ABUSE TRACKER

MINNESOTA
Sleepy Eye Herald-Dispatch

On Tuesday, Feb. 28, New Ulm Police Department Investigator Jeff Hohensee confirmed that the investigation into allegations of improper conduct by Fr. Sam Wagner is not completed.

By Deb Moldaschel, Editor

On Tuesday, Feb. 28, New Ulm Police Department Investigator Jeff Hohensee confirmed that the investigation into allegations of improper conduct by Fr. Sam Wagner is not completed. Fr. Wagner had been placed on leave from ministry by the Diocese of New Ulm, earlier this month, when the allegations were brought to their attention.

“The investigation is still continuing,” said Hohensee. “I am currently conducting interviews of church members and other potential witnesses.” Hohensee said search warrants were granted in the case and he is awaiting the results of those warrants—digital evidence.

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MINNESOTA
Minneapolis Star Tribune

It is the 16th Catholic Diocese in the country to file for bankruptcy.

By Rochelle Olson and Jean Hopfensperger MARCH 3, 2017

The Diocese of New Ulm filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Friday, becoming the 16th Catholic religious organization in the nation to seek protection from clergy sex abuse claims.

The New Ulm Diocese had received 101 claims of child sex abuse in recent years, and financial reorganization was the fairest way to address the claims, said New Ulm Bishop John LeVoir in a statement.

The claims were made through the 2013 Minnesota Child Victim’s Act, which opened a three-year window for filing older abuse claims.

“Reorganization provides the diocese a process to fulfill its obligation, as much as possible, to victims and survivors of clergy sexual abuse of minors, while continuing to carry out its ministry,” LeVoir said in a statement.

New Ulm is the third Minnesota diocese to declare bankruptcy in response to an outpouring of child sexual abuse claims. The St. Paul and Minneapolis Archdiocese and the Duluth Diocese filed in 2015. The cases are making their way through federal bankruptcy court.

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MINNESOTA
Roman Catholic Diocese of New Ulm

Message from Bishop LeVoir – video

On March 3, 2017, the corporation of the Diocese of New Ulm filed for financial reorganization under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code.

Chapter 11 provides a neutral, court-supervised process for the Diocese of New Ulm to establish a plan to pay its creditors while continuing work essential to its mission.

The Diocese’s creditors are victims and survivors of clergy sexual abuse as minors who filed a total of 101 lawsuits against the Diocese and some parishes within the geographic area the Diocese serves under the Minnesota Child Victims Act. That Act lifted the civil statute of limitations for a period of three years, ending on May 25, 2016. The lifting of the civil statute of limitations allowed people to file claims of sexual abuse, regardless of when that abuse happened. Most of the abuse claims stem from incidents reported to have occurred from the 1950s through the 1970s. No priests accused of abuse are currently in public ministry in the Diocese.

The Diocese and those representing victims and survivors will continue to work together, under the guidance of the court, to come to a fair resolution of claims. It is unknown how long this will take, but we seek to complete the reorganization process as promptly and efficiently as possible.

Parishes, Catholic schools and other Catholic organizations located in the geographic area served by the Diocese are not part of this filing. Parishes and other Catholic organizations are separate corporations under Minnesota law.

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MINNESOTA
Jeff Anderson & Associates

3/3/2017

(New Ulm, MN) – Today, the Diocese of New Ulm filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection. The Diocese of New Ulm is the sixteenth Catholic Diocese or Religious Order to file for bankruptcy in the United States. In 2015, the Archdiocese of Saint Paul & Minneapolis and the Diocese of Duluth filed for bankruptcy protection as well. Both cases are still pending in bankruptcy court.

“The bankruptcy filing does not stop the pursuit of justice for sexual abuse survivors,” said Attorney Mike Finnegan. “Survivors will continue to seek truth and accountability in the bankruptcy process.”

Sexual abuse survivors advocated for the diocese to release the names of credibly accused priests who worked in the Diocese of New Ulm. In March 2016, the diocese agreed to release the names of 16 priests with credible allegations of child sexual abuse.

Contact Jeff Anderson: Office/651.964.3473 Cell/612.817.8665
Contact Mike Finnegan: Office/651.964.3473 Cell/612.205.5531

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MINNESOTA
Mankato Free Press

NEW ULM — The Diocese of New Ulm filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection, Jeff Anderson & Associates PA announced today in a press release.

The Diocese of New Ulm is the 16th Catholic Diocese or Religious Order to file for bankruptcy in the United States.

In 2015, the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and the Diocese of Duluth filed for bankruptcy protection as well. Both cases are still pending in bankruptcy court.

“The bankruptcy filing does not stop the pursuit of justice for sexual abuse survivors,” Attorney Mike Finnegan said in the press release. “Survivors will continue to seek truth and accountability in the bankruptcy process.”

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CITTA’ DEL VATICANO
Corriere della Sera

Guido Vecchi

CITTÀ DEL VATICANO «Ha voluto un po’ scuotere l’albero». Il cardinale Pietro Parolin, Segretario di Stato vaticano, non si scompone dopo le dimissioni di Marie Collins, l’ultima ex vittima rimasta nella Commissione per la protezione dei minori istituita nel 2014 da Francesco contro la pedofilia nel clero. Il cardinale parla all’uscita una conferenza sull’esortazione del Papa «Evangelii Gaudium», nel seminario arcivescovile di Firenze. Marie Collins ha parlato di «bastoni tra le ruote» e «una mancanza di collaborazione vergognosa» nella Curia romana. «Ci sono stati alcuni episodi che hanno portato la signora Collins a questo passo: per quello che io conosco, lei li ha interpretati così, e ha sentito che l’unica maniera di reagire, anche un po’ per scuotere l’albero, era quella di dare le dimissioni».

L’impegno prosegue

Il Segretario di Stato parla del lavoro della commissione e del suo presidente, l’arcivescovo di Boston Sean O’Malley: «Ho visto sempre un grande impegno del cardinale O’Malley per la protezione dei fanciulli: stanno portando avanti un bel lavoro di sensibilizzazione. Di per sé la commissione non deve occuparsi degli abusi sessuali, è la Congregazione per la Dottrina della fede che lo fa, ma deve preoccuparsi soprattutto di creare nella Chiesa un ambiente che sia tale che difenda bambini e ragazzi, li tuteli, e non permetta il ripetersi di episodi di pedofilia».

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VATICAN CITY
Crux

Inés San Martín March 3, 2017
VATICAN CORRESPONDENT

Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin said that the commission’s work will continue under the command of Boston’s Cardinal Sean O’Malley. The American prelate defined Marie Collin’s departure as a “blow to the commission,” but one which “increases our resolve to work harder for reform.”

ROME- According to Pope Francis’s right-hand man, a survivor of clerical sexual abuse who resigned earlier this week from a papal anti-abuse commission quit because she wanted to “shake the tree” in the Vatican.

Speaking to Crux, survivor Marie Collins had said some members of the Church’s governing body, known as the Roman Curia, have hindered and blocked the work being done by the commission. Talking to America magazine later on, she specifically named the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF).

The Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera quotes Italian Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s Secretary of State, as saying that there have been specific episodes which led Collins to take the step she did.

“For what I know, she has interpreted them as [lack of cooperation], and felt that the only way to act, even to ‘shake the tree’ a little, was to present her resignation,” Parolin said in Florence while attending a conference about Pope Francis’s apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

NCR Editorial Staff | Mar. 3, 2017

EDITORIAL

The resignation of Marie Collins from the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors is a turning point in Pope Francis’ pontificate. It cannot be seen any other way. For all the hope and promise that we find in Francis and his vision for the church, we believe his pontificate teeters on the brink of failure on the issue of sexual abuse by the clergy.
For three and a half years, Francis has promised to take real action to bring accountability to the highest structures of the church and to help heal survivors. Now the commission he created to do that must confront serious questions about its credibility.

For his part, Francis must take some decisive, public action here. He must empower the commission with authority — a fully functioning commission cannot operate without a budget, permanent staff and the power to hire outside expertise. Beyond that, Francis must act to guarantee that the Vatican dicasteries and their personnel cooperate fully with the commission. Those who deliberately frustrate the commission’s work, no matter what level of the Curia they represent, must be replaced with personnel who will claim the eradication of this scandal as part of their mission.

But something deeper is at play here. If all we get are stronger managerial presences and dedicated staff and office space, we may not get the full reform of structures this issue calls out for. A resistance to change that is planted deep within the all-male clerical culture is the largely unaddressed issue at the heart of the scandal and has been since the first major story about it appeared in these pages more than 30 years ago.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Times

Fiona Hamilton, Crime Editor
March 3 2017
The Times

Police officers have been unable to use a new law to catch paedophiles because of lengthy government delays, it has emerged.

The Ministry of Justice is facing questions about why it has failed for two years to implement measures intended to prevent child grooming, even though the number of cases has more than tripled in recent years.

The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children said that the delays were a “disgrace” and called on ministers urgently to enact the law.

Sexual predators can currently only be arrested and charged if they meet a child after grooming them. However, a law was passed in March 2015 that would make it illegal for an adult to send a sexual communication to a child, either over the phone or via the internet.

The law is contained in section 67 of the Serious Crime Act but it is awaiting the “commencement order” that is needed before police forces can start using it. The NSPCC said that in the meantime children are being put at risk and pointed to a sharp rise in the number of abusers meeting children they have groomed.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Times

Andrew Norfolk, Chief Investigative Reporter
March 3 2017
The Times

A man accused of several sex offences against a 12-year-old boy is head of music at a top public school, it can be revealed after a gagging order was lifted.

Sean Farrell’s role at Wellington College, in Crowthorne, Berkshire, was kept secret when he appeared before magistrates last week.

He is charged with sex crimes said to have been committed in North Yorkshire three decades ago against a pupil at Ampleforth College, a leading Roman Catholic school.

Reporters and the public were ordered to leave the court in York last Thursday before Deputy District Judge Edward Barr banned the media from revealing where and in what role Mr Farrell was employed.

The restriction had been requested by his former wife. It was overturned yesterday after a challenge by The Times, which said that Judge Barr had no power to make it.

Mr Farrell, 49, is a former Ampleforth pupil and his alleged victim was at Gilling Castle, the college’s prep school at which Mr Farrell had been a student music teacher between 1985 and 1986.

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UNITED STATES
Father Kenneth Lasch

Thursday March 2, 2017

Website Editor’s Note: Last week, I posted a combination of several articles dealing with the unfinished business associated with the scandal of sexual abuse in the RC Church. I realize that many if not most folks in the pew assume it’s over and done with. But alas, notwithstanding Pope Francis’ intention to hold accountable bishops who defaulted on their responsibility to protect children and vulnerable adults, in fact the process of adjudication and justice has broken down. In his Apostolic Letter, ‘As a Loving Mother’, Pope Francis laid down the procedure whereby bishops are to be held accountable: “The diocesan Bishop or Eparch, or one who holds a temporary title and is responsible for a Particular Church or other community of faithful that is its legal equivalent, according to can. 368 CIC or can. 313 CCEO, can be legitimately removed from office if he has through negligence committed or through omission facilitated acts that have caused grave harm to others, either to physical persons or to the community as a whole. The harm may be physical, moral, spiritual or through the use of patrimony.” [Article One, § 1}

The Commission established by Pope Francis to deal with allegations of sexual abuse has been stalled for over two years.

In the light of so many wonderful words and counsels written and spoken that have emanated from Pope Francis moving the Church toward a renewal spearheaded by the Second Vatican Council, it is disheartening to acknowledge the fact that he has dropped the ball on following up on his own admonitions and exhortations regarding sexual abuse. There is no question that justice and mercy must embrace [Psalm 87] but there can be no mercy until there is justice, no justice until there is full disclosure and accountability.

The following video except is riveting testimony that has emerged from the Royal Commission on Sexual Abuse in Australia. It may be rightly assumed to be testimony that might be duplicated in other parts of the world. Based on the history of sexual abuse in Ireland, in the US and in other countries across the globe, it is chilling to imagine what such a commission might yield in this country. Click Testimony.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

By Isobel Frodsham For Mailonline

The head of music at a £37,000-a-year top private school in Berkshire has been suspended following claims he sexually assaulted a s 12-year-old boy three decades ago.

Sean Farrell, 49, was removed from his post at Wellington College, in Crowthorne, ‘several months ago’ after a police investigation commenced.

His ex-wife applied for a gagging order to prevent his workplace and job being named when Farrell appeared at York Magistrates Court last week.

However, after it was challenged, the order was lifted, according to The Times.

He is accused of two charges of indecent assault and two charges of gross indecency against a boy at Ampleforth College, in North Yorkshire, in the 1980s. Farrell denies the claims.

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AUSTRALIA
Manny Waks

3/3/2017

I’m delighted to share publicly the important letter I received today from the Australian Jewish community’s peak body, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ), an organisation in which I was honoured to serve as a vice president some years ago.

To me personally, and often to victims/survivors more broadly, justice and accountability is particularly important, especially in the context of the child sexual abuse scandal that has engulfed the Australian Jewish community over the last few years. To me (and to many others), the ECAJ, along with many other communal institutions, failed us. Which is why I have continued to raise the issue of justice and accountability. While many may have forgotten the extent of what transpired over many years, many of us have not. We can not. We live with different aspects of it daily. And as the target of much of the vitriol and worse over many years – for merely pursuing justice for myself and others, and to ensure our children are safe – I’ve continued to live with all of this until this day.

Which is why this powerful letter from the ECAJ is so important – to me, to my fellow victims/survivors, and indeed to many in the broader community. No doubt it will contribute to the ongoing healing process for many.

From a personal perspective, it is another important milestone in my journey. This letter effectively resolves all the outstanding personal issues I have with all Jewish Australian institutions (notwithstanding my civil case against Melbourne’s Yeshivah Centre, as well as the Jewish Taskforce Against Family Violence’s recent decision to shut their doors seemingly instead of accepting responsibility and apologising for their failures). It is also further vindication of my work to date. I hope and expect that this outcome, which is what I’ve been striving to achieve over the past few years, will lift further weight off my shoulders.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Kevin Doyle
March 3 2017

SIGNIFICANT quantities of human remains have been discovered at a Galway site excavated by the Mother and Baby Homes Commission.

The Commission has described itself as “shocked” by the discovery made in Tuam over recent weeks.

The Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation is currently probing how unmarried mothers and their babies were treated between 1922 and 1998 at 18 State-linked religious institutions.

A small number of the remains discovered in Tuam were recovered for the purpose of analysis.

“These remains involved a number of individuals with age-at-death ranges from approximately 35 foetal weeks to 2-3 years,” the body said.

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IRELAND
The Journal

* Human remains found at site of Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home in Tuam
* They were discovered in what appears to be some type of sewage container
* Scientific analysis puts the age of death between 35 foetal weeks and 2 to 3 years
* Radiocarbon dating confirms the remains are from the time the home was in operation – many are likely to be from the 1950s.

THE COMMISSION OF INVESTIGATION into Mother and Baby Homes has discovered a significant number of human remains in what appears to be a decommissioned sewage chamber in Tuam.

The Commission has completed two test excavations of the Galway site and today confirmed that “significant quantities of human remains have been discovered” in a structure which appears to be “related to the treatment/containment of sewerage and/or wastewater”.

The structure where the remains were found is long and divided into 20 chambers. The Commission is not yet clear if it was ever used for sewerage or wastewater.

There were remains found in at least 17 of the 20 chambers. A small number of the remains were recovered for testing. A scientific analysis has put the ages of the deceased at between 35 foetal weeks to two to three years old.

Radiocarbon dating suggests that they are from the time the Bon Secours home was in operation between 1925 and 1961. A number of the samples are likely to be from the 1950s.

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IRELAND
BBC News

“Significant quantities” of human remains have been discovered at the site of a former mother and baby home in County Galway.

In October 2016 the Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation began test excavations at the site in Tuam.

The commission was established following allegations about the deaths of 800 babies in Tuam and the manner in which they were buried.

It said it was “shocked” by the discovery.

The Tuam home was one of 10 institutions in which about 35,000 unmarried pregnant women are thought to have been sent.

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IRELAND
RTE News

Residents from the housing estate constructed on the site of the former mother and baby home in Tuam have been invited to a meeting to discuss this morning’s revelations that a significant amount of human remains was found at the site.

The meeting has been organised by Galway County Council and is taking place at the Town Hall in Tuam this afternoon.

Residents were informed of the commission’s findings in a leaflet drop to all homes in the Dublin Road housing estate this morning.

The council has said it recognises that the scale of the discoveries will be upsetting and difficult for many locals, several of whom tended the site where the remains were located for several years.

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IRELAND
Irish Mirror

BY TREVOR QUINN
3 MAR 2017

The discovery of a ‘significant quantities’ of human remains has been described as “sad and disturbing” by Children’s Minister Katherine Zappone today.

The horrific find, in a structure next to a septic tank, happened after a test excavation of the site by the Mother and Baby Homes Commission in Tuam, Co Galway during recent months.

The test excavation came after a ground survey in October 2015 identified a number of ‘sub surface anomalies and a further investigation was recommended.

Some of the skeletal remains are now being analysed and it’s estimated their age of death ranges from 35 foetal weeks to 2 to 3 years and date back to the 1950’s.

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IRELAND
RTE News

Human remains of a significant number of babies and infants up to three years of age have been found on the site of the former mother and baby home in Tuam, Co Galway. This follows work by the Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation which carried out planned excavations there.

What is the Commission and what is its remit?

The Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation was established by the last government on February 17th 2015 and is chaired by Judge Yvonne Murphy.

It is directed to investigate and to make a report to the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs in accordance with the provisions of Section 32 of the Commissions of Investigation Act 2004 (No. 23 of 2004).

The Commission has been asked, among other things, to establish the circumstances and arrangements for the entry of single women into mother and baby homes and to establish the living conditions they experienced there.

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IRELAND
RTE News

“Significant quantities” of human remains have been discovered at the site of the former mother-and-baby home in Tuam, Co Galway.

It comes after the Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation began test excavations at the site of the children’s burial ground on the Dublin Road housing estate in Tuam, Co Galway in October 2016.

The commission was established following allegations about the deaths of 800 babies in Tuam over a number of decades and the manner in which they were buried.

In a statement today, the commission said significant quantities of human remains have been discovered in at least 17 of the 20 underground chambers which were examined earlier this year.

It added: “These remains involved a number of individuals with age-at-death ranges from approximately 35 foetal weeks to two-three years.”

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IRELAND
Minister for Children and Youth Affairs – Irish government

Friday 3rd March, 2017

Katherine Zappone TD, Minister for Children and Youth Affairs today commented on the finding of human remains on the site of the former Mother and Baby Home in Tuam, Co. Galway. This follows work by the Commission on Mother and Baby Homes which carried out planned excavations there.

The Minister said:

“This is very sad and disturbing news. It was not unexpected as there were claims about human remains on the site over the last number of years.

Up to now we had rumours. Now we have confirmation that the remains are there, and that they date back to the time of the Mother and Baby Home, which operated in Tuam from 1925 to 1961.”

The Minister said that we must respond sensitively and respectfully to the situation. She said that her Department had brought together all of the key Departments and agencies to set out a way forward. This will include the following:

– The Commission will continue its work under its terms of reference, including such matters as post mortem practices and procedures, reporting and burial arrangements for residents of Mother and Baby Homes

– The Coroner for North Galway will take the steps he deems necessary under his independent statutory functions

– Galway County Council will engage with the Commission in relation to the immediate next steps on the site

– Galway County Council will engage with local residents and other interested parties on what should happen next in relation to the remains

– There will be an information line for factual information, and a service for those who feel personally affected by the news.

Minister Zappone added:

“Today is about remembering and respecting the dignity of the children who lived their short lives in this Home. We will honour their memory and make sure that we take the right actions now to treat their remains appropriately.”

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IRELAND
Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation

The Commission has completed its test excavation of the Tuam site.

The stratigraphic survey which was conducted in October 2015 identified a particular area of interest and identified a number of sub surface anomalies that were considered worthy of further investigation. These were further investigated by a test excavation in November/December 2016 and in January/February 2017. Test trenches were dug revealing two large structures. One structure appears to be a large sewage containment system or septic tank that had been decommissioned and filled with rubble and debris and then covered with top soil. The second structure is a long structure which is divided into 20 chambers. The Commission has not yet determined what the purpose of this structure was but it appears to be related to the treatment/containment of sewage and/or waste water. The Commission has also not yet determined if it was ever used for this purpose.

In this second structure, significant quantities of human remains have been discovered in at least 17 of the 20 underground chambers which were examined. A small number of remains were recovered for the purpose of analysis. These remains involved a number of individuals with age-at-death ranges from approximately 35 foetal weeks to 2-3 years. Radiocarbon dating of the samples recovered suggest that the remains date from the timeframe relevant to the operation of the Mother and Baby Home (the Mother and Baby Home operated from 1925 to 1961; a number of the samples are likely to date from the 1950s). Further scientific tests are being conducted.

The Commission is shocked by this discovery and is continuing its investigation into who was responsible for the disposal of human remains in this way. Meanwhile, the Commission has asked that the relevant State authorities take responsibility for the appropriate treatment of the remains. The Coroner has been informed.

The Minister for Children and Youth Affairs is making a statement on the matter today.
Ministers statement

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Elaine Edwards

Human remains of a significant number of babies and infants up to three years of age have been found on the site of the former mother and baby home in Tuam, Co Galway, it has been confirmed.

This follows work by the Commission on Mother and Baby Homes which carried out planned excavations there.

Local research records 796 infants and children recorded as having died in the Tuam home between 1925 and 1961, but there is not as yet any indication of exactly how many bodies have been discovered at the site.

In a statement on Friday, the commission said it was “shocked” by the discovery of remains in an underground chamber and was continuing its investigations.

“The stratigraphic survey which was conducted in October 2015 identified a particular area of interest and identified a number of sub surface anomalies that were considered worthy of further investigation,” the commission said.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio , heugenio@guampdn.com March 2, 2017 | Updated 7:49 p.m. ChT March 2,

Archbishop Michael Jude Byrnes extends his prayers and asks others to do the same for all victims of clergy sexual abuse, including five former altar boys who recently filed multi-million dollar lawsuits against former island priest Louis Brouillard, the Archdiocese of Agana and other unnamed defendants.

In a statement on Thursday afternoon, Byrnes said he extends his prayers to former altar boys Morgan Wade Paul, Benny T. Manglona, Johnny T. Bascon, Albino T. Bascon and Roque Flores, as well as their families.

Their lawsuits have brought to 23 the total number of childhood sexual abuse cases filed so far in the U.S. District Court of Guam.

The 23 former altar boys, many of them also former Boy Scouts of America scouts, are represented by attorney David Lujan, of the law firm of Lujan and Wolff. More lawsuits are anticipated to be filed in the weeks ahead, attorneys for other survivors said.

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GUAM
Guam Daily Post

Coadjutor Archbishop Michael Byrnes has asked Catholics in Guam to pray for all victims of clergy sexual abuse.

In a statement issued yesterday, Byrnes reacted to the latest five lawsuits filed in the District Court of Guam against the Archdiocese of Agana and former clergy who worked in parishes around the island.

Children must be ‘safeguarded’

“With every person or persons who come forward to share accounts of being abused by clergy in the Catholic Church on Guam, each of us should grieve deeply,” Byrnes said. “Sexual abuse of children, no matter when or where it occurred, represents a betrayal of trust and harm of the worst kind; it has a devastating impact on the victim.”

The archbishop said everyone in the Catholic Church must ensure that children entrusted to its care are “stringently safeguarded” from abuse or harm of any kind.

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JAMAICA
The Gleaner

The clergymen involved in the Moravian sex scandal will have to wait another 12 weeks to find out whether their case will move to the Home Circuit Court in Kingston.

Reverends Dr Paul Gardner and Jermaine Gibson, who appeared before the Manchester Circuit Court this morning, had their bails extended and are expected to return to court on Wednesday, May 24.

According to their attorney, Peter Champagnie, the defence presented some documents to the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) which has requested time to review them.

Gardner and Gibson were charged with carnal abuse arising from a series of incidents dating as far back as 2002.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Whistleblowers

It appears that the safety of children and vulnerable adults is not a priority to Pope Francis. As Pope, he has all the power and authority he needs to make things happen in the Catholic Church. But in matters of clergy sexual abuse he has failed, perhaps because of his reluctance to walk in the shoes of the victims / survivors. Actions speak louder than words.

On March 1 Marie Collins of Ireland resigned from Pope Francis’ Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors. She is the second victim / survivor of clergy sexual abuse as a minor to step away from this commission. The other is Peter Saunders of Great Britain who took a leave of absence from the group about one year ago.

In her public resignation comments Marie indicated that her dismay lies mainly in both the continued reluctance of the Vatican Curia to implement recommendations of the commission that the Pope had approved, and in the failure of Pope Francis to follow his own norms for holding accountable culprit bishops and religious superiors who negligently handled clergy sexual abuse allegations. Peter spoke similarly when he stepped away from the commission in February 2016.

The Catholic Whistleblowers Steering Committee congratulates and thanks both Marie and Peter for their courage and prophetic leadership.

Moreover, we realize that the Catholic Church is not competent to remedy its clergy sexual abuse crisis and scandal. Thus, the civil governments must act, be that at the federal, state, or local level.

Actually, Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse that has functioned so productively these past few years provides an excellent example of what is needed. And we strongly support any and all civil authorities who establish such commissions. It’s about protecting minors and vulnerable adults.

Here is the link to the public statement by Marie Collins as presented in the National Catholic Reporter https://www.ncronline.org/news/people/exclusive-survivor-explains-decision-leave-vaticans-abuse-commission

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OREGON
The Register-Guard

By Jack Moran
The Register-Guard
MARCH 3, 2017

A jury on Thursday deliberated less than 90 minutes before finding a Eugene priest guilty of paying for sex with an underage prostitute.

Daniel MacKay, 42, will return to Lane County Circuit Court next Thursday for sentencing. He faces a potential jail sentence. His lawyer, Terri Wood, declined comment after Judge Karrie McIntyre read the verdict.

The victim in the case was in the courtroom when the verdict was read, as were nearly 20 of MacKay’s friends and relatives. One of the priest’s friends, Patrick White, said he was “really shocked” by the jury’s decision after having listened to testimony in the case.

Jurors listened to nearly two hours’ worth of closing arguments from Wood and prosecutor JoAnn Miller before beginning deliberations shortly after 3 p.m.

Miller also declined comment after the verdict was returned.

MacKay testified in his own defense Wednesday and denied the allegations. He said that he met with the teenager and gave her money on several occasions because she appeared homeless and needy, and that he sometimes provides similar help to others in his neighborhood.

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UNITED STATES
The Open Tabernacle: Here Comes Everybody

Posted on March 3, 2017 by Betty Clermont

The Catholic Church has long been known for gut-wrenching sex abuse scandals. But this personal involvement by a pope is unprecedented.
____

Fr. Mauro Inzoli is now facing a second Vatican trial after new evidence emerged against him as reported on Feb. 25.

The Vatican found the Italian priest guilty in 2012 of sexually abusing young boys and he was defrocked. But Inzoli is friends with Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio who “intervened on behalf of Inzoli and Pope Francis returned him to the priestly state in 2014, inviting him to ‘a life of humility and prayer.’” Inzoli was later seen at a conference on the family.

In June 2016, a civil court convicted Inzoli of eight incidents of sexual violence between 2004 and 2008 against five children aged 12-16. Fifteen more crimes were barred by the statute of limitations. (Two out of three sexual assaults in the U.S. go unreported. An Australian report found a 33 year gap on average between the sexual abuse and the date reported.)

Inzoli was sentenced to four years and nine months. The Vatican had withheld information from their canonical trial from the civil prosecutors. “Of course, the pope could have allowed the Vatican to share this information with civil authorities if he so desired,” noted Michael Brendan Dougherty, senior correspondent at TheWeek.com.

The Inzoli case is one of several in which Francis overruled the advice of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) and reduced a sentence that called for the priest to be laicized (defrocked). Instead, the priests were sentenced to penalties including a lifetime of penance and prayer and removal from public ministry. At the same time, Francis also ordered three longtime staffers at the CDF dismissed, two of whom worked for the discipline section that handles sex abuse cases.

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NEVADA
KTVN

By Paul Nelson

The Assembly Judiciary Committee heard testimony, in favor of of a bill that would double the length of the statute of limitations for child victims of sexual abuse. Nobody testified against the initiative, but more than a dozen people testified in favor of the change, including attorney Gloria Allred.

“It would help to empower victims and will assist victims to become survivors,” Allred said. “It will also teach the wrongdoers that they must bear the cost of the wrong and be accountable for what they have forced the victims to suffer.”

Allred testified on a similar bill, two years ago. The bill passed, changing the statute of limitations for criminal cases of sexual assault from 10 years to 20 years. The case was helped by the testimony of women who allege sexual allegations by Bill Cosby. Linda Kirkpatrick says she was sexually assaulted by Cosby in Las Vegas when she was 24 years old. She testified, Wednesday, for sexual abuse she endured as a child.

“When my sister-mama, Gloria, said ‘where are the children?’, my hand goes up,” Kirkpatrick said. “Six. I was six years old the first time I was sexually abused by a grown man, who was my brother.”

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Peter Lusted

The Catholic Church’s Melbourne Archdiocese has rejected an independent review’s recommendation to extend compensation for child sex abuse victims to their families or carers.

It also rejected the review’s recommendation to allow victims it has paid compensation to, to seek further legal action.

In August 2014, the church announced retired Federal Court judge Donnell Ryan QC would carry out an independent review of the Melbourne Response — the church’s program set up in 1996 by then-archbishop of Melbourne George Pell to deal with sexual abuse claims made against it.

Mr Ryan’s report was released in 2015 but it was suppressed by the church for more than a year.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

Jane Lee

The Melbourne Archdiocese has rejected a recommendation that it extend its internal compensation scheme to secondary victims of child sexual abuse, including to parents and children of abuse.

Survivors of clergy abuse have long criticised the scheme – established by Cardinal George Pell in 1996 – for failing to properly compensate them for life-long trauma and in some cases adding to it. They also say that the church awards greater compensation when victims launch lawsuits.

Melbourne Archbishop Denis Hart announced in April 2014 that he had appointed former Federal Court judge Donnell Ryan, QC, to review the Melbourne Response, the church’s internal compensation scheme for victims while giving evidence at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. ​Despite receiving Mr Ryan’s report four months later, the archdiocese only tendered its recommendations to the royal commission last week.

Last November, the church revealed it would double the payment cap from $75,000 to $150,000 and previously agreed to review past claims.

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CANADA
Yahoo!

PR Newswire
March 2, 2017

MONTREAL, March 2, 2017 /CNW Telbec/ – The Archdiocese of Montreal reacted today to the criminal charges of a sexual nature brought against Fr. Brian Boucher, a diocesan priest. The process leading to his indictment came as a result of close collaboration between diocesan authorities and the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM).

“We unequivocally denounce all forms of abuse, whether physical, psychological or sexual; furthermore, anyone practising their faith within the Archdiocese of Montreal must be able to do so in total safety and without fear or misgiving,” said Bishop Alain Faubert, Auxiliary Bishop and Vicar General. “We would like to acknowledge the courage of those who contacted the Archdiocese to report what they had experienced. They are in our thoughts and prayers, as are their families, loved ones and the communities to which they belong.”

The Archdiocese would like to stress that as soon as its officials received testimony alleging misconduct by Fr. Boucher, every effort was made to shed light on these allegations. Diocesan authorities removed him from all Church ministry, launched an internal investigation, guided the alleged victims through the process, and collaborated with the police by sharing the results of its investigation.

Zero tolerance throughout the Archdiocese of Montreal

In June 2016, Most Rev. Christian Lépine, Archbishop of Montreal, established a service to promote Responsible Pastoral Ministry, charged with ensuring a healthy and safe environment throughout the diocese. Through the decree establishing the service, the Archdiocese of Montreal applies a strict zero-tolerance policy regarding abusive behaviour of a physical, psychological or sexual nature to all those in its employ or acting on its behalf.

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AUSTRALIA
Cootamundra Herald

Reverend Brian Hassett was at the helm of Cootamundra’s Sacred Heart Catholic Church as Parish Priest from 1980 until 1989.

Following his tenure in Cootamundra, he moved to Tumut, from where claims arose and were investigated he inappropriately touched children.

The claims were investigated by the Archdiocese of Canberra-Goulburn under the NSW Reportable Conduct Scheme and were substantiated, according to a spokesman for the church.

NSW Police has confirmed Tumut Police were not aware of any active investigations into the former priest.

It is understood the two complainants did not want to press charges.

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CANADA
Montreal Gazette

A Montreal priest is facing several charges related to sexual offences against minors police allege were committed between 1994 and 2011.

Brian Boucher, 56, has been charged with sexual assault, sexual touching, sexual interference and breaking and entering. The charges stem from three different cases, police said, and the alleged victims were all minors at the time they say the acts were committed.

Boucher was based in 10 different churches from 1985 to 2015, mostly found in Senneville, LaSalle, Dorval, Town of Mount Royal and downtown Montreal. According to Montreal police spokesperson Jean-Pierre Brabant, Boucher was still working as a priest when he was arrested this week.

Boucher was first arrested on Jan. 12 but was released under strict conditions. He was arrested again on Wednesday after two more complaints surfaced about him. He appeared in Quebec Court on Thursday and was released after agreeing to follow several conditions, including not being around minors.

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AUSTRALIA
Canberra Times

Katie Burgess

Catholic parishioners in Tumut have leapt to the defence of their ex-priest who was stood down after an archdiocese investigation found he had touched a child inappropriately.

The Catholic Archdiocese of Canberra-Goulburn admitted Father Brian Hassett had been the subject of “sustained complaints” during his time as the parish priest of Tumut.

A church investigation into the complaints began in 2013 and was overseen by the NSW Ombudsman.

Mr Hassett was temporarily moved to Lanigan House in early 2014, “in response to the preliminary findings of the investigation”, director of the Institute for Professional Standards Matt Casey said.

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INDIA
DNA

Fri, 3 Mar 2017

The priest, Robin Vadakkumchery, was finally caught after the victim became pregnant and gave birth, which he tried to hush up, allegedly with the support of others in the church hierarchy.

The outburst of public anger against the Catholic Church in Kerala over the allegations of shielding a priest accused of raping a minor girl is reminiscent of similar events that have been happening in the United States for two decades. The priest, Robin Vadakkumchery, was finally caught after the victim became pregnant and gave birth, which he tried to hush up, allegedly with the support of others in the church hierarchy.

An anonymous call to a government child helpline led to the newborn being allegedly traced to a church-run orphanage. The immense social clout and spiritual influence of a Catholic priest among rural Christian communities is evident from the revelation that the priest was able to convince the victim’s father to assume the blame for her pregnancy. Further, the role of an array of church institutions, like the hospital where the victim gave birth, the orphanage where the newborn was taken, and functionaries who abetted the cover-up deserve to be probed and taken to task.

This is not the first time that cases of sexual abuse involving the clergy have come to light. In many instances, families of victims prefer to raise complaints with the church hierarchy rather than go to the police out of fear of social stigma or a desire to not embarrass the Church. Instead of reporting the crime to the police, which should be the first instinct for any law-abiding institution, the culprits are merely transferred to another parish or taken off active duties. This is a documented practice in Catholic dioceses across countries. Where the victims are children, many live with the burden of abuse, loss of faith, and destruction of their childhood, often without telling parents. Many a time, the victims hail from poor families, who look upon the Church and the priest as godly and benevolent figures who can do no wrong.

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MASSACHUSETTS
Boston Globe

By Lisa Wangsness GLOBE STAFF MARCH 03, 2017

Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley vowed Thursday to make sure clergy sexual abuse victims have a voice on a Vatican panel addressing the crisis that rocked the Catholic Church, and he expressed frustration with resistance to change in some corners of the church.

His promise came a day after the lone clergy sexual abuse survivor serving on that papal commission resigned in exasperation with what she described as “shameful” Vatican foot-dragging.

“The voice of survivors is very important I think, and we have to consider what is the best way to ensure that” they’re included, said O’Malley, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Boston, in an unusually expansive telephone interview.

O’Malley said he shared some of the concerns about Vatican stonewalling expressed by Marie Collins, a clergy abuse survivor from Ireland who on Ash Wednesday resigned in frustration from the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, drawing global attention. O’Malley is chairman of the commission.

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AUSTRALIA
Canberra Times

Katie Burgess

Education minister Yvette Berry says the ACT government will not wait for the findings of a royal commission to re-examine how it regulates non-government schools.

On Friday, Ms Berry told a committee hearing she was still waiting for the Catholic Archdiocese of Canberra-Goulburn to explain how an ex-priest stood down over inappropriately touching a child came to live next to two primary schools.

“There’s an expectation from the government and the community that this incident should not have occurred particularly given the conversation we’re having with the royal commission’s investigations,” Ms Berry said.

“We’ve asked for an explanation from the archdiocese on Tuesday and we’re still waiting for a response about how this could occur and how it did occur.”

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INDIA
The News Minute

Ragamalika Karthikeyan | Saritha S Balan | Friday, March 03, 2017

A minor girl in Kerala was raped and impregnated, allegedly by a priest, and everything in the investigation points to a system that not only allowed this crime to happen, but actively tried to cover it up.

But the Kerala Catholic Bishops’ Council is completely blind to this problem in their backyard. Instead of taking steps to ensure that priests don’t get away with crime, the council has conveniently said that this case is an ‘exception’ among the 9033 catholic priests in Kerala.

In a reply to TNM’s queries on the issue, Father Paul Thelekat of the Bishops’ Council said, “In India there are 19946 catholic priests and in Kerala 9033 priests. What we discuss is a case of failure of a small minority in living the lofty ideal of celibacy. The fact it is a minority does not make the sin and crime minor. The very fact that it gets news value is that it is an exception and a fall from the ideal.”

The feeble attempt at denouncing the crime is lost in the justification offered by the council for the behaviour of ‘some’. The reply gets more bizarre as the council then puts the blame for sexual violence and child sexual abuse squarely on ‘consumerism’.

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CANADA
CTV

Montreal police have arrested a priest on three sexual assault charges related to crimes alleged committed between 1994 and 2011.

Investigators believe Brian Boucher, 56, may have committed more crimes and are asking any other potential victims to come forward.

Boucher appeared in court Thursday to face charges of sexual interference, sexual contact, sexual assault and break and enter. He was released strict under conditions, most notably that he can’t be in the presence of minors.

The suspect was first arrested on Jan. 12, then released with a promise to appear with conditions.
Investigators again arrested him on March 1 in connection with two other complaints.

Police first received complaints about the priest in August 2015, and began their investigation then with the cooperation of the Archdiocese of Montreal.

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CANADA
Global News

By Amanda Jelowicki
Anchor/Reporter Global News

Father Brian Boucher, who started working as the parish priest at a church in Montreal’s Town of Mount Royal (TMR) in 2005, has been charged with several counts of sexual assault and sexual touching against three minors.

He appeared in court Thursday.

The 55-year-old had been heavily involved in all activities at the Our Lady of the Annunciation Church, including helping children with their first communions and confirmations.

In recent years, rumours about inappropriate behaviour started spreading among parishioners.

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CANADA
CBC News

Brian Boucher, a Roman Catholic priest who has worked at 10 churches in Montreal over the last two decades, has been arrested and charged with several sex-related offences.

The 56-year-old appeared in court Thursday and was charged with:

* Sexual assault.
* Sexual interference.
* Invitation to sexual touching.
* Breaking and entering.

He was released with several conditions, including having no contact with minors.

Boucher was a priest at several parishes on the island of Montreal from 1985 to 2015. The churches were situated in Senneville, LaSalle, Dorval, the Town of Mount Royal and downtown Montreal.

The alleged incidents took place between 1994 and 2011.

Police say they have reason to believe there are more alleged victims, and they are asking them to come forward by calling 911.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier

Melissa Cunningham
2 Mar 2017

Clergy sexual abuse survivors say they will not rest until “ironclad laws” are implemented to protect future generations of children from pedophilia.

Victims of disgraced Christian brother Robert Best embraced outside the Victorian County Court on Thursday, moments after the notorious paedophile was sentenced to another six years in jail.

It was 16,000 kilometres from where four of the men had stood on the steps of the Hotel Quirinale in Rome on the same day last year.

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MEXICO
International Business Times

BY JASON LE MIERE @JASONLEMIERE ON 03/02/17

A priest in southern Mexico has become the first member of the Catholic Church in the country ever to be convicted of sexual abuse. The Rev. Gerardo Silvestre Hernández, a priest in the Archdiocese of Antequera Oaxaca, was sentenced to 16 years and six months in prison last week for crimes committed against two minors between 2009 and 2010, according to the Catholic News Service. The priest was also ordered to pay damages to the victims of around $4000

Hernández, who had been in prison since 2013, was accused of abusing close to 100 minors between the ages of 11 and 13 in the village of Villa Alta, reported Mexican magazine Proceso. In passing his judgment, the presiding judge, Alfredo Lagunas Rivera, confirmed that it was the first time a conviction had been handed down against a member of a religious association in the country. Only in recent years has the subject of sexual abuse in the church been seen as a problem by Mexican Catholics, according to church observers.

The Oaxacan Childhood Forum (FONI) had called for the maximum sentence to be imposed. The coalition of groups has also insisted that Archbishop José Luis Chávez Botello should offer a public apology and pay damages to the victims. Hernández is alleged to have plied his victims with alcohol, shown them pornographic images and films and then sexually assaulted them.

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ARKANSAS/FLORIDA
United States Attorney, Southern District of Florida

An Ashdown, Arkansas, resident has been arrested and charged by criminal complaint with traveling in foreign commerce with the purpose of engaging in illicit sexual conduct with a minor, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 2423(b).

Wifredo A. Ferrer, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, and Mark Selby, Special Agent in Charge, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations (ICE-HSI), made the announcement.

According to allegations made in the criminal complaint, Daniel John Pye, 35, originally of Bradenton, Florida, traveled from the Southern District of Florida to Haiti on multiple occasions from the years 2008 through 2011 for the purpose of sexually abusing minors. Pye, who ran a missionary orphanage in Jacmel, Haiti, is alleged to have engaged in illicit sexual conduct with minor female children who resided at his orphanage.

Since leaving Haiti, Pye is believed to have resided in the Liberty Hill, Texas, Texarkana, Texas, and Ashdown, Arkansas, areas.

Law enforcement encourages the public to report suspected child predators and any suspicious activity to Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) through the toll-free Tip Line at 1-866-DHS-2-ICE or by completing the online tip form at https://www.ice.gov/webform/hsi-tip-form.

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ARKANSAS
KSLA

Posted by Curtis Heyen, Digital Content Producer

(KSLA) –
A Southwest Arkansas man is accused of sexually abusing girls who live at a missionary orphanage he ran in Haiti.

Federal authorities have arrested 35-year-old Daniel John Pye, of Ashdown, on a charge of traveling in foreign commerce with the purpose of engaging in illicit sexual conduct with a minor.

Pye traveled from Florida, where he originally lived in Bradenton, to Haiti multiple times from 2008 through 2011 allegedly to sexually abusing female minors, according to court documents.

He also believed to have lived in Liberty Hill and Texarkana, Texas, since leaving Haiti, federal authorities said.

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HAITI
Caribbean 360

WASHINGTON, United States, Thursday March 2, 2017 – An American man who ran a missionary orphanage in Haiti has been charged for allegedly having sex with girls who resided there.

Prosecutors say 35-year-old Daniel John Pye traveled from Florida to Haiti on multiple occasions between 2008 and 2011 for the purpose of sexually abusing minors. Over the period, they say, he sexually assaulted at least four victims between the ages of six and 14.

He has been charged with “traveling in foreign commerce with the purpose of engaging in illicit sexual conduct with a minor”, the US Attorney for the Southern District of Florida Wifredo Ferrer.

Pye began running the missionary orphanage that cared for, fed and educated orphans as well as underprivileged children with living parents, in the southern coastal city Jacmel about 11 years ago. It was affiliated with Haitian Children’s Home, but following a financial conflict, he was fired by the board of Haitian Children’s Home. However, Pye continued to run the orphanage with alternative funding.

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FLORIDA
Miami Herald

BY ALEX HARRIS
aharris@miamiherald.com

Daniel Pye ran a missionary orphanage in Haiti for years, where he fed and cared for 22 children. This week he was arrested and hit with federal charges of sexually abusing some of the minors he was charged to protect.

Pye, originally from Bradenton, volunteered at Haitian orphanages for years with his wife before they started their own in Jacmel, a southern coastal city. In Haiti, missionary orphanages house, care for, feed and educate orphans as well as underprivileged children with living parents.

The 35-year-old was arrested in his current hometown of Ashtown, Arkansas and faces child sex tourism charges in the Southern District of Florida.

In a federal criminal complaint, prosecutors accused Pye of molesting three of the girls in his care. One was 6 years old at the time. Her mother was fired from her job at the orphanage after she confronted Pye, according to the complaint, although he continued to pay her.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/crime/article135725488.html#storylink=cpy

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ARKANSAS
KTBS

Updated: Mar 01, 2017

ASHDOWN, Ark –
An Ashdown, Arkansas, resident has been arrested and charged by criminal complaint with traveling in foreign commerce with the purpose of engaging in illicit sexual conduct with a minor, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 2423(b).

Wifredo A. Ferrer, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, and Mark Selby, Special Agent in Charge, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations (ICE-HSI), made the announcement.

According to allegations made in the criminal complaint, Daniel John Pye, 35, originally of Bradenton, Florida, traveled from the Southern District of Florida to Haiti on multiple occasions from the years 2008 through 2011 for the purpose of sexually abusing minors.

Pye, who ran a missionary orphanage in Jacmel, Haiti, is alleged to have engaged in illicit sexual conduct with minor female children who resided at his orphanage.

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INDIA
The New Indian Express

KANNUR: The government should constitute a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the rape of a 16-year old girl who gave birth to a baby in a private hospital in Kottiyoor last month demanded BJP State General Secretary Sobha Surendran.

“There is a big conspiracy behind the issue and it will come out only if there is an investigation directly monitored by the High Court of Kerala.There is a serious lapse on the side of the school. Hospital authorities even from the Child Welfare Committee of Waynad tried to conceal the issue. It is notable that all the incidents have taken place in the institutions that are under the control of the church. Robin, the arrested priest, was the director in many of these institutions,” she said.

“The incident came to light following an anonymous call to a Child Line activist and intervention by the

police. If this call was not made, the priest would have escaped,” she added.

He was arrested on his way to Nedumbassery Airport on February 28 and remanded in judicial custody.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

In the wake of community outcry, the Catholic Church says it has now removed three former priests from a Catholic-run retirement home neighbouring two Canberra primary schools.

One of the men, who was sacked after an internal investigation into inappropriate behaviour towards children, had been living at the Garran home for more than two years before the schools were alerted by the Catholic Church.

It is not known why the other two priests needed to be moved or how long they had been living at the home.

In a statement, Matt Casey from the Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn simply said the other two priests were “removed from the ministry for other matters”.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Hertfordshire Mercury

The priest of a Baldock church embroiled in scandal voluntarily stepped down from his role in a school while an investigation took place.

Reverend Andrew Holford, rector of St Mary’s Church, chose to stop working with St Mary’s Junior School while the Diocese of St Albans investigated the misuse of a church computer.

The computer had been used to view pornographic images, which according to accusations included indecent images of children, although an on-going police investigation has found no evidence of this.

Pat Jenkins, head teacher of the school, said: “The Rector of St Mary’s voluntarily stepped aside from his ministry work in our school while the Diocese of St Albans conducted an investigation into events which took place at St Mary’s Church in 2010.

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MEXICO
NVI

[“One thing is the crime committed by a Catholic priest and another very different is my faith as a Catholic so I do not have to renounce my religion,” said Consuelo Rojas Mendez yesterday after receiving the stroke of ash on the forehead.]

“Una cosa es el delito que haya cometido algún sacerdote católico y otra muy distinta es mi fe como católica, por ello, no tengo porqué renunciar a mi religión”, señaló ayer Consuelo Rojas Méndez, luego de recibir el trazo de ceniza en la frente que considera un signo importante para entrar a un periodo de arrepentimiento y reflexión sobre sus actos.

“Quienes renuncian a la religión católica o se alejan de ésta, no están cimentados en su fe”, expone la madre de familia y asegura: “los casos de abuso sexual no sólo se dan en algunos ministros de la Iglesia Católica, también involucran a pastores de otras expresiones religiosas.

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ITALIA
Leggo

[The scourge of child abuse by clergy had spread like wildfire around the world and has also arrived to 800 complaints in one year in the Vatican. It was 2004 but in recent years the cases submitted to the former Holy Office to hover around 600 per year.]

Mercoledì 1 Marzo 2017

La piaga degli abusi sui minori da parte del clero si era diffusa a macchia d’olio in tutto il mondo e si è arrivati anche ad 800 denunce in un solo anno in Vaticano. Era il 2004 ma anche negli ultimi anni i casi sottoposti all’ex sant’Uffizio di aggirano intorno ai 600 l’anno. Queste dunque le denunce di tipo «canonico», secondo i dati forniti dal Vaticano qualche anno fa, ma restano poi le inchieste giudiziarie aperte dalla magistratura civile.

Uno scandalo enorme che portò Papa Benedetto XVI, già da quando era ancora cardinale con la responsabilità di Prefetto della Congregazione per la Dottrina della fede (l’istituzione vaticana che si occupa della materia) ad alzare i tappeti sotto i quali era nascosta la ‘polverè e a decidere per la ‘tolleranza zero’. Linea confermata e rafforzata da Papa Francesco che ha assunto una serie di decisioni molto forti. Anche quella di voler processare in Vaticano, un Nunzio, un alto esponente della diplomazia, come nel caso di Jozef Wesolowski, morto però prima che il processo fosse entrato nel vivo. In dieci anni, dal 2004 al 2013, sono stati circa 900 i preti ridotti allo stato laicale. Praticamente ‘cacciatì dalle gerarchie e impossibilitati a proseguire nel loro ministero sacerdotale.

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SCHWEIZ
cath.ch

Luzern, 1.3.17 (kath.ch) Sowohl Ephrem Bucher als auch Mauro Jöhri haben, als sie Provinzial der Schweizer Kapuziner waren, ihrem pädophilen Mitbruder Joël Allaz verboten, in der Seelsorge tätig zu sein. Dies teilte der aktuelle Provinzial, Agostino Del Pietro, auf Anfrage von kath.ch mit. Damit präzisiert er frühere Aussagen des Ordens. Wann die Kommission, die den Fall «Allaz» juristisch aufarbeiten soll, tätig wird, konnte Del Pietro noch nicht bekannt geben.

Mit der Versetzung von Allaz im Jahr 1989 nach Frankreich sei der Provinzial von Frankreich ordensrechtlich für den Kapuziner zuständig geworden, schreibt Del Pietro. Dort habe ihn Ephrem Bucher, seit 2001 Provinzial der Schweizer Kapuziner, besucht, weil er sich gewissermassen moralisch für den Schweizer Mitbruder verantwortlich gefühlt habe.

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INDIA
Hindustan Times

Mar 02, 2017

Ramesh Babu
Hindustan Times, Thiruvananthapuram

A string of sexual assault allegations involving clergymen is turning out to be a major embarrassment for the Catholic Church in Kerala. What is more worrying is that such incidents are popping up even after Pope Francis’s call to enforce “zero tolerance” towards sexual crimes.

The latest in the series is the rape of a 16-year-old girl allegedly by a 48-year-old priest who was active in social circles in north Kerala. The incident came to light two weeks after the victim gave birth to a baby. Shockingly, there was a systemic attempt to cover up the whole incident and bail out the priest involved in the crime.

Many in the church now want a strict code of conduct for priest and nuns. And reformists blame insiders for the rot and say they are planning to send a letter to the Vatican City, seeking stringent steps to rein in what they call “wayward priests”.

“Once a crime is committed, the first reaction is an attempt to cover it up. This emboldens others also to commit the same crime,” said a spokesman of Catholic Laymen’s Association.

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AUSTRALIA
National Catholic Reporter

Kieran Tapsell | Mar. 2, 2017

On March 1, Marie Collins, the only abuse survivor on Pope Francis’ Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, resigned because “what was happening behind closed doors was in conflict with what was being said to the public.”

On Feb. 23, three other members of the Pontifical Commission, Baroness Sheila Hollins of Great Britain, Bill Kilgallon from New Zealand and Kathleen McCormack from Australia gave evidence in a panel to the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, and expressed their frustration with the Vatican. Their views were personal, and did not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Pontifical Commission as a whole.

Justice Peter McLellan, the chair of the Royal Commission, told the panel that the work they were doing was of “fundamental importance to individual countries” because the work of the Royal Commission indicates that real change in the culture and practices of the church in Australia will only occur if “it’s coming from Rome.”

After several hours of questioning in which the panel spoke about resistance in Rome to the work of the Pontifical Commission and its lack of resources, McLellan observed: “The picture you all paint, from an outsider’s point of view, is of a world organization which is struggling to come to terms with the safety of children and its responsibilities in that area.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
TVNZ

A child sex abuse survivor has told a British inquiry “it was a feast of kids at an orphanage” for Christian Brothers pedophiles in Western Australia in the 1950s.

The 72-year-old told the child sex abuse inquiry in London overnight he had been in orphanages in the UK since he was a baby before being shipped to WA in 1953 at the age of eight as a child migrant.

The witness, now living in Perth and only referred to as A4 to protect his identity, said he was sent to the boys’ home at Castledare where he was sexually abused by Brother Lawrence Murphy.

He said Murphy woke him up one night in the dormitory to say he must go to the toilet, but instead led him to his bedroom.

Holding back tears he told the inquiry Murphy had told him to take off his pyjamas.

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OREGON
The Register-Guard

By Jack Moran
The Register-Guard
MARCH 2, 2017

Eugene priest Daniel MacKay took the stand in his own defense Wednesday and forcefully denied ever trying to pay for sex with a teenage prostitute.

He answered with a firm “no” or “absolutely not” each time he was directly asked about specific allegations he faces.

MacKay, 42, is charged with four misdemeanor counts of prostitution for a series of meetings he allegedly had last year with a 17-year-old girl who advertised prostitution services online. He told the four-woman, two-man jury in his trial that the allegations are untrue, and that his interactions with the teenager had nothing to do with sex.

“I responded to her as a person who needed charity and guidance,” MacKay said.

He told jurors that he first met the girl last August, when she asked him for money after approaching him outside a convenience store in the Whiteaker neighborhood where MacKay lives and works.

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AUSTRALIA
news.com.au

MARCH 2, 2017

Amber Wilson
Australian Associated Press

A Christian Brother pedophile described as a “monster” by one of his victims will most likely die in prison after being sentenced to serve an extra six years.

Robert Best, who molested 20 children over two decades at schools across Ballarat, Box Hill, Geelong and Essendon, will not be eligible for parole until mid-2027, when he is 86.

He is already serving 14 years and nine months in jail for sex offences against another 11 boys.

In the County Court of Victoria on Thursday, Judge Geoffrey Chettle described Best’s behaviour between 1968 and 1988 as “abhorrent and disgusting”.

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INDIA
Huffington Post

There’s evidence of the Church’s complicity.

02/03/2017

G Pramod Kumar Contributing Editor, HuffPost India

The recent alleged rape of a minor girl by a vicar and what appears to be an attempted institutional cover up in Kerala has brought the Catholic Church under fire yet again. The vicar was an influential priest who had held important offices of power and the Church had apparently used its various apparatuses to protect him from the law.

This is not the first time that the Syro Malabar Church, the largest congregation of Catholics in the state, is at the centre of controversy. Over the years, many of its priests have been accused of various sexual offences and rights violations, and its institutions of cover-ups. Some have been punished by law, but many have managed to escape as the vicar in the latest rape case nearly did.

The main accused in the case is Father Robin Vadakkumchery, the priest of the St. Sebastian Church in the state’s northern district of Kannur, and the survivor, a 16-year-old girl from a poor family that belongs to the same parish. Allegedly, the priest had been sexually exploiting the girl for a long time and the family came to know about it only when the girl became pregnant. Following this, a cover-up plan seems to have been set in motion by the priest, backed by Church-run institutions.

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NEW YORK
Americans United for Separation of Church and State

March 2017
AU Bulletin

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) has introduced a revised version of the Child Victims Act that would remove the statute of limitations on prosecution of abusers in public and private institutions around the state.

Cuomo’s proposal would allow adults who were abused as children to file civil lawsuits up to 50 years after the attacks occurred, and would allow victims who couldn’t bring their cases to court due to current statute-of-limitations laws to have a one-year window to do so.

Some states began considering laws like this in the wake of a wide-ranging child-abuse scandal in the Catholic Church. The revisions have been met with opposition; some religious organizations that are arguing that the proposed one-year window of reporting and re-visiting old cases is unfair.

New York State Catholic Conference spokesman Dennis Poust told The New York Daily News on Jan. 12 that church officials should see more details regarding Cuomo’s proposal while emphasizing that the church will continue opposing the proposed one-year lookback window.

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NEVADA
Las Vegas Review-Journal

By BEN BOTKIN
REVIEW-JOURNAL CAPITAL BUREAU

CARSON CITY — Victims of child sexual abuse lined up to testify before Nevada lawmakers Wednesday, recounting crimes they endured decades ago.

Many would gain nothing from Assembly Bill 145, but it would empower future victims, they said.

“Give us a fighting chance, because we, the victims, have a life sentence of the crime perpetrated against us,” testified Linda Kirkpatrick, who said she was sexually abused as a child. “Where are our rights?”

AB145 would extend the Nevada statute of limitations for victims to sue by another decade, from 10 years to 20 years. Time starts applying toward the statute of limitations after a victim turns 18 or discovers an injury was caused by the abuse, whichever comes later.

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UNITED KINGDOM/AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

AAP

Two men who were shipped from Britain to Western Australia as children in the 1950s have told an inquiry in London of their abuse by Christian Brothers paedophiles.

One witness, now 72 and living in Perth and referred to as A4 to protect his identity, told the UK’s child sex abuse inquiry he had been in orphanages in Britain since he was a baby before being shipped to WA in 1953 at the age of eight as a child migrant.

He said he was sent to the boys’ home at Castledare where he was sexually abused by Brother Lawrence Murphy.

The national child abuse inquiry is hearing testimony from people who were shipped as children to Australia. Some children sent to former colonies between the 1920s and 1970s faced servitude, hard labour and abuse

He said Murphy woke him up one night in the dormitory to say he must go to the toilet, but instead led him to his bedroom.

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IRELAND
Galway Independent

Former Tuam Home residents and their families are looking for answers, but are being left “in the dark” in relation to the investigation into the home, according to Tuam historian Catherine Corless.

An inquiry into the former Mother and Baby Home in the town is currently underway, with two excavations having been carried out on the site to determine whether children reported to have died at the home have been buried there.

The deadline for submissions to the Mother and Baby Home Commission of Investigation looking into the former Bon Secours institution is today, Wednesday 1 March, and Ms Corless, whose research led to the investigation, is encouraging people to contact the Commission.

The body has asked for anyone who lived or worked in the Tuam Home or in any of the 14 Mother and Baby Homes and four County Homes under investigation to contact them.

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AUSTRALIA
Stirling Times

March 1st, 2017

Written by Kate Leaver

A TUART Hill teacher has been charged with allegedly possessing thousands of child exploitation videos and images.

Child Abuse Squad detectives carried out a search warrant at the 29-year-old man’s property on Monday .

It will be alleged detectives seized several electronic storage devices belonging to the man and identified more than 1000 images and videos containing child exploitation material.

The man has been charged with possessing child exploitation material, distributing child exploitation material and intent to expose a person believed to be under 13 years old of age to indecent material.

A police spokeswoman said the man was employed as a teacher at a catholic primary school in the Central Metropolitan Policing District.

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AUSTRALIA
WA Today

Phil Hickey

A Catholic school teacher from Perth has been charged with online child exploitation offences after police carried out a warrant at his home this week.

Detectives from the Child Abuse Squad executed a search warrant at the man’s Tuart Hill home on Monday.

They seized several electronic storage devices belonging to the man.

A preliminary analysis of the devices has allegedly identified over 1000 images and videos containing child exploitation material.

The 29-year-old man has been charged with possessing child exploitation material, distributing child exploitation material and intent to expose a person believed to be under 13 to indecent matter.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

[with video]

AAP

Child abuse squad detectives have raided the home of a Perth school teacher, allegedly finding more than 1000 child exploitation images and videos.

Police raided the 29-year-old’s Tuart Hill home on Monday and seized several electronic storage devices that allegedly contained the material.

The man, a West Australian Catholic primary school teacher, only graduated from a teaching degree two years ago.

Since then, the man has taught at primary schools in the south-west region, the Perth hills and Inglewood.

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PENNSYLVANIA
We Are Central PA

[with video]

Harrisburg, Pa. – Last year a bill addressing the statute of limitations on child sex abuse cases overwhelmingly passed in the House. That bill included an amendment with retroactivity so that the new extension of the statue of limitations would apply to past cases. That bill stalled in the Senate and a new bill this year passed in the Senate that did not include the retro-activity. Victims say the bill isn’t doing enough.

Both sides of the argument on retro activity agree that the statue of limitations on child sex abuse should be eliminated. However, past victims believe the retro activity clause will give them the justice they deserve.

Shaun Dougherty was a victim of abuse and is fighting for retro-activity. He said, “Without retroactivity, everybody that was found out in that AG’s report last year, will be off the hook scot-free.”

Representative Judy Ward voted against the original bill with retro-activity and explained the difficulty in her decision. She says that she believes making laws that go back in the past is unconstitutional. She explained, “This should never happen and if it happens, it is such a heinous crime there should be no statue of limitations moving forward. I agree with that. It’s just always the retro-activity that i get hung up on.”

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PENNSYLVANIA
Altoona Mirror

MAR 2, 2017

RUSS O’REILLY
Staff Writer
roreilly@altoonamirror.com

Survivors of sexual abuse at the hands of local Roman Catholic clergy don’t believe much has changed since last year when a statewide grand jury revealed that about 50 religious leaders abused hundreds of children over the past 40 years in the Altoona-Johnstown diocese.

About 10 members of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests gathered Wednesday for a demonstration in front of the diocese administration building on Logan Boulevard.

Mark Dougherty, who said he was sexually molested as a minor by a diocesan priest, said local legislators as well as church leadership are failing victims who deal with pain from past abuse.

“A year has gone by since the grand jury report. … and actions of the Republican state Senate are suffocating yesterday’s victims and jeopardizing today’s children,” Dougherty, of Johnstown, said.

Last year, the state attorney general recommended that the Legislature abolish criminal and civil statute of limitations on child sexual abuse completely.

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ROME
The Times (UK)

Philip Willan, Rome
March 2 2017
The Times

A group of cardinals who supported the election of Pope Francis are worried that his controversial reforms are leading the Catholic church towards a schism and are planning to appeal to him to step down, a leading Vatican watcher has claimed.

“A large part of the cardinals who voted for him is very worried and the curia . . . that organised his election and has accompanied him thus far, without ever disassociating itself from him, is cultivating the idea of a moral suasion to convince him to retire,” Antonio Socci wrote in the Italian newspaper Libero.

The conservative Catholic author and journalist said that the election four years ago of Jorge Mario Bergoglio had been backed by progressive German cardinals and a curia faction impatient with the rule of his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI.

It was the latter faction who now believed that the Pope should resign and who would like to replace him with Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state, Mr Socci said. He believed that the group numbered around a dozen, “but the importance of the members counts more than their number”.

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VATICAN CITY
ABC News (Australia)

By Anne Barker

A prominent survivor of clerical sexual abuse has accused authorities within the Vatican of hiding behind a culture of silence and secrecy to avoid dealing with the issue.

Marie Collins has resigned from a special Vatican commission, created by Pope Francis, to tackle the issue of paedophilia within the church.

In a written statement she cited a refusal by senior men in the Vatican to cooperate with the commission as a key factor in her decision.

“The reluctance of some in the Vatican Curia to implement recommendations or cooperate with the work of a commission, when the purpose is to improve the safety of children and vulnerable adults around the world, is unacceptable,” Ms Collins said.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Owen Bowcott Legal affairs correspondent
@owenbowcott
Thursday 2 March 2017

The national child abuse inquiry has been criticised by a prominent lawyer representing victims for failing to seize potentially vital caches of evidence before they are destroyed.

In a letter to the inquiry, London solicitor Imran Khan has called for records from Catholic treatment centres for problem priests, Lambeth council and even the Boston Globe newspaper – which investigated clerical abuse in the USA – to be secured.

Khan also expressed concern that some victims who are due to give evidence in criminal trials relating to abuse have been asked for fresh witness statements in a procedure that might prejudice existing prosecutions.

The inquiry, which began its first public hearing this week into the abuse of British children sent overseas to Australia, is due to hold its first hearing on abuse within the Catholic church in December.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

There are now 23 lawsuits for civil claims of sexual abuse filed against the Archdiocese of Agana.

(Archdiocese of Agana) – In regard to the latest lawsuits and allegations of clergy sexual abuse to be filed, Archbishop Michael Byrnes extends prayers to Mr. Morgan Wade Paul, Mr. Benny Manglona, Mr. Johnny Bascon, Mr. Albino Bascon and Mr. Roque Flores as well as their families. All Faithful are also asked to pray for all victims of clergy sexual abuse. “With every person or persons who come forward to share accounts of being abused by clergy in the Catholic Church on Guam, each of us should grieve deeply,” Archbishop Byrnes said. “Sexual abuse of children, no matter when or where it occurred, represents a betrayal of trust and harm of the worst kind; it has a devastating impact on the victim,” Archbishop Byrnes said.

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OREGON
The Oregonian

By Jim Ryan | The Oregonian/OregonLive

A Salem pastor has been sentenced to more than 37 years in prison for sexually abusing a girl under 14 years old.

Mauricio Aguilera-Garcia, 56, was arrested in July after a weeklong investigation, a Marion County Sheriff’s Office spokesman said at the time. He met the girl through his church, Our Father’s House, the spokesman said.

Prosecutors said Aguilera-Garcia opted to plead guilty near the end of his first day of trial rather than continue with two more trial days. His victim testified about being sexually abused by Aguilera-Garcia, who was then her pastor and close to her family, the county district attorney’s office said in a news release.

Aguilera-Garcia pleaded guilty Tuesday to three counts of second-degree rape and two counts of both second-degree sodomy and unlawful sexual penetration, court records show. He has since been convicted on the charges and sentenced to 37-1/2 years in prison, prosecutors said.

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OREGON
KATU

A Salem pastor has been sentenced to 37 years in prison for raping a 13-year-old girl.

Mauricio Aguilera-Garcia, 55, was arrested last summer on charges of rape, sodomy and unlawful sexual penetration charges.

Marion County Sheriff’s deputies say he met his victim at his church, Our Father’s House. That church rents space from the Solid Rock Community Church on Ward Drive NE in Salem.

Aguilera-Garcia was barely a day into his trial this week when he entered guilty pleas. The jury had heard emotional testimony from his victim, who is now an adult.

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OREGON
Bend Bulletin

Pastor sentenced — A 56-year-old church pastor has been sentenced to 37 years in prison for multiple counts of rape and other sex crime charges against a child under age 14. The Marion County District Attorney’s Office said in a news release that Mauricio Aguilera-Garcia pleaded guilty Tuesday to rape, sodomy and unlawful sexual penetration. He entered the pleas at the end of the first day of his jury trial after the victim testified. Prosecutors say Aguilera-Garcia also was convicted of sex abuse against a child under age 12 in 1985.

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IRELAND
Limerick Leader

Donal O’Regan
1 Mar 2017

THE BOOK of evidence has been served on a priest accused of sexual offences in County Limerick.

Last July, the man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was charged with eight counts of sexual assault on dates between September 1988 and August 1990. It is understood the complainant was aged 11 or 12 at the time.

In January, he was further charged with six sexual assaults after a second male came forward to gardai. It is believed the plaintiff was a teenager at the time of the alleged offences between September 1988 and June 1990.

State solicitor, Aidan Judge said: “My application to the court is the defendant be returned for trial to the next sittings of Limerick Circuit Court. The DPP consents for the case to be sent forward for trial.”

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CONNECTICUT
New Haven Register

By Ed Stannard, New Haven Register

The Archdiocese of Hartford has been sued by a former altar boy, claiming he was sexually abused by a priest who served three parishes in Greater New Haven.

The Rev. Daniel McSheffery has been accused of abusing the man, now 49 years old, between 1977 and 1982 when McSheffery was pastor of St. George Roman Catholic Church in Guilford.

McSheffery was ordained in 1956 and also served at St. Mary Church in Branford, St. Augustine Church in North Branford and St. Augustine Church and its school in Hartford, according to the lawsuit filed by attorney Thomas McNamara of McNamara and Goodman in New Haven. McSheffery died in 2014, according to Maria Zone, spokeswoman for the archdiocese, who said church officials would have no other comment on pending litigation.

“McSheffery was one of Connecticut’s most cunning and deceitful child sexual abusers ever to wear a Roman collar,” McNamara said. “Parishioners hung on his every word and he used his charisma to inflict lifelong harm on the most defenseless in the St. George community.”

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INDIA
The Hindu

K.P.M. BASHEER MARCH 02, 2017

While the Catholic faithful in Kerala have been rattled by the arrest of a priest for raping and impregnating a minor girl, Church rebels and those in the know of things allege that the Kottiyoor incident is but just the tip of the iceberg.

Four former Church officials — three men and a woman, of whom two wished to remain anonymous — The Hindu spoke to claimed that Kottiyoor was only a sneak peek into the sexual abuse going on within the Church establishment. They also accused Church authorities of using their clout to keep mouths shut.

“If, in spite of all the clout, wealth and secrecy of the Church, the Kottiyoor incident came out into the open, you can imagine the extent of sexual abuse going on,” Sister Jesme, former Principal of St. Mary’s College, Thrissur, who left the Congregation of Mother Carmelite after serving it for 33 years, told The Hindu . Sister Jesme has, in her book Amen: The Autobiography of a Nun, revealed the murky goings-on within the Church establishment, the sexual abuse of nuns by priests and the wayward nature of bishops.

Nun abused

“I know of an incident in Kozhikode early last year,” Sister Jesme said, “a Catholic nun was impregnated by a priest. After the childbirth, the baby was separated from her and she was packed off to an unknown place. The man still continues to be a priest.”

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AUSTRALIA
ABC – Religion and Ethics Report

Wednesday 1 March 2017

The roots of Australia’s own Catholic funk are obvious – revelations from the royal commission into church and institutional sex abuse.

Over the past three weeks, the commission has heard that 1,900 church personnel were accused of abusing 4,500 children over 50 years.

Most cases went unchecked, no reports to police.

The silence intended to protect the church’s reputation.

But what if many priests and bishops stayed quiet because they were hiding their own sex lives? not with underage people but with consenting adults. Not breaking the law but breaking their vows.

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AUSTRALIA
Canberra Times

Katie Burgess

An ex-priest who was found to have inappropriately touched a child has been removed from a home for retired clergy next to two primary schools.

The Catholic Archdiocese of Canberra-Goulburn has also moved two other priests, who had been removed from the ministry for “other reasons”, from Lanigan House due to community concerns.

Catholic Archbishop Christopher Prowse housed former Tumut priest Father Brian Hassett at Lanigan House, next to Sts Peter and Paul Primary School and Malkara School in Garran, for two years after he had been stood down over two incidents involving children in Tumut.

While NSW police did not press charges, the claims were substantiated in an archdiocese investigation overseen by the NSW Ombudsman.

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ROME
Irish Times

Paddy Agnew in Rome

No one who knows how the Vatican works can be surprised by the resignation of abuse survivor Marie Collins from the Holy See’s Commission for the Protection of Minors.

Appointed to the commission at its inception in March 2014, she has found herself frustrated for much of the last two years when dealing with certain departments in the Holy See, in particular the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF).

In an interview with The Irish Times, she said the “last straw” had been the refusal of a “particular dicastery” (the CDF) to respond to letters from abuse survivors.

Some outsiders might be surprised at what Collins called the CDF’s refusal to “change their processes”. However, there are many corners of the Holy See where people are reluctant to change both processes and their pastoral approach in response to Pope Francis’s attempted reform of the Curia.

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PENNSYLVANIA
WJAC

by Kody Leibowitz

HOLLIDAYSBURG — Survivors of clergy sex abuse and community supporters stood at the foot of the Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown.

Signs and pictures of alleged victims were in hand as the group demanded change on a rainy March morning.

“Any priest that has touched a child inappropriately needs to resign,” said Thomas Venditti.
One year ago, life changed for many members of the Catholic faith in the Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown: a 147-page grand jury report was released.

Fifty priests and religious leaders were accused of horrific abuse against children dating back to the early 1960s. The report laid out a detailed record and revealed a secret diocesan fund that authorities say showed the diocese paid victims specific amounts of money for the level of sexual abuse a victim endured.

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TEXAS
KWTX

By Rissa Shaw and John Carroll

WACO, Texas (KWTX) The Texas Rangers have launched a preliminary investigation of sexual assaults at Baylor.

The Department of Public Safety issued a statement in which it said, “The Texas Rangers are working with the local prosecutor to conduct a preliminary investigation to determine if further action is warranted.”

McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna said the Rangers have been working with his office “to review any information obtained from Baylor University for the presence of any potential criminal conduct.

“Baylor has already cooperated and been providing our office information regarding specific instances of sexual assaults, ” he said.

“We are now going to sit down with Baylor, through their office of general counsel, and discuss the disclosure of the information referenced in the Pepper Hamilton report. The Texas Rangers have been kept in the loop of these communications,” he said.

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VATICAN CITY
New York Times

By ELISABETTA POVOLEDO and GAIA PIANIGIANI
MARCH 1, 2017

ROME — A high-profile member of a commission advising Pope Francis on ways to protect minors from sexual abuse by the clergy resigned from the panel on Wednesday, citing what she called “cultural resistance” from the Vatican.

Marie Collins, who was molested by a priest in Ireland when she was 13, expressed frustration over what she called reluctance among the Roman Catholic Church’s hierarchy to implement the commission’s recommendations — even those approved by the pope.

“I feel I have no choice but to resign if I am to retain my integrity,” Ms. Collins said in a statement to National Catholic Reporter. The lack of action, she wrote, “is a reflection of how this whole abuse crisis in the church has been handled: with fine words in public and contrary actions behind closed doors.”

Ms. Collins was one of two victims of clergy sexual abuse appointed by Francis to the commission when it was created in 2014. A year ago, the commission suspended the other victim, Peter Saunders, after he accused the panel of failing to deliver on its promises of reform and accountability, and he has been on a leave of absence since.

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AUSTRALIA
The Record

Australian Catholic Bishops Conference President, Archbishop Denis Hart has last week acknowledged the cooperation of witnesses, agencies, religious institutions and dioceses across the Catholic Church at the conclusion of Case Study 50 of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

“I particularly want to acknowledge the bravery of the survivors of child sexual abuse who have given evidence, not just in case studies involving the Catholic Church, but across more than 50 case studies so far that have examined the many different institutions throughout Australia,” Archbishop Hart said.

“Over the past three weeks, more than 70 Church leaders and professionals have appeared before the Commissioners sharing expertise, identifying failings and describing best practice for the future of our Church structure, culture and governance.”

“The final hearing discussed many aspects and characteristics of Church and clergy life including: Canon Law, the confessional, celibacy, clericalism, formation, professional support and supervision.”

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CONNECTICUT
Zip06

By Zoe Roos, Staff Writer • Contact Reporter
Published March 01, 2017

A lawsuit has been filed against the Archdiocese of Hartford by a former altar boy at St. George’s Church in Guilford, claiming former priest Daniel McSheffery sexually molested him for five years.

The suit, filed in superior court on Feb. 27, claims McSheffery began abusing the boy in the spring of 1977 when the boy was nine and continued for five years until the boy was 14. In that period, the lawsuit claims McSheffery abused the boy more than 250 times.

McSheffery, who died in 2014, was a priest at St. George’s from 1974 to 1986. Allegations of sexual misconduct concerning McSheffery first surfaced years ago, with the archdiocese settling numerous lawsuits against him with plaintiffs claiming that McSheffery sexually abused them in the late 1960s and 1970s while McSheffery served in Hartford. The Courier first reported on McSheffrey’s alleged crimes in 2002.

The current lawsuit lists the Archdiocese of Hartford as the only defendant, claiming the archdiocese knew of the abuse and did nothing, placing minors in danger.

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CONNECTICUT
Patch

By Brian McCready (Patch National Staff) – March 1, 2017

GUILFORD, CT — A former altar boy at St. George’s Church claims in a lawsuit that former parish priest, Daniel McSheffery, sexually abused him more than 250 times during a five-year period from 1977 until 1982, reports the Hartford Courant’s David Altimari.

McSheffery died in 2014 and he had been involved in eight other lawsuits and the Archdiocese of Hartford, which is the lone defendant in this case, had previously settled claims against McSheffery and three other priests totaling $22 million back in 2005, the Courant reports.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Tribune-Democrat

By Dave Sutor
dsutor@tribdem.com

HOLLIDAYSBURG – On a drizzly Ash Wednesday, about a half-dozen Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests supporters congregated outside the Roman Catholic Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown’s headquarters, calling upon the local institution to provide more help and justice for victims of child sexual abuse.

The event occurred one year to the day after the Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General released a grand jury report that provided details about an alleged decades-long coverup of abuse by at least 50 priests and other religious leaders, all reportedly orchestrated by former Bishops James Hogan and Joseph Adamec.

The attorney general’s office accused the diocese of maintaining a “secret archive” with information about predators, using a specific system to determine payout levels based on the type of abuse, and exploiting connections within the legal and law enforcement systems to keep accusations quiet.

Diocese officials, over the past year, have responded by holding prayer services for victims and releasing the names of priests who have been credibly accused of child sexual abuse.

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UNITED STATES
Boston Globe

By Lisa Wangsness GLOBE STAFF MARCH 01, 2017

The only abuse survivor serving on Pope Francis’s commission to address the clergy sexual abuse crisis resigned Wednesday, citing a “shameful” lack of cooperation from elements of the Vatican bureaucracy.

The departure of Marie Collins leaves Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley, the archbishop of Boston and a newly appointed member of a key Vatican department that handles abuse, under pressure to marshal support for the commission’s work inside the fractious church power structure.

Collins’s resignation highlights the stubborn resistance among some in the Vatican to work coooperatively to address important aspects of the clergy abuse crisis, four years into Francis’s papacy and more than 15 years after the abuse crisis exploded into the headlines in the United States.

Collins, an Irish woman who suffered abuse by a priest during a hospital stay as a child, is a widely respected and blunt-spoken voice in the survivor community. She said in a statement that the commission’s work has been hampered by “constant setbacks” that were “directly due to the resistance by some members of the Vatican Curia to the work of the commission.”

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Radio

[with audio]

(Vatican Radio) The Vatican announced on Wednesday that a member of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, Irish abuse survivor Marie Collins, has resigned from her position.

She had been a member of the Commission since it was established by Pope Francis in 2014. In her resignation letter to the Pope, she cited frustration at the lack of cooperation with the Commission by other offices of the Roman Curia.

In a statement, the president of the Commission, Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston, said Marie’s concerns would be listened to carefully and discussed at next month’s plenary meeting. He said she will continue to work with the Commission on training programmes for new bishops and for other offices of the Holy See.

To find out more, Philippa Hitchen spoke to Marie Collins about her decision and about her hopes for the future work of the Commission

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VATICAN CITY
Associated Press

BY FRANCES D’EMILIO
ASSOCIATED PRESS

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Frustrated by what she described as Vatican stonewalling, an Irish woman who was sexually abused by clergy quit her post Wednesday on a panel advising Pope Francis about how to protect minors from such abuse.

The Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors said Marie Collins quit out of “frustration” at an alleged lack of cooperation from other Vatican offices, known as the Curia. Her departure delivered another blow to the Vatican’s insistence that it is working to ensure that no more children are abused by predator priests.

Collins, in a statement carried by the National Catholic Reporter, was damning in her criticism. She decried the “cultural resistance” at the Vatican that she said included some officials refusing the pope’s instructions to reply to all correspondence from abuse survivors.

“I find it impossible to listen to public statements about the deep concern in the church for the care of those who lives have been blighted by abuse, yet to watch privately as a congregation (office) in the Vatican refuses to even acknowledge these letters!” Collins said in her statement.

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VATICAN CITY
Los Angeles Times

Alexandra Zavis

In a stinging indictment of Vatican efforts to address sexual abuse by priests, an Irishwoman who was abused as a child resigned Wednesday from a panel that is advising Pope Francis on how to respond to the scandal that has tarnished the Roman Catholic Church for decades.

Marie Collins said she quit the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors because she was frustrated by a lack of cooperation with the panel by some members of the Roman Curia, or Vatican administration.

“As a survivor I have watched events unfold with dismay,” she said in a statement to the National Catholic Reporter. “The reluctance of some in the Vatican Curia to implement recommendations or cooperate with the work of a commission when the purpose is to improve the safety of children and vulnerable adults around the world is unacceptable.”

The commission said that the pope had accepted Collins’ resignation “with deep appreciation for her work on behalf of the victims/survivors of clergy abuse.” It also noted in a statement that she had accepted an invitation from the head of the panel, Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley of Boston, to work with it in an educational capacity.

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VATICAN CITY
NPR

March 1, 2017

CAMILA DOMONOSKE

A survivor of abuse has resigned from Pope Francis’ panel on clerical sex abuse, citing “shameful” resistance within the Vatican to the group’s efforts to protect children.

Marie Collins, who was abused by a priest as a child, was the only survivor active on the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors. Another high-profile survivor and advocate, who expressed frustration with the slow pace of change, took a leave of absence from the commission last year.

Collins says she is leaving the panel because, as she told The Telegraph, “there are people in the Vatican who do not want to change or understand the need to change. … They are not cooperating.”

She says it was “soul-destroying” to face the Vatican’s resistance on the issue.

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ITALIA
Rete L’Abuso

Riceviamo e pubblichiamo volentieri il comunicato di Raffaella Mauceri e le sue osservazioni sulla re-intitolazione di Viale Luigi Cadorna in Viale papa Wojtyla.

A proposito del viale Luigi Cadorna, apprendo dall’articolo a firma di Salvatore Maiorca pubblicato su Libertà del 26 febbraio, che la circoscrizione di S. Lucia ha inoltrato una petizione al Comune di Siracusa per cambiare la denominazione del viale.

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic News Service

By Carol Glatz Catholic News Service
3.1.2017

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — One of the founding members and the last remaining abuse survivor on the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors has quit over what she described as resistance coming from Vatican offices against implementing recommendations.

Marie Collins, who joined the commission when it was established in 2014, said: “The reluctance of some in the Vatican Curia to implement recommendations or cooperate with the work of a commission when the purpose is to improve the safety of children and vulnerable adults around the world is unacceptable.”

“It is devastating in 2017 to see that these men still can put other concerns before the safety of children and vulnerable adults,” she said in an editorial published online March 1 by the National Catholic Reporter.

Pope Francis created the commission to be an independent body of experts, including survivors of clerical sexual abuse, to advise him with recommendations on best practices for protecting minors and vulnerable adults in the church. The commission is also charged with promoting responsibility in local churches by “uniting their efforts to those of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, for the protection of all children and vulnerable adults,” according to the commission’s statutes.

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INDIA
Times of India

Rebecca Samervel | TNN | Mar 1, 2017

Mumbai: Two years after his arrest, charges have been framed against Fr Lawrence Johnson (52) for allegedly abusing a teenage boy from his parish in Shivaji Nagar. The court framed the charges under section 377 (unnatural sexual offences) of the Indian Penal Code and sections under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. The case will come up for hearing on March 10.

The prosecution said that on November 27, 2015, the victim visited the church with his brother. After prayers, the accused called the boy inside to keep a box, closed the door from inside and sexually assaulted him, it said. The prosecution said in a statement to the magistrate that the child said a similar incident took place in August 2015. It said the boy was examined on December 1, 2015 and medical evidence showed injuries to his private parts. The case is registered with the Shivaji Nagar police station.

Last year, the special POCSO court rejected the priest’s bail plea. The defence said the priest was dedicated to the church for 15 years. It said he used to allow concessions for students in school fees and this was afforded to the victim and his siblings for some years; subsequently a false case was made up as it was refused.

The Archdiocese of Bombay had appointed a three-member committee to conduct an internal investigation. Fr Nigel Barrett, spokesman for the archdiocese, said, “The inquiry report has been submitted to the Vatican, which will decide if there is merit in the allegations. I am not privy to the outcome of the inquiry.” The priest is receiving legal aid from the Conference of the Diocesan Priests of the archdiocese as part of his “right to defence”.

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CONNECTICUT
Hartford Courant

Dave Altimari

A former altar boy at St. George’s Church in Guilford has filed a lawsuit against the Archdiocese of Hartford, alleging he was molested by former parish priest Daniel McSheffery starting when he was nine.

The lawsuit claims that McSheffery took the boy under his wing, offering him counseling and even helping with his schoolwork to gain his trust. The lawsuit alleges the abuse started in the spring of 1977 and continued for five years until the boy was 14.

The lawsuit alleges that during that time, McSheffery, who died in 2014, abused the boy more than 250 times. The accuser is named in the lawsuit but the Courant is not publishing his name because he is a possible sexual assault victim.

The lawsuit, filed this week, names only the the Archdiocese of Hartford as a defendant. The claim is that church officials, including then-Archbishop John F. Whealon, knew that McSheffery was a danger to minors and did nothing about it.

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