VIRGINIA
The Virginian-Pilot
By Bill Bartel
The Virginian-Pilot
April 20, 2015
A victims advocacy group said last week it will again request that Roman Catholic leaders in southeast Virginia ask parishioners whether they were molested by a friar, once based in Norfolk, who had been linked to dozens of child assaults in other states.
The new request is triggered by media reports last week that three more victims of Brother Stephen Baker reached financial settlements with church-related groups. The three said Baker abused them in the 1990s while they were teenagers at Bishop McCort High School in Johnstown, Pa.
Baker, who committed suicide in 2013, was on the faculty of a now-closed Norfolk parochial school in the 1970s. His death sparked the advocacy group’s initial request for assistance by the Richmond diocese, which includes Hampton Roads.
Becky Ianni, the Virginia director for the national organization SNAP, Survivor Network of those Abused by Priests, said she hopes that enough time has passed that anyone who might have been victimized by Baker will seek counseling.
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