ABUSE TRACKER

AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By Sean Tynan June 29, 2015

THE following is a response to Gabriel Wingate-Pearse’s opinion piece (‘‘Compassion, and so on’’ Herald, 23/6) .

I acknowledge that as the manager of Zimmerman Services, the Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle’s child protection service, I am biased. It’s not my intent to comment on the Right Reverend Greg Thompson, Anglican Bishop of Newcastle. Nor am I defending the eloquence, or otherwise, of Catholic Bishop Bill Wright and his introduction of Francis Sullivan on February 25, 2015.

Critical analysis of the diocese’s commitment to protecting children and working to address its terrible legacy of historic child sexual abuse is legitimate and important. I acknowledge our performance to date is not perfect.

However, I believe the article’s premise is unfair. Its argument is that a poor introduction by Bishop Bill at a public forum equates to a lack of commitment or leadership in addressing such issues. Shouldn’t such criticism be based on a more comprehensive consideration of words and deeds?

In my first meeting with Bishop Bill in 2011, he wanted a comprehensive briefing on the diocese’s issues of child abuse. I left absolutely certain of the bishop’s capacity and determination to lead the diocese and do everything reasonable to promote healing and to cooperate and actively support the exposure and investigation of past crimes, whilst working to maximise protection of children and minimise future risk.

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UNITED STATES
Mennonite World Review

Twelve survivors of sexual abuse and their advocates have formed an Anabaptist-Mennonite chapter of an organization that “protects the vulnerable, heals the wounded and exposes the truth.”
Leaders of the group, known as SNAP-Menno, announced its formation June 23.

SNAP stands for Survivor’s Network of Those Abused by Priests. Founded 26 years ago to expose sexual violations by U.S. Catholic clergy, it has expanded to serve survivors of predators and pedophiles from a variety of faith communities.

SNAP-Menno “provides a safe place, entirely independent of institutional structures, for Mennonite-related survivors to seek healing,” according to a news release.

The group is convened by longtime victim-advocate Ruth E. Krall, an emerita professor at Goshen (Ind.) College, with SNAP-trained survivor-advocates Cameron Altaras, Barbra Graber and advocate Jeff Altaras.

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AUSTRALIA
Broken Rites

Article updated by a Broken Rites researcher, 29 June 2015

A former Catholic priest, John Joseph Farrell, 62, appeared in court on 25 June 2015, charged with 27 sexual offences allegedly committed against five boys between 1981 and 1984 in northern New South Wales. Some offences allegedly occurred while Father Farrell was based at the Moree parish (within the territory of the Armidale Catholic diocese); and some offences allegedly occurred when Farrell visited a parish at Tweed Heads on the NSW north coast. The magistrate rejected Farrell’s request to have his name suppressed. Farrell was remanded in custody. The case is listed for its next mention in Sydney’s Central Local Court on June 30.

John Joseph Farrell was charged by a specialist team of detectives (named Strike Force Glenroe), which was established in 2012 by the Sex Crime Squad at the NSW Police Headquarters, Parramatta, Sydney. This strike force is continuing its investigations while the Farrell matters are awaiting the future court hearings.

Farrell has been living for the past three years at Harden [near Cootamundra and Young] in southern NSW, the June 25 hearing was told. Therefore, the June 25 court procedure was held in southern NSW (at the Wagga Local Court). This was a preliminary hearing to enable these 27 charges to be officially filed for the first time. Now the case, rergarding these 27 charges, has moved to Sydney’s Central Local Court.

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IRELAND
RTE News

A former Catholic archbishop has told the High Court he had sexual experiences with a number of other people while he was a bishop in Nigeria.

66-year-old Richard Burke from Tipperary is continuing his cross examination in his action for defamation against RTÉ in which he claims he was wrongly branded as a paedophile in a television documentary.

Mr Burke denies he had sex with a woman featured in the programme, Dolores Atwood, when she was 14. He claims she was 20 when they first had sex.

He told the court he had also “embraced and inappropriately touched” her sister after Ms Atwood had moved to Canada.

Mr Burke accepted in cross examination that his relationship with Dolores Atwood was not the only sexual relationship he had.

It was put to him by counsel for RTÉ Paul O’Higgins that he had relationship with a lot of others, numbering “in the teens”.

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AUSTRALIA
Northern Star

IT’S been just over a year since the Royal Commission into Institutional Child Sexual Abuse heard the harrowing stories from victims of paedophile Marist Brothers at St Carthage’s in Lismore in the 1980s, but it’s still unclear when the commission will hand down its findings.

Over eight days from June 10 to August 7, evidence was given from 17 witnesses in an attempt to establish the Marist Brothers’ response to allegations of child sexual abuse against Brother John “Kostka” Chute and Brother Gregory Sutton.

Former St Cathages assistant principal Jan O’Grady told the commission she long suspected Brother Gregory Sutton was a poison to St Carthage’s Primary School but had her warnings ignored by the Marist Brothers and the Lismore Catholic Education Office.

She said she first became concerned in 1985 when she saw the same group of about five or six children hanging about Sutton in the playground and frequently going into the store room with him to apparently collect sporting equipment.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

GREG CRAVEN HERALD SUN JUNE 30, 2015

IT is rare an entire society is traumatised. But it is undeniable we are all shattered by the evidence before the royal commission into institutional child abuse.

We have seen the leering face of evil. Horror inflicted on the innocent by monsters.

Nothing has been more traumatic than the revelations of abuse in the Catholic Church. That ministers of the kindest being ever to walk the Earth could be so cruel is almost beyond belief.

But it is beyond dispute, and those most appalled are themselves Catholic.

The victims were our friends, our families, ourselves.

Rage is an inevitable and entirely appropriate response.

But we must be careful our just rage does not lead to unjust responses.

The prime case here is Cardinal George Pell. He is such a ready target for our fury.

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CANADA
CBC News

A woman who was abused by a priest decades ago is getting ready to walk 900 kilometres across Newfoundland in an effort to improve services for abuse victims at religious institutions.

Gemma Hickey will start her walk in Port aux Basques on Thursday.

On Sunday she held a “pre-walk” around Quidi Vidi Lake in St. John’s — an opportunity for people to walk with her and learn more about why she’s taken on the challenge.

Gemma Hickey is going to walk 900 kms across Newfoundland to bring attention to the need for improved services for abuse victims of religious institutions. (CBC)

Hickey founded an organization called Pathways for men and women who have experienced abuse within religious institutions.

“It’s a deep wound in our province, and I think the best way for people to move forward and deal with it is to actually look at what happened and work toward prevention,” she said.

“We have to do that collectively. It can’t just be one individual.”

Hickey’s goal is to walk 30 kilometres every day, arriving at the Mount Cashel Memorial in St. John’s in early August.

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UNITED STATES
The Open Tabernacle: Here Comes Everybody

Posted on June 28, 2015 by Betty Clermont

Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to the United Kingdom in 2010 was supposed to be a debacle. Richard Dawkins reportedly was planning on making a citizen’s arrest of the pope because of the clerical sex abuse scandals. A mock memo suggesting the launch of “Benedict” condoms, his blessing same-sex unions, opening an abortion ward and ordaining women was widely published. Protestors wanted his “state visit” downgraded to a “pastoral visit” so the cost would be paid by the Catholic Church. Arguments for this rested on whether the Vatican counted as an actual state, and even so, state visits are for political reasons.

But by the time the pope arrived, the wind had shifted significantly. Catholic Voices, a project founded by [Opus Dei] specifically for the pope’s visit, had stepped in and provided media training to faithful Catholics who wanted to convey the joy of the Gospel through the media.”

Opus Dei, an official institution of the Catholic Church, at the top is a secret society of international bankers, financiers, businessmen and their supporters. Their goal is the same as other plutocrats – unbridled power – except they use the influence of the Catholic Church and its worldwide network of institutions exempt from both taxes and financial reporting requirements to advance right-wing parties and governments.

Co-founder of Catholic Voices, Jack Valero, is also press officer for Opus Dei in the UK. He was joined by Austen Ivereigh who works with the Opus Dei Pontifical University of the Holy Cross on conferences and making videos for their School on Church Communications.

“Inspired by the success of Catholic Voices, similar groups have appeared across the world, notably in Spain and Mexico, where Ivereigh and Valero have travelled to give training.” Right-wing National Review editor, Kathryn Jean Lopez, is the founding director of the U.S. branch of Catholic Voices. Lopez regularly lectures at Opus Dei’s Catholic Information Center on K Street, Washington D.C., as do other “leaders in the conservative policy world.”

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

Probably not, but Pope Francis and his low tax billionaire donors seem intent on trying to do so. Indeed, if US voters by the November 2016 elections fail to wake up, the pope could even succeed, at least on matters crucial to the Vatican and their subordinate US bishops. Pope Francis comes from a centuries old tradition of absolute papal monarchs who exploit secret communications and media manipulation. This has been made clear in revealing and well documented detail once again by Betty Clermont here, the stalwart Catholic grandmother and author of The Neo-Catholics. She connects many of the dots that too many in the media seem oblivious to, apparently out of indifference or self interest. What a disappointing shame many in the media are!

The pope has recently confirmed his top down and secretive approach to transparency and media matters with his new clerically controlled Vatican Secretariat for Communications. Now both Vatican finances and information will be tightly controlled by a majority of Vatican clerics answerable ultimately only to an unaccountable pope selected by unaccountable cardinals. The names and committees may change, but the monarchical structure continues. Will Pope Francis’ mythical reformer facade survive his farcical “familyless” October Family Synod or even his US elections’ focused September US visit? Can the papal “spinners” spin that fast? Time will tell, but time is running out for the pope’s “Mañana Strategy”. Catholics are running out of patience and tolerance for the pope’s continuing stall strategies.

Pope Francis, with his planned September US visit, is preparing to step up his diversionary efforts to help elect next year a US president, preferably another named Bush. This troubling papal political interference in US elections seeks the return on a long term basis of a “Vatican friendly” (1) US Supreme Court majority (as up to 5 of the 9 current Supreme Court Justices may be replaced by appointees selected by the next US president), and (2) US Justice Department/Criminal Division, each as had existed mostly under the last two “Vatican friendly” Bush presidencies. Much has changed adversely for the pope, however, since US Republican House leader John Boehner asked him many months ago to address the US Congress. These include (A) ongoing child abuse cover-up criminal proceedings in Minneapolis that could involve the seemingly troubling roles of the brother of President Barack Obama’s Chief of Staff and possibly even the pope’s US ambassador/nuncio, (B) the troubling recent disclosures about the pope’s top financial aide, Cardinal George Pell and Ireland’s former Primate, Cardinal Sean Brady, (C) the vague, almost illusory, Vatican announcement, under pressure from brave abuse survivors Peter Saunders and Marie Collins, of a “captive tribunal” for bad bishops to be set up over five years (after the pope’s own predicted departure date), (D) a Catholic revolt over clerical sex abuse cover-ups in Chile, (E) an overwhelming papal rejection vote on same sex marriage in Catholic Ireland, and even (F) the child abuse allegations about former US Speaker Dennis Hastert that US leaders, including Boehner and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, apparently missed addressing earlier, raising questions as to why no US leaders to date have called for a long overdue national investigation into institutional child sexual abuse. Indeed, the possibility that Hastert, the second in line constitutionally for eight years to be US president if the president and Vice President were unable to serve, might have been a child abuser would make the earlier presidential scandals of Clinton and Nixon seem almost minor by comparison. It seems clear that attention to Hastert’s alleged misdeeds will soon expand quickly to protected institutional child abusers, including US Catholic bishops.

Whatever it takes the pope now, it appears, is acceptable for the Vatican to secure US national political and judicial protection, even if necessary by changing the child abuse subject, including with a diversionary climate encyclical, some selective and hurried Hispanic canonizations (Fr. Junipero Serra and Archbishop Oscar Romero) and multiple wasteful and mainly media driven US papal extravaganzas. The Vatican seems hellbent to try to head off a US national investigation of institutional child sexual abuse, like the massive investigation now underway in Australia and the one now beginning in the UK. The “pope of the poor” seems as profligate in his expenditures for bishops’ protection as were the German “Bishop of Bling” and Newark’s Archbishop Myers on their lavish bathtubs. Incidentally, the Bling Bishop just represented the Vatican in good standing at the US bishops’ semi-annual conference. So much for the pope’s bishop accountability approach.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

June 29, 2015

Paul Bibby
Court Reporter

Young people who spend their childhoods in Out of Home Care are finding it virtually impossible to access their own case files because the process is choked in red tape, the Royal Commission has heard.

As the Commission continued its examination of institutional child sexual abuse on Monday, four youths who grew up in care described the instability, under-resourcing and lack of ongoing support which continue to characterise the system.

The youths, who now advocate for others in care, said that many wanted to access their case files but gave up because of the impenetrable bureaucracy such requests involved.

“I decided not to do it because it was going to be a nightmare,” Kate Finn from the Youth Movement Initiative said.

“I’ve been told that I need to have permission from anyone who can possibly be mentioned in there who is over the age of 18,” she said.

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CALIFORNIA
Merced Sun-Star

BY COREY PRIDE
Los Banos Enterprise

A Catholic priest who has been charged with possession of child pornography pleaded not guilty at his arraignment in Los Banos on Friday.

The Rev. Robert Gamel stood next to his attorney in Merced Superior Court and declared he was not guilty of a felony count of possession of matter depicting sexual conduct of a person under the age of 18.

If convicted, Gamel faces up to three years in jail or prison. Judge Harry Jacobs set Gamel’s next court appearance, a pre-preliminary hearing, for July 29 at 1:30 p.m.

Gamel, 64, was arrested June 10, following a 10-month investigation by the Los Banos Police Department.

In August, church officials told police the then-pastor of Los Banos’ St. Joseph’s Catholic Church may have obtained nude photographs of a teenage parishioner through the Internet, according to court records.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Keeping abuse “secret – very, very, secret” marred lives and smeared the church as authorities reacted poorly

Colum Kenny
PUBLISHED
28/06/2015

James Finley was abused physically and sexually as a child. He overcame the abuse and decided to become a monk. Years into his training he was abused by a priest, and quit.

Finley turned his life around. Today he is a clinical psychologist and respected spiritual teacher. In Ireland last week he gave a moving talk to mark the launch of Spire, the new Irish Spirituality Institute for Research & Education.

But his visit was overshadowed by more revelations about sex abuse here. The kind of positive religious path that he walks, one praised by Fr Michael O’Sullivan SJ who introduced him, seems choked by a Catholic Church mired in abuse and cover-ups.

It is hard to look at pictures of the late Brendan Smyth, multiple child-molester, without wincing. He abused scores of victims when church authorities let him. And it seems, the Gardai let him also.
Any idea that people “did not adequately understand” what child abuse really was “back then” was blown away last week at the Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry in Northern Ireland.

Revelations continue to emerge north of the border, where UTV in 1994 first revealed Smyth’s crimes.

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PARAGUAY
U.S. News

By PETER PRENGAMAN, Associated Press

CIUDAD DEL ESTE, Paraguay (AP) — Children awaiting surgery and women fleeing domestic violence never saw the $350,000 donated for their benefit. Then, there were the questionable property sales and the money for a cleaning business partially owned by a relative.

In the months since Pope Francis ousted the bishop of Paraguay’s second-largest diocese, questions keep surfacing about the Rev. Rogelio Livieres Plano’s management of church money.

As Paraguayan Catholics prepare to welcome Francis during his South American tour that starts July 5, new leaders of the diocese in this eastern border city are trying to erase the debt left by the controversial bishop, raising money through raffles and bingo games. Many parishioners are demanding answers.

“The former bishop ran things like a mafia,” said Carlos Pereira, a humanities professor at the Catholic University in Ciudad del Este. “How did we end up in debt? What happened to the diocese’s properties, to all its assets?”

The diocese is $800,000 in debt, a considerable sum in one of South America’s poorest countries. The arrears have come to light since Livieres Plano, a member of the conservative Opus Dei movement, was pushed out in September.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Brendan Smyth’s psychiatric records revealed at abuse inquiry give fresh insights into a child sex abuse that still haunts the Catholic church

Maeve Sheehan
PUBLISHED
28/06/2015

A man hovered in the yard beside Banbridge court house pulling on a cigarette waiting for the now retired Cardinal Sean Brady to come out.

The retired Cardinal had spent Thursday morning telling the Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry about the church’s “flawed” response to complaints about Brendan Smyth, the paedophile priest back in 1975.

The man outside the court house watched as Cardinal Brady emerged to a whirr of cameras, got into a waiting silver car and drove away. Then he told a bit of his own story. He had been sexually abused by Smyth in various children’s homes in Northern Ireland. Some years later he was doing time in Magilligan prison when Smyth was incarcerated there for abusing more than 40 children. Some of the other inmates attacked him with snooker balls in a bag but he never went near him. He was still terrified of the monster Brendan Smyth.

Last week, Northern Ireland’s Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry (HIA) resurrected the ghost of Brendan Smyth. Almost 20 years after his death, when you’d think there was little more that could shock us about paedophile priests and the protectionist Catholic hierarchy, the HIA put into the public domain decades’ worth of internal church documents, letters, medical records and police reports and transcripts.

They provide further insight into the horror of what Smyth’s crimes, marking the response of his superiors – already widely acknowledged as being woeful – as even worse. This is one case where the devil is truly in the detail.

The HIA is investigating whether systemic failures allowed Smyth, who abused at least seven boys in children’s homes, to continue abusing for so long.

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UNITED STATES
POPE FRANCIS the CON-Christ.

Paris Arrow

Pope Francis has not said a word on why Bishop Finn resigned and why Archbishop Nienstedt resigned. That’s strange. No explanation from the innate loquacious Jesuit Master of Deceits on the exact reasons why the most infamous bishops resigned under his short-term papacy. The truth is Pope Francis is not a reformer but a conformist, a chameleon and a puppet who does not have any “hard lines” but only PR campaigns –– obeying his boss the Opus Dei Beast PR Deceits Team and their cunning strategies –– to save the Vatican Empire that’s crumbling down like the Roman Empire.

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic News Agency

Vatican City, Jun 27, 2015 / 02:09 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The Vatican’s nine communications offices will soon be consolidated under the authority of the newly-established Secretariat for Communications, per a Saturday directive of Pope Francis.

The Roman Pontiff instituted the new secretariat with a motu proprio titled The current communication context, promulgated June 27. The letter states that the new management body will take effect June 29.

“The current communication context, characterized by the presence and the development of digital media, by the factors of convergence and interactivity, requires a rethinking of the information system of the Holy See and dedication to a reorganization which … must proceed decisively towards integration and a unified management,” the Pope wrote.

“For these reasons, I desire that all organizations which, thus far have dealt with communications in different ways, be brought together in a new Dicastery of the Roman Curia … thus, the communication system of the Holy See will respond in an ever more efficacious manner to the needs of the mission of the Church.”

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UNITED STATES
Religion News Service – Rhymes with Religion

Boz Tchividjian | Jun 27, 2015

A three year old child is brutally beaten by his mother’s boyfriend and then threatened to remain quiet or he’ll get another beating. One morning following another beating, the child goes to school with bruises on his face and is questioned by a concerned teacher. Petrified and not knowing what to do or say, the little boy eventually discloses the horrific abuse to the teacher who calls the police. It is later discovered that this boy had belt marks on his back and stomach, and bruises all over his body. Police also find his 22-month old sister with black eyes, burn injuries, a swollen hand, and two pigtails having been ripped out of their roots. The abuser, Darius Clark , is arrested and charged with aggravated child abuse. Justice seems to be having its way until shortly before the trial when the judge decides that the child isn’t capable of testifying against the defendant.

At trial, the judge did allow the teacher to testify about what the child had told her regarding being hit by the defendant. Fortunately, the defendant was convicted of these horrific crimes and sentenced to prison for 28 years. Unfortunately, just when it seemed as if justice had finally been served, the appellate court reversed the defendants’ conviction. The court ruled that since the child was not able to testify, the teacher’s testimony about what the child had reported violated the defendant’s constitutional right to confront his accuser.

Was the court saying that abused children who are unable to confront their abusers are simply out of luck? Was the court siding with those who hurt little ones? Where is the justice in that?

Fortunately, the appellate court didn’t have the last word. That last word was published last week in a Supreme Court decision getting a bit less attention than others, but no less important. A decision that has the potential to bring much needed justice to abused children around the country.

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IRELAND
The News

An Irish Catholic Priest Richard Burke has revealed the series of threats and blackmail by a Nigerian lady, with whom he himself admitted he had an ‘inappropriate sexual relationship’, because as a priest he had sworn to celibacy.

In a defamation suit against RTÉ, alleging he was wrongly depicted as a paedophile in the 2011 Prime Time Investigates programme Mission to Prey, Co Tipperary-born Richard Burke, now 66 years old told the court how he was pestered for money by the Nigerian lady, now Mrs. Dolore Atwood based in Canada.

In direct examination, Mr Burke told his counsel Jack Fitzgerald SC Ms Atwood sought €200,000 from him in 2009 after he had paid her some €176,000 over a number of years.
When he told her he could not get the money, she asked him, and he agreed, to have sex with her in an hotel in Halifax, Canada, he said.

He felt “terrorised” by Ms Atwood and feared she would disclose their sexual relationship which would bring disgrace and shame on himself and his ministry.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
CBS St. Louis

Associated Press/Kevin Killeen (@KMOXKilleen)

ST. LOUIS (AP/KMOX) – A St. Louis priest who was accused of sexually abusing a boy in a Catholic school bathroom before the charges were dropped earlier this month is suing the alleged victim’s parents, police and a victim’s rights group.

Barbara Dorris of The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) tells KMOX that she believes the suit is intended to send a message.

“Our fear is that this is a way to intimidate victims, witnesses and whistle-blowers…into silence,” says Dorris. “If you tell the truth, we will sue you and I think it’s intended to silence people.”

The Rev. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang, 32, filed suit Thursday in U.S. District Court, seeking unspecified damages. The suit claims he was unfairly targeted and his reputation was damaged.

It names the boy’s parents by their initials, as well two police officers, the city of St. Louis, SNAP and SNAP leaders David Clohessy and Barbara Dorris.

Jiang’s lawsuit said he “fled religious persecution in his native land of China, only to face religious persecution in America in the form of unconstitutional discrimination by state officials.” It also said the parents “falsely and maliciously accused (Jiang) of sexually abusing their minor son for the crass motive of monetary gain,” and that police officers went after him because of his religious and racial background.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Tim Healy
PUBLISHED
27/06/2015

A FORMER Catholic Archbishop has told the High Court he had an “inappropriate” sexual relationship with a woman in Nigeria which began in 1989 when she was aged 20 and he was 40.

Tipperary-born Richard Burke (66), ordained a priest in 1975, said he felt “uneasy” about the demeanour of then 20-year-old Dolores Atwood, which “gave an impression of being flirtatious”, when she came unexpectedly to his private apartment on a Sunday afternoon in the Nigerian city of Warri in September or October 1989.

Mr Burke was being cross-examined in his continuing action alleging defamation in the May 2011 ‘Prime Time Investigates: Mission to Prey’ programme.

Mr Burke, a former Archbishop of Benin, Nigeria, alleges it wrongly depicted him as a paedophile. RTÉ denies defamation.

He told the court that after Ms Atwood came to his apartment, he left her in the room while he went to see if he could find a “chaperone” but he later returned alone to the room “in turmoil”.

Her “smile, eyes, expression suggested something to me”, indicated she “wanted to be intimate with me” and he felt “flattered”.

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MINNESOTA
Minnesota Public Radio

Tom Scheck Jun 27, 2015

The head pastor at St. Basilica of Saint Mary in Minneapolis is urging the Twin Cities Archdiocese to release details of an internal investigation into Archbishop John Nienstedt.

Father John Bauer wrote on his blog that releasing the details of the internal investigation into Nienstedt is imperative if the Archdiocese will be able to move forward.

He cited findings from an MPR News report that found Nienstedt limited an investigation into his conduct even though he himself authorized it.

The law firm hired by the archdiocese took statements that accused Nienstedt of inappropriate behavior including sexual advances to at least two priests. Neinstedt denied any inappropriate conduct. He resigned this month after criminal charges were filed over his handling of sexual abuse cases by priests in the archdiocese.

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AUSTRALIA
Northern Daily Leader

By Ken Grimson June 26, 2015

A MAGISTRATE has refused to suppress the name of a former Catholic priest who has been charged over historic child sex offences allegedly committed in parts of northern NSW.

John Joseph Farrell, 62, was charged on Wednesday by specialist detectives from a strike force set up to investigate alleged assaults upon young children in northern NSW several decades ago.

Farrell appeared in the dock of Wagga Wagga Local Court yesterday afternoon after he was refused bail by local police, charged with 26 separate offences.

During yesterday’s proceedings, detectives were in court, but Farrell was not required to enter a plea to the 18 counts of sexual assault and act of indecency against a person aged under 16.

He is also charged with eight counts of sexual assault of a person under 16.

Farrell did not apply for court bail and it was formally refused by magistrate Erin Kennedy. The case was adjourned to Central Local Court in Sydney next week for Farrell to make a bail application.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Catholics4Change

JUNE 27, 2015 BY SUSAN MATTHEWS

Father John Paul has chosen voluntary laicization. It’s a quiet end to a situation that enraged parents and those who came forward as victims. Due to Pennsylvania’s Statute of Limitations for Child Sex Abuse, he can not be charged with any crimes.

In November of 2013, Father Paul resigned as pastor of Our Lady of Calvary Parish in Philadelphia for “physical and spiritual” health reasons. It was revealed that those “health” issues stemmed from two separate allegations of child sex abuse. At the time, we were outraged that the Archdiocese permitted him to remain as pastor for over a year while he was secretly investigated. When the information became public with his retirement, the Archdiocese suspended him.

The archdiocesan official statement stated, “Father Paul remained in ministry at the parish since that time in a restricted capacity ‘in that he had no unsupervised contact with minors.’ Appropriate notification of his restrictions was made to pertinent parties and a monitoring and support plan was implemented and followed.” He was a pastor running a parish and school. How does one avoid children in that position? Pertinent parties did not include parents. That shows very little respect for families. Maybe our archdiocese leadership will attend some helpful workshops during the World Meeting.

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IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

By Tim Healy
PUBLISHED
27/06/2015

A former Catholic Archbishop has told the High Court in Dublin he had an “inappropriate” sexual relationship with a woman in Nigeria which began in 1989 when she was aged 20 and he was 40.

Co Tipperary-born Richard Burke (66), ordained a priest in 1975, said he felt “uneasy” by the demeanour, which “gave an impression of being flirtatious” of then 20-year-old Dolores Atwood when she came unexpectedly to his private apartment in the Nigerian city of Warri in 1989.

Mr Burke was being cross-examined in his continuing action alleging defamation in RTE’s May 2011 Prime Time Investigates: Mission to Prey programme.

Mr Burke, a former Archbishop of Benin, Nigeria, alleges it wrongly depicted him as a paedophile. RTE denies defamation.

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MALTA
Times of Malta

The Church’s Commission for the Safeguarding of Children and Vulnerable Adults said today it takes action in all cases where a risk of harm to children or vulnerable adults is present, based on the information passed on to the Commission and on the outcome of its initial assessment.

The commission was reacting to reports that a priest is due to be taken to court to face child abuse allegations.

The commission said it will not divulge information about specific cases.

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MALTA
Malta Independent

Priest to be charged with abusing minors after reports made to Curia, arraignment in the coming days

A priest will be taken to court in the coming days to face charges of child abuse, TVM has reported.

The charges were presented in court yesterday and the priest, who has not been named, is expected to be arraigned in the coming days. TVM says the priest will not be arraigned under arrest.

It said the police launched an investigation after reports made to the Archbishop’s Curia. Enough evidence has been gathered to arraign the man.

In a statement issued this morning the Curia said it would not be giving any details about the case.

“With reference to the alleged case of abuse reported in the media, the Commission for the Safeguarding of Children and Vulnerable Adults would like to clarify that, whilst it will not divulge information about specific cases, according to its policy, the necessary action is taken in all cases where a risk of harm to children or vulnerable adults is present, based on the information passed on to the Commission and on the outcome of its initial assessment.”

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SCOTLAND
Herald Scotland

Editorial

Perceptions are key in the matter of who carries out inquiries into historic child abuse allegations.

Two religious orders are arguing that the woman appointed to lead the Scottish Government’s inquiry might appear to be biased.

This is on the grounds that Susan O’Brien QC has previously acted in cases against the catholic order the Sisters of Nazareth. She helped alleged victims of abuse challenge a time bar which prevented them from bringing cases against the Catholic order over incidents of abuse they claim happened in its children’s homes in the 1960s and 1970s.

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CANADA
CBC News

By Jason Proctor, CBC News

Lawyers for former Olympics CEO John Furlong and reporter Laura Robinson spelled out clear and opposing interpretations Friday of the facts surrounding a landmark B.C. Supreme Court defamation case.

Is it a case of a journalist targeted for doing her job? Or of a reasonable man responding to an attack?

Robinson is suing Furlong — claiming he attacked her professionalism and character in response to a 2012 Georgia Straight article alleging verbal and physical abuse against First Nations students at a Burns Lake, B.C., Catholic school.

Her lawyer, Bryan Baynham, told the court that clearing Furlong would declare “open season” on journalists for powerful people seeking to avoid investigative reporters.

“Being adversarial or critical does not mean her reporting was not responsible,” he said.

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CANADA
The Tyee

By Bob Mackin, Today, TheTyee.ca

The lawyer for reporter Laura Robinson conceded at the end of John Furlong’s B.C. Supreme Court defamation trial June 26 that the former Vancouver Olympics chief executive won the battle in the court of public opinion.

“He excels at the court of public opinion,” Bryan Baynham told Justice Catherine Wedge. “My client seeks justice in a court of law.”

The two-week trial was the product of Robinson’s countersuit filed in January 2014. Furlong claimed on several occasions that she was an activist with a vendetta and a poor journalist. Furlong was first to sue Robinson and the Georgia Straight for defamation in November 2012, two months after Robinson’s expose, headlined “John Furlong biography omits secret past in Burns Lake” was published. Robinson’s story accused Furlong of inconsistencies in his Patriot Hearts memoir and abuse against his First Nations gym class students at Immaculata elementary.

Furlong dropped his defamation lawsuits against the newspaper in October 2013 and against Robinson in March of this year after three sexual abuse lawsuits by people claiming to be former students never made it to trial.

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SOUTH DAKOTA
Brookings Radio

by Perry Miller

A Brookings County jury finds a former Brookings pastor guilty of sexual contact with a child under 16.

The verdict was returned against 37-year-old Timothy Bariteau Thursday afternoon. Bariteau was indicted last November and arrested in California, where he had been living

The incident occurred in April or May of 2014 when Bariteau was one of the pastors at Morningside Community Church in Brookings.

The jury deliberated for about five hours yesterday before returning the guilty verdict. States Attorney Clyde Calhoon says the jury reviewed the video of Bariteau being interviewed by D-C-I agents during the deliberations. Those had also been shown during the trial.

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SOUTH DAKOTA
Capital Journal

Associated Press

BROOKINGS — A jury has convicted a former Brookings pastor of having sexual contact with a child under the age of 16.

Brookings Radio reports (http://bit.ly/1LJMEy4 ) that 37-year-old Timothy Bariteau was indicted last November and arrested in California, where he had been living. He was convicted Thursday after a Brookings County jury deliberated for about five hours.

Authorities say the crime occurred in April or May of 2014 when Bariteau was one of the pastors at Morningside Community Church in Brookings.

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ALABAMA
WSFA

[with video]

Attorneys: Deposing Catholic school priest would “harass and embarrass” him, regarding past sex allegations

By Kati Weis, FOX10 News Reporter

MOBILE, AL (WALA) – According to the most recent court documents filed in Mobile County Circuit Court, attorneys for Father Johnny Savoie are still trying to block subpoenas requesting to hear his sworn testimony about previous allegations against him.

They’re even saying that requiring his testimony would “harass and embarrass” him.

This all began when parents of former students at St. Pius X Catholic School in Mobile filed suit against the school, alleging the school’s administrators did nothing to stop their children from being bullied.

So far, 15 plaintiffs, including parents, former, and current students, have filed in the suit against the school.

While pursuing that lawsuit, lawyers representing the plaintiffs found a statement Savoie made to his congregation last year, denying sexual misconduct allegations involving a teenage boy.

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MICHIGAN
WILX

Prosecutors have added six additional charges against a former Michigan Catholic school priest, teacher and wrestling coach in connection with reported sexual assaults of boys more than three decades ago.

James Rapp now faces 19 criminal sexual conduct charges after two more alleged victims came forward.

The charges were amended Friday at a district court hearing.

The 76-year-old Rapp waived a preliminary examination, sending the case to circuit court. Bond is set at $1 million.

The state attorney general’s office says the abuse took place from 1981 to 1986.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

By Jean Hopfensperger Star Tribune JUNE 26, 2015

A prominent Catholic cleric has asked the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis to release details of two investigations into alleged sexual misconduct by former Archbishop John Nienstedt.

The Rev. John Bauer, pastor of the Basilica of Saint Mary in Minneapolis, said refusing to share the archdiocese-commissioned investigations suggests that “the Archdiocese has not been transparent, honest and forthcoming in the information it is has shared with the faithful. …”

“I realize objections will be raised in regard to the release of this material,” Bauer wrote in an open letter Thursday to Archbishop Bernard Hebda, Bishop Andrew Cozzens and Vicar General Charles Lachowitzer.

“Given the fact that Archdiocesan funds were used, however, I firmly believe that the right of the faithful to this information outweighs any objections. More importantly, I believe that in order for our Archdiocese to rebuild the trust needed for the healing process to begin, full disclosure is essential.”

The archdiocese did not respond Friday to a request for comment.

The letter marks the first time a member of the Twin Cities clergy has publicly solicited the results of the investigations, which the archdiocese commissioned last year after receiving anonymous allegations about misconduct in Nienstedt’s personal life.

It was written by a well-known Twin Cities priest who has not publicly criticized Nienstedt in the past, and it reflects the difficult financial and ethical questions confronting many religious and lay leaders taken aback by Nienstedt’s resignation. Bauer declined to comment further.

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AUSTRALIA
Perth Now

DETECTIVES investigating the cold case murder of a mother in 1980 have cleared her family’s priest as a suspect.

Maria James was stabbed to death at the Thornbury Bookstore 35 years ago.

The case was reopened in 2013 when her son revealed new evidence that he alleged may have implicated Father Anthony Bongiorno.

But Detective Sen-Sgt Stuart Bailey, of the Homicide Squad, said Father Bongiorno — who died in 2002 — had now been ruled out as a suspect.
.
“Father Bongiorno … has been eliminated as a suspect through a variety of investigative techniques,” Det Sen-Sgt Bailey said.

He said the investigation had uncovered “other avenues of inquiry” as police continued to investigate Ms James’s murder.

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

Saturday, June 27, 2015

By Evelyn Ring
Irish Examiner Reporter

Clerical sex abuse survivor and papal representative Marie Collins said she was glad there would be an inquiry over the failure by the gardaí to act on information it had in 1973, about paedophile priest Brendan Smyth.

“There can be no excuse for the gardaí not acting on the information they had then. There can be no justification for doing nothing,” Ms Collins said yesterday.

Evidence was provided to the Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry in Northern Ireland this week that gardaí in Finglas, Dublin, had been alerted in 1973 about a very real risk of future abuse by Smyth.

Belfast solicitor Kevin Winters said he would be writing to the Garda Commissioner Nóirin O’Sullivan to find out why the letter informing gardaí that Smyth was “suffering from paedophilia” was not acted on.

Mr Winters’ firm represents a number of Smyth’s victims, who are seeking damages against the gardaí for failing to prevent crimes against the innocent and vulnerable.

Confidential documents from St Patrick’s Hospital in Dublin disclosed during the inquiry showed that Smyth was receiving psychiatric treatment in 1973 for his sexual propensities.

The Department of Justice and Equality said it would examine any conclusions or findings made by the historical abuse inquiry that were relevant to this jurisdiction.

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SCOTLAND
Telegraph

Catholic nuns who faced a barrage of compensation claims from youngsters in care are seeking to overturn the appointment of a leading lawyer as head of an inquiry into historical child abuse in Scotland.

The Congregation of the Poor Sisters of Nazareth and The Daughters of Charity of St Vincent de Paul are seeking to set aside the decision of the Scottish Ministers to make Susan O’Brien QC chair of the inquiry in a judicial review.

Miss O’Brien, who previously sat on an inquiry into the death of Caleb Ness in Edinburgh, was appointed in May to the new role by Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning Angela Constance and her appointment is due to begin on July1.

The religious groups have expressed concerns that Miss O’Brien will end up acting as judge after previously appearing on behalf of people who were pursuing claims against one of them.

Their counsel Alastair Duncan QC told the Court of Session in Edinburgh: “The Scottish Ministers would be acting unlawfully, unreasonably and irrationally in pursuing such an appointment.”

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CANADA
Georgia Straight

by Carlito Pablo on June 26th, 2015

The lawyer for a journalist who is suing John Furlong for defamation warned of the “chilling effects” that will be created if the former Vancouver Olympics CEO prevails in the case.

In his closing arguments in B.C. Supreme Court, Bryan Baynham said a Furlong victory would signal that it’s “open season” for the “wealthy and powerful” to destroy the reputations of journalists like his client, Laura Robinson.

“Journalists by their very nature publish uncomfortable allegations,” Baynham said today (June 26).

They are, in turn, expected to act responsibly, which, according to Baynham, was what Robinson did when she investigated and wrote about omissions made by Furlong in his autobiography and the alleged abuses he committed against First Nations students during his previously undisclosed early years in Canada.

Baynham said that Robinson did what a “good investigative journalist” does, which was to conduct research and interviews.

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CONNECTICUT
CT Post

By Daniel Tepfer
Published 5:00 pm, Friday, June 26, 2015

HARTFORD — The state Supreme Court on Friday rebuffed the Roman Catholic Church’s attempt to curb the number of lawsuits brought by those who claim they were abused as children by priests, upholding the law that allows abuse victims to file lawsuit until they are 48.

Upholding a $1.3 judgment for a man who claimed he was abused by a priest at a Derby school in the early 1980s, the state’s highest court ruled the 13-year-old law extending the statute of limitations for abuse lawsuits is constitutional.

“Given the unique psychological and social factors that often result in delayed reporting of childhood sexual abuse, which frustrated the ability of victims to bring an action under earlier revisions of the statute of limitations, we cannot say that the legislature acted unreasonably or irrationally,” the court ruled.

New Haven lawyer Thomas McNamara, who represented the plaintiff in the Derby case, said sex abuse victims often don’t come to terms with the abuse until much later in life and the state legislature recognized that when in 2002 it voted to extend the statute of limitation on sex abuse cases to 30 years from when a complainant reaches 18. The law was made retroactive.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Berger’s Beat

June 26, 2015 Author: berger

In a first, an archdiocesan priest is going after parents of a young alleged victim of a pedophile priest. Fr. Joseph Jiang has filed a civil federal lawsuit against the mom and dad of a Cathedral parish boy who city cops and prosecutors say was molested by the priest. Jiang’s Clayton lawyer once clerked for Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. The suit also names as defendants two police officers, two SNAP leaders and the city itself, claiming religious discrimination and other counts. “We feel terrible for these brave parents who’ve done nothing but act with courage and compassion to protect other kids,” said SNAP’s David Clohessy.

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

SUNNY DHILLON
VANCOUVER — The Globe and Mail
Published Friday, Jun. 26, 2015

Former Vancouver Olympics CEO John Furlong defamed freelance journalist Laura Robinson by portraying her as a cruel and callous activist who tried to extort money from him, Ms. Robinson’s lawyer said Friday in his closing argument.

And, the lawyer said, Mr. Furlong should not be able to claim he was merely responding to an attack, because his statements showed a “reckless disregard for truth.”

Ms. Robinson is suing Mr. Furlong for his response to a story she wrote in September, 2012, which alleged the former Olympics CEO abused students while teaching in northern B.C. more than 40 years ago.

Mr. Furlong held a news conference the day the article was published, saying the story showed a lack of diligence and accusing Ms. Robinson of having a vendetta against him. Ms. Robinson also claims in her lawsuit that Mr. Furlong implied she tried to extort him.

Bryan Baynham, one of Ms. Robinson’s lawyers, told the court Mr. Furlong’s statements from September, 2012, to December, 2013, “were defamatory both in their literal meaning and in their inferential meaning.”

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CANADA
680 News

by THE CANADIAN PRESS

VANCOUVER – A lawyer for a freelance journalist says former Olympics CEO John Furlong portrayed her as a heartless, cruel and callous activist who was motivated by contempt for male authority figures.

Bryan Baynham has begun his closing arguments in a civil trial where Laura Robinson is alleging Furlong defamed her in public comments after she wrote an article that alleged he physically and verbally abused First Nations children decades ago.

Furlong held a news conference the day the article was published in the Georgia Straight newspaper in September 2012 and accused Robinson of a shocking lack of diligence, inaccurate reporting and a personal vendetta.

Baynham says Robinson sought Furlong’s comment four times through his lawyer, but he refused to explain why he had omitted from his memoir “Patriot Hearts” his past work as a teacher at a Catholic school in northern B.C. in 1969 and 1970.

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IRELAND
BBC News

By Kevin Sharkey
BBC News NI

The Irish government is facing calls to respond to revelations that police failed to prosecute the paedophile priest, Brendan Smyth, in the 1970s.

It emerged this week at the Historical Institutional Abuse (HIA) inquiry that Gardaí (Irish police) knew Smyth was a paedophile as far back as 1973.

Smyth continued to abuse for more than 20 years, until he was jailed in 1994.

Both the main opposition party, Fianna Fáil, and Sinn Féin have called on the government to take action on the case.

‘Dismay and disgust’

Sinn Fein has urged Dublin ministers to set-up an independent judicial review into the HIA revelations.
Fianna Fáil’s justice spokesperson, Niall Collins, urged the Irish minister for justice and the head of the police to set up a “mechanism” to address concerns that state agencies failed to act to protect Smyth’s victims.

Mr Collins said: “Along with the rest of the country, I have watched with growing dismay and disgust as further details of Brendan Smyth’s abuse has been laid bare in the hearings in Banbridge.

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IRELAND
Today FM

One of Fr Brendan Smyth’s victims is not very impressed with Cardinal Sean Brady’s expressions of regret about his role in failing to prevent Smyth’s abuse.

The former Catholic Primate of All Ireland, Sean Brady, has expressed his horror and offered an unreserved apology to all those affected as a result of the crimes of Fr Brendan Smyth. Brady received sharp criticism after it emerged he had been meetings where two teenage victims of Smyth were sworn to secrecy in 1975.

Their evidence was never handed over to police. Smyth continued abusing children before the authorities eventually caught up with him and he was jailed in 1994. He died in prison in 1997. Brady said:

“There was a shroud of secrecy and confidentiality with a view not to destroying the good name of the church. To offset that, the scandal was kept a secret — very, very secret. Everybody involved would be bound to secrecy too.” The evidence from Smyth’s victims was never handed over to police, allowing the west Belfast churchman to continue abusing children before he was finally jailed in 1994.

One of Smyth’s victims Helen McGonigle spoke to Matt from her home in Connecticut. Helen was just six years old when Smyth first abused her. Now a successful attorney in Connecticut, she says Smyth destroyed her family. She blames Smyth for the death of her sister and brother and the demise of her mother.

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MICHIGAN
MLive

By Theresa Ghiloni | tghiloni@mlive.com
on June 26, 2015

JACKSON, MI – A man who said he was among those victimized by former priest at Jackson Lumen Christi High School more than 30 years ago wants other victims to know that justice and closure are possible.

Andrew Russell, 46, spoke with the Jackson Citizen Patriot after a probable cause hearing for 75-year-old James Rapp, who faces 19 counts of criminal sexual conduct for crime he is accused of committing from 1981 through 1986.

“I’m not going to … hide my face, I’m going to step forward and talk for these people and represent these people,” Russell said. “It’s not just about this case. It’s about abuse worldwide and coming forward and getting healing. … It’s time justice was served, and to move on and get healing.”

He said there should be no shame or embarrassment in sharing the truth.

“I hate that it’s me, but somebody has to,” he said.

Russell said he is grateful that two men came forward in 2013 and reported the abuse to the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office. Sgt. Tim Schlundt then launched an extensive investigation against Rapp, who has been serving a 40-year prison sentencing in Oklahoma since 1999.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
KSDK

Alexandra Martellaro, KSDK

ST. LOUIS — A Roman Catholic priest who was accused of sexually assaulting a boy has filed a lawsuit, claiming he was unfairly targeted.

Charges against the Rev. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang were dropped last week without explanation. He was accused of abusing a young boy in 2011 and 2012 in a Catholic school bathroom.

The suit names the boy’s parents by their initials, two police officers, the city of St. Louis, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, and SNAP leaders David Clohessy and Barbara Dorris. It’s seeking unspecified damages.

Jennifer Joyce’s office left the door open for the case to be refiled in the future. The statement said the statute of limitations on this case does not run out for another 35 years, leaving plenty of time to refile the case.

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PENNSYLVANIA
PennLIve

By The Associated Press
on June 26, 2015

HOLLIDAYSBURG, Pa. (AP) — Agents with the Pennsylvania attorney general’s office have seized documents and computers from a monastery where a Franciscan friar killed himself after he was accused of sexually abusing students at schools in two states.

The attorney general’s office refused to comment on Thursday’s raid at the St. Bernardine Monastery near Hollidaysburg, Blair County. Officials also declined to comment.

Sixty-two-year-old Brother Stephen Baker stabbed himself in the heart in January 2013, nine days after the Roman Catholic diocese in Youngstown, Ohio, settled abuse claims with 11 former students at a school in that state.

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CONNECTICUT
Record-Journal

Associated Press

HARTFORD — The Connecticut Supreme Court has upheld a $1 million jury verdict in a priest sexual abuse case against the Archdiocese of Hartford.

A jury in Waterbury Superior Court determined in 2012 that the archdiocese was reckless and negligent in letting the Rev. Ivan Ferguson work with children again in 1981 at the St. Mary’s school in Derby.

The lawsuit said Ferguson sexually abused a St. Mary’s student, known only as Jacob Doe in court documents, about 20 times between 1981 and 1983, beginning when he was 13. Court documents say the abuse happened after Ferguson received treatment for abusing other boys.

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CONNECTICUT
The Hartford Courant

The state Supreme Court Friday upheld a $1 million verdict in a priest sexual abuse case while at the same time rejecting an argument by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Hartford that a state law which extended the statute of limitations for potential victims to file a lawsuit was unconstitutional.

In February 2012, a jury in Waterbury awarded a former altar boy $1 million after a trial in which the victim, identified in court papers as Jacob Doe, testified that he and a friend were repeatedly molested and sexually assaulted by the Rev. Ivan Ferguson and a friend of the priest.

During oral arguments before the Supreme Court last year the archdiocese argued to overturn the verdict based on a variety of claims — including that the trial judge erred by not allowing an expert witness to testify for the church and by allowing the jury to hear testimony from a deposition of Ferguson, who died years ago.

But the most controversial argument was that the state legislature’s decision in 2002 to extend the statute of limitation for civil cases on sexual assault claims to 30 years from when a complainant reaches 18 was unconstitutional.

The statute of limitations had previously been 17 years. The change was retroactive.

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ITALIA
UAAR

[An overview of clergy abuse in the Catholic Church. In response to the many requests of visitors to the website of UAAR , a fact sheet has been prepared on the problem of child sexual abuse committed by Catholic Church representatives. Other fact sheets will follow, which will analyze the various aspects of the phenomenon, and in particular the Italian reality.]

In risposta alle tante sollecitazioni dei frequentatori del sito della UAAR, è stata preparata questa prima scheda informativa sul problema degli abusi sessuali sui minori commessi da esponenti della Chiesa cattolica. Ne seguiranno altre, che analizzeranno i vari aspetti del fenomeno ed in particolare la realtà italiana.

Presa di coscienza del problema negli Stati Uniti

Il problema degli abusi sessuali su minori era noto negli Stati Uniti, anche se non nelle sue reali dimensioni, fin dagli anni Cinquanta del Novecento, anche se solo nel 1967 se ne era tenuta una pubblica discussione presso il campus della Notre Dame University. Il clero cattolico statunitense tuttavia, almeno fino agli anni Ottanta, se ne è interessato solo occasionalmente.
Nel settembre 1983 il “National Catholic Reporter” aveva portato il problema alla ribalta nazionale; ma solo nel 2002, dopo la pubblicazione di alcuni articoli accusatori sul “Boston Globe”, il tema ha polarizzato i media e suscitato un vasto allarme sociale, giacché è sembrato subito evidente che (a) gli abusi sessuali costituivano una realtà documentata, (b) il loro numero era notevole, (c) vi era stata una politica di segretezza e di copertura degli abusi da parte della Chiesa locale, (d) la Chiesa non aveva preso adeguati provvedimenti nei confronti dei colpevoli, limitandosi per lo più ad allontanarli dalla loro sede ma senza limitarne il contatto con altre possibili vittime, (e) il fenomeno non era limitato agli Stati Uniti.

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SCOTLAND
Scotsman

Chris Marshall

TWO religious groups have begun legal action to remove the head of a national inquiry into historical child abuse from her post.

The Court of Session in Edinburgh heard how Ms O’Brien acted as legal counsel in two cases brought against the Poor Sisters of Nazareth which reached the House of Lords.

Both religious congregations ran children’s homes during the twentieth century which became subject to allegations of abuse during the 1990s.

The court heard how Ms O’Brien had acted on behalf of two pursuers during an appeal to the House of Lords on the issue of the timebar, which prevents action being taken once a period of time has passed. The case related to alleged abuse at the Nazareth House children’s home in Cardonald, Glasgow, which is now closed. The legal proceedings concluded in 2008.

Alastair Duncan QC said: “The particular concern that my clients have is that Ms O’Brien had acted for clients alleging abuse against them.”

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SCOTLAND
BBC News

Two Catholic charities have objected to the choice of chairwoman for Scotland’s public inquiry into historical cases of child abuse.

The Congregation of the Poor Sisters of Nazareth and the Daughters of Charity of St Vincent De Paul have lodged a petition for judicial review.

They raised the issue of bias over the appointment of Susan O’Brien QC, who has acted in a case against them.

The charities’ petition will be heard at the Court of Session in Edinburgh.

The government said it would “robustly” defend the appointment, while some victims called the legal move “disappointing” and “outrageous”.

The action centres on Ms O’Brien’s involvement in a case brought by two former residents of Nazareth House children’s home in Glasgow.

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ITALIA
la Repubblica

[Daring photos of minors were seized from the computer of Francesco Micciche, former bishop of Trapani in Italy.]

di ALESSANDRA ZINITI

Più gli inquirenti scavano nella vita di Francesco Micciché, più l’inchiesta nata dagli ammanchi alla Curia di Trapani prende strade impreviste e imprevedibili: dagli affari immobiliari alla truffa dell’otto per mille, dall’appropriazione di tesori della Chiesa trapanese alla pedopornografia. La più scabrosa delle ipotesi di reato a carico dell’ex vescovo di Trapani è emersa nelle scorse settimane dall’esame del pc che gli investigatori hanno sequestrato nella villa di Monreale dove l’ex vescovo, rimosso dal Vaticano dopo lo scandalo che ha travolto la Curia di Trapani, risiede insieme alla sorella e al cognato.

Nel portatile del sacerdote gli esperti informatici che erano a caccia di documenti che potessero sostenere le accuse nei confronti di Micciché, indagato per appropriazione indebita dalla Procura di Trapani, hanno trovato un vero e proprio album fotografico che ritrae in pose inequivocabili dei minori, alcuni molto piccoli. Le ha scaricate l’ex vescovo per uso personale o qualcun altro dei suoi familiari ha avuto accesso a quel pc e a quei file? Una domanda alla quale adesso dovrà rispondere il consulente nominato dai pm cooordinati da Marcello Viola.

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IRLAND
kath.ch

[Abuse: Irish Cardinal admits coverup]

Dublin, 26.6.15 (kath.ch) Der frühere katholische Primas von Irland, Kardinal Sean Brady (75), hat Fehler und Vertuschungsversuche im Umgang mit Missbrauchsfällen eingeräumt. Medienberichten vom Freitag, 26. Juni, zufolge bedauerte Brady bei der Anhörung vor der Kommission zur Untersuchung von Missbrauchsfällen in der katholischen Kirche, dass man sich fälschlicherweise nicht um die Opfer, sondern um den Täter gekümmert habe. Er sprach von einem «dunklen Kapitel unserer Geschichte».

Mit Blick auf den Fall des pädophilen Priesters Brendan Smyth, der mehrfach in andere Gemeinden weiterversetzt worden war, räumte Brady «unangemessenes Verhalten» ein. Man habe «mit der Absicht, den guten Ruf der Kirche nicht zu zerstören, einen Schleier des Schweigens und der Geheimhaltung» über die Angelegenheit gelegt. Es habe sich um «unsägliche Vergehen gehandelt»; deshalb habe man den «Skandal geheim gehalten – sehr, sehr geheim».

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
KMOV

ST. LOUIS, Mo. (KMOV.com) – Rev. Xiuhui “Joseph” Jiang filed a federal lawsuit days after the St. Louis circuit attorney’s office dismissed child abuse charges against him.

In the lawsuit, filed Thursday, Jiang claims he was unfairly targeted by the city, police and sexual abuse victims.

The lawsuit names St. Louis police officers Tonya Porter and Jaimie Pitterle, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) and its leaders, David Clohessy and Barbara Dorris, the City of St. Louis and the accuser’s parents.

Jiang had been accused of twice abusing a male victim under the age of 14 between July 2011 and August 2012.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Victims to hold news conference
In a first, priest sues alleged victim’s parents
SNAP leaders, police officers and city are also accused
Group to Archbishop “Why let a twice-accused predator do this?”

What:
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims will discuss an unprecedented new federal lawsuit in which, for the first time ever, an accused local child molesting cleric is suing

–an alleged victim’s parents
–SNAP
–the police and/or
–the city

The victims will blast the priest’s “intimidating” legal maneuver and will blast the archbishop for letting him do this.

For the sake of public safety, SNAP wants Catholic officials to

–disclose the priest’s whereabouts,
–take his passport so he can’t flee overseas, and
–publicly answer troubling questions about the cleric and his relationship to the archbishop.

They will also urge anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered the twice-accused priest’s crimes to call “independent sources of help, like therapists, police, prosecutors or support groups.”

When:
TODAY, Friday, June 26 at 2:30 p.m.

Where:
Outside the St. Louis Cathedral on Lindell at Taylor in the city’s Central West End

Who:
Three members of a support group called SNAP (the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests)

Why:
Earlier this month, prosecutors dropped child sex abuse charges against a twice-accused archdiocesan priest with close ties to St. Louis’ top Catholic official but said they hope to re-file the case later.

Now, the priest is suing the alleged victim’s parents, SNAP, two police officers and the city of St. Louis claiming his religious freedom has been violated and his reputation has been besmirched.

[St. Louis Post-Dispatch]

Even though a civil child sex abuse case against the priest is pending, church staff have hinted that the suspended cleric may be put back to work in a parish. SNAP opposes that potential move and wants church staff to take the priest’s passport to prevent him from fleeing the US.

Despite an official national church policy mandating “openness” in pedophile priest cases, Archbishop Robert Carlson refuses to reveal where Fr. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang is living, why he had a bedroom in Carlson’s home and why Fr. Jiang followed Carlson from city to city (a highly unusual arrangement in the Catholic church). Carlson also refuses to address an allegation that Fr. Jiang admitted to a girl’s parents that he’d molested their daughter and that Carlson tried to get the parents to give him the $20,000 check that the priest reportedly left on their car windshield. SNAP wants Carlson to honor his pledges to be “transparent” and publicly disclose this information.

Carlson only real response to these accusations was an eight-page civil legal filing in which he calls “baseless” the charge that he tried to tamper with evidence. On five other charges, however, Carlson basically argues that he can’t be held responsible even if the allegations in the case are true. Carlson’s lawyers want the entire civil case tossed out.

The civil suit charges that Carlson “knew (Fr. Jiang) was dangerous to children before (a girl) was abused,” last summer, asked the alleged victim’s parents for a $20,000 check the priest had given them, committing “the criminal offense of attempted tampering with evidence,” because he reportedly suggested that the girl’s parents “return to him the check.” (The parents, however, had given it to police.)

SNAP says that Carlson is “opting to fight on the technicalities, not on the merits” and “ignoring his promises of openness while adopting maneuvers of defense that cloud, rather than clarify the situation,” as he has in dozens of other, older clergy sex abuse and cover up cases.

Fr. Jiang was arrested in June 2012 for repeatedly molesting a Lincoln County girl numerous times in 2012 (mostly in her home). He was charged with alleged child sex crimes and “victim tampering.” Those charges were dismissed in November 2013. In April 2014, he was arrested on charges of repeatedly molesting a St. Louis city boy between 2011-2012 (at a Catholic school). SNAP notes that it’s possible Fr. Jiang abused the boy while out on bond on charges of molesting the girl.

According to the suit, Carlson was “supervising Fr. Jiang very closely,” “knew that (he) was a danger to children” and abused the girl while “living in the archbishop’s home.”

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CONNECTICUT
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests ( 314 566 9790, SNAPclohessy@aol.com )

Connecticut’s top Catholic official has lost his bid to overturn a crucial state child safety law. Shame on him for trying.

[court decision]

Ex-Hartford Archbishop Henry Mansell and current Hartford Archbishop Leonard Blair asked Connecticut’s Supreme Court to gut a measure that gives victims of child molesters more time to expose and deter those who commit or conceal child sex crimes.

[SNAP]

Supreme Court officials rebuffed his move. We are grateful. And we hope that hundreds more adults who were sexually violated as children in Connecticut will step forward, seek justice, and expose and prevent child sex crimes and cover ups.

This ruling is part of an encouraging pattern by judges in the US to make it easier for victims to use the courts to protect the vulnerable and heal the wounded by exposing and punishing wrongdoers whose misdeeds hurt kids or enable others to hurt kids. It’s tragic that Hartford Catholic officials want to make it much harder for victims, witnesses and whistleblowers to protect children, inside and outside of the church.

The case before the Supreme Court centered on Fr. Ivan Ferguson and on a widely-praised 13 year old state law that gives victims more time to expose those who commit and conceal child sex crimes through civil litigation.

In 2002, Connecticut lawmakers extended the statute of limitations, letting child sex abuse victims to take legal action against their predators and employers who shield them until they turn 48 years of age. (Since 2002, lawmakers have extended it even further.)

Archbishop Leonard Blair – and his predecessor Archbishop Henry Mansell – claim that the statute was unconstitutional, based on the ‘due process’ clause of the state constitution.

Blair’s boss, Pope Francis, has said the church should ‘make reparations” to victims and “All bishops must (exercise) the utmost care in order to help foster the protection of minors.’” But like most nice-sounding papal pronouncements about clergy sex crimes and cover ups, these sentiments are routinely ignored and contradicted by bishops like Blair.

In 2012, a jury found Hartford Archdiocese officials negligent and reckless in handling abuse reports against Fr. Ferguson and awarded a victim a $1.3 million judgment (which includes $300,000 in punitive damages). Fr. Ferguson admitted his crimes. But Blair also wants to overturn this verdict.

Fr. Ferguson has been accused before. In 1993, three men filed civil abuse and cover up lawsuits charging that they were molested by Fr. Ferguson in the1970s and that archdiocesan staff could and should have prevented the crimes.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

The US Supreme Court, with at least two Catholic Justices in favor, has within 24 hours just handed Pope Francis’ central positions two defeats — one by declaring that gays have a constitutionally protected right to marry, and the other by upholding Obamacare with its free access to effective contraception to millions of US couples. These are clear victories for children, women and gay folks and underline the political losing streak the pope is on, despite his superficial but declining popularity in the polls. The papal defeats also indicate that the pope’s main goal of avoiding an Australian style national US investigation into institutional child sexual abuse is increasingly unlikely to be achieved. Read The Gay Marriage Opinion here.

The pope will, it is expected, still hammer his anti-gay marriage crusade in the USA to try to help draw out fundamentalist voters sought desperately by right wing Republicans and their billionaire low-tax funders for next year’s election of a US president who could then appoint a future right wing majority to the US Supreme Court. These two Supreme Court decisions make clear that control of the Supreme Court is the key to political power in key areas in the USA.

Meanwhile, the basic contradiction in Pope Francis’ new encyclical, ‘Laudato Si”, in failing to lift recent popes’ ban on contraception, has been thoroughly exposed by Yale educated theologian, Jamie Manson. If only more theologians had Ms. Manson’s prophetic courage and tenacious intellect, God willing!

John Cornwell, Cambridge University historian of the modern Vatican (e.g., “Hitler’s Pope” and the “Dark Box”), in his recent Prospect article about the pope’s climate change encyclical also tells us that the the contraception ban omission has been noted, as well as alluding to other shortcomings of the pope’s current strategy. Cornwell observed (in italics):

“Nor are all liberals necessarily enthused by Francis’s championing of the environmentalists. A typical reaction from one well known Catholic liberal blogger in the United States, Gerald Slevin, is that the encyclical is evidence of the Pope trying to “change the subject.” That subject, he reminds his readers today, are the clerical paedophile abuse scandals which have dogged the church.

Other liberal Catholics raise that great elephant in the Catholic room: the church’s ban on artificial contraception. At a London press conference to launch the encyclical yesterday a journalist asked Cardinal Archbishop Nichols whether the encyclical addressed the problem of birth control as part of the environmental problem. The Cardinal merely responded that the Pope insisted that the rich should not tell the poor how many children they should have.” (emphasis mine)

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

By Joel Currier

ST. LOUIS • The Rev. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang, a Roman Catholic priest whose charges of sexual abuse of a boy were dropped this month, has filed a federal lawsuit claiming he was unfairly targeted by police, the city and advocates for sexual abuse victims.

Jiang claims in the suit filed Thursday in St. Louis that false abuse accusations were the result of religious and ethnic discrimination and that he was denied due process under the constitution and defamed by a group that seeks justice for victims of abuse by priests.

The lawsuit names the accuser’s parents — by initials only — along with St. Louis police officers Tonya Porter, Jaimie Pitterle, the city of St. Louis, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) and its leaders David Clohessy and Barbara Dorris.

Dorris called the lawsuit “a desperate move to try to intimidate other victims, witnesses and whistle-blowers into keeping silent. We hope it will backfire.”

Jiang was accused of molesting a boy in 2011 and 2012 in a bathroom of St. Louis the King School, the elementary school at the Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis. St. Louis Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce dropped the charges this month without explanation.

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MICHIGAN
MLive

By Theresa Ghiloni | tghiloni@mlive.com
on June 26, 2015

JACKSON, MI – Six new charges were added against a former Jackson Lumen Christi High School priest Friday morning for sexual abuse he allegedly committed more than 30 years ago.

James Rapp, 76, was arraigned on 13 charges of criminal sexual conduct in late May, but now faces 19 charges of criminal sexual conduct. Assistant Attorney General Angela Povilaitis amended the charges against Rapp during a probable cause hearing in Jackson County District Judge Joseph Filip’s courtroom June 26 saying two new victims have come forward since the original charges were authorized.

Rapp now faces seven counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct and 12 counts of second-degree criminal sexual conduct for crimes the Attorney General’s Office say occurred between August 1981 and February 1986.

He waived his right to a preliminary examination and the case has been forwarded to Circuit Judge Susan Beebe.

Rapp served as a priest, teacher, maintenance supervisor and wrestling coach during his time at Lumen Christi High School from 1980-86. He is currently serving a 40-year prison sentence in Oklahoma, after he was convicted in 1999 of sexually abusing two teen-age boys in Duncan, Oklahoma, where he was a church pastor, according to Jackson Citizen Patriot archives.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier

CARDINAL George Pell has provided his full passport details in an extraordinary step to disprove allegations that have been made against him.

A former child victim of a paedophile Christian Brother has claimed that in 1969 Dr Pell, who was then a young priest, heard him pleading for help a few weeks after he had been raped.

The cardinal has this week given the Herald Sun access to a copy of his full passport showing his travel between the 1960s and 1970s. The passport makes it clear that Cardinal Pell was not in Australia in 1969. The Herald Sun reported on Monday that Paul Lyons, 55, had challenged the cardinal to prove he was not in Ballarat at the time he told priests at St Alipius Presbytery of his rape.

Mr Lyons, who has previously made the claims through his lawyer at a Victorian parliamentary inquiry into child abuse, went public on the weekend saying: “I want Pell to produce the pages of his passport as proof that he was visiting Australia at the time.’’

The travel documents now prove that Dr Pell was studying in Oxford at the time Mr Lyons has said he was brutally raped, at age 9, in St Alipius Primary School by Christian Brother teacher Robert Best.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier

By Melissa Cunningham June 26, 2015

A HARROWING portrait of clergy sexual abuse survivor David Ridsdale has been entered in the prestigious Archibald Prize.

Ballarat artist Domenico Milivoj Micich was compelled to use the nephew of one of Australia’s most notorious pedophiles, Gerald Ridsdale, as the subject of his artwork in the wake of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Mr Micich, who was sexually abused himself during his childhood in Italy, said his portrait, Magnum Silencium: David Ridsdale and the bribe, was particularly controversial due to Mr Ridsdale’s connection to his uncle and Cardinal George Pell.

It is also encompassed a deeper message.

“It explores the struggle for justice,transparency and finally healing,” Mr Micich said.

Testifying at the Royal Commission earlier this year, Mr Ridsdale revealed he had told Cardinal Pell in a 1993 phone call, he had been repeatedly raped by his uncle.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Tribune-Democrat

By Dave Sutor
dsutor@tribdem.com

Posted on Jun 25, 2015

HOLLIDAYSBURG – Pennsylvania Attorney General Office agents reportedly searched St. Bernardine Monastery where accused child molester Brother Stephen P. Baker, T.O.R is said to have committed suicide in 2013.

Jeffrey Johnson, assistant press secretary for Attorney General Kathleen Kane, could not confirm the search occurred. A grand jury is believed to be investigating the Baker case, another point Johnson could not discuss.

“There’s really not much we can say at this time,” Johnson said.

The Tribune-Review reported about a half-dozen investigators were on-scene Thursday at the monastery, located at 788 Monastery Road in Newry, Blair County.

A search lends support to the belief the attorney general is still investigating individuals and organizations associated with Baker, who is accused of victimizing boys when he was an athletic trainer at what was then called Bishop McCort High School from the early 1990s to early 2000s, along with previous incidents in Michigan, Ohio and Minnesota.

“I have no real information I can provide other than I was aware the investigation was ongoing,” said Altoona attorney Richard Serbin, who has represented Baker victims. “As for the details of that investigation, I have no idea.”

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MINNESOTA
Washington Post

Crime for minister to have sex with someone who is seeking spiritual aid — even if minister doesn’t know that this is why the person came to him

By Eugene Volokh June 26

That’s what the Minnesota Supreme Court just held Wednesday in State v. Wenthe. Indeed, the minister could be guilty even if he had no reason to know that the person came to him seeking spiritual aid. So if you’re a minister (or a rabbi or anything else), someone — acquaintance or stranger — comes to you to talk, one thing leads to another, and you have sex, you are guilty of a felony if the reason the person approached you was to seek “religious or spiritual advice,” even if that person never stated that desire before you had sex.

The relevant Minnesota statute provides that it’s a felony if

A person who engages in sexual penetration with another person … [and]

(1) the actor is or purports to be a member of the clergy, the complainant is not married to the actor, and:

(i) the sexual penetration occurred during the course of a meeting in which the complainant sought or received religious or spiritual advice, aid, or comfort from the actor in private …

The argument in favor of such laws is similar to the argument for restrictions on psychotherapist-patient sex; indeed, another provision in the same statute applies if “the actor is a psychotherapist and the complainant is a patient of the psychotherapist and the sexual penetration occurred … during the psychotherapy session.” By analogy, then, sex during a clergy counseling session would be a crime. (Other provisions also make it a crime for clergy or psychotherapists to have sex with people with whom they have an ongoing counseling relationship, even if the sex doesn’t occur during a counseling session.) And the court could have interpreted the statute as applying in situations where there really is a clear counseling session, because the clergy member knows that he is being approached for counseling purposes. (Inferring a required mental state into a statute that is silent on the subject is quite normal in American law.)

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LOUISIANA
WDSU

[with video]

NEW ORLEANS —A day after New Orleans police released the name and photo of a man wanted for allegedly sexually abusing two teen boys, Ryan Rodgers has not been located.

Police say the 36-year-old is accused of “grooming” the teen victims for more than a year. The victims told police Rodgers “toughed them inappropriately while they slept” and they “woke up to Rodgers fondling them.”

Rodgers is also accused of buying the teens underwear and making them pose in front of him.

Most of the encounters occurred, according to police, inside Rodgers’ Baronne Street apartment.

“It’s scary, my kids live here, but also play here,” said Kelli Jones, a resident of the same complex.

Police said Rodgers has not answered his apartment door, has turned off his cellphone and may be living in motels.

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INDIANA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, June 26

Statement by Barbra Graber, leader of SNAP Mennonite Chapter, Mennonite@SNAPnetwork.org, 540-214-8874

Officials at Notre Dame are refusing to admit widely-documented and repeated sexual misconduct by a high profile former professor who worked on campus for two decades. We call on university staff to investigate his abuse and school cover ups and reach out to his victims.

[National Catholic Reporter]

[National Catholic Reporter]

In two new stories, The National Catholic Reporter says

— John Howard Yoder had “a long history of predatory behavior toward women, especially young female students.”

–“Notre Dame officials became aware of his previous sexual misconduct in the early 1980s, years before alleged victims went public in 1992,” and

–“What remains unanswered is who knew what at Notre Dame at the time of (Yoder’s) hiring, whether officials there simply ignored his past and what officials on the campus subsequently did as reports of his abusive behavior began to surface.”

–“Yoder’s presence at Notre Dame gave a significant boost to the school’s theology department,” bringing with him “international acclaim.”

Earlier this year, officials at Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary — where Yoder taught for 24 years – publicly apologized to Yoder’s victims for the first time. Notre Dame must do this and more. They must launch an independent investigation into both misdeeds by Yoder and cover ups by school staff.

And even sooner, we urge the school’s hierarchy to aggressively seek out current or former students or staff who may have been hurt by Yoder and offer them help.

Catholic bishops and officials in the US have pledged, time and time again, to be “open and transparent” in abuse cases. Notre Dame staff must honor these promises in the Yoder case.

We are grateful that university officials have taken Yoder’s name off a lecture series. But much more remains to be done if the truth is to be exposed and the victims are to be healed and cover ups are to be deterred.

We are even more grateful to the brave women – victims, witnesses, whistleblowers and advocates – who have helped expose the horrific sexual misdeeds by Yoder and the cover ups and poor responses by Yoder’s colleagues and supervisors. Because of their courage, churches are safer. We hope the NCR reporting will bring them sorely-needed, long-overdue and well-deserved healing.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, June 26

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

An Orthodox pastor who worked in Brookline has just been arrested on a sex charge involving a teenager. Now, it’s time for his former church colleagues and supervisors in Boston to take action.

[WFMJ]

[Vindicator]

Rev. Archim Andoni, a Chicago native, lives in Pittsburgh and works at a Youngstown church. But he has also worked in Massachusetts, New Mexico, Idaho, Colorado, Illinois and Iowa, according to the Dubuque Telegraph-Herald.

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SCOTLAND
Herald Scotland

Friday 26 June 2015

Two Catholic charities have raised fears of bias as they launched a legal challenge against the choice of chairwoman for Scotland’s public inquiry into historic cases of child abuse.

The Congregation of the Poor Sisters of Nazareth and the Daughters of Charity of St Vincent De Paul have lodged a petition for judicial review at Edinburgh’s Court of Session objecting to the Scottish Government’s appointment of Susan O’Brien QC.

Their action centres on Ms O’Brien’s involvement in a case brought against the Poor Sisters of Nazareth at the House of Lords by two former residents of Nazareth House children’s home in Glasgow who alleged they were abused in the 1960s and 70s.

Ms O’Brien acted as counsel for the former residents in their 2008 appeal which unsuccessfully challenged an earlier court ruling that the claims were time barred, or made too late.

Alastair Duncan QC, representing the charities, told the Court of Session: “The particular concern that my clients have is that Ms O’Brien had acted for individuals alleging abuse against them, that she had supported the allegations that were made by appearing as counsel for those individuals and that she is now being asked to adjudicate on the very same issues.”

Mr Duncan said the allegations that arose in the House of Lords case were “almost certain” to be heard again at the public inquiry.

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VATICAN CITY
Mercury News

By Nicole Winfield

POSTED: 06/25/2015

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Philadelphia church officials said Thursday they’re confident about preparations for Pope Francis’ visit at the three-month homestretch, having raised more than two-thirds of the $45 million needed and lining up 6,000 of 10,000 volunteers.

Archbishop Charles Chaput and Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter wrapped up four days of talks at the Vatican ahead of the Sept. 22-27 World Meeting of Families. Francis arrives Sept. 26 and will celebrate a final Mass before upward of 1.5 million people.

“We expect to meet our goal of raising $45 million,” Chaput said as he confirmed pledges for more than $30 million so far. The bulk of the money is going toward security, infrastructure and cleanup.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
BBC News

A victim of a prolific paedophile priest has said Irish police must be held responsible for the abuse he suffered as a boy.

Brendan Boland was sexually abused by Fr Brendan Smyth in the 1970s.

An inquiry heard this week that police in Dublin were aware of Smyth’s activities as far back as 1972, more than 20 years before he was convicted.

Mr Boland also said an apology to abuse survivors from a senior member of the Catholic church was “weak and feeble”.

Smyth was a notorious child abuser, and was at the centre of one of the first clerical abuse scandals to hit the Catholic church in Ireland.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Tim Healy
PUBLISHED
26/06/2015

A FORMER Catholic Archbishop has told the High Court he first had sex with a Nigerian woman in 1989 when she was aged 20 and he was aged 40.

Co Tipperary-born Richard Burke (66) said he later paid sums totalling about €176,000 sought by Dolores Atwood. He also agreed to have sex with her in a hotel in Canada in 2009 after she asked him to do that when he told her he could not pay her another €200,000 sought by her, he said.

Mr Burke said he felt “terrorised” by Ms Atwood and feared she would disclose their relationship which would bring disgrace and shame on himself, his family and his ministry.

Mr Burke said he first met Ms Atwood in 1986 or 1987 when she was aged 17 or 18 and he first had sex with her in 1989 when she was aged 20 in his bedroom in Cathedral House in Warri city in Nigeria. He did not know her when she was aged 13 or 14, he said.

He was ordained a Bishop in 1996 and an Archbishop in December 2007, the jury heard.

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

Friday, June 26, 2015

by Ann O’Loughlin

A former Catholic archbishop has told a High Court jury he was portrayed during an RTÉ television programme as leading a young girl up a stairs to his bedroom where he had sexually abused, sexually assaulted, and raped her.

“I could not believe my eyes,” Richard Burke said. “This did not happen, I did not do that, what is portrayed there is a lie.”

When his counsel, Jack Fitzgerald, asked: “Are you a paedophile,” he replied: “No.”

Mr Burke, aged 66, from Tipperary, said he was living in London with a member of his order, the Kiltegan Fathers, when Prime Time Investigates: Mission to Prey was screened on May 23, 2011.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

By Peter Smith / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

A Pittsburgh-based priest with ties to several Orthodox Christian jurisdictions is on leave from his parish in Youngstown, Ohio, pending resolution of a criminal charge of sexual imposition in that state.

The Rev. James Callozzo, 73, of Brookline, faces a third-degree misdemeanor charge. An 18-year-old man alleged Rev. Callozzo followed him into the bathroom of a suburban Youngstown restaurant May 15, started talking explicitly about the younger man’s private parts and then grabbed them before the man forced him away.

Rev. Callozzo has a pretrial hearing on July 28. He pleaded not guilty Tuesday at his arraignment at Mahoning County Area Court and was released on $2,500 bond.

Rev. Callozzo has been relieved of duties as pastor of Nativity of Christ Orthodox Church while the case is pending, said Archpriest Roman Star, dean of the Central States for the Patriarchal Parishes in the USA, part of the Russian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate), to which the parish belongs.

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AUSTRALIA
Star Observer

SYDNEY CATHOLIC DIOCESE SENDS LETTER WARNING BUSINESSES TO NOT SUPPORT GAY MARRIAGE

JULIE GREKSA — JUNE 26, 2015

THE Catholic Church in Sydney has sent letters to companies that expressed their support for marriage equality as part of an open letter.

Advertisements showing some of the 180 business signatories to a corporate support campaign by Australian Marriage Equality were run in the Weekend Australian this month.

In one response to the ads, business manager of the Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney Michael Digges wrote to law firm Maurice Blackburn questioning their role and accusing them of “over stepping” by participating in the marriage debate.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Response to Child Sexual Abuse

The Royal Commission has published further submissions in response to its consultation paper on redress and civil litigation, released by the Royal Commission 30 January 2015.

The submissions are available on the Royal Commission website

Submissions were required to undergo procedural fairness and privacy checks prior to publication.

1. The incidence of child sexual abuse in contemporary out-of-home care settings.
2. Recruitment, assessment and training of carers in out-of-home care.
3. Monitoring and oversight of children in out-of-home care in the context of preventing child sexual abuse and responding to allegations of child sexual abuse.
4. Systems, policies, practices and procedures for
a. reporting allegations of child sexual abuse in out-of-home care
b. responding to allegations of child sexual abuse in out-of-home care, and
c. supporting children who have been sexually abused in out-of-home care.

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OREGON
Bend Bulletin

By Claire Withycombe / The Bulletin / @kcwithycombe
Published Jun 26, 2015

A Gresham man conditionally released before his Deschutes County sexual abuse trial is in custody at the Tillamook County jail on related charges, court records show.

James Daniel Worley, 42, is being held in lieu of $1.1 million bail in the Tillamook County jail on charges of sexual abuse, rape and sodomy of two children, alleged to have occurred in 2005 and 2006. The Tillamook County jail confirmed Worley remained in custody Thursday.

Court records show Worley, a pastor and former Tillamook police officer, pleaded not guilty on April 29 to 12 counts of first-degree sexual abuse, three counts of first-degree rape and several other sex crimes in Tillamook County. Records also indicate Worley’s attorney argued for his conditional release, but the motion was denied.

Worley pleaded not guilty in January to 37 charges pertaining to the alleged sexual abuse of two children between 2002 and 2004 in Deschutes County. He was conditionally released from the Deschutes County jail in late January after his bail was reduced from $1 million to $250,000.

He now also awaits a trial in Tillamook County, which is scheduled to begin Aug. 11. His Deschutes County trial is scheduled to begin about a month later on Sept. 15 and is expected to take eight to 10 days.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Altrincham Today

A former St Ambrose College pupil is to detail the abuse that he and others suffered at the school in a new book to be published next week.

David Nolan will release Tell the Truth and Shame the Devil on July 2nd, with a sold-out launch event at Local Creation in Altrincham tonight.

The book follows on from his involvement with the trial of former teacher Alan Morris, who was jailed for nine years last summer for decades of abuse at the Hale Barns school.

Nolan withdrew his right to give evidence in the trial in order to document the lead-up to the trial in an 11-minute film for Granada Reports.

The film prompted more former pupils to come forward – Nolan says a total of “nearly 100″ for the trial and after sentencing – and he says he has written the book to help those who continue to struggle with their experiences at the school.

He adds: “For the victims it didn’t happen in the past, because they thought about it this morning. One of the interviewees in the book tried to kill himself twice. I get very annoyed with people who say, ‘oh it’s all in the past’, because it isn’t in the past for them.

“Some of the victims got to see Morris in court, but for others, they never got that, so this is some form of alternative.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Tribune-Review

By Andrew Conte and Brad Bumsted
Thursday, June 25, 2015

HOLLIDAYSBURG — The only way to stop Catholic clerics who abuse children is to prosecute the people who oversee them and let it continue, said an Altoona lawyer who has successfully represented dozens of victims across Pennsylvania.

Attorney Richard Serbin said he thinks agents with the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office were pursuing a broader investigation Thursday near this Blair County borough when they raided St. Bernardine Monastery, where a Franciscan friar accused of molesting children killed himself two years ago.

“If they knowingly allow children to be abused or place them in situations where they were likely to be abused, they should be prosecuted,” he said.

Brother Stephen Baker, 62, worked in various roles as a religion teacher and baseball and wrestling coach at Catholic facilities in several states. He was athletic trainer at Bishop McCort Catholic High School in Johnstown from 1992 to 2001.

In late January 2013, he fatally stabbed himself in the heart at the monastery, where he had been living.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier

By Matthew Dixon June 26, 2015

Survivors of clergy sex abuse who have already received payments from the Catholic Church may be entitled to a further settlement, according to a leading lawyer.

Shine Lawyers partner Roger Singh has represented a number of people with claims and believes the evidence presented at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse may allow survivors who have already received payments to be open to further settlements.

“So when I look at what is coming out of the Royal Commission what concerns me, especially with what we are hearing about from the Catholic Church, is that there is a time when they knew (what was happening), that is what is being suggested,” he said.

Mr Singh said if abuse survivors had approached the church to seek answers and redress, and the church provided it to them, and it was then proven the church had some knowledge of what had occurred, it would be considered that agreement was struck without all of the information provided.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

Cardinal Brady apologises to Fr Brendan Smyth’s victims after revelations two teenage boys were asked if they enjoyed abuse they suffered

By Rebecca Black
PUBLISHED
26/06/2015

Two teenage boys abused by Father Brendan Smyth were interrogated by three priests after speaking out, and even asked whether they had enjoyed their sexual abuse.

The harrowing details of how the victims were treated by the Catholic Church was revealed at the Historic Institutional Abuse inquiry (HIAI) sitting at Banbridge courthouse yesterday.

Former head of the Catholic Church in Ireland, Cardinal Sean Brady (75), issued an “unreserved apology” to all of Fr Smyth’s victims and spoke of his regret at how the situation had been handled.

Giving evidence to the inquiry yesterday, it emerged that Cardinal Brady was present at separate meetings in 1975 with both the boys, aged 14 and 15 years old.

He was then a teacher at St Patrick’s College in Cavan and was acting as notary going under the name Father John Brady.

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WORCESTER (MA)
Telegram & Gazette

By Mark Sullivan
Telegram & Gazette Staff

Posted Jun. 25, 2015

WORCESTER – Three former Worcester Diocese priests implicated in the sexual abuse of minors have been formally defrocked by Rome, the diocese has announced.

The three men, Gerard L. Branconnier, Robert E. Kelley and Lowe B. Dongor, have been dismissed from the clerical state by the Vatican and may never again function in any capacity as priests, according to a statement issued by Bishop Robert J. McManus.

“It is my fervent prayer that Christ may bring healing and hope to anyone who has been abused by these men or by anyone in the Catholic Church,” Bishop McManus said.

Mr. Branconnier, 63, who was assigned as a priest to the parishes of St. Roch in Oxford, North American Martyrs in Auburn, Sacred Heart of Jesus in Gardner, and St. Paul & St. Thomas Aquinas in Warren, had been removed from ministry by Bishop Timothy Harrington in 1993 following “credible allegations of abuse” involving a 16-year-old boy, the diocese said. His case was sent to Rome in 2005.

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TEXAS
Christian Post

Former ROC Church Pastor Geronimo Aguilar Who Ran ‘Tax-Free Harem’ Found Guilty of Multiple Sex Crimes

By Leonardo Blair , Christian Post Reporter

Former and founding pastor of the Richmond Outreach Center megachurch in Richmond, Virginia, Geronimo “Pastor G” Aguilar, who a prosecutor said ran a “tax-free harem,” was convicted Wednesday of sexually assaulting two sisters in Fort Worth and Grapevine, Texas, nearly 20 years ago when they were both younger than 14 years old.

A report from the Star-Telegram said a jury in Tarrant County spent less than four hours deliberating before convicting Aguilar, 45, on all seven counts of an indictment that included two counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child which carry a maximum sentence of life in prison.

Aguilar was also convicted of three counts of sexual assault of a child younger than 17, and two counts of indecency with a child, according to WTVR. Each of these second-degree felonies, carry a maximum sentences of 20 years.

Aguilar, who was free on bond during his trial, was immediately taken into custody after the verdict, according to the Star-Telegram. Some jurors reportedly hugged the two sisters who were 13 and 11 when the assaults began in 1996, according their testimonies that were delivered last week.

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MASSACHUSETTS
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Thursday, June 25

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

Exactly three decade after he was suspended because of child sex crimes, the Vatican has defrocked one of Worcester’s most notorious predator priests, along with two other child molesting clerics. But local Catholic officials, who hid these decisions for at least six months, must do more.

[Catholic Free Press]

Robert E. Kelley, Lowe B. Dongor and Gerard L. Branconnier are no longer priests. Worcester Bishop Robert McManus should use his vast resources to aggressively seek out and help others who are suffering because they were sexually violated as kids by these pedophiles. And he should defrock, demote, discipline and denounce current and former church staffers who ignored or concealed their crimes.

Kelley was twice convicted of molesting kids, served two prison terms and is a registered sex offender. He worked at churches in Southbridge, Lunenburg, Leominster, and Gardner.

Branconnier was supposedly suspended from active ministry in 1993 for abusing a boy at North American Martyrs Parish in Auburn. But in 2006, that alleged that Branconnier was continuing to function as a priest.

Dongor studied at Assumption College and St. Mary Seminary and was removed in 2001 from St. Joseph Parish in Fitchburg because computer technicians found child pornography on his computer and called police. Later he was arrested and fled to the Philippines 11/11. Vatican asked to laicize him. In 2012, he was extradited to the US and pled guilty.

We hope this belated, grudging and paltry move brings some healing to the dozens who were assaulted by these clerics. And we hope that every single person who saw, suspected or suffered their crimes – or cover ups by Worcester Catholic officials – will get help, protect kids, call police, expose wrongdoers, deter cover ups and start healing.

NOTES

1) For a moving account by a victim of Kelley, see

[SNAP]

2) Photos of all three are at BishopAccountability.org. According to that organization, there are 41 publicly accused Worcester area child molesting clerics.

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UNITED STATES
BishopAccountability.org

Summary of Case: Michael Brennan was a Third Order of Regular Franciscan priest, ordained in 1951. He was assigned to parishes in the Baker OR diocese, the T.O.R.’s monastery in the Altoona PA diocese, and at a parish as well as a boarding school for elementary school children in the St. Cloud MN diocese. Brennan’s name was included on the St. Cloud diocese’s list released January 3, 2014 of 33 clergy members “who were likely involved in the sexual abuse of minors.” His whereabouts after 1968 are unknown.

Ordained: 1951

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

SUNNY DHILLON
VANCOUVER — The Globe and Mail
Published Thursday, Jun. 25, 2015

Freelance journalist Laura Robinson should not have directly mentioned former Vancouver Olympics CEO John Furlong and the word “abuse” when she posted a notice looking for people to interview, an expert on conducting historical child sex-abuse investigations testified on Thursday.

John Yuille was the final witness in a B.C. Supreme Court defamation case. Ms. Robinson has sued Mr. Furlong over his response to a story she wrote in September, 2012. Closing arguments are scheduled for Friday.

Dr. Yuille, a professor emeritus of psychology at the University of British Columbia, told the court an investigator should not reveal who or what behaviour is being investigated.

“This is central, detailed information and it must come from the witness, not from the investigator. As soon as the investigator supplies the identity, the time frame, the location, the allegation that there’s abuse, this makes it no longer possible for that information to come spontaneously from the witnesses,” he said.

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UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage

William D. Lindsey

Yesterday, I noted that Catholic culture (at an official level) remains irredeemably heterosexist, and has gotten even more so in response to the movements for women’s and LGBT rights in the 20th and 21st century. I predicted that the upcoming synod on the family will only cement into place more firmly than ever the trend to heterosexism — to the domination of women by men and of homosexual people by heterosexual ones — in Catholic institutions.

To me, the recently released draft of the report on which synod discussion will be based strongly suggests that the upcoming synod will not be a kairotic occasion for the Catholic church to acknowledge the manifold ways in which heterosexism, with the unmerited power and privilege it accords heterosexual males and its belief that women should be subordinated to men and gay folks excluded from the order of creation, does very serious damage to the church itself and to the world at large.

I’d like to ask you to keep those remarks in mind as I talk now about an important set of articles by Soli Salgado that National Catholic Reporter published online this morning. The first of these notes that allegations of sexual harrassment of female students by Mennonite theologian John Howard Yoder now extend to Notre Dame University, which hired Yoder as a full-time professor of theology in 1984. The second article, also by Salgado, explains why it seemed important that this story be told, given that Yoder died in 1997 and the officials who chose to ignore or cover up his sexual violence towards female students are also themselves no longer with us in many cases.

One of the people cited in both articles is Mennonite theologian and mental health clinician Ruth Krall, whose outstanding theological work on issues of sexual abuse I’ve often noted here. As I’ve indicated, at her blog site Enduring Space, Ruth has published a series of books entitled The Elephants in God’s Living Room: Clergy Sexual Abuse and Institutional Clericalism, which deal with the Yoder story. These books, and Ruth’s work on issues of abuse in the Mennonite church, have been ground-breaking in forcing the Mennonite church to talk honestly about Yoder’s legacy, and to come to terms with what it means for Mennonite pacifist theology to have been represented, in the 20th century, by a leading theologian with a history of sexual violence towards his students.

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SCOTLAND
Herald Scotland

Stephen Naysmith
Social affairs correspondent

TWO Catholic charities are to lodge a legal objection to the choice of chair for the Scottish Government’s inquiry into the historic abuse of children in care.

The Congregation of the Poor Sisters of Nazareth and the Daughters of Charity of St Vincent De Paul will seek a judicial review today challenging the appointment of Susan O’Brien QC, who is due to take up the post within days.

Last night a senior civil servant wrote to various parties, including several victims of historic child abuse who have campaigned for more than 14 years to achieve an inquiry, warning them about the action being taken by the charities.

The first hearing will be at the Court of Session in Edinburgh, he said, adding: “Please be reassured that the Scottish Ministers are defending this challenge robustly. It is still intended that Ms O’Brien will take up her position as planned on the 1st of July.”

Education Secretary Angela Constance appointed Ms O’Brien last month to head the inquiry which will examine any instance in which a child was abused in care.

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SCOTLAND
Scotsman

CHRIS MARSHALL
Friday 26 June 2015

TWO religious groups have launched a legal challenge to block the appointment of a respected QC to chair Scotland’s national inquiry into child abuse.

The Congregation of the Poor Sisters of Nazareth and the Daughters of Charity of St Vincent De Paul have raised judicial review proceedings against Scottish Government ministers.

The move is designed to challenge a decision to appoint Susan O’Brien as the chair of Scotland’s child abuse inquiry, which is due to get under way later in the year.

A hearing is expected to take place today at the Court of Session in Edinburgh. The Scottish Government said it would defend its position “robustly”.

In an e-mail to abuse survivors, Scottish Government official Ellen MacKinnon wrote: “I am writing to make you aware that the Congregation of the Poor Sisters of Nazareth and the Daughters of Charity of St Vincent De Paul have raised judicial review proceedings.

“I was not sure if you would be aware of these proceedings and did not want this to come as a surprise to you. Please be reassured that the Scottish ministers are defending this challenge.”

The Poor Sisters ran a number of children’s homes across Scotland and the UK which have been at the centre of abuse allegations. They have links with the Daughters of Charity of St Vincent De Paul, which has also been subject of abuse allegations.

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ILLINOIS
Journal Star

Andy Kravetz
Journal Star courts reporter

Posted Jun. 25, 2015

PEORIA — A former pastor was sentenced to three years in prison Thursday for sexually abusing a preteen girl for a number of years.

Ralph W. Barnett, 74, of 4216 N. Patricia Court, spoke in soft and measured tones. He apologized for his actions, telling Judge David Brown that it “just happened” and he was going through a bad time in his life. He told the judge he stopped himself after five years and now was seeking repentance and forgiveness.

But the judge took issue with the statement that Barnett “just happened” to begin abusing the girl in 2003 and then just stopped in 2008.

“It just doesn’t happen that you enter into a sexual relationship with a child for several years,” he said, before imposing sentence. The judge said probation, which Barnett wanted due to his extensive medical issues, wasn’t appropriate as children needed to be protected and a message had to be sent.

The judge also noted the testimony from the victim, now a teenager, who tearfully told how the abuse affected her.

In April, Barnett pleaded guilty in Peoria County Circuit Court to aggravated criminal sexual abuse. In return for his plea, three other counts including criminal sexual assault and predatory criminal sexual assault of a child were dropped. Prosecutors agreed to a 10-year cap. Without the deal, he had faced up to 60 years behind bars.

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LOUISIANA
Fox 8

NEW ORLEANS, LA (WVUE) –
The NOPD has obtained an arrest warrant for a 36-year-old youth minister accused of having inappropriate sexual contact with two teen males.

Most of the incidents are reported to have occurred at the Baronne Street home of Ryan Scott Rodgers.

Rodgers is accused of touching the two teenage boys inappropriately while they were sleeping. Both victims told detectives that they were awakened by Rogers fondling them. The victims told Detective Stephanie Taillon that Rodgers sexually abused them for over a year.

During the course of the investigation, Taillon learned that Rodgers would buy the teen underwear and make them pose in front of him. Rodgers is a youth minister at several local churches in Orleans, Jefferson and Plaquemines Parishes.

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TENNESSEE
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Thursday, June 25

Statement by Susan Vance of Knoxville, Eastern TN SNAP leader ( 865-927-2923, 865-748-3518 cell, vancefamily1@comcast.net )

We’re glad that an increasingly desperate and manipulative predator priest has lost in court again. We hope his relentless legal maneuvers will prod others who saw, suspected or suffered his crimes to step forward, help prosecutors, protect kids and start healing.

[WJHL]

We’re sad that an admitted predator priest, Fr. William Casey, is rubbing salt into the wounds of his victims by making yet another desperate legal move to escape responsibility for his heinous crimes by exploiting legal technicalities.

[Greeneville Sun]

Shame on Fr. Casey for his latest hurtful, self-serving legal maneuver. We hope he fails with every one of his seemingly endless “Hail Mary” filings and that they will prompt more people with information or suspicions about his crimes to step forward.

We call on every bishop who supervised Fr. Casey to publicly denounce this hurtful move, especially Knoxville Bishop Richard Stika.

Finally, we in SNAP call on other victims of Fr. Casey to come forward and help police and prosecutors keep this dangerous cleric locked up and away from kids.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Thursday, June 25

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests ( 314 566 9790, SNAPclohessy@aol.com )

We’re glad law enforcement are searching a Catholic institution where a serial child molesting cleric spent time. We hope current and former monastery staff and students with information about the predator will pick up the phone and call the Pennsylvania attorney general’s office immediately.

[Tribune-Review]

We also hope sources who talked with the Tribune-Review are correct and that today’s action “may be part of a larger investigation of child molestation over nearly three decades involving more than 20 priests in the Altoona-Johnstown Roman Catholic Diocese.”

Beyond the Brother Stephen Baker cases, Altoona-Johnstown Bishop Mark Leonard Bartchak has a dreadful record on safeguarding kids, ousting predators and helping victims. We hope law enforcement officials at the local and state levels will more aggressively investigate crimes and cover ups in his diocese.

We also hope sources who talked with the Tribune-Review are correct and that today’s action “may be part of a larger investigation of child molestation over nearly three decades involving more than 20 priests in the Altoona-Johnstown Roman Catholic Diocese.”

Beyond the Brother Stephen Baker cases, Altoona-Johnstown Bishop Mark Leonard Bartchak has a dreadful record on safeguarding kids, ousting predators and helping victims. We hope law enforcement officials at the local and state levels will more aggressively investigate crimes and cover ups in his diocese.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Huddersfield Daily Examiner

BY NEIL ATKINSON

Police have confirmed they expect to hear from more victims of perverted headteacher Anne Lakey.

And it has been revealed that the disgraced teacher – jailed for sex offences against young pupils – worked in Huddersfield.

She was a teacher at the then All Saints Catholic High School at Bradley Bar.

It was one of her first teaching posts after qualifying at Sheffield University.

Now her career is in ruins after she was jailed for eight years for having sex with two boys.

Police have also revealed they are expecting other victims to come forward from Lakey’s past.

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WORCESTER (MA)
Roman Catholic Diocese of Worcester

June 25, 2015

Related: 2014 Audit finds Diocese compliant with National Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People

June 25, 2015, WORCESTER, MA — Following the Catholic Church’s commitment to the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, Most Rev. Robert J. McManus, Bishop of Worcester, has announced that Gerard L. Branconnier, Robert E. Kelley and Lowe B. Dongor have been laicized. All were dismissed from the clerical state by the Holy Father, Pope Francis. As a result of the laicizations, the three men may never function in any capacity as priests or be referred to as priests or as “Father” in writing such as in future obituaries. Although the decisions were reached by late 2014, formal announcement has waited until the period for any individual appeals was concluded.

“It is my fervent prayer that Christ may bring healing and hope to anyone who has been abused by these men or by anyone in the Catholic Church,” said Bishop McManus.
Bishop McManus encourages anyone in need of pastoral assistance as a result of clerical abuse to contact the diocesan Victims Assistance Coordinator in the Office of Healing and Prevention by calling 508-929-4363. The bishop noted, “As Pope Francis wrote to the Episcopal Conferences throughout the world in February 2015, ‘everything possible must be done to rid the Church of the scourge of the sexual abuse of minors and to open pathways of reconciliation and healing for those who were abused.’” …

In a related announcement, the Diocese of Worcester was found compliant in the national compliance audit in 2014 regarding the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People. In 2014 it reported having received three new reports of abuse, all of which occurred prior to 1980, and has had ongoing contact with 24 victims and their families who made reports prior to July 2013. The Diocese of Worcester is committed to creating safe environments in all diocesan parishes and institutions and continues to work closely with local law enforcement agencies and community resources to support that commitment. In late 2014 it launched a new online training program for recognizing the signs and symptoms of child abuse in collaboration with Dallas Child Advocacy Center to augment the diocesan onsite training programs. The diocese has processed more than 36,000 background checks over the past decade for ordained and lay employees and volunteers which is another example of how it has been fully supportive of the commitment toward the safety of children in its care.

A Diocesan Review Board meets regularly to review cases brought forward from victims of abuse, as well as concerns involved in the ongoing support of victims and their families who have come forward over the years. More than half of the board members are from outside the employ of the diocese, as mandated by the charter and have pertinent experience to assist the diocese in meeting its commitment to safety. They include the following: Judith Audette, L.I.C.S.W., Chairperson, Executive Director, Pathways of Central Massachusetts; Maurice Boisvert, L.I.C.S.W., CEO Emeritus, YOU Inc.; John Duggan, M.D., Pediatrician; Claire Freda, Leominster City Councilor; Richard Hummel, Ph.D., Psychologist, Child Sexual Assault Specialist; Marian McGovern, State Police Colonel (retired); Christina Martinez, LMFT; Father Dean N. Paleologos, Saint Spyridon Greek Orthodox Cathedral (retired); Katherine Perkins, L.I.C.S.W., Child Sexual Assault Specialist; Honorable Edward J. Reynolds; and Lynda M. Young, M.D., Pediatrician.

In addition to these three laicizations, the Diocese of Worcester has previously announced the following men as having been removed from the clerical state by Rome since 2011: David Blizard, Thomas Kane, Robert Shauris, and Thomas Teczar.

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WORCESTER (MA)
The Catholic Free Press

Three former diocesan priests have been laicized, according to a press release from the Diocese.

Following the Catholic Church’s commitment to the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, Bishop McManus has announced that Gerard L. Branconnier, Robert E. Kelley and Lowe B. Dongor have been laicized. All were dismissed from the clerical state by Pope Francis, according to the press release.

As a result of the laicizations, the three men may never function in any capacity as priests or be referred to as priests or as “Father” in writing, such as in future obituaries, explained Raymond L. Delisle, director of the Office of Communications and chancellor. The decisions were reached late in 2014, but formal announcement was delayed until the appeal period was concluded.

“It is my fervent prayer that Christ may bring healing and hope to anyone who has been abused by these men or by anyone in the Catholic Church,” Bishop McManus said.

Contact Diocese for help

Bishop McManus encourages anyone in need of pastoral assistance as a result of clerical abuse to contact the diocesan victims assistance coordinator in the Office of Healing and Prevention by calling 508-929-4363. The bishop noted, “As Pope Francis wrote to the Episcopal Conferences throughout the world in February 2015, ‘everything possible must be done to rid the Church of the scourge of the sexual abuse of minors and to open pathways of reconciliation and healing for those who were abused.’”

Gerard L. Branconnier, 63, was removed from ministry in 1993 by Bishop Timothy J. Harrington following the determination of credible allegations of abuse with a 16-year-old young man. Branconnier has not had faculties for priestly ministry since 1993. He was ordained in 1978 and served in the following parishes: St. Roch, Oxford; North American Martyrs, Auburn; Sacred Heart of Jesus, Gardner, and St. Paul and St. Thomas Aquinas, Warren. Bishop McManus submitted the case to Rome in November 2005.

Robert E. Kelley, 73, was removed from ministry in 1985 by Bishop Harrington after learning of credible allegations of abuse which had occurred in the 1970s. He has not had faculties to serve in priestly ministry since 1985. Kelley was ordained in 1968 and served in the following parishes: Notre Dame, Southbridge; St. Boniface, Lunenburg; St. Cecilia, Leominster, and Sacred Heart of Jesus, Gardner. He has served two prison terms, one in 1990 and one in 2003, for sexual abuse of children prior to 1984 and is registered in Massachusetts as a Level 3 sex offender. Bishop McManus submitted the case to Rome in November 2005

Lowe B. Dongor, 38, was removed from ministry by Bishop McManus in July 2011 for possession of child pornography. Dongor had not yet completed his first year as a priest. He was an associate pastor at St. Joseph Parish, Fitchburg. Dongor has not had faculties to serve as a priest since then. When it was learned that he returned to his native Philippines prior to a pre-trial hearing, Bishop McManus notified the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines that Dongor was not a priest in good standing should he try to present himself for ministry there.

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CANADA
CBC News

By Jason Proctor, CBC News

An expert on human memory says journalist Laura Robinson conducted a flawed investigation after she travelled to Burns Lake, B.C., to interview potential abuse victims about John Furlong.

UBC professor John Yuille questioned a flyer Laura Robinson posted in the community while researching a damning 2012 Georgia Straight article on the former Olympics CEO’s time as a teacher at a Catholic school in 1969.

The poster said she was a “journalist investigating abuse” and was interested in students who “had John Furlong as a phys-ed teacher.”

“I’m not a journalist. I don’t set journalist standards,” Yuille said.

“This is bad investigation — that I know.”

Keeping an open mind

Yuille was the final witness Thursday in an unprecedented B.C. Supreme Court trial.

While Furlong was the subject of an article containing allegations he verbally and physically abused children at Immaculata Catholic school, the reporter is suing him for defamation.

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