ABUSE TRACKER

AUSTRALIA
The Standard

By PETER COLLINS
Nov. 17,

THE chairman of a national council of Catholic priests has revealed how he worked and lived with priests later convicted of child abuse who had kept their dark perversions secret from other clergy.

Father Eugene McKinnon, who was raised and served in the south-west, said the offenders had kept that part of their lives hidden until confronted by outside authorities.

“I knew three of the paedophile priests,” he said.

“I lived in the same parish presbytery with a bloke who was later jailed, but I didn’t pick up on what he was doing.

“You could eat and talk with him and you never knew there was another part of his life.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

GEORGIA
Savannah Morning News

By Bryan County Now

A priest who once worked at Holy Cross Church in Pembroke, Fr. Robert Poandl, was indicted by federal authorities on child sex crimes Thursday.

According to the Associated Press the Rev. Robert Poandl, of the Cincinnati-based Glenmary Home Missioners, voluntarily surrendered to authorities after he learned of the charges and was in Butler County Jail in southwest Ohio following an order by a federal magistrate judge that he be taken into custody.

The indictment against Poandl, opened in Cincinnati federal court on Wednesday, accused the priest of taking a 10-year-old boy to West Virginia for sex in 1991.

A statement released by Glenmary, said Poandl was serving as pastor of Glenmary’s missions in Claxton, Pembroke and Sand Hill until Feb. 11 of this year when he was relieved of his ministerial duties following an allegation of sexual misconduct.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CALIFORNIA
Santa Monica Mirror

Posted Nov. 15, 2012

Brenton Garen / Editor-in-Chief

Former Santa Monica St. Anne’s Church priest Rafael Venegas pleaded to one count of misdemeanor battery and one count of furnishing alcohol to a minor last Friday, Nov. 9.

Venegas was sentenced to one day in jail, 364 days of probation, 160 hours of community service, and counseling through the archdiocese, which must contain a segment dealing with sexual compulsion.

The sentencing stems from a Santa Monica Police Department investigation that began on July 1, 2012.

A 20-year-old woman, who was not a parishioner of St. Anne’s, reported that a sexual assault involving Venegas occurred on the property of St. Anne’s Parish at 2017 Colorado Avenue in Santa Monica in September 2011.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The West Australian

EXCLUSIVE Gary Adshead, The West Australian
Updated November 17, 2012

A mother who discovered 18 years after her teenage son committed suicide that he had been molested by an Anglican priest in Gosnells will ask the national royal commission into child sex abuse to investigate the case.

David Dossett was 13 in 1976 when he overdosed on sleeping tablets, leaving his mother Margaret baffled until detectives with evidence about the crimes of Rev. Michael Roderick Painter knocked on her door in 1994. Mrs Dossett has spoken publicly for the first time about her son’s suicide and her belief that Painter abused many children before taking his life.

She described the heartache of finding out that the priest, who prayed for her son while he lay dying in hospital and later conducted his funeral service, was responsible for David’s death.

“I’d wish I’d had the strength to confront Michael Painter and say, ‘What have you done to my son’,” Mrs Dossett said. “But I didn’t have that strength. It is my big regret.”

Painter killed himself four months after police officers told Mrs Dossett that entries in his diaries would result in the priest being charged with molesting her son between 1974 and 1976.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The West Australian

Gary Adshead, The West Australian
Updated November 17, 2012

Reverend Michael Painter didn’t stay long after laying 13-year-old David Dossett to rest during a small but gut-wrenching funeral service at Karrakatta in 1976.

The boy’s mother Margaret assumed the family priest, who she says had taken David on youth group trips, found it too upsetting.

Almost two decades later she learnt the real reason Painter disappeared early on that terrible day. He was a shame- ridden paedophile who robbed David of his innocence and drove him to suicide.

Mrs Dossett’s memory of the circumstances surrounding David’s death was vivid.

She knew the names of the constables who were at the bush site in Thornlie where David was found at 4.50pm on August 12, 1976, having been lying unconscious and out of sight all day.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The West Australian

Andrew Tillett Canberra, The West Australian

The head of the Catholic Church in Perth warns that forcing priests to report sex offenders could be counterproductive and still put children at risk.

Archbishop Timothy Costelloe told _The Weekend West _ yesterday that the confidentiality of the confession box may be the only way of getting predators to admit and deal with their crimes.

In the wake of Julia Gillard announcing a national royal commission this week into child sex abuse, a raft of politicians – including the Prime Minister, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott and Premier Colin Barnett – said priests had a responsibility to pass on claims of child sex abuse to the authorities.

In WA, priests are not bound by the same mandatory reporting requirements as teachers, doctors, nurses and police.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By JOANNE McCARTHY
Nov. 17, 2012

IT’S the investigation that has everything – a defrocked priest, a former Newcastle lord mayor, spying allegations, and questions about the professional standards of a professional standards director.

Newcastle Anglican Diocese is keeping tight-lipped about a complaint involving its professional standards director Michael Elliott and his alleged attempts to view a service organised by a defrocked priest.

The diocese has confirmed it received a complaint after Mr Elliott was asked to leave the enclosed backyard of a unit for vulnerable people, including domestic violence victims, on October 26.

The unit complex overlooks a former church building in the Newcastle area.

Mr Elliott is alleged to have identified himself when challenged, and to have told a complex employee he was looking for a vantage point to observe a service organised by defrocked Newcastle priest John Gumbley.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Geelong Advertiser

Mandy Squires | November 17th, 2012

GEELONG priest Kevin Dillon says a public rally against the handling of Catholic Church abuse claims could help send a message to the church’s leaders.

Ordinary Catholics should consider letting the “blind and deaf” church hierarchy know they do not agree with the way abuse claims have been handled and want a new way forward, Father Dillon of St Mary’s Basilica said.

A rally would also show support to abuse victims, he said.

“Maybe what we need is a march up Bourke St like we had for Jill Meagher a few weeks ago, to say to church leaders we want a different approach,” Father Dillon said.

“We want people who have been violated and had their lives ruined to be looked after and we’re sick and tired of this business of being told how good it (the Catholic Church’s own system for handling abuse claims) is, when it hasn’t been able to produce one victim to actually say that.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CONNECTICUT
Patch

By Paul Petrone

After his lawyer cited a need to look further into his medical records, today Fr. Dennis Carey’s case was continued again until January 7 by Judge Susan B. Handy.

Carey, the former head paster of Waterford’s St. Paul in Chains Rectory, was arrested in July on a charge of first-degree possession of child pornography after police allegedly found more than 300 files of child pornography on Carey’s computers inside the rectory. Carey has since said he wants help for his addiction to child pornography and has spent time in a mental health institution.

Today he appeared in New London Superior Court with his lawyer, Ron Stevens. His appearance lasted less than 30 seconds, with Handy saying the state had no opposition to Stevens’ request for more time and rescheduled his court date for January 7.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW ZEALAND
New Zealand Herald

By Catherine Masters , Greg Ansley

5:30 AM Saturday Nov 17, 2012

Calls mount for New Zealand involvement in a top-level Australian inquiry into the widespread sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests and other authority figures. Greg Ansley and Catherine Masters report

Former priest Denis McAlinden was defrocked following sexual abuse allegations involving minors in Australia. He spent six months in Tokomaru Bay’s church. Photo / Supplied

The Catholic church in Tokomaru Bay, Gisborne, is like many in small-town New Zealand – a picture of safety and innocence.

It’s hard to imagine that the pretty little wooden chapel with the blue roof has been caught up in a top-level inquiry into the sexual abuse of children, which was launched in Australia but is likely to extend to this country.

Among the practices to be investigated is that instead of prosecuting paedophile priests, the Catholic church transferred them from diocese to diocese – sometimes shipping them across the Tasman to New Zealand and vice versa.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MISSOURI
KCTV

Posted: Nov 15, 2012

By Laura McCallister, Multimedia Producer
By Betsy Webster, News Reporter

MONITEAU COUNTY, MO (KCTV) –
A Missouri church is facing criticism from within its own ranks over a pastor accused of child sex crimes who refuses to step down.

Pastor Travis Smith has been exonerated of two child sex crimes cases, and now charged in two more.

Baptist leaders are concerned, while his congregation is steadfast in their support.

In several small mid-Missouri towns surrounding the county seat of California, MO, Smith’s name can invoke the response, “Say no more.”

Before being pastor at the First Baptist Church in Stover, MO, Smith was youth pastor at Pilot Grove Baptist Church.

“The whole thing just made me sick. The whole thing was sickening,” said a woman who didn’t want to reveal her identity.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UTAH
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Barbara Dorris on November 16, 2012

A West Valley City minister has been removed for failing to quickly report allegations of child abuse.

We are grateful for this move. Too often, those who abuse kids get away because church officials refuse to or delay reporting allegations. When predators are brought to justice, those who enabled and protected them get off scot free, and allowed to remain in their positions. Only when those who enable and cover up child sex abuse are punished for their actions will the tide begin to turn against the child sex abuse epidemic.

We hope that Rev. Eddie Kelemini, who has stepped into the position left vacant by Rev. Havili Mone’s ouster, will be a friend to victims and an advocate for those who have been hurt by the church. We urge Rev. Kelemini to search within his church for others who may be suffering in silence and use every resource at his disposal to help them heal and seek justice.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CLEVELAND (OH0)
Fox 8

[with video]

November 14, 2012, by Bill Sheil

A FOX 8 I-Team investigation looks into how the Cleveland Catholic Diocese has handled one particular priest.

The priest took a leave of absence ten years ago, just after the priest sex abuse scandal exploded into public view.

The FOX 8 I-Team’s Bill Sheil tells you what the priest is doing now.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OHIO
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on November 16, 2012

Cleveland’s Catholic bishop is restoring to ministry a priest who “groomed” a teenager and tried to abuse him.

In a nine minute televised investigative report, based largely on “hundreds of pages of documents from the Lake County prosecutor,” Fox 8 investigative reporter Bill Sheil reports that Bishop Richard Lennon is putting Fr. Jeffrey M. Weaver back on the job for the first time in a decade.

Read the story.

Leaders of a support group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, are blasting the move as “reckless, callous and deceitful.”

According to the records released by prosecutors, in 1996, Fr. Weaver

–“bought the teenager a large number of alcoholic drinks,”
–“then tried to French kiss him” while victim pushed him away in the Immaculate Conception rectory,
–“rubbed his legs above the knee, approaching his penis one time,”
–“locked his legs together over the victim’s legs, saying ‘isn’t this nice,’” and
–“put the victim’s hands on his (the priest’s) legs.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

WASHINGTON
Sky Valley Chronicle

November 16, 2012

(SEATTLE, WA) — The Seattle Archdiocese has decided to settle a 1980’s sex abuse lawsuit for $635,000 payable to the man who said he was victimized by a former lay youth minister.

Rolfe Eckmann alleged he was abused in the mid-80s by Jim Funnell, a former youth minister at Saint John Vianney Catholic Church in Kirkland.

In the lawsuit he filed Eckmann contended the Archdiocese hired Funnell without a background check while at the same time the church was also implementing its sex abuse prevention policies.

In 1989, Funnell was charged with sexually assaulting a different boy and was fired from his job. He pleaded guilty to a lesser charge.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
EADT 24

Friday, November 16, 2012

A RETIRED priest from Suffolk who sexually abused teenagers will not be sentenced today because of administrative reasons.

Father John Haley Dossor had been due to receive his punishment after pleading guilty at an earlier hearing to six indecent assaults against two boys aged between 13 and 17.

The 71-year-old, of Kirton, near Felixstowe, had denied a further nine charges relating to attacks on men and boys and they will remain on file.

But the hearing at Norwich Crown Court could not take place.

Dossor will be sentenced at a date yet to be confirmed.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

November 17, 2012

Mike Carlton

Grave of mien, choosing each word with studied care, every inch a prince of Rome, Cardinal George Pell defied the accusers.

The sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests had been exaggerated, he told a news conference in Sydney on Tuesday. There was a “press campaign” against the church, with “general smears that we are covering up and moving people around”.

“We object to being described as the only cab on the rank … because there is a persistent press campaign focused largely on us, that does not mean we are largely the principal culprits.”

With those few sentences, Australia’s most senior Catholic churchman flung aside any lingering shred of moral authority attached either to his person or his office as the Cardinal Archbishop of Sydney. There were one or two perfunctory remarks about “shame” delivered in that familiar treacly baritone, but that was it. Strip away the apostolic airs and he could have been a flack for James Hardie assuring the world that the dangers of the company’s asbestos products had been rather overblown.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

November 17, 2012

Chrissie Foster

I COULD never stand to live in a world without justice and truth: at last there will be a platform for both. Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s announcement of a royal commission on child sexual abuse has brought to an end the cries from victims and victim supporters. Of course, there have been many tears this week. More will be shed. But the royal commission is a cause for celebration.

For my family, the struggle to achieve this breakthrough began 16 years ago, on March 26, 1996. This was the day my daughter Emma, after almost a year of starving her 13-year-old body to an emaciated 41 kilograms, numerous self-harming horrors and attempts to take her own life, disclosed that our parish priest had sexually assaulted her. Not once, but on many occasions over her primary school years.

Fifteen months later more horror and heartbreak surfaced through a half-finished suicide note from our second daughter, Katie. She had hidden the note in a shoebox. It was written in her very neatest handwriting. Katie had been another victim of our parish priest.

There was no cure for my much-loved daughters. The pain never leaves. After years of subsequent torment, Emma took her own life at the age of 26. Katie, while drunk after binge drinking, was hit by a car in 1999 (she was 15) and still receives 24-hour care as a result of her injuries.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

JAMIE WALKER
From:The Australian
November 17, 2012

THE spiritual leader of Australia’s 3.5 million Anglicans, Phillip Aspinall, believes that priests may be able to report child abuse revealed during the rite of confession without breaking the seal of the confessional, putting him at odds with Catholics.

The Anglican Primate says the sanctity of the confessional should be examined by the royal commission into child sexual abuse called this week by Julia Gillard, which he regards as being a decade overdue.

Dr Aspinall’s predecessor as Archbishop of Brisbane, Peter Hollingworth – who lost his job as governor-general after a scandal erupted over his handling of sex-abuse cases in the diocese – also backed the inquiry.

Dr Hollingworth warned yesterday that the abuse of children was “more widespread than previously thought”, and welcomed the royal commission as an important national initiative and a means to help victims.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

PETER CRAVEN
From:The Australian
November 17, 2012

IT’S fortunate that when Julia Gillard announced on Monday that she would hold a royal commission into child abuse, she emphasised it would not confine itself to any one religious institution, or to religious institutions at all: government childcare, non-profit private bodies such as the Scouts – all would be scrutinised.

If the process was going to take years, then fair enough, in the Prime Minister’s view – there could (and should) be no shortcuts in this business.

It was an appropriate way to announce a royal commission, because the immediate provocation for one was that there had been more reports of abuse involving the Catholic Church.

They were hellish reports: of Catholic brothers committing pack rapes of children in orphanages, of offending priests being posted to new parishes where they offended again.

Premier Ted Baillieu in Victoria has an investigation under way and his NSW counterpart Barry O’Farrell has announced one too. Former prime minister Malcolm Fraser, independent senator Nick Xenophon and independent federal MP Tony Windsor had all called for a royal commission.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
The Independent

Tom Pugh

Friday 16 November 2012

Police investigating allegations of sex offences against boys and young men by a retired Church of England bishop said seven more people have come forward claiming they were abused.

The Rt Rev Peter Ball, 80, was arrested at his home near Langport, Somerset, on Tuesday on suspicion of sex offences against eight boys and young men aged from 12 to their early 20s in East Sussex and elsewhere in the late 1970s and 1990s, sources said.

Since his arrest, Sussex Police said a further seven people have come forward making allegations of abuse against them.

A number of people have also stepped forward with potentially useful information, although not alleging that offences had been committed against them.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

IRELAND
Irish Independent

Friday November 16 2012

AN ELDERLY priest has been charged with sexually assaulting a teen over an eight-year period two decades ago.

Fr Vincent Mercer (66) of Black Abbey, Kilkenny, was remanded on bail after being charged before Cork District Court with a total of 39 counts of sexual assault.

Fr Mercer faces 39 charges of sexual assault against a juvenile at various locations in Cork and Limerick between January 1, 1986 and February 22, 1994.

The juvenile was aged between 11 and 17 over this period.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
EADT 24

Friday, November 16, 2012

A RETIRED priest from Suffolk who sexually abused teenagers is due to be sentenced.

Father John Haley Dossor pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to six indecent assaults against two boys aged between 13 and 17.

The 71-year-old, of Kirton, near Felixstowe, had denied a further nine charges relating to attacks on men and boys and they will remain on file.

He will be sentenced at Norwich Crown Court and has been warned he could be jailed.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MIAMI (FL)
Miami Herald

By Audra D.S. Burch
aburch@miamiherald.com

The Miami Archdiocese faces another child abuse lawsuit involving an accused serial molester already being held in the Broward County jail in a criminal case.

In a lawsuit, Fr. Neil Doherty is accused of drugging and sexually molesting Dennis Montero almost three decades ago as the priest “blessed him” and told the then 15-year-old “his job was to share God’s love.’’

“He drugged me repeatedly and raped me repeatedly. This guy is a monster,” Montero, 43, said Thursday. “I ended up punishing myself with drugs and alcohol to deal with the pain.’’

Doherty, 69, already named in more than two dozen sex-abuse lawsuits, is in jail awaiting trial on a charge of sexually assaulting a minor in Broward County.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
Reuters

By Andrea Burzynski

NEW YORK | Fri Nov 16, 2012

(Reuters) – Four deaf Wisconsin men were some of the first to seek justice after suffering childhood sexual abuse at the hands of a priest, and a new documentary about the Catholic Church’s poor handling of such cases stemming from the Vatican seeks to make their voices heard.

“Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God” explores the impact of the Roman Catholic Church’s protocol as dictated from the Vatican for dealing with pedophile priests. It opens in U.S. cinemas on November 16, and will air on cable channel HBO in February.

Though American media coverage about child sex abuse by clergy has been extensive since a slew of cases came to light in Boston in 2002, Oscar-winning documentary director Alex Gibney wanted to connect individual stories with what he sees as systemic failures stemming from the top of the church.

“A lot of individual stories had been done about clerical sex abuse, but I hadn’t seen one that really connected the individual stories with the larger cover-up by the Vatican, so that was important,” Gibney told Reuters in an interview.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MAINE
Bangor Daily News

By Julia Bayly, BDN Staff

FORT KENT, Maine — Members of St. John Vianney Parish could have their former spiritual leader back in time for Christmas following word Thursday from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland that the Rev. James Nadeau is returning after a 7-month voluntary leave of absence.

Nadeau stepped down from his position as pastor of the St.John Valley parish in the wake of a Maine attorney general’s office investigation into possible embezzlement of parish funds.

Earlier this month, that office decided to not pursue criminal charges against Nadeau, citing lack of evidence supporting the allegations which had been brought by an unidentified third party.

Nadeau met for two hours in Portland Thursday afternoon with Bishop Richard J. Malone, Apostolic administrator of the diocese, according to Dave Guthro, communications director with the diocese.

Guthro declined to provide further details about the investigation, but said Thursday’s meeting between Malone and Nadeau “went very well. The two men wanted to keep that meeting a private conversation between Father Nadeau and the Bishop [and] it sounded like it went well with no rancor.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
The Star-Ledger

By Stephen Whitty/The Star-Ledger

Alex Gibney’s new film begins with dark shots of Gothic architecture, ominous figures moving through murky shadows and, in the background, faintly chanted Latin. It feels a bit like a monster movie.

It is, too.

Sadly, though, “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God” is a documentary about real-life horrors – the sexual abuse (and coverups) that have tortured countless innocents, bedeviled the Catholic Church and caused many to question their faith.

The Summit-based documentarian, always a careful filmmaker, begins by focusing on a single, albeit monstrous case – a priest who, for decades, abused boys at a Wisconsin boarding school for the deaf.

But then, it slowly widens its gaze – to see similar horrors taking place in Ireland, in Italy, in Latin America. And to uncover a pattern of deceit that both denied the victims help and practically ensured their abusers could continue the assaults.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

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

By Robert Patrick rpatrick@post-dispatch.com

ST. LOUIS  •  An advocacy group for victims of sexual abuse praised on Thursday the extradition order that will send a former University City man to Australia to face child sexual abuse charges.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests called U.S. Magistrate Judge Nannette Baker’s extradition order last month a “win for victims everywhere,” and urged any victims of David Kramer to come forward to police.

Australian authorities claim Kramer fondled or otherwise indecently assaulted four male students, ages 10 and 11, who attended the school where Kramer taught. The abuse was alleged to have occurred from 1989-92, while Kramer was teaching at a school in St. Kilda, a Melbourne suburb.

Officials charged Kramer last December, months before he was released from a Missouri prison after serving a seven-year sentence for sexual misconduct and statutory sodomy. Prosecutors said he fondled a 12-year-old boy and masturbated in front of him in an apartment in University City. Kramer pleaded guilty in 2008.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OHIO/WEST VIRGINIA
WLWT

[with video]

CINCINNATI —
A federal grand jury has indicted a Fairfield priest with transportation of a minor across state lines for illicit purposes.

A grand jury in West Virginia indicts a Cincinnati priest on child sex charges.
More

The indictment, issued Wednesday, said 71-year-old Robert Poandl, known as “Father Bob,” took a 10-year-old boy to West Virginia in 1991 and sexually assaulted him there. …

“I was yelling hooray for the victims and for kids,” said Judy Jones, associate director of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests. “Hopefully they can’t be harmed anymore by this predator.”

Jones said Poandl was indicted in this same case two years ago but the charges were dismissed.

Glenmary’s president issued this statement saying, “We have just learned of these charges today, and we are working to fully comply with the subpoena and cooperate with investigators.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
ABC – PM

TONY EASTLEY: The Federal Government’s Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse may have been sparked by incidents within the Catholic Church but it’s not the only organisation that will be subject to scrutiny.

Many people who were abused in foster care or at boys’ and girls’ homes also hope the Royal Commission will bring some recognition of what they went through.

The Care Leavers Australia Network hopes that compensation will be considered.

A warning: Timothy McDonald’s report contains material that some listeners might find distressing.

TIMOTHY MCDONALD: Jeffrey Myers says he suffered horrific abuse as a child at the Royalston Boys Home in Glebe in inner Sydney.

He’s in his 70s now and the abuse happened decades ago, but he still has a hard time talking about it.

JEFFREY MYERS: Well I will go as far as saying that there was penetration by objects in my body. That’s about as far as I’ll go mate, as far as the torture side of it was concerned. And I did black out.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

Emily Portelli and Shannon Deery
From:Herald Sun
November 16, 2012

A FORMER priest who allegedly drugged then raped students at a Catholic boys’ school will face the charges against him at trial.

David Rapson, 59, allegedly abused seven boys between 1973 and 1990 at various schools including Salesian College Rupertswood, in Sunbury.

Magistrate Gregory McNamara today committed Rapson to stand trial after a four-day hearing in which previous students gave evidence about the alleged offences.

“I’m satisfied there is evidence of sufficient weight to support convictions in relation to all of these charges,” Mr McNamara said.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Jamie Walker, Queensland Bureau Chief
From:The Australian
November 16, 2012

ANGLICAN Primate Phillip Aspinall says the planned national royal commission into child sex abuse should have been called a decade ago, when he first approached then prime minister John Howard to set up such an inquiry.

In a statement today strongly backing the inquiry announced this week by Julia Gillard, the spiritual leader of the country’s 3.6 million Anglicans said it offered a historic opportunity to protect children and called for bipartisan support from MPs to make it well-resourced, independent and free from political agendas.

Dr Aspinall, the Archbishop of Brisbane, also reminded the Prime Minister that “all victims of child sex abuse” would be looking to the royal commission for answers and validation, including the vast majority who were harmed in family settings.

“Of the nearly 3.6 million Australians who call themselves Anglican, statistically, one in four women and one in eight men are victims of abuse, so it is something that affects our church on many levels,” he said.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
7 News

ABC
Updated November 16, 2012

Anglican Church Primate Phillip Aspinall said the royal commission into child sex abuse would be an historic opportunity to protect children.

Archbishop Aspinall, visiting Adelaide for a meeting of the General Synod standing committee, said he approached then-prime minister John Howard a decade ago about abuse within institutions such as the church, but nothing was done.

“I thought it was worth doing 10 years ago and I approached the prime minister. At the time he declined. I approached the state premier in Queensland, he declined so the church did what we could in Brisbane. I welcome the fact that we’re taking a more comprehensive approach,” he said.

He urged the commission’s terms of reference be full and fearless and that it be properly resourced.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Goulburn Post

By ANTONY DUBBER
Nov. 16, 2012

THE Administrator of the Canberra/Goulburn Catholic Archdiocese has come out in support of a Royal Commission into child sexual abuse.

Monsignor John Woods is also calling for meaningful recommendations on a possibly long-running inquiry.

He told the Post that child abuse was a ‘cancer’ that needed to be addressed not only in the Catholic Church but across a broad spectrum of society.

Msgr Woods said the Royal Commission could run for a number of years, as was the case in Ireland, when the church there carried out a thorough and all-encompassing investigation which took nine years.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
7 News

Adam Walters, 7News Sydney
Updated November 16, 2012

EXCLUSIVE: If you thought the Catholic Church has been literally paying dearly for the sins of its clergy, you’d be mistaken.

A new scandal is brewing for the Catholic Church with claims victims of sexual abuse are being paid with funds provided by school fees.

Seven News can reveal parents, and taxpayers, are bankrolling the church’s own insurance company which pays out victims’ compensation.

The victims’ support group Broken Rites says parents of Catholic school children, and taxpayers, are effectively bankrolling massive compensation pay-outs for sexual abuse.

“The Catholic Church has paid mega-millions to the victims. It doesn’t like doing this, it tries to evade it when it can,” Bernard Barrett from Broken Rites said.

He said the church minimises the financial impact of abuse, as parents pay fees to schools, which in turn pay premiums to Catholic Church Insurance Limited.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Daily Advertiser

Editorial

THIS week’s announcement of a royal commission into child sex abuse is both welcome and long overdue.

Such abuse is one of the most abhorrent crimes our society must deal with, the implications of its prevalence changing lives forever – in some cases, bringing them to a premature end.

There must be no debate about the cost or the time this commission takes – this is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to tackle one of the most confronting issues facing our society.

Tuesday’s press conference by Cardinal George Pell shed some light on the church’s likely approach, saying he expected all within to co-operate fully with the inquiry. Not that the church would have much option.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Bega District News

By Ben Smyth
Nov. 16, 2012.

A BEGA Valley man who claims he was sexually abused by a Catholic brother as an 11-year-old has spoken out for the first time about his ordeal.

On the condition of anonymity, he shared his story with the BDN as news of a royal commission into child sex abuse was announced by Prime Minster Julia Gillard earlier this week.

John (not his real name) attended Marcellin College at Randwick in Sydney from 1957 to 1965 and said his schooling, particularly between 1960 and 1963, was a nightmare he has tried to forget.

“I feel very nervous about saying anything too specific…as a victim I have enormous difficulties with trust,” John said.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Canberra Times

November 17, 2012

Jack Waterford

Julia Gillard’s decision to go for a royal commission into institutional sex abuse of children may have involved a calculation that it had more capacity to hurt the other side of politics than her own. That might be summarised with the observations that Australia’s most visible Catholic, George Cardinal Pell, is a close friend, mentor and counsellor of the Opposition Leader, Tony Abbott, and no one can remember Pell wittingly doing Labor a favour – at least since 1955 – or missing an opportunity to benefit the Coalition.

Pell is not, of course, a sexual abuser of children, nor any sort of apologist for it. Nor is Abbott. But Pell’s embattled, defensive and sometimes angry reaction to criticism of the church’s response to the epidemic of child abuse – including his suggestion this week that the media were beating up on the church – could hardly have better symbolised a common suspicion that the leadership of the church was slow to act once it realised it had a big problem, failed to reach out properly to victims, and in certain respects still fails to ”get it”. Pell, when on the front foot on this subject, as opposed to Catholic issues he would prefer to be talking about, is a public relations disaster for the church.

And, some tacticians might think, the well-known reluctance of Pell to take a backward step or a back seat when under attack might accentuate the disaster at times in the political cycle when it matters. The Catholic Church may have a lot of adherents, even generally loyal ones, but it has only limited moral capital in the bank, and expending it on defending the indefensible is pretty dumb.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
WA Today

November 17, 2012

Richard Baker, Nick McKenzie

THE Australian Catholic Church holds thousands of pages of documents containing the psycho-sexual profiles of dozens of clergy accused of sexually abusing children and vulnerable adults.

The profiles, often sent to bishops, were created as part of the church’s little-known 1997-2008 rehabilitation program for those it described as ”sexual boundary violators”.

It is understood none of the clergy treated under the multimillion-dollar Encompass Australasia program run from Sydney’s Wesley Private Hospital was referred to police.

This was despite senior church figures being aware of serious abuse allegations – or in some cases, admissions – that led to clergy being sent for treatment.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Canberra Times

[Church funding paedophiles’ legal defence]

November 17, 2012

Rick Feneley, Paul Bibby, Barney Zwartz, Jane Lee, Daniel Lane

Members of the small parish were furious. Word had gone around that money from the Christmas collection had been used to help pay the legal costs of a local priest accused of repeatedly raping an altar boy. It was December 2004. Father James Patrick Fletcher, 64, had just been found guilty of multiple counts of anal and oral penetration of ”Desmond”, who was 13 when the attacks had started in 1990 in the Maitland-Newcastle diocese. Fletcher would die one year into his 10-year maximum jail sentence.

But The Newcastle Herald soon began to question how his defence had been financed. According to the victim support group Broken Rites, legal experts had estimated his costs for the 11-day trial, including for the services of a prominent QC, exceeded $200,000. The Bishop of Maitland-Newcastle, the Most Reverend Michael Malone, said Fletcher had made use of a ”loan facility”. He also admitted that one local priest had ”donated” part of the parish’s Christmas collection to help pay Fletcher’s lawyers. Not that this priest had told his parishioners or sought their permission. It was the secrecy that really angered the faithful.

As Fairfax Media revealed on Friday, at least two Catholic orders – the Christian Brothers and Marist Fathers – have continued to fund the legal defences of clergy as they went to trial for the second, third and even fourth times for the sexual abuse of children. It is the perception that churches have shielded their own – and that even police have turned a blind eye – that largely motivated the Prime Minister this week to announce the biggest inquiry into child abuse in Australia’s history.

Only on Tuesday, the Archbishop of Sydney, George Pell, stressed that his archdiocese did not pay for the defence of clergy accused of child abuse. But as Pell also made clear, he is not the boss of the Catholic Church in Australia. He is the nation’s only cardinal, making him Australia’s most influential Catholic. It gives him moral authority to speak out. But different orders have their own authority.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

November 17, 2012

Cardinal George Pell

To the surprise of some, the Catholic bishops of Australia welcomed the Prime Minister’s announcement of a royal commission into child sexual abuse.

Australians believe in justice and there is a strong feeling that justice has been denied to victims of sexual abuse. Justice is also owed to the individuals and institutions working to prevent sexual abuse and helping victims and their families.

I welcome the royal commission because it will help victims and help to clear the air. Victims have an absolute right to justice and I am pleased that they have welcomed the royal commission.

It might be helpful to clarify some important points from last week.

Some proposed an inquiry into only the Catholic Church. I opposed this for the simple reason that there is no evidence to suggest abuse is confined to the Catholic Church. I welcome the fact that the commission will consider the problem more broadly across all Australian institutions. If we are serious about tackling this scourge in our society, this is the right thing to do.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Canberra Times

November 17, 2012

Ross Peake

George Pell now has the unlikely mantle of The Great Uniter.

He has unexpectedly drawn federal politicians from all parties together for a meeting of minds, in revulsion and disgust against his views.

The nation’s leading atheist Julia Gillard is joined by the conservative Catholic Opposition Leader in opposing the cardinal as he clings to the notion that the law of the Vatican overrides the law of this land. Why should a priest who is told of sex abuse not be required to report this to police?

And many Australians would just see Pell as an embarrassment, noting his quick dismissal of the row over child sex abuse as a media ”beat-up”.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

BELIZE
The Guardian

Written by Shane D. William
Thursday, 15 November 2012

Last week, an eleven-year-old girl from Frank’s Eddy Village summoned the courage to tell her mother that she was being sexually abused by the pastor of their church, 46-year-old Julio Cesar Garcia. According to the mother, the child spoke of two occasions when Garcia pressured her into having sex. The first time was actually inside the church on October 28th. The second time was at the pastor’s home on November 1st. The mother was devastated by the news. She took the child to a doctor, who confirmed that the child was carnally known. The mother then reported the incident to police and Garcia was arrested and charged with two counts of unlawful carnal knowledge. He appeared in the Belmopan Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday, November 7th, where the charges were read against him. Due to the nature of the offense, bail was not granted, and he was remanded to the Belize Central Prison until his next court appearance on January 25th, 2013.

For the eleven-year-old, Garcia’s arrest should have been the start of the recovery process. Unfortunately, that is far from the case. Garcia’s arrest caused other victims to come forward. At least two other mothers claimed that their daughters reported sexual advancements by Garcia to them. The scandal made headlines on the local television stations and Garcia was exposed as a “Predator Amongst the Flock”. The church’s parent organization, the Baptist Association, issued a press release disassociating itself from Garcia, claiming that he had never been a Baptist pastor. Those familiar with the Baptist denomination explained that it is common practice to have church leaders, who are not ordained pastors, sothe association’s statement was in no way a disassociation. However, it did act as the final nail in the forearm of the crucified Garcia. He had been jailed, publicly humiliated and labeled as a predator. Some would say deservingly so. Undeservingly though, is that where Garcia’s suffering had come full circle the victim and her family’s suffering was just beginning.

The Guardian spoke to the victim’s mother on Monday, November 12th. She said that since the story was made public, life has been difficult for her family. She said, “I won’t say any names. Some people are just looking at me and some of them are mad saying that this is a lie. The God that I serve, he knows that I am not lying…” The mother said that her family has been receiving more cold shoulders than expressions of support or even sympathy. The incident was not enough to shake her faith in God, and she still attended church this past Sunday. She said that by the way they watched her, she knows they are upset. As hard as it has been for the mother, it is nothing compared to what the child experiences on a daily basis. “They tease her at school,” the mother said as her eyes fill and her voice cracked. She knows that life will never be the same for her daughter and family. They have become like lepers – outcasts in the tiny village they call home. And as the child continues to suffer from pain in her womb, it is the pain in her heart that is unbearable. She suffers greatly because instead of providing a healing environment, her community has chosen to ridicule and scratch the wounds. Instead of moving on from being abused twice, she now has to cope with abuse on a daily basis.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UTAH
The Salt Lake Tribune

By Pamela Manson and Bob Mims
The Salt Lake Tribune

First Published Nov 15 2012

The pastor of the Tongan United Methodist Church in West Valley City has been removed from his position for failing to promptly report that young boys had been sexually abused by an older boy in the congregation, according to a letter written by a Denver church official.

The Rev. Havili Mone was suspended in August while officials investigated complaints against him. Bishop Elaine Stanovsky wrote in a letter dated Nov. 11 that when Mone first heard reports about the offenses, he “acted to heal the harm of abuse in a way that did not fulfill the expectations of The United Methodist Church and fell short of the professional standards for clergy in the United States.”

Stanovsky had installed the Rev. Eddie Kelemeni, who is retired and lives in Hawaii, to fill in at the church, at 1553 W. Crystal Ave. (2590 South). She said in her letter that he will complete his time as interim pastor Nov. 30 and that a new pastor soon will be appointed.

The letter was sent Tuesday to church leaders with instructions to distribute it to members of the congregation, according to the Rev. Steve Goodier, a church superintendent.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UTAH
The Republic

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
November 15, 2012

SALT LAKE CITY — The pastor of a West Valley church has been removed for failing to promptly report claims that young boys had been sexually abused by an older boy in the congregation.

Bishop Elaine Stanofsky said in a letter that she intended to end the appointment of the Rev. Havili Mone from the Tongan United Methodist Church, effective Thursday.

Sgt. Mike Powell of West Valley City says the alleged incidents occurred at the church and that the primary suspect is a 16-year-old boy. Powell stressed that Mone is not a suspect in the abuse cases, but has been investigated for failure to report the abuse.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CALIFORNIA
ChicoER

By RYAN OLSON-Staff Writer chicoer.com
Posted: 11/16/2012

OROVILLE — A former associate pastor of a Chico church charged in a child sex abuse case has pleaded no contest to a lesser count.

Jesse Daniel Ruhl, formerly of Pleasant Valley Baptist Church, pleaded no contest Wednesday to an added misdemeanor count of engaging in lewd conduct in a public place, according to his attorney, Philip Heithecker.

Ruhl had initially been charged in Butte County Superior Court with a misdemeanor count of child molestation for the reported relationship with a then-16-year-old girl. The girl and her parents were members of the church where Ruhl was a music teacher, but the girl was reportedly being home-schooled at the time of the offense.

The prosecution had alleged the relationship between Ruhl and the girl became more intimate in October 2010 when they exchanged 20-30 text messages. For about two to three months, they reportedly met several times per week at their residences and in public places.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

SEATTLE (WA)
Patch

By Greg Johnston

The Archdiocese of Seattle has settled a child sexual abuse lawsuit that had been scheduled for trial on Monday allegedly involving a former youth minister at Kirkland’s St. John Vianney Church.

The victim’s attorney, Michael T. Pfau, issued a news release about the settlement, for $635,000, on Thursday, and the archdiocese confirmed it for Kirkland Patch.

The news release said the victim, identified only by his initials, D.E., was sexually abused in the mid-1980s by the youth minister, and claimed the archdiocese hired the youth minister without a proper background check. It said a proper check would probably have found similar involvement with youth previously in New Orleans and “multiple concerns about boundary issues with children. One of them rejected him from being a campus minister because of those concerns.”

The youth minister was identified in the release as Jim Funnell, and the archdiocese confirmed that he did work at St. John Vianney in the mid-80s. The release said Funnell later was charged and pleaded guilty to a charge of child abuse

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Anglican Diocese of Melbourne

16/11/2012

By Primate’s office media release

The Primate of the Anglican Church said today that the royal commission called by Prime Minister Julia Gillard offered an historic opportunity to protect Australian children.

Brisbane’s Archbishop Phillip Aspinall commended the Prime Minister for her decision to establish a royal commission. He also urged that the commission’s terms of reference should be full and fearless and called for the commission to properly resourced.

He said a truly federal process was warranted given child sexual abuse crosses State and territory borders, infecting all places where child live, learn and play, including churches, schools, sporting clubs and families.

Archbishop Aspinall acknowledged that the royal commission would address shameful failings on the part of institutions, including churches. But a comprehensive, independent examination would also give ordinary Australians a chance to see for themselves the results of a decade-plus reform process instituted across many Anglican dioceses.

In Archbishop Aspinall’s Brisbane diocese, every allegation of child sexual abuse is reported to police, the diocese assists police, victims of historic abuse have been actively sought out, multiple times, via media calls and advertising.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Illawarra Mercury

[Bishop Igham’s statement]

Wollongong’s Catholic bishop says the diocese will fully co-operate with a Royal Commission inquiry into the sexual abuse of children.

In a statement to be read at churches across the diocese on Sunday, Bishop Peter Ingham described this as one of the saddest periods in his priesthood.

He welcomed the Royal Commission, which will investigate child sexual abuse and the responses of institutions, including churches and government and not-for-profit organisations.

‘‘Hopefully, it will shine a light on the progress we have made in recent years as well as highlight areas in which we can improve our practice,’’ he said.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
The New York Times

By A. O. SCOTT

Published: November 15, 2012

The Rev. Lawrence C. Murphy, a Roman Catholic priest in Wisconsin who died in 1998, appears in old photographs and home movies as an energetic, round-faced man with a warm, friendly, efficient manner. Even without the sinister music that shadows these glimpses of Father Murphy’s benign, banal public activities in the ’50s and ’60s, the viewer of “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God,” Alex Gibney’s new documentary, will suspect that there’s something terrible lurking under the surface.

There was a time, not long ago, when a priest’s devotion to children would elicit a smile of approval rather than a shudder of suspicion and dread. The revelation early in the movie that Father Murphy, who was for many years in charge of a boarding school for the deaf, systematically molested youngsters in his care — scores if not hundreds over the years — is sickening but not especially surprising. A decade of reporting and advocacy has made stories like his distressingly familiar.

“Mea Maxima Culpa” is not the first documentary to present the testimony of victims or to expose the failure of the Roman Catholic hierarchy in dealing with widespread sexual abuse by priests. Kirby Dick’s “Twist of Faith” (2004) and Amy Berg’s “Deliver Us From Evil” (2006) are both important predecessors that link intimate crimes with institutional failures. But the prolific Mr. Gibney, whose other films include “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room,” “Taxi to the Dark Side” and “Casino Jack and the United States of Money,” is something of a specialist in the corruptions of power. And he doggedly updates the larger story here, connecting dots that lead, in a trail of denial and cover-up, from the rural Midwest to the Vatican.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Latrobe Valley Express

By Louis Nelson
Nov. 15, 2012

The Catholic Church is investigating fresh allegations of sexual abuse by a priest within Gippsland; however, if current church protocols stand, the allegations may never be made public.

While Catholic diocese of Sale’s Bishop Christopher Prowse would give no further details of the investigation into the priest, who was now deceased, he said he was confident the church could respond to the victim’s claims appropriately.

In welcoming Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s announcement of a royal commission into child sex abuse in an interview with The Express on Tuesday, Bishop Prowse defended the church’s tradition of handling sexual abuse allegations in-house.

This comes amid growing calls for the Catholic Church to adopt mandatory reporting of abuse allegations to police, something Bishop Prowse said the church would oppose in the context of allegations being made within confession.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

FLORIDA
Sun Sentinel

By James D. Davis, Staff writer

November 16, 2012

The Rev. Neil Doherty, currently in Broward County jail awaiting trial on a range of abuse-related charges, was named Thursday in a new $5 million lawsuit against the Archdiocese of Miami.

The suit says Doherty, 69, formerly a pastor at St. Vincent Catholic Church in Margate, sexually abused a 15-year-old Miami-Dade County boy for 18 months starting around 1984, allegedly plying him with drugs, wine and money. Doherty is not named as a defendant.

Attorney Jeff Herman, who filed the suit in the Miami-Dade County’s 11th Judicial Circuit Court on Thursday morning, said the archdiocese allowed Doherty access to children even after learning of other sexual abuse accusations.

“For years, the archdiocese knew he was abusing boys,” Herman said in a telephone interview. “Instead of protecting them, they protected him.”

Archdiocesan spokeswoman Mary Ross Agosta said she couldn’t comment directly until she had seen the lawsuit. And Doherty’s attorney, J. David Bogenschutz of Fort Lauderdale, did not return two calls for comment on Thursday.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW YORK
New York Post

By FARRAN SMITH NEHME
November 16, 2012

MEA MAXIMA CULPA: SILENCE IN THE HOUSE OF GOD
Strong, deeply moving. Running time: 107 minutes. Not rated (explicit discussion of sexual abuse). At the Film Forum, Houston and Varick streets.

Public revulsion over the sex-abuse scandal in the Catholic Church is already so widespread that a filmmaker bold enough to retell this tragedy had better be purposeful about it — and Alex Gibney (“Taxi to the Dark Side”) definitely is that.

“Mea Maxima Culpa” is a fire-breathing set of theses nailed on the Vatican’s door.

Gibney structures the film with care, beginning with the depredations of one Father Lawrence Murphy at St. John’s School for the Deaf in Milwaukee. The priest abused the men in the film when they were schoolboys in the 1950s and ’60s, favoring with horrendous cunning the ones whose parents couldn’t speak to their sons in sign language.

As the boys grew into men they began to communicate with one another, and eventually became some of the first to go public, in the 1970s, with accusations against a priest.

From this group Gibney spirals outward, to those who tried — and failed — to get Murphy away from the school, to the higher-ups who protected the church’s image but not the victims, across the ocean to similar cases in Ireland and Italy, and finally to the Vatican itself. The film builds to a ringing demand that the church open completely its archives on sexual abuse.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OHIO/WEST VIRGINIA
NECN

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A Roman Catholic priest accused of taking a 10-year-old boy to West Virginia for sex more than two decades ago was jailed on Thursday.

The Rev. Robert Poandl, of the Cincinnati-based Glenmary Home Missioners, was in Butler County Jail in southwest Ohio following an order by a federal magistrate judge that he be taken into custody.

Poandl voluntarily surrendered to the FBI after learning of the charge, Glenmary said in a statement. An indictment in Cincinnati federal court on Wednesday accused Poandl of taking the boy on Aug. 3, 1991, but didn’t list specifics.

A statement from Glenmary Home Missioners, a society of priests and brothers who say they’re dedicated to establishing a Catholic presence in rural areas and small towns, said the indictment is related to a June 2009 accusation of sexual misconduct with a minor in Spencer, W.Va.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Standard

By Mark Russell
Nov. 16, 2012

A former Catholic priest has today been committed to stand trial on child sex abuse charges.

Magistrate Greg McNamara late this afternoon found there was sufficient evidence to convict David Rapson, 59, and ordered him to stand trial in the County Court.

Rapson, who told the magistrate he was “not guilty” of all the charges against him, was released on bail to appear in the County Court on December 11 for a directions hearing. His trial will be held in August next year.

Rapson is charged with one count of rape, five counts of indecent assault, four counts of indecently assaulting a child under 16, and one count of gross indecency from 1973 to 1990.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

Police investigating allegations of sex abuse against a former bishop and a retired priest say 10 more people have alleged they were victims.

The Rt Rev Peter Ball, 80, a former Church of England bishop of Lewes and Gloucester, was arrested on suspicion of abusing eight boys and men.

He was arrested on Tuesday at his home in Somerset, over allegations relating the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Retired Church of England priest Vickery House, 67, was also arrested.

Police said since the arrests 10 more people had come forward alleging sexual offences were committed against them, seven by the former bishop and three by the former priest.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Courier

CARDINAL George Pell this week argued the Catholic Church had been unfairly targeted by the media in regard to allegations of sexual abuse.

While it is true that the Prime Minister has announced a broad-based inquiry beyond any single denomination or organisation, it is fact that the church has been central to the issue in the past 50 years.

In Ballarat, this reality is stark.

The notable irony of Cardinal Pell’s press conference this week was the time he spent explaining the steps the Catholic Church had taken in Australia to repair the wrongs of the past.

Cardinal Pell detailed the inquiries, reports and documents which proved, he said, that the church was acting pro-actively to stamp out abuse and help in the healing process.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
Salon

Pick of the week: Alex Gibney’s “Mea Maxima Culpa” follows the scandal from one Wisconsin school to the pope’s desk

By Andrew O’Hehir

You can’t argue that Alex Gibney’s “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God” is the definitive treatment of the Roman Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal. This problem goes so deep into church history, and its implications are so broad, that no single book or film or series of newspaper articles can encompass it all. But by beginning with one of the earliest and most infamous of documented cases in the United States — the abuse of perhaps 200 deaf boys at a Wisconsin boarding school by a priest named Lawrence Murphy — the Oscar-winning Gibney (director of “Taxi to the Dark Side,” “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” and several other films) is able to suggest answers to certain very big questions.

Ever since the clerical abuse scandal began to break open in the early 2000s, with wave after wave of disturbing revelations and a groundbreaking investigative series in the Boston Globe, certain issues have remained shrouded in mystery. How much did the Vatican hierarchy know about the widespread rape and sexual abuse of children by men who were designated as the earthly representatives of Jesus Christ, and what did they do about it? Was the scandal really limited to the United States and other “Anglo-Saxon” countries, as many Catholics outside North America maintained? Were there few documented cases prior to the 1960s because they did not exist, or because they had been successfully squelched? Of course it was tempting to assume or infer answers to those questions, especially when faced with the world’s largest, oldest and most secretive religious organization, but journalists are supposed to hew to a higher standard than guesswork.

It won’t surprise anyone who’s been following this story over the past decade or so to learn that the partial answers emerging from “Mea Maxima Culpa” pretty much amount to the worst-case scenario on all those questions. While it became Vatican policy early in the scandal to blame the American bishops for their inadequate response to the crisis (and many of them indeed behaved disgracefully), the best evidence now indicates that the hierarchy in Rome heard about virtually every case, and that from 2001 onward most if not all of them went straight to the desk of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who is now Pope Benedict XVI.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Recorder

By Bevan Shields
Nov. 16, 2012

A NOTORIOUS child sex offender, the former priest Brian Spillane, has launched a bid to quash his conviction by claiming he faced an unfair trial.

Spillane, a former chaplain at Bathurst’s St Stanislaus College, was sentenced to nine years in prison earlier this year for abusing three girls, one as young as eight, in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Fairfax Regional Media can reveal Spillane’s lawyer, Greg Walsh, has prepared a series of documents outlining why the conviction should be overturned. The case will be heard in the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal in April next year, around the same time the Royal Commission into child sex abuse will be lifting the lid on decades of crime and cover-up.

Spillane’s defence lawyer, Greg Walsh, this week claimed Spillane, 69, was wrongly convicted.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
New Zealand Herald

By Sarah Joseph

Friday Nov 16, 2012

In response to the cascade of accusations and evidence of systemic and decades-long child abuse, the Australian Government finally announced a royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse on Monday.

One possible recommendation is being mooted, that priests be obliged to report any knowledge of child sex abuse to police.

Such an obligation would undoubtedly enhance protection of the rights of children. It would also interfere with the freedom of religion of priests if they are compelled to reveal information conveyed during formal “confessions”. In this clash of rights, which should prevail?

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

BOSTON (MA)
Washington Post

By G. Jeffrey Macdonald| Religion News Service,

Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley on Thursday (Nov. 15) launched an ambitious, five-year plan to consolidate local parish leadership and reinvigorate an archdiocese rocked by scandal, declining Mass attendance and a chronic shortage of priests.

Starting with a first phase in January, O’Malley’s “Disciples in Mission” initiative will reorganize the archdiocese’s 288 parishes into 135 “collaboratives,” or clusters of two or three parishes headed by a single pastor. Assistant pastors and other staff from local parishes will be reoriented to serve entire collaboratives. By 2016, every parish will be part of a collaborative.

The shift marks the latest major change for the 1.8 million Catholics in and around Boston, who grieved 69 parish closures in the wake of the clergy sexual abuse crisis. Clustering parishes under shared leadership is now crucial, organizers say, in order to carry out the “New Evangelization” encouraged by Pope Benedict XVI.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
WSIU

By Mark Jenkins

Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God documents the claims made by four deaf men who accused a Catholic priest of sexual abuse — and in chronicling the response of the church, details the role the current pope played in such scandals earlier in his career.

By the time Father Lawrence Murphy died in 1998, it’s alleged, he had sexually abused more than 200 children. Many of them must have seemed ideal victims: Students at St. John’s School for the Deaf in Milwaukee between 1950 and 1974, they possessed limited ability to communicate with others. Commonly in that period, the boarding school’s pupils had hearing parents who didn’t know American Sign Language.

These boys, largely unable to speak, are more than metaphors for all of the voiceless children whose sexual assaults are chronicled in Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God. In 1972, three of them became the first known victims of a pederast priest to accuse their attacker publicly.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OHIO/WEST VIRGINIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on November 15, 2012

We are grateful to this brave victim for cooperating with law enforcement authorities and trying to protect other kids from horrific child sex crimes by this predator priest.

Fr. Poandl is a shrewd child molester. But even cunning criminals are sometimes caught.

Still, this is not the time for complacency. Accused Catholic clerics usually get top notch defense lawyers. Sometimes, they walk free by exploiting legal technicalities. And sometimes, they get lenient sentences because other victims, witnesses and whistleblowers stay silent.

So we beg anyone who saw, suspected or suffered Fr. Poandl’s crimes to speak up, get help, call police, expose wrongdoing, protect kids and start healing.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MIAMI (FL)
WSVN

MIAMI (WSVN) – A South Florida priest who is awaiting trial on sexual abuse, is now facing new accusations.

Dennis Montero, who did not want to show his face on camera, is speaking out and claims Father Neil Doherty drugged and raped him when he was a child.

Montero explained why he stayed silent until now. “Being raped by a man is not something you tell your friends or your mom or anybody else. That’s not something you do. At least, not where I came from,” said Montero.

In a recently filed lawsuit, Montero and his attorney claimed Father Doherty used drugs, alcohol and money to take advantage of a young boy from a poor family.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OHIO/WEST VIRGINIA
Fox 19

CINCINNATI, OH (FOX19)- A federal grand jury has charged Robert Frank Poandl, 71, of Fairfield with one count of transportation of a minor across state lines for illicit purposes.

Poandl, who is also known as “Father Bob,” was arrested by FBI agents at the Glenmary Missioners in Fairfield.

The indictment alleges that in August 1991, Poandl took a 10-year old boy from Cincinnati to West Virginia to engage in sexual activity with him.

After these allegations arose, Poandl was removed from his position in Atlanta.

He arrived in Cincinnati on Feb. 13.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OHIO/WEST VIRGINIA
WKRC

A Fairfield priest is indicted by a federal grand jury on a child sex charge.

In February, Father Robert Frank Poandl denied any wrongdoing but was suspended from performing any priestly duties. The indictment alleges Father Poandl took a ten year old boy to West Virginia in 1991 with the intent to engage in sexual activity. Poandl is now 71 years old.

The FBI arrested the priest commonly called Father Bob today at the Glenmary Missioners.

Glenmary Missioners have posted a statement on their website. It says the alleged victim made the allegation against Father Poandl in 2009. “Father Poandl were dismissed by a West Virginia court in August 2010 and Father Poandl’s record was expunged. Following the Nov. 15 hearing Father Poandl has been temporarily detained at the Butler County Jail in Hamilton, Ohio, until his next hearing on Nov. 19.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CALIFORNIA
BishopAccountability.org – Assignment Record

Summary of Case: Ordained for the Los Angeles archdiocese in 1967, Ziemann spent much of his career at Our Lady Queen of the Angels high school seminary where he served as teacher, spiritual director, vice-rector, and dean of studies. He was elevated to Auxiliary Bishop in 1987, then to Bishop of Santa Rosa in 1992. In 1999 a younger priest of the diocese accused Ziemann of coercing him into sex over a two year period, ending in 1998. Ziemann abruptly resigned, admitting to a sexual relationship with the priest, but denying coercing him. In 2002 a man accused Ziemann of sexually abusing him beginning in 1968, when the man was a sixth-grade altar boy, and continuing for almost twenty years. This accuser claimed that Ziemann began to pay him for sex when he was 17 years-old. Ziemann denied the allegations. Another man surfaced in the early 2000s with claims that Ziemann sexually abused him as an altar boy in the 1960s, and a third man in 2004 accused Ziemann of sexually assaulting him as a boy in the 1970s, on the grounds of Our Lady’s high school seminary. After stepping down Ziemann spent some time in an east coast residential treatment program. In 2000 he settled into a ‘life of prayer and study’ at a Benedictine monastery in the Tucson diocese. Ziemann died in October 2009.

Ordained: April 29, 1967
Incardinated: Los Angeles
Appointed: Auxiliary Bishop Dec. 23, 1986
Appointed: Bishop of Santa Rosa July 14, 1992
Retired: July 1999
Died: Oct. 22, 2009

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OHIO/WEST VIRGINIA
Cincinnati Inquirer

Written by
Dan Horn

A Catholic priest in Fairfield was accused in federal court Thursday of transporting a boy across state lines so he could abuse him.

The Rev. Robert Poandl, a Glenmary Home Missioner, faces up to 10 years in prison if he is convicted.

Federal prosecutors say the abuse occurred in 1991 when Poandl traveled with the 10-year-old boy from Ohio to West Virginia. His accuser, now 30 and living in Cincinnati, told police in 2009 that Poandl molested him at the Holy Redeemer Catholic Church rectory in Spencer, W.Va.

Poandl, 71, was charged with sexual abuse in West Virginia, but a judge dismissed those state charges in 2010.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MISSOURI
The Kansas City Star

By JUDY L. THOMAS
The Kansas City Star

A former Kansas City area Catholic priest who was the subject of sexual abuse lawsuits, the most recent filed earlier this year, has died.

John R. Tulipana, who left the ministry in the mid-1990s, died Nov. 5 at the age of 66, according to his obituary.

Tulipana’s name first surfaced in 1994 in connection with sexual abuse when the diocese confirmed it had settled two complaints against the priest, who denied the accusations.

In 2008, allegations against Tulipana were part of a $10 million settlement the diocese approved with 47 plaintiffs who alleged sexual abuse by 12 priests.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OHIO/WEST VIRGINIA
WLWT

A federal grand jury has indicted a Fairfield priest with transportation of a minor across state lines for illicit purposes.

A grand jury in West Virginia indicts a Cincinnati priest on child sex charges.
More

The indictment says 71-year-old Robert Poandl, known as “Father Bob,” took a 10-year-old boy to West Virginia in 1991 and sexually assaulted him there.

Poandl was indicted Wednesday and taken into custody Thursday.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
Eastbourne Herald

Published on Thursday 15 November 2012

Sussex Police have revealed that they have received a “substantial” amount of new information over historic allegations of sex offences against children and young men in East Sussex following the arrests this week of two members of the clergy.

The former Bishop of Lewes, the Right Reverend Peter Ball, and retired church of England priest, Vickery House, were both arrested this week by police. Both have been released but are expected to be questioned again by police shortly.

Eighty-year-old Peter Ball was arrested on Tuesday at his home near Langport in Somerset, on suspicion of eight sexual offences in East Sussex and in one case elsewhere, almost all during the late 1980s and early 1990s. He was released at his home that afternoon on medical advice and police intend to interview him at a later date. The offences were allegedly committed against eight boys and young men, all of whom were at time in their late teens or early twenties, except one who was 12 when the alleged offending occurred in the late 1970s.

Vickery House, 67, was arrested on the same morning at his home address near Haywards Heath on suspicion of two separate sexual offences against two boys aged 17 and 18 at the time, in East Sussex between 1981 and 1983. He was interviewed in Sussex and released on police bail this afternoon until Thursday, November 29 while enquiries continue.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

Police investigating allegations of sexual offences against young men in Sussex have received a ‘substantial amount of new information’ from members of the public since two arrests were made on Tuesday 13th November. Another 10 people have come forward, making allegations.

An 80-year-old man arrested at his home address near Langport, Somerset, on suspicion of eight sexual offences in East Sussex and in one case elsewhere, almost all during the late 1980s and early 1990s, was released on medical advice. Police intend to interview him at a later date

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Robert Booth
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 15 November 2012

Police investigating allegations of sexual abuse, including child abuse, against the retired bishop Rt Rev Peter Ball have received complaints from a further seven men who claim they were victims, it emerged on Thursday.

A man who was 12 when he alleges he was abused by the former bishop of Lewes was among those who came forward, according to a spokesman for Sussex police’s Operation Dunhill. Ball was arrested on Tuesday on suspicion of sex offences.

Detectives said they had received “a substantial amount of new information from members of the public” in the 48 hours since his arrest at his home near Langport in Somerset.

He was due to be questioned on suspicion of a further eight sexual offences against boys and young men ranging in age from 12 to early 20s but was released at his home that afternoon on medical advice. Police now intend to interview him at a later date.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MIAMI (FL)
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Miami

Thursday, November 15, 2012

Communications Department – Archdiocese of Miami

The Archdiocese of Miami was informed today by the media of a lawsuit alleging sexual abuse by Father Neil Doherty, a retired priest. At this time, Father Doherty is incarcerated in Broward County.

The Archdiocese of Miamis policy on sexual abuse allegations is very clear: a report is made to the State Attorneys office; our internal Archdiocesan Review Board reviews the allegation; and pastoral care and counseling are offered to any alleged victim. Our policy is available for review on the archdiocesan website www.miamiarch.org.

As always, the Catholic Churchs concerns are for the victims and a prevailing sense of justice and healing. Over these past ten years, the Archdiocese has been forthcoming and taken steps to keep children safe through training and background screenings of all its employees, volunteers, clergy and teachers.

If anyone has been a victim of sexual abuse by a member of the clergy or church personnel, they should contact the local law enforcement department and/or the Archdiocese of Miamis Victims Assistance Hotline, 1-866-802-2873.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MIAMI (FL)
Riptide

By Michael MillerThu., Nov. 15 2012

This afternoon, local attorney Jeffrey Herman held a press conference to announce yet another lawsuit against the Archdiocese of Miami. According to the suit, Father Neil Doherty — now in prison — drugged, molested, and raped then 15-year-old Miami resident Dennis Montero.

Before the press conference, however, the Archdiocese sent reporters a list of “questions that you should keep in mind” for the attorney including “Is the Archdiocese of Miami the only organization/person Mr. Jeffrey Herman sues?”

“It seems to me like it’s deflecting from the issue,” says Herman, “which is why was Neil Doherty working there for decades when he was molesting children?”

In his lawsuit, Montero says he met the priest in 1984 at the Keystone Trailer Park in Miami:
Doherty took Dennis and his friend to a trailer, where another adult male lived. In this trailer, Doherty gave Dennis wine. The wine was drugged and caused Dennis to lose consciousness. When Dennis awoke, he was naked with Father Doherty also naked sleeping next to him. Dennis could feel the residue of semen on his leg. Dennis was confused and upset, and Doherty calmed him down. Father Doherty offered Dennis Money.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
Film Journal

Nov 15, 2012

-By Daniel Eagan

The details of the crime were appalling. For years, the students of St. John’s School for the Deaf outside Milwaukee, Wisconsin, were systematically abused by the very person put in charge to protect them, Father Lawrence Murphy. The students appealed to teachers and eventually to the police for help, only to be turned away. As Oscar-winning director Alex Gibney shows in Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God, this pattern of indifference and culpability leads from Milwaukee to the Vatican, the headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church.

Raised a Catholic, Gibney reacted strongly to the issue of sexual abuse within the Church. “But a lot of people had done films about isolated tales of clerical abuse,” he says during an interview from HBO offices in New York. “I wanted to make sure that if I was going to do it, I could make a new contribution.”

Articles by New York Times national religion correspondent Laurie Goodstein about how deaf survivors took their story to the public brought national attention to the St. John’s incident. Gibney was drawn to the story because it linked Church abuse for the first time to the Vatican, giving him a canvas that was both intimate and panoramic. “This was a story about everyday heroes,” he adds. “Deaf survivors who had no voices, but still managed to make themselves be heard.”

In the film, Gibney builds the case against the Vatican gradually, first working backwards to explain the conditions at St. John’s. “We didn’t want to make a dogmatic film,” he explains. “We wanted to fan out from this case to something much bigger. Much as these survivors, who were just local kids from Milwaukee, suddenly got religion, so to speak, and started to try to raise their voices until they took their story all the way to the top. But honestly, the movie comes out of silence, and you have to learn to inhabit that world first, let it open up to you.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter

by Tom Roberts | Nov. 15, 2012

I arrived in Kansas City, Mo., today and wasn’t here more than three hours when someone handed me a recent letter headlined “Bishop’s Annual Appeal.” The bishop who is doing the appealing, of course, is Robert Finn, recently convicted in county court for failing to report suspected child abuse and spared a fine and jail time under an agreement worked out with prosecutors.

It was somewhat amusing, then, to see the line just under that heading:

“Honoring Bishop Emeritus, Raymond J. Boland – 25 Years As A Bishop.”

Boland was hardly a hero when it came to policing sex abuse crimes. He demonstrated the same lapses as was the case with many members of the hierarchical culture of his generation. But on other matters he was, in temperament, management style and pastoral approach, quite a different bishop from Finn, who within days of taking over undid by fiat virtually everything that had been put in place by Boland and several of his immediate predecessors. Generally speaking, Boland was respected; in the same degree, it might safely be said, Finn sets teeth on edge.

Whether or not Boland gave permission for his name to be used this way, it seems clear that Finn — having violated not only civil law but also church law in the form of the charter fashioned by the U.S. bishops themselves, and having made the diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph a source of embarrassment and derision nationwide — had to find some sympathetic figure on which to hang his fund raising ambitions.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MIAMI (FL)
NBC 6

A retired Miami priest who’s already behind bars awaiting criminal trial on sexual battery charges is the subject of a new lawsuit filed Thursday that claims he drugged and sexually abused a teen boy in the 1980s.

The lawsuit, filed against the Archdiocese of Miami, claims Father Neil Doherty, 69, began the abuse when the victim, Dennis Montero, was 15-years-old.

A spokeswoman for Montero’s attorney, Jeffrey Herman, said Montero wants his name disclosed and will be speaking about the alleged abuse at a Thursday afternoon news conference.

Officials with the Archdiocese said they were aware of the lawsuit and would issue a statement sometime Thursday.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Fraser Coast Chronicle

MARYBOROUGH priest Paul Kelly says he would break the sacred “seal of silence” and report child sex abusers who confessed to him, despite the threat of excommunication from the Catholic Church for doing so.

Father Kelly’s comments come after the Federal Government announced a royal commission into child sex abuse cases, a move which has unearthed concerns about the church directive that priests keep secret all information given in confession.

For a priest to break this code is considered a mortal sin and would see them excommunicated from the Catholic Church.

But Father Kelly, who has also campaigned against the gay panic defence, said he agreed with suggestions the “seal of silence” privilege could be seen to protect child sex offenders.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

IRELAND
Irish Times

BARRY ROCHE, Southern Correspondent

A Dominican priest was today remanded on bail after he was charged with 39 counts of sexually assaulting a boy at various locations in Munster around 20 years ago.

Fr Vincent Mercer (66), who is out of ministry but remains a member of the Dominican Order, appeared at Cork District Court today in relation to the offences.

He was charged with 39 counts of sexually assaulting the boy, who was aged between 11 and 17 at the time, on various dates between January 1st 1986 and February 22nd 1994.

The offences are alleged to have happened at a house in Cork city, a location in Co Limerick, a location in Co Cork and a number of unknown locations.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MINNESOTA
Stamford Advocate

BARNESVILLE, Minn. (AP) — A teenager who posted his support for same-sex marriage online has been denied a Catholic rite of passage at his northwestern Minnesota church, his family said.

Shana Cihak said her 17-year-old son, Lennon, wasn’t allowed to be confirmed at Assumption Church in Barnesville last month after posting a Facebook picture of himself with a political sign he altered to oppose the marriage amendment on Minnesota’s ballot. Voters on Nov. 6 rejected the constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.

Assumption Rev. Gary LaMoine told The Associated Press Thursday that the teen was not denied confirmation but declined to explain, calling it an “internal and pastoral” matter.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MISSOURI
St. Louis Review

Joseph Kenny | jkenny@archstl.org

Archbishop Robert J. Carlson will preside at healing prayer services to mark the 10th anniversary of the U.S. bishops’ Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People and to pray for healing and reconciliation and for the prevention of abuse. Bishop Edward M. Rice will attend the Dec. 20 service.

The charter is a set of procedures established by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in June 2002 for addressing allegations of sexual abuse of minors by Catholic clergy.

All who are victims/survivors of physical, sexual, emotional or verbal abuse by anyone — clergy, family, friends, co-workers or strangers — are invited to attend the prayer service. In addition, family members and friends of survivors are encouraged to participate, as well as those who are involved in helping abused people and those who work to prevent abuse.

The services will be held at 7 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 20, at St. Luke the Evangelist Church, 7230 Dale Ave. in Richmond Heights, and 7 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 23, at Queen of All Saints Church, 6603 Christopher Drive in Oakville.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Courier Mail

Terry Sweetman
From:The Courier-Mail
November 16, 2012

CHRIS Masters, of The Moonlight State fame, wrote that when Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen was trying to scuttle the Fitzgerald inquiry he warned colleagues that if you lifted an old piece of tin you were likely to find a dead cat or an angry snake.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard is doubtlessly aware plenty of stinking cats and venomous snakes will be exposed when her Royal Commission lifts the rusty iron of institutional responses to child abuse.

The difference is Gillard will not be overly surprised by what the inquiry turns up.

After a litany of complaints, exposes, court cases and plain old humbug stretching back decades, the only surprise for any sentient human might be the breadth of institutional inaction and the depth of the cover-ups. Rarely can Australia, or any of its states, have embarked on an inquiry where so many of the answers have been so evident for so long.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

ILLINOIS
Madison-St. Clair Record

November 15, 2012

By Christina Stueve Hodges

St. Clair County Associate Judge Vincent Lopinot was assigned Nov. 5 to an Illinois man’s lawsuit against the Catholic Diocese of Belleville involving allegations of sexual abuse.

Plaintiff John Doe S. claims former priest Raymond Kownacki sexually abused him in 1985 while Doe was a parishioner at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Valmeyer.

A status conference is set Nov. 19 to determine if the case would go before a jury and if there are amendments or challenges to the pleadings.

According to the complaint filed July 26, Kownacki served at area churches before being appointed to the diocesan board.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Australian Jewish News

CONVICTED paedophile David Kramer’s efforts to avoid extradition have failed, with a US court ordering the former Yeshivah College (Melbourne) teacher back to Australia to face charges, including indecent assault and indecent acts with a child under the age of 16.

Kramer was arrested in St Louis, Missouri, moments after being released from prison, where he had served four years of a seven-year sentence for molesting a 12-year-old boy.

Kramer is alleged to have sexually abused four boys at Yeshivah College between 1989 and 1992, before being spirited away to Israel by the school.

A spokesperson from the Attorney-General’s Department would not confirm when Kramer was due back in Australia, saying only that he is “wanted by Victorian authorities to face prosecution for the offences of indecent assault and indecent acts with a child under the age of 16”.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES/AUSTRALIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on November 15, 2012

A support group for victims of clergy abuse is applauding the upcoming extradition of an alleged predator who molested in St. Louis and was freed from prison earlier this year.

Last Thursday, a U.S. District Court sustained a motion to extradite David Kramer to Australia where he will stand trial for abuse between 1989 and 1993 that reportedly took place at Yeshivah College in Melbourne. Parents of kids at the school allege that school officials assisted in helping Kramer, who is a dual Israeli and American citizen, flee to the United States after allegations had been reported to school officials.

While in the St. Louis area, Kramer was a volunteer youth leader at Nusach Hari B’nai Zion, an Orthodox synagogue (their phone number is 314-991-2100).

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CALIFORNIA
Millstone

This past Monday, I was honored to be invited to be on KFI 640 AM’s John and Ken Show to talk about MILLSTONE. Both John and Ken have been ardent supporters of victims of clergy sex abuse since they stood outside of the Los Angeles Cathedral almost 10 years ago and began reading leaked emails from Cardinal Mahony. The emails were explosive:

“In one, dated March 27, 2002, Mahony notes that the church has not reported three of the eight most abusive priests, one of whom was Baker. Mahony worries that if the district attorney finds this out, ‘I can guarantee you that I will get hauled into a grand jury proceeding and I will be forced to give all the names.’”And in another message dated April 1, 2002, Mahony suggests that the archdiocese issue a statement saying it cannot release the names or numbers of accused priests while the government is investigating. ‘Since that is weeks and months down the road, I hope interest would have waned by then,’ Mahony writes.”

John and Ken have remained steadfast in their fight to get Mahony and his successor to come clean about abuse. We had a great talk about the book, my own story, and the importance of the upcoming November 26 awareness event.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

BALTIMORE (MD)
National Catholic Reporter

by Catholic News Service | Nov. 14, 2012

Baltimore —
During their annual fall general assembly Nov. 12-15 in Baltimore, the U.S. bishops voted down a document on the troubled U.S. economy, passed documents on penance and better preaching, approved a reorganization of their Communications Department and endorsed the sainthood cause of Dorothy Day.

Although the bishops discussed the economy, their document “The Hope of the Gospel in Difficult Times: A Pastoral Message on Work, Poverty and the Economy” did not gain the two-thirds vote required for passage Tuesday.

Some bishops criticized the document after it was introduced Monday for being too long to be practical and for failing to include a variety of points and historical references. …

The bishops approved a reorganization of their Communications Department that would include hiring a director of public affairs who would work to unify messages on the activities and stances of the USCCB — not individual dioceses or bishops — and better carry out church campaigns related to new evangelization, according to New York Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York, USCCB president. …

The bishops also approved a 2013 budget of $220.4 million and agreed to add a national collection for the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services. The budget for 2013 represents a 1.3 percent increase from 2012.

The new collection for the military archdiocese would begin in 2013. Under the plan, it would be taken voluntarily in parishes every three years. Bishop Michael J. Bransfield of Wheeling-Charleston, W.Va., USCCB treasurer, said the 2013 budget includes a surplus totaling more than $749,000. He also told the bishops that there was a projected surplus of $250,000 for 2014, meaning there was no need to seek an increase in the annual diocesan assessment for USCCB operations.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

KANSAS CITY (MO)
The Kansas City Star

By MARY SANCHEZ
The Kansas City Star

Certainly there are more dangerous places for a young person to get lost.

IHOP, south Kansas City’s evangelical missionary movement, was created 13 years ago by a man who grew up in the Center School District. It’s one man’s version of religion made big.

The suspicious have long leveled the charge of “cult” against IHOP (International House of Prayer). That will likely increase in light of recent news coverage.

A young woman with ties to IHOP was found murdered at Longview Lake. A young man with ties to IHOP is charged with suffocating her.

IHOP, it should be emphasized, isn’t accused of anything criminal in the murder. Only those eventually charged will bear that burden.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Age

November 16, 2012

Mark Russell

A WITNESS has told a court how he was playing computer games in former Catholic priest David Rapson’s office at Salesian College Rupertswood in Sunbury when he was given a glass of lemonade and passed out.

He claimed he woke up to find Rapson raping him.

He was 12 years old.

And as he ran from Rapson’s office, the priest allegedly called out for him to come back ”in a voice like the devil”.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

November 16, 2012

Paul Bibby
Court Reporter

THE Catholic Church has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on legal fees to defend priests and brothers who have already been tried and convicted of serious sexual assaults against children in their care.

A Fairfax Media investigation has revealed that at least two Catholic orders have continued to fund the legal defences of some of their religious members as they went to trial for the second, third and even fourth time for the sexual abuse of children.

This includes the funding of multiple appeals, hiring top barristers who charge thousands of dollars a day, and hiring private investigators.

In some cases the result has been that criminal prosecutions and the victims of abuse are dragged through the courts for many years.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MISSOURI
Fulton Sun

By Don Norfleet

Thursday, November 15, 2012

A priest on trial in Boonville on charges of molesting children may have worked as a counselor in Fulton during the 1980s, a representative of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) said Wednesday in Fulton.

Judy Jones, SNAP midwest associate director, appeared in front of the Callaway County Sheriff’s Office Wednesday morning to ask anyone in Callaway County who might have known of any sexual abuse by Gerald James Howard, the accused priest and counselor, to notify the Callaway County Sheriff’s Office or Fulton Police.

Jones said she has not personally notified the Callaway County Sheriff’s Office about the situation but she wanted to have the press conference in front of the Sheriff’s Office to make sure that all of the department’s officers and the public were aware of the potential earlier sexual abuse in Callaway County.

Jones produced a notarized statement by one of the parents of the boy who testified against Howard at his recent forcible sodomy and kidnapping trial in Boonville.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Age

November 16, 2012

Michelle Grattan

The royal commission’s wide remit is fair but a nightmare in practice.

A DECADE ago Father Frank Brennan, a high-profile Jesuit priest who is now professor of law at the Australian Catholic University, had a woman confess to him that she was a murderess.

Brennan, with a deep belief in the sanctity of the confessional, would not have dreamed of going to the police, even if the law required it, which it does not. Anyway, Brennan asks, what good would it have done? He didn’t know the names of the woman or her alleged victim, nor the time or place of the alleged crime.

Brennan has never had anyone confess to child sex abuse. He believes the intense debate about whether priests should have to report what they’ve heard from confessions is beside the point. The perpetrators don’t share those secrets in the confessional box (although it is perhaps more likely priests might pick up information about perpetrators from victims).

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Jill Rowbotham
From:The Australian
November 16, 2012

WHETHER priests respect the sanctity of the confessional is likely to be irrelevant to the royal commission into child sexual abuse because few people attend and those who do don’t reveal such matters.

If push came to shove, legal evidence expert Ian Freckelton SC said, there was not much room to refuse to testify, for priests or anyone else. However, while royal commissions did not afford the protections of a court, Dr Freckelton added: “I can’t imagine a royal commission attempting to coerce a priest to disclose what was said in the confines of the confessional.”

While politicians including Tony Abbott and NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell, who are both Catholic, have distanced themselves from Cardinal George Pell’s defence of the confessional, senior churchmen queried whether it would ever become relevant.

Catholic historian Paul Collins, a former priest, said: “The vast majority of Catholics don’t go to confession now. Priests could sit in confessionals for hours on end and wouldn’t meet a soul.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Rocco Mimmo
From:The Australian
November 16, 201212:00AM

THE announcement by Julia Gillard that we are to have a royal commission into child sex abuse is universally welcomed.

However, in some quarters of the media it has unleashed a hysteria of salivating opportunism for vengeful attacks on religion, in particular the Catholic Church.

How unfortunate, as it moves the focus from the primary aim of healing the victims and bringing to trial those accused of abuse.

It is a fair bet that whatever acknowledgement is made and apologies offered to victims of clergy abuse this will never satisfy the anti-religious group as they zero in on the confessional.

The important point in all of this is to keep in mind what was said by Broken Rites, the organisation campaigning for the victims of the clergy’s sex abuse: “. . . confession was a non-issue. The real issue is when victims or their families complain about abuse, the church authorities fail to arrange an interview between the victim and police.”

Wednesday’s editorial in this newspaper put it nicely: ” . . . those conducting the commission and those reporting on it will need to guard against turning this into an inverted Spanish Inquisition — a chance to desecrate the Catholic Church.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

November 16, 2012

Waleed Aly

Who says politicians can’t sing in unison? This week we’ve seen the full array of politicians – Green, Labor, Liberal and independent – lining up to dismantle the Catholic Church’s institution of sealed confession. The idea that a priest could hear another priest’s confession of child sex abuse, and fail to report it to the authorities is, says the Attorney-General, Nicola Roxon, “really abhorrent”. The NSW Premier, Barry O’Farrell, “just can’t fathom” it. The independent MP Nick Xenophon just slams it as “a medieval law that needs to change in the 21st century”.

No freedom of religion argument can succeed against this. The secular liberalism that defines our public culture simply won’t accept it for one simple reason: religious freedom ends where harm to other people begins. And it’s a rare kind of harm that is more horrific than children being raped. The church can argue all it likes that the confessional seal is “inviolable”. But what obligation does the secular state have to canon law? What interest does the state have in ensuring people can receive absolution? The church simply has no answer to this. Hence the spectacle of practising Catholics like Tony Abbott and Christopher Pyne jumping on the anti-confessional bandwagon. There’s just no politically viable alternative.

But here’s the problem: the whole issue of the confessional seal is a monstrous red herring. This becomes clear once you pay attention to the way politicians are talking about it. Xenophon recounts the story of a 10-year-old boy who told his story of being abused to a priest at a confessional, only to be told that he’s the sinner and he needs to repent. If that’s the full story, then Xenophon’s right to call it “sickening”, but it simply has nothing to do with the confessional seal. There’s no confession from the abuser to reveal. The child is perfectly entitled to take his story to the police and the priest is perfectly entitled to help him do it. This case isn’t about confidentiality. It’s about a priest with a septic morality. I’d want that priest fired. I’d want the church to apologise, help prosecute the abuser, compensate the victim and make sure it never happens again. And breaking the seal of confession doesn’t help any of that.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

PROVIDENCE (RI)
Courthouse News Service

By IULIA FILIP

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (CN) – The Legionaries of Christ used undue influence to persuade a dying man to leave it $1 million in his will, the late man’s son claims in Federal Court.

Paul Chu, of Connecticut, sued the Legion of Christ aka The Legionaries of Christ, several affiliated entities, and Grupo Integer, a Mexican holding company that manages the order’s donations. Chu sued individually and as executor of the Estate of James Boa-Teh Chu.

Chu claims that while the Legionaries were soliciting his late father for donations, “the Order was being investigated by the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy in Rome for grave improprieties within the Order.”

According to the order’s website, “the Legionaries of Christ are a religious Congregation of priests, of pontifical rite, founded in 1941 in Mexico.” The congregation includes three bishops, 920 priests and more than 2,000 novices, candidates and seminarians in 22 countries.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

IRELAND
Kilkenny People

Published on Thursday 15 November 2012

An ex-priest who was based in Thomastown and Kilkenny city in the early 1970s has been jailed for indecently assaulting boys at various locations in Co Meath. Raymond Brady (77), Baltrasna, Oldcastle admitted ten offences of indecent assault and one of attempted indecent assault at Trim Circuit Court last week. Harrowed witnesses heard the crimes had been committed at parochial houses in Drumcondrath and Kilbeg as well as in the victims homes and at a caravan in Bettystown. Brady had assaulted his victims on dates between April 1st. 1968 and June 30th. 1976 when the boys were aged between 11 and 16 years old.

In most cases the assaults began when the victims were altar boys and continued in their homes after Brady had befriended and won the trust of their families. On some occasions Brady would be in the sitting room with the boy on his knee fondling him while the victim’s mother was in the kitchen making tea for the priest. On other occasions Brady brought the boys on trips and allowed them drive his car while he abused them. The victims in statements read to the court said that the priest’s actions had ruined their childhood and caused many problems for them in later life. Some said they were still haunted by what had happened. A number said they had turned against the Church and no longer attended Mass because of what he had done. One said that while he still attended Mass he became angry when asked every Sunday to pray for the Church but not for the abused

Two brothers said they had been shocked to learn after 40 years that each had been abused by Brady.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
NEWS.com.au

OPPOSITION Leader Tony Abbott says the sanctity of the confessional should not exempt priests from reporting child abuse – but his local bishop does not agree.

Mr Abbott, a devout Catholic who once studied to be a priest, said on Wednesday that everyone should be obliged to obey the law and report knowledge of child abuse. This applied to priests as well.

“If they become aware of sexual offences against children, those legal requirements must be adhered to,” he said.

“Everyone has to obey the law, regardless of what position they hold.” Asked if that applied to priests, Mr Abbott said: “Indeed.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
The Take Away

In recent years, the Catholic Church has faced countless accusations of child abuse, cover ups and institutional secrets. The cases number in the thousands. And all of them are horrific. But one of the most shocking took place in Milwaulkee. It involved a priest named Father Murphy and 200 deaf children in his care.

Alex Gibney delves into Father Murphy’s history of abuse, and the church’s decision to cover it up, in his new documentary, “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God.”

Gibney, when asked to describe what kind of person could commit these kinds of crimes says, “Father Murphy is an interesting but also appalling character. I mean many of the worst clerical sex abuses turn out not to be the kind of people that are Gollum-like in the corner muttering about precious. These people are very charismatic, they’re charming and that’s their cover.”

Recently, the church in Milwaukee criticized the film for causing more pain to the victims by re-opening old wounds.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.