light in recent years.

Celibate clergy and lay people can do what married clergy and laity cannot, but equally the married can serve Christ in ways that the celibate cannot. The experience of married clergy in the Eastern Catholic Churches and the Anglican Ordinariates (established by Pope Benedict for those Anglicans who have entered full communion with the Catholic Church) needs to be called upon and listened to if the Catholic Church is to have a rounded view of what kind of priesthood is needed in our time.

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MADISON (WI)
GazetteXtra

March 7, 2020

By Frank Schultz

The Catholic Diocese of Madison has deemed allegations of sexual misconduct against the Rev. William A. Nolan not credible.

Nolan served in several southern Wisconsin parishes.

“In the coming days, Fr. Nolan will be reinstated to his previous status as a retired priest of the Diocese of Madison in good standing,” according to a news release from diocese communications director Brent M. King.

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WAUKESHA (WI)
FOX6 News

March 9, 2020

The jury trial begins on Monday, March 9 for a Pewaukee priest accused of sexually assaulting a 13-year-old girl.

Father Charles Hanel served at Queen of Apostles Catholic Church in Pewaukee. He’s accused of inappropriately touching a 13-year-old girl during confession.

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NORTH DAKOTA
Mea Worldwide

March 9, 2020

By Akshay Pai

New documents have named more than 50 priests with substantiated allegations of sexual abuse against a minor

A disgraced former North Dakota priest said he’s not remorseful for sexual assaults he carried out on young children decades ago.

New documents released following an investigation into more than 50 Catholic Clergy from the Fargo and Bismarck Dioceses have named 53 priests with substantiated allegations of sexual abuse of a minor, including one Martin Cullen.

Cullen from Fargo was removed from the ministry in 1992 because of the allegations and admitted to Valley News Live that he sexually abused two children but said he wasn’t sorry for his crimes. He did concede he regretted the emotional abuse his victims may feel now but said no more.

Other priests mentioned in those documents include Fernando Sayasaya, who was sentenced to 20 years in prison for molesting two children in Cass County, and Abraham Anthony, who was charged in Stutsman County for sex crimes against boys in 2000 but fled to India and died before he could be arrested.

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MADISON (WI)
Associated Press

March 8, 2020

Sexual misconduct allegations made against a retired Wisconsin Catholic priest who was acquitted last year on charges he sexually assaulted an altar boy are not credible, the Diocese of Madison said.

The diocese announced Saturday that William Nolan will return to his previous status as a retired priest of the Madison Diocese “in good standing.” The announcement comes after the church’s investigation into two separate allegations made against Nolan and his acquittal during a weeklong trial in September on charges that he sexually assaulted an altar boy over several years, starting in 2006.

Bishop Donald Hying said Nolan is owed “the presumption of innocence and right to a good name,” especially after his acquittal and the lack of evidence found in support of the allegations against him. Nolan will be allowed to minister publicly as a priest again, the diocese said.

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ROME (ITALY)
Crux Now via Angelus

March 9, 2020

By Inés San Martín

Recently the Vatican announced Pope Francis has created a task force to help bishops’ conferences around the world address the clerical sex abuse crisis. The lineup is impressive, but much like a high-profile February 2019 summit on child protection, laypeople — women in particular — are the missing link.

The eight-man lineup for the task force includes seven clerics, two of whom are regarded by all sides as part of the solution to the abuse crisis: Maltese Archbishop Charles Scicluna, once the Vatican’s top prosecutor on priestly abuse of minors; and German Father Hans Zollner, SJ, a member of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors and director of the Center for Child Protection of Rome’s Gregorian University.

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GLASGOW (SCOTLAND)
Daily Record

March 9, 2020

The Jesuit was removed from “ministry” on February 22 and the school informed four days later.

By Keith McLeod

A Jesuit priest has been removed from a prestigious fee-paying Catholic school and reported to police amid a “disclosure” of historical abuse against children.

The man was taken out of £13,455-a-year St Aloysius’ College in Glasgow after it received a report from the Jesuit safeguarding officer in London.

The Jesuit was removed from “ministry” on February 22 and the school informed four days later.

St Aloysius’ College then contacted Police Scotland and passed on the information it had received.

Last year, the school was rocked by historical allegations of sexual abuse against children.

In an email to parents, headmaster Matthew Bartlett said the individual “came into the school in their capacity as a Jesuit, which required minimal interaction with children whilst carrying out his duties.

“However, all appropriate safeguarding procedures were in place, as always is the case with anyone coming into the school. We have been informed by the Jesuits that the reason for his removal from ministry is not related to his time at St Aloysius’ College, but a period of time over 35 years ago.”

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MUMBAI (INDIA)
The Hindu

March 9, 2020

By Jyoti Shelar

Memorandum to Archbishop calls for equal participation

On International Women’s Day on Sunday, women have demanded equality in the Catholic Church of India. In a memorandum submitted to Cardinal Oswald Gracias, the Archbishop of Bombay who is also the president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India and advisor to Pope Francis, women have called for a prophetic church where their voices count, and demanded respect from the clergy in their communication.

“We seek changes in the policies, practices and structures of the church so that women can participate fully in its life and leadership,” said the memorandum, which has 140 signatures and is being circulated to gather more endorsements. “Every year, we celebrate International Women’s Day with the full support of the bishops and clergy, but the concerns and frustrations of women within the church remain the same. We have leadership training for women but there are no spaces for them to exercise this leadership,” it said.

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MORRISTOWN (NJ)
Morristown Daily Record

March 8, 2020

By William Westhoven

A former Morris Catholic High School volleyball coach was charged with aggravated sexual abuse of two minor female students between 2015 and 2019, Morris County prosecutors announced Sunday.

Carlos A. Franco-Leon, 42, of Rockaway Township was taken to the Morris County Correctional Facility to await a court hearing on six first-degree counts of aggravated sexual assault, two counts of second-degree sexual assault and two counts of second-degree endangering the welfare of a minor.

Three Rahway men have been arrested and cocaine, heroin and cash were seized drug the execution of a search warrant at a Fulton Avenue address.
Three Rahway men have been arrested and cocaine, heroin and cash were seized drug the execution of a search warrant at a Fulton Avenue address. (Photo: ~File)

He is alleged to have committed sexual acts on female students known to him while he was working as a teacher and volleyball coach at Morris Catholic in Denville.

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NEW YORK (NY)
Crux

March 9, 2020

By Christopher White

A new analysis of diocesan lists of priests credibly accused of sexual abuse in the United States finds that more than 50 such clerics have been able to continue in ministry in another country, including work with minors, suggesting global gaps in the Church’s response to the abuse crisis.

The findings, published jointly last week by ProPublica and the Houston Chronicle, is a follow-up to an investigative effort commenced last year and published in January that includes the launch of an independent database listing nearly 6,000 priests accused of abuse in America.

Reporters from the two outlets analyzed lists from 52 U.S. dioceses, which revealed 51 priests facing allegations who continued in new assignments outside of the U.S., including Nigeria, Ireland, the Philippines, and Mexico, which proved to be the most common destination for such priests.

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MANILA (PHILIPPINES)
UCA News

March 9, 2020

Activists take aim at Duterte during International Women’s Day marches

The exploitation of women and other abuses committed against them are “an affront to God,” according to an official of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP).

Every offense against the dignity of women is a sin, said Bishop Crispin Varquez of Borongan, chairman of the CBCP’s commission on women.

He cited sexual abuse, violence, prostitution and discrimination as being the main violations against the “intrinsic being” of women.

“Man and woman are equal in dignity,” Bishop Varquez stressed. “Their true relationship is to complement and complete each other.”

Meanwhile, hundreds of Filipino women set aside coronavirus fears and took to the streets of Manila and other cities for a rally to mark International Women’s Day on March 8.

During the rally protesters burned a large effigy of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, whom they accuse of being the country’s chief misogynist.

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AUSTRALIA
BigNewsNetwork.com (blog)

March 7, 2020

By Chris Friel

“He didn’t say in evidence or committal or anywhere that the wine bottle was in the sink area. He said it was in the alcove area So he always maintained that the wine bottle was there in the alcove. He never maintained it was in that new sink area we know exists now.” Mark Gibson, Closing Address.

In Locating the Wine in the Alcove I argued that the video we have of the police interview with Pell in Rome undermines the claim that, as far as the original story goes, the complainant was right about the wine. He did not locate wine in the alcove but rather in what was called a “storage kitchenette” immediately to the left of the door.[i] If this argument can be sustained it is significant for two reasons. First, it removes the Crown’s contention that the complainant’s knowledge of the “correct” location of the wine enhances his credibility, and second, it positively damages his credibility. This is because the complainant’s so-called knowledge of the layout is actually a knowledge about furniture that was only put in after 1996 which in turn suggests a visit or a coach with up-to-date information.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

March 7, 2020

By John Ferguson

It is a measure of George Pell’s lot that he finds himself in notionally better surrounds but not necessarily better company.

The cardinal, still Australia’s most senior Catholic, will monitor next week’s High Court developments while in isolation in his ­relatively new home at Victoria’s maximum-security Barwon Prison, near Geelong.

Barwon is a hole that swallowed gangland murderer Carl Williams but it’s not quite as deep as Pell’s former holding cell in the centre of Melbourne.

Pell, 78, now has more room to move, with a more modern but still austere toilet, shower and general living facilities. He is served shoddy food and his main human contact is with the prison guards who bring him his medication for twin heart conditions.

It remains a life of deprivation.

Given his convictions, most people will be happy with Pell’s plight. For others who have followed the facts of the case closely, including the brightest minds in the law, next week’s High Court appeal will be a significant moment in Australian legal history.

There are deep divisions about whether Pell should even be in jail.

“If you look at all of the case law about unreasonable verdicts, it’s (the Pell convictions) right on the borderline of what’s reasonable and what isn’t,’’ Sydney University academic Andrew Dyer told ­Inquirer.

Dyer, who has co-authored a paper on the Pell case with the university’s Professor David Hamer, is not predicting in any way how the High Court will act. Nor is anyone else with any certainty.

But the paper, published in the Sydney Law Review, makes clear what many independent voices suspect: Pell’s convictions may be flawed.

Dyer and Hamer write that it appears open to the High Court to overturn the Pell verdicts on the basis of the cumulative effect of the evidence, but they doubt the court will make this finding.

They express concern about the impact that rejection of the Pell decision would have on the standing of juries.

Dyer and Hamer’s views are not black and white. They also make clear that the law allows for convictions based largely or solely on the complainant’s evidence and a different tack would “undermine the prohibition against child ­sexual assault’’.

This is a tick to the prosecution’s heavy reliance on the surviving choirboy, whose evidence was central to the Pell convictions.

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KENYA
Vatican News

March 7, 2020

By Benedict Mayaki

AMECEA organizes meeting of Child Protection Officers to examine policy implementation in member conferences

One year ago, Pope Francis urged Bishops to renew child protection guidelines during his address at the conclusion of the meeting for the protection of minors. This week, the Association of Member Episcopal Conferences in Eastern Africa (AMECEA) organized a three-day meeting with the goal of examining the effects of policies regarding the protection of children and vulnerable adults in its member countries.

The meeting, from 3 – 5 March, took place in the diocese of Nakuru, Kenya. It is the second of its kind, after a similar one was held in Ethiopia last year.

Speaking at the start of the meeting, the Secretary-General of AMECEA, Fr. Anthony Makunde said: “After a year, we have taken some time to do a bit of self-monitoring, a self-evaluation as a region to see for ourselves how far we have managed to journey this road, which the mother Church has called us to journey on.”

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KINSHASA (DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO)
La Croix International

March 5, 2020

By Lucie Sarr

Papal nuncio reminds bishops they can be removed if they are not vigilant

The bishops of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have held their first training session on the protection of minors in the Church.

Meeting from Mar. 2-4 at a Caritas center in Kinshasa, the session was the Congolese Church’s latest effort to implement Pope Francis’ “motu proprio,” Vos estis lux mundi (You are the light of the world), on sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable persons.

The training session was funded and facilitated by the apostolic nunciature in DRC.

Archbishop Ettore Balestrero, who has been the pope’s representative to the county since July 2018, reminded the bishops of their responsibilities in the area of child protection.

“The universal Church is giving the bishops a great deal of space for the exercise of their function as judges in their respective dioceses,” he explained.

He warned them that bishops are called to account and could be dismissed if they have been seriously negligent in the exercise of their pastoral office.

Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo of Kinshasa, vice-president of the national bishops’ conference (Cenco), presided at the Mar. 2 opening Mass.

In his homily, the Capuchin Franciscan spoke of the situation of children in the city of Kinshasa, the seat of his archdiocese.

Archbishop Marcel Utembi of Kisangani, who is currently Cenco president, said the Church has a duty to administer justice well when dealing with crimes that violate the dignity of the child.

Measures for the protection of minors

Father Georges Kalenga, second secretary general of Cenco, outlined the measures the bishops have taken to protect minors in an interview last October with La Croix Africa.

He noted that in 2013 they published a text entitled “Guidelines for dealing with cases of clerical sexual abuse of minors”, which emphasize that special attention must given to the victims.

It states that “in the prevention of abuse and the protection of minors, another two-fold attention is needed: the training of clerics, as well as all the faithful, and the treatment of the accused in appropriate facilities to ensure they do not offend again”.

Training

“The bishops of Cenco also insist that clerics be informed of the damage that priest sexual abuse causes the victim and that the cleric must be held responsibility at the canonical and civil level,” explained Father Kalenga in that interview.

This is being reiterated in training sessions priests must take concerning sexual abuse.
Such training is offered to all Church employees and and those who deal in any way with children in Church structures: schools, hospitals, and the Catholic Action Movement. All coordinators of Catholic schools in DR-Congo are also given child protection training.

In addition, every diocese is urged to take initiatives to promote a frank dialogue within the Living Ecclesial Communities (CEV) on the issue of sexual abuse.

The Congolese bishops’ conference has also mandated that each diocese set up an office where people can report alleged abuse.

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[Constitutional Court orders the church to deliver files reserved to a journalist]

MEDELLÍN (COLOMBIA)
El Espectador

March 3, 2020

La Arquidiócesis de Medellín tendrá que entregar información sobre los antecedentes de 43 sacerdotes pedida por el periodista Juan Pablo Barrientos. El alto tribunal señaló que esta información era de carácter semiprivada y que primaba el derecho a la información frente a la privacidad de los miembros del clero.

El periodista Juan Pablo Barrientos es reconocido por sus investigaciones relacionadas con violaciones y abusos sexuales cometidos por el clero en Colombia. Archivo El Espectador
Una nueva victoria judicial tuvo el periodista Juan Pablo Barrientos, reconocido por sus investigaciones sobre actos de pederastia cometidos por miembros de la iglesia católica colombiana y por su libro “Dejad que los niños vengan a mi”. En esta ocasión, la Corte Constitucional le dio la razón frente a la solicitud de los antecedentes de 43 sacerdotes que hacían parte de la Arquidiócesis de Medellín. Por eso, el alto tribunal le ordenó a esta comunidad que entregue estos datos solicitados por el comunicador.

[GOOGLE TRANSLATION: The Archdiocese of Medellín will have to provide information on the background of 43 priests requested by the journalist Juan Pablo Barrientos. The high court said that this information was semi-private and that the right to information prevailed over the privacy of clergy members.

A new judicial victory was the journalist Juan Pablo Barrientos, recognized for his investigations into acts of pedophilia committed by members of the Colombian Catholic Church and for his book “Let the children come to me.” On this occasion, the Constitutional Court gave him the reason for the request for the background of 43 priests who were part of the Archdiocese of Medellín. Therefore, the high court ordered this community to provide this information requested by the communicator.]

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AUSTRALIA
Lawyers Weekly

March 5, 2020

By Naomi Neilson

With the special hearing to determine George Pell’s hearing approaching fast, Sydney law professors have looked into whether or not the cardinal stands a chance.

The High Court of Australia has been asked to decide whether the Court of Appeal of Victoria (VSCA) was right in finding, by majority, that it was open to the jury at Cardinal Pell’s trial to convict him of sexually abusing two young children.

Ahead of the Full Court sitting at Parliament House on March 11 and 12, professors in Sydney Law School Andrew Dyer and Professor David Hammer argue that if the HCA grants Cardinal Pell special leave to appeal, it should reject his argument that VSCA majority reversed the onus of proof when reaching the conclusion that it did.

“[Cardinal] Pell’s claim that the VSCA majority reversed the onus of proof is dubious,” Mr Dyer and Professor Hammer wrote. “But the evidence that Pell had no opportunity to offend was strong; and it does seem open to HCA plausibly to insist Cardinal Pell’s convictions were unreasonable. Against that are considerations of judicial restraint.”

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AUSTRALIA
“Four Corners,” Australian Broadcast Corporation

March 2, 2020

By Louise Milligan

Child safety authorities have made numerous referrals to Victoria Police over allegations about teachers following a Four Corners investigation into Melbourne’s prestigious boys’ school, St Kevin’s College.

St Kevin’s new acting principal, John Crowley, Victoria’s Commissioner for Children and Young People (CCYP) and the Victorian Institute of Teaching (VIT) have been given information containing potential concerns of conduct about several teachers which has then been passed on to police for investigation.

Four Corners understands that at least four referrals by the CCYP to Victoria Police relate to Peter Finnigan, who had been a very senior member of staff at St Kevin’s and other prominent Catholic boys’ schools around Australia.

St Kevin’s has been in the spotlight since a Four Corners investigation in mid-February revealed how the school did not support a student victim through a child sex offence trial.

Five teachers have left St Kevin’s College since the story aired including the headmaster and his deputy following criticism of the school’s handling of complaints.

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WASHINGTON D.C.
National Catholic Reporter

March 6, 2020

By Tom Roberts

Archbishop Charles Scicluna, Sr. Carol Zinn speak with NCR

Two Catholic leaders recently turned the discussion about the crisis in the church away from a focus on institutional change to the less measurable work of transformation, the significance of relationships and the need for members of the hierarchy to confront that culture’s past.

Sr. Carol Zinn, a member of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Philadelphia and executive director of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, and Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta, widely considered one of the most significant forces in revealing the truth of the sex abuse crisis, advanced their ideas in separate interviews.

The two were among participants and panelists in a Feb 28-29 session organized by the Leadership Roundtable, an organization formed in 2005 following the revelations of widespread abuse and cover-up in Boston. The Leadership Roundtable event, “From Crisis to Co-Responsibility: Creating a New Culture of Leadership,” was held at the Fairmont Hotel in Washington. The two-day event explored ways in which mostly structural change could lead to more transparency and accountability and greater involvement of laypeople in the life of the church.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
LaIst

March 6, 2020

By Jessica P. Ogilvie

The Catholic Church let at least 51 priests who were credibly accused of sexual abuse move to different countries to continue working as clergy, according to an investigation from ProPublica released Friday. Of those, a handful were accused in Los Angeles prior to going elsewhere.

Among the Los Angeles-based offenders is a man ProPublica reporters describe as, “One of the most notorious cases of an accused priest moving across international borders.”

Rev. Nicolas Aguilar Rivera was transferred to L.A. after being accused of sexual abuse in Tehuácan, Mexico. Once here, Rivera allegedly molested 10 boys. Rather than strip him of his priesthood or report him to the police, however, church leaders transferred him to Mexico once again.

The news outet’s report comes from an analysis of their own database, which gathered lists of credibly accused clergy and made them public and searchable.

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MADISON (WI)
Jefferson County Daily Union

March 8, 2020

By Frank Schultz

The Catholic Diocese of Madison is reinstating the Rev. William A. Nolan to his status as a retired priest after deeming that allegations of sexual misconduct against him were not credible.

Father Nolan served in several southern Wisconsin parishes, including St. Joseph Catholic Church in Fort Atkinson from 2002-07.

“In the coming days, Fr. Nolan will be reinstated to his previous status as a retired priest of the Diocese of Madison in good standing,” according to a news release from diocese communications director Brent M. King.

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VICKSBURG (MS)
Associated Press

March 6, 2020

A Mississippi church pastor was found guilty of sexually assaulting two girls between the ages of 14 and 16.

The Rev. Troy Anthony Piccaluga was arrested in March 2018 and charged with two counts of statutory rape and one count of sexual battery.

A Warren County jury found Piccaluga guilty Thursday of one count of statutory rape and one count of sexual battery, The Vicksburg Post reported.

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