ABUSE TRACKER

A Hampden County judge on Monday ruled that the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield can’t obtain information from a Berkshire Eagle journalist that could reveal the identities of anonymous sources.

In a reversal of her earlier order related to a civil lawsuit against the diocese by a victim of clergy sexual abuse, Superior Court Justice Karen Goodwin said the diocese can only look to what non-confidential sources told Larry Parnass, who began reporting on the abuse in 2019.

Goodwin also said that if the diocese wants to continue to press Parnass for communications and testimony involving sources to whom he promised confidentiality, it will first have to demonstrate what efforts it has made to get the information from other sources.

Goodwin, however, said the court is “open” to requiring Parnass to disclose whether any of his anonymous sources are trial witnesses, and “to produce the information those sources provided to…

View Cache

Alexandria police are investigating allegations that a Catholic priest now serving in Montgomery County sexually abused minors several decades ago before he was ordained, according to police and church officials.

The pastor of Holy Cross Catholic Church in Garrett Park, Md., who has not been charged with any crime, is accused of committing the abuse before hebecame a priest in 1991, the Catholic Archdiocese of Washington told parishioners in a letter Friday.

The archdiocese “immediately” placed him on administrative leave after learning of the alleged abuse Friday, wrote the Rev. Anthony Lickteig, the archdiocese’s vicar for clergy and secretary for ministerial leadership. He said the accused pastor’s priestly faculties — including his ability to say Mass and administer sacraments — were suspended and that he is no longer at the rectory where he had been living.

Lickteig encouraged anyone with information about the allegation to contact Alexandria police, and he…

View Cache

Rev. Robert Buchmeier, pastor of Holy Cross in Garrett Park, has been suspended following accusations of child abuse occurring before he was ordained.

A prominent Montgomery County priest has been suspended following allegations he sexually abused children years ago, before he became a priest. 

Father Robert Buchmeier — pastor of the Holy Cross Parish in Garrett Park — was stripped of his priestly faculties and removed from the rectory, while police and church officials investigate.

Parishioners got word of the allegations against their pastor over the weekend. In a letter to the parish, the Washington Archdiocese Vicar for Clergy, Very Reverend Anthony Lickteig, wrote that pastor Buchmeier had been accused of sexual abuse of minors. The allegations date back decades before he was ordained as a priest, and occurred in the Arlington diocese. 

“It deeply saddens us to have to share some difficult information, however,…

View Cache

A Nobel Peace Prize-winning bishop alleged to have abused teenaged boys during the 1990s was sanctioned by the Vatican, which limited his movements and prohibited him from contact with minors or with his home country of East Timor. Meanwhile in Yakima, Washington, after a whistleblower raised concerns about the previous bishop’s handling of sexual abuse allegations, the now-retired bishop received a formal reprimand from the Vatican.

Though the details of these two cases differ, what they share in common is that the consequences to the church leader under investigation — and even the fact of the investigation itself — were kept secret. That is, until news media shared the truth.

In the case of Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo, who shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996 with current East Timor President José Ramos-Horta for their nonviolent resistance to Indonesia’s occupation, the Dutch newspaper De Groene Amsterdammer last week (Sept….

View Cache

Bishop Belo was sanctioned by the Vatican in 2019 following reports of his ‘serious crimes’

The Vatican representative in Timor-Leste has urged Catholics to respect the sanctions that have been imposed on Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo for “the serious crimes” he has committed and asked them to maintain loyalty to the Church amid heated debates over the issue.

Bishop Belo’s case is no longer just an accusation, but it has been decided, Monsignor Marco Sprizzi, charge d’affaires of Apostolic Nunciature in Dili, said in an interview broadcast on the state television RTTL on Oct. 4

“This is a decision made and accepted by the bishop and that we just have to respect it, respect the bishop and respect the Vatican’s decision,” he said.

“I tell Timorese Catholics, who are so loyal to the Pope, to the Vatican, to follow Vatican guidelines, just as Bishop Belo…

View Cache

The Legionaries of Christ announced Monday the conclusion of a judicial process in the Ordinary Court of Milan involving three priests and two other persons in Italy.

In a statement posted on their website Oct. 3, the Legionaries reported that the ruling says, “All the defendants have been fully acquitted of the crime of attempted extortion because such an attempt did not exist,” and that “the judge will announce the reasons for her decision within 90 days.”

The statement explains that the accusations were made in 2013, “in the context of the relationship with a family that had reported abuse by Vladimir Reséndiz Gutiérrez.”

Reséndiz is a Mexican national and former Legionary of Christ priest. In 2011 he was accused of committing sexual abuse between 2006 and 2008 in the congregation’s minor seminary in Gozzano, in Italy’s Novara Province.

In March 2011, while working in Venezuela, he was removed from…

View Cache

A priest at a Catholic church in Garrett Park, Maryland, has been placed on administrative leave after he was accused of sexually abusing minors before he became a priest.

The Archdiocese of Washington (ADW) informed parishioners at Holy Cross Catholic Church in a Sept. 30 emailed letter that their pastor, Father Robert P. Buchmeier, had been suspended from his duties and is no longer living at the rectory. Buchmeier has not been charged criminally in connection with any of the allegations.

In the letter, Father Anthony Lickteig, the ADW’s episcopal vicar for clergy, explained that the Archdiocese of Arlington, Virginia, notified the ADW of the accusations against Buchmeier and noted that the abuse was alleged to have taken place decades before in another diocese “prior to his ordination to the priesthood.”

The letter did not specify the number of incidents of abuse cited in the accusation.

WTOP news  View Cache

Father James Jackson, a Rhode Island priest who was arrested in October on federal and state child pornography charges, admitted Monday in federal court that the government could prove that he violated certain conditions of his pre-trial release.

The conditions of Jackson’s pretrial release were set in November 2021 before he was allowed to leave Rhode Island to reside with a family member in Kansas. He was arrested in July by the U.S. Marshals in Kansas. He is currently in the custody of the U.S. Marshals at the Donald W. Wyatt Detention Facility in Central Falls, Rhode Island. 

In his Oct. 3 hearing in U.S. District Court in Providence, Jackson admitted that the government could prove that he violated the condition prohibiting him from “possessing any materials including videos, magazines, photographs, computer generated depictions or any other forms that depict sexually explicit conduct involving children,” according to James…

View Cache

A man from Manchester who ran an after-school program at a Hartford elementary school and a home-based ministry has been found guilty of sexually assaulting a child, state officials said.

Robert Nichols, 43, was found guilty by a jury in Hartford Superior Court of two counts of sexual assault in the fourth degree and risk of injury to a child, according to a statement by Hartford State’s Attorney Sharmese L. Walcott.

According to testimony at trial, Nichols was running an after-school program connected to the Michael D. Fox Elementary School in Hartford during the 2009 and 2010 school year when he offered to let an 11-year-old boy stay at his home over the summer to help his mother “with disciplining the child,” Walcott’s office said.

During that time, Nichols sexually and physically assaulted the boy, according to court testimony and Walcott’s statement.

According to police, the boy came forward after…

View Cache

Steve Greisen, a Christian filmmaker and veteran of the Jesus movement’s 1970s-era music scene, was arrested last month in Colorado Springs following “a summer long collaborative effort to identify and arrest child sexual predators” involving local and federal investigators.

The Gazette reported the arrests on Oct. 1.

Greisen, 68, has operated two film companies in Monument, a small town north of Colorado Springs:

• Principal Exploration Films Distribution, which says it manages distribution of over 400  films that “celebrate the true, the good and the beautiful,” including “Incredible Creatures that Defy Evolution,” which is popular with Christians who embrace young-Earth creationism.
• Reel Productions, LLC, which released “First Love,” the acclaimed film on the early years of the contemporary Christian music movement, as well as the biblical thrillers “The Mystery of The Ark of The Covenant” and “The Search for The Real Mt. Sinai” (both narrated by John Rhys-Davies…

View Cache

A civil lawsuit filed on behalf of three John Does claims that a church in Florence, Alabama, enabled a man who held various leadership positions there to sexually abuse them.

The civil suit follows a July criminal lawsuit in which Kelly Dale Crotts, 47, was charged with three counts of indecent exposure, two counts of child abuse with sexual motivation, and two counts of second-degree sex abuse, WHNT-TV of Huntsville reported. 

Crotts turned himself in following a grand jury indictment in the criminal case. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges, and his trial is set to begin Oct. 17. 

The civil case, filed last week, alleges assault and battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress/outrage, invasion of privacy, false imprisonment, breach of fiduciary duty, negligence and wantonness, deceit and misrepresentation. Cornerstone Church of Christ, where Crotts worked, also is named as a defendant in the civil action.

…

View Cache

The hearings at the Vatican’s corruption trial resumed last week and shed light on new aspects of the “trial of the century” and the broader context of Vatican finances.

Behind every decision and litigation, in the end, one can glimpse a power struggle, whether it is big or small, systemic or personal.

Primarily, the trial revolves around the Secretariat of State’s investment in luxury real estate in London. However, it also explores further criminal allegations.

Cardinal Angelo Becciu, for instance, also faces charges for allocating money from the Secretariat of State to Caritas in his native region. The Sardinian is furthermore called to answer for the engagement of Cecilia Marogna as a consultant to the Secretariat of State.

However, the big deal at the center of the trial is the luxury property investment.

The Secretariat of State bought shares of the property on London’s Sloane Avenue and repeatedly changed brokers — apparently…

View Cache

Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Monday that he will humbly listen to people’s “harsh voices” criticizing his governing party’s cozy ties to the ultra-conservative Unification Church and help victims of its allegedly fraudulent businesses and huge donation collection.

Kishida has come under fire in a widening scandal that has exposed decades of close ties between former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who was assassinated in July, his ruling Liberal Democratic Party and the Unification Church, which has been accused of raking in huge donations by brainwashing adherents.

Kishida has split public opinion by honoring Abe with a state funeral, which opponents assailed as a prewar tradition designed to stir nationalism, without an acceptable legal basis or parliamentary discussion. Abe, on top of his divisive legacy, is now seen as a key figure behind the governing party’s church ties.

Kishida desperately needs to regain public trust for his government’s key policies, including a national…

View Cache

Canada’s bishops wound up their first in-person meetings in three years with discussion of concrete steps toward reconciliation with Indigenous Canadians.

At the end of four days of plenary meetings of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops in Cornwall, Ontario, Edmonton Archbishop Richard Smith told a news conference that the bishops are following the example of Pope Francis and the priority he placed on meeting with Indigenous people.

“I don’t think it overstates it to say it was a pivotal moment in the history of this country,” Smith said Sept. 29, referring to the pope’s July pilgrimage across Canada. “This was an historic moment, hopefully a moment of healing and moving things forward on this journey.”

Smith pointed to the sacrifice Francis made to be in Canada despite his health issues, to fulfill the promise he made in March to visit Indigenous people on their land for…

View Cache

Women religious in Ireland told officials for the upcoming Synod of Bishops on synodality that they feel resigned to and hurt from the “constant battering” from the media, which has used them “as scapegoats for Irish church and society.”

In their submission to the synod as part of the Irish national synthesis of the synodal process published Aug. 16, women religious in Ireland lamented their invisibility and highlighted their sense of marginalization. They said religious life in Ireland has been given a lot of bad press, with a particular focus on the past.

“There is a sense of being silenced, but silence is seen as condoning the accusations and giving an impression that ‘we’re all guilty’. We are partly to blame for our own invisibility as we appear to have gone underground,” they wrote.

They likened the negative coverage to “a niggling sore” and say it…

View Cache

Earlier this year, the retired bishop of the Diocese of Yakima, Washington, received a formal reprimand from the Vatican for how he handled clergy abuse allegations — and possibly for how he treated a whistleblower.

Victim advocates have praised the Vatican’s actions on that case as a rare rebuke of a bishop. Yet the dearth of information about both the investigation and subsequent reprimand appears to reinforce advocates’ concerns about one of Pope Francis’ landmark achievements on clergy abuse. Last week’s report that retired East Timor Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo was secretly sanctioned for alleged abuse has raised similar critiques.

Vos Estis Lux Mundi (“You Are the Light of the World”), issued by Francis in 2019, is a sweeping set of laws that includes a system to evaluate reports of abuse or cover-up by bishops. Bishop Carlos Sevilla, who led the central Washington diocese from 1996…

View Cache

A judge in Milan on Monday acquitted five members of the Legion of Christ religious order and their lawyers of attempted extortion in a case in which they were accused of offering to pay the family of a sexual abuse victim to lie to prosecutors.

Four of the five were also absolved of obstruction of justice charges because the statute of limitations expired, while a fifth was acquitted outright, said Daniela Cultrera, the lawyer for the victim’s family.

The investigation was an offshoot of a case in which Italy’s highest court last year upheld the conviction and 6 1/2-year prison sentence for a defrocked Legion priest, Vladimir Resendiz, for sexually abusing boys at the Legion’s youth seminary in northern Italy.

That case was sparked in 2013 when one of Resendiz’s victims confided in his therapist about the abuse he suffered while he was in middle school at the seminary. The…

View Cache

The Catholic Church has confirmed it is undertaking an investigation into sexual misconduct allegations against resigned Broome Bishop Christopher Saunders.

Key points:

• Bishop Saunders has strongly denied the allegations against him
• A police investigation was closed last year without charges being laid
• Bishop Saunders has been ordered to leave the diocese while the investigation is underway 

It has also ordered that the 72-year-old leave the outback diocese where he has been a priest and bishop for more than 50 years.

In a rare statement released on Saturday night, the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference said a Vos Estis Lux Mundi investigation was underway.

“The Holy See has initiated a canonical investigation into former Broome Bishop Christopher Saunders, with Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane appointed to oversee the investigation,” the statement said.

“Bishop Saunders stood aside … after media reports that Western Australia Police had begun an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct.

…

View Cache

MEDIA RELEASE: September 24, 2022

[Click here to see our PDF cache of the media release as it appeared on the letterhead of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference.]

The Holy See has initiated a canonical investigation into former Broome Bishop Christopher Saunders, with Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane appointed to oversee the investigation.

Bishop Saunders stood aside as Bishop of Broome in March 2020 after media reports that Western Australia Police had begun an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct. He strongly denies the allegations.

At the conclusion of its investigation, Western Australia Police confirmed that no charges would be brought against Bishop Saunders.

Bishop Saunders later tendered his resignation to Pope Francis, which was accepted in August 2021.

A letter being read at Masses in the Diocese of Broome this weekend, signed by Apostolic Administrator Bishop Michael Morrisey and Archbishop Coleridge, says the Church investigation “could not happen”…

View Cache

The Vatican has appointed Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane, president of the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference, to oversee an investigation into the former bishop of Broome, Christopher Saunders.

The case is understood to be the first application of “Vos Estis Lux Mundi” in Australia, the norms promulgated by Pope Francis in 2019. 

Saunders stepped aside as bishop of Broome in March 2020 after media reports that Western Australia Police Force had begun an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct.

At the conclusion of its investigation, Western Australia Police confirmed that no charges would be brought against Saunders, prompting critics to call on police to “put up or shut up.”

Saunders later tendered his resignation to Pope Francis, which was accepted in August 2021. 

Saunders has steadfastly denied the allegations, which were made by Aboriginal men from remote communities in the West Kimberley region, according to a report by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

The diocese…

View Cache

Tylko pełna przejrzystość może pomóc Kościołowi w odbudowie autorytetu.

Watykan – poprzez usta Franciszka oraz wielu, także polskich, hierarchów – od dłuższego czasu mówi o zmianie polityki w podejściu do wyjaśniania spraw wykorzystywania seksualnego małoletnich. Zmiana ta miała dotyczyć zarówno księży sprawców, jak i ich przełożonych, którzy w wielu przypadkach wiedzieli o przestępczej działalności podwładnych, lecz nie reagowali w sposób odpowiedni i tym samym umożliwiali im dalsze krzywdzenie małoletnich.

Jednym z podstawowych elementów tej zmiany miała być transparentność, zerwanie z „kulturą sekretu”. Postulat ten bardzo mocno wybrzmiewał podczas spotkania Franciszka z przewodniczącymi episkopatów z całego świata, które odbyło się w Watykanie w lutym 2019 roku. W ciągu kilku miesięcy Stolica Apostolska przygotowała dokumenty, które wskazywały na to, że idzie nowe. Najpierw – w maju 2019 r. (z mocą obowiązującą od czerwca) – pojawił się dokument „Vos estis lux mundi” (VELM), w którym szczegółowo opisano procedury postępowania wobec biskupów…

View Cache

Pope Francis’s 2019 Motu proprio on addressing and handling abuse allegations apparently has some invisible appendix explaining that the law does not apply to bishops or cardinals who are powerful or notable.

Vos estis lux mundi, the Church’s process for handling allegations of abuse or negligent handling of abuse by bishops, has completed its three-year trial period. It is now ostensibly under review by the Vatican. Shall we review its operation?

Recently a Dutch magazine reported accusations of child rape against Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, a Nobel Prize winner from East Timor. The Vatican then revealed that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith had been aware of the case since 2019 and that Bishop Belo had been under certain restrictions since 2020, including being forbidden from ministry in East Timor. Notably, Bishop Belo had resigned in 2002 at…

View Cache

A Holy Cross Catholic Church priest has been suspended over sexual assault allegations, according to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington.

In a letter sent to the Holy Cross Church Community last Friday, Very Reverend Anthony Lickteig revealed that Reverend Robert P. Buchmeier has been accused of sexually abusing minors.

The incidents are believed to have occurred in another diocese decades ago, prior to Buchmeier’s ordination to the priesthood. 

“This allegation was reported to the Catholic Diocese of Arlington, which notified the appropriate civil authorities and also notified us, The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington. Upon receiving this allegation, I, as Episcopal Vicar for Clergy and Secretary for Ministerial Leadership, immediately placed Father Buchmeier on administrative leave in compliance with our Child Protection and Safe Environment Policy. Father Buchmeier’s priestly faculties have been suspended, and he is no longer at the rectory, pending a review of the allegations,” Lickteig stated…

View Cache

[See cached PDF of this letter as it appeared on archdiocesan letterhead.]

Dear Holy Cross Church Community,

It deeply saddens us to have to share some difficult information, however, we believe it is important to make the community aware of a matter involving child protection concerns.

Recently, we received information that Reverend Robert P. Buchmeier has been accused of sexual abuse of minors that is reported to have occurred in another diocese decades ago, prior to his ordination to the priesthood.

This allegation was reported to the Catholic Diocese of Arlington, which notified the appropriate civil authorities and also notified us, The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington. Upon receiving this allegation, I, as Episcopal Vicar for Clergy and Secretary for Ministerial Leadership, immediately placed Father Buchmeier on administrative leave in compliance with our Child Protection and Safe Environment Policy. Father Buchmeier’s priestly faculties have been suspended, and he…

View Cache

A priest of a Catholic Church and school in Garrett Park, Maryland, has been suspended of his duties over allegations of sexual abuse of minors.

The priest serves at Holy Cross Catholic Church. WTOP is not identifying him because no charges have been filed.

A letter from the Archdiocese of Washington posted on the church’s website says the accusations of sexual abuse of minors date back decades, “prior to his ordination to the priesthood” and in another diocese. The pastor was ordained in 1991.

In a statement to WTOP the archdiocese said, “As we shared in our communication to the parishioners, staff and parents of Holy Cross parish and school on Friday evening, we have just learned of this allegation and we have turned the matter over to law enforcement to investigate.

“Our focus is on meeting the needs of our community, and we will be communicating further…

View Cache

The former choirmaster of an Altrincham church has been jailed for 12 years for three decades of abuse against underage boys.

Richard Owen, also known as Franklyn Stanowski, abused 14 boys at churches across Cheshire.

Chester Crown Court heard how Owen, from Hale, would abuse the boys for his own sexual gratification in private rooms.

The offences occurred between 1968 and 1998 when the boys were under 16.

Owen became choirmaster at St John’s in Altrincham – now converted into apartments – in the late 1980s and remained in the role until 1998.

During this time he also volunteered at a local primary school, teaching the children to sing as well as attending school trips to recruit choirboys.

The court heard he abused numerous boys during his time in Altrincham, with “hundreds” of occurrences leaving boys terrified.

The 70-year-old, from Winsford, admitted to 27 offences involving indecent assault of underage…

View Cache

Survivors of Guam clergy sexual assault are a step closer to obtaining compensation as a judge on Monday began hearing arguments that would get the Archdiocese of Agana out of bankruptcy and pay claimants $34 million to $101 million.

“We’re almost at the finish line,” U.S. District Court of Guam Chief Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood, who’s been serving as bankruptcy judge in the archdiocese case, said on the first day of the hearing.

The remaining concerns about the plan related to the Boy Scouts of America, among other things, are expected to be addressed, and the judge assured of a “reasonable, fair, expeditious” decision.

If the judge confirms or approves the fifth amended joint reorganization plan this week, payments could start reaching survivors in “90 to 120 days,” according to attorney Robert Kugler of Minneapolis-based Stinson LLP, counsel for the creditors committee.

Attorney Edwin Caldie, also representing the creditors committee, told…

View Cache

Two years after the Roman Catholic Church on Long Island became the largest diocese in the nation to declare bankruptcy, none of the hundreds of clergy sex abuse cases filed against the church has been settled.

That has some survivors and their attorneys saying it is adding to the pain and injury the victims suffered as children years or even decades ago.

“They declared bankruptcy and said they wanted to see the victims adequately compensated,” said Paul Mones, an attorney who is representing some of the survivors. “People who suffered continue to suffer through these legal machinations that they are forced to go through.”

The Diocese of Rockville Centre has hired a major international law firm, Jones Day, to defend itself in the complex proceedings, which sometimes involve nearly 100 attorneys meeting at the same time.

The diocese declined to comment on the proceedings, other than pointing to court documents…

View Cache

Clergy sexual abuse cases are casting a pall over the Catholic Church in Portugal, ensnaring senior officials even as authorities scramble to explain why shelter was given to a Nobel Peace Prize-winning bishop at the center of sexual misconduct allegations.

Senior Catholic leaders apologized over the weekend for the hurt caused by decades of alleged abuse and cover-up — current estimates number around 400 cases — with the archbishop of Lisbon begging the faithful to not lose faith in the church.

“Be confident that for our part we will do our best, with respect to the law and the Gospel,” Archbishop Manuel Clemente said after Sunday Mass.

A spotlight fell on Portuguese church authorities, as well as the Vatican, last week when the Holy See’s sex abuse office confirmed a Dutch media report that in 2020 it had secretly sanctioned Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, the revered independence hero of East…

View Cache

In October 1992 in New York’s Times Square, an industrial steamroller crunched over a pathway littered with Sinéad O’Connor CDs as onlookers cheered and journalists filmed the protest. Today, a building overlooking the square bears an enormous photo of the singer’s famous shaven head. Her Bambi eyes gaze out across the city – and a wider country which vilified, mocked and banned her.

When Kathryn Ferguson, director of a new documentary about the singer, came across the picture while walking through Manhattan, she stopped in her tracks. “There she is, this monolith!” she says. “I cried. Like a phoenix from the flames, she’s back.”

In an era when so many public figures are widely applauded activists, it is hard to overstate how alone, courageous, and yet how demonised O’Connor once was. Nor how huge the institutions she took on were: the Catholic church, the Irish constitution,…

View Cache

On the first Saturday of fall, a sweating Bart Barber trekked across a weedy pasture in search of Bully Graham, the would-be patriarch of the rural Baptist pastor’s fledgling cattle herd.

With the afternoon temperature in the mid-90s, the 52-year-old Texan found the bull — whose nickname reflects his owner’s deep affection for the late Rev. Billy Graham — and 11 heifers cooling under a canopy of trees.

“Hey, baby girl,” Barber said as he patted one of the cows, a favorite he dubbed Lottie Moon after the namesake of his denomination’s international missions offering.

For nearly a quarter-century, Barber enjoyed relative obscurity as a minister in this town of 3,600, about 50 miles northeast of Dallas. That changed in June as delegates to the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting in Anaheim, California, chose Barber to lead the nation’s largest Protestant denomination at a time of major crisis.

The previous…

View Cache

They were in the Bible study room when Deryk Terril, a shy 11-year-old with shaggy hair in 1976, found the courage to finally say something: An elder at a Jehovah’s Witnesses congregation in Spokane, Wash., had been molesting him for years, Terril, now 57, recounts in a lawsuit filed in August.

He says he told a church leader he trusted to protect him.

Instead, the church leader got angry and told Terril they could do nothing about it without a second witness, Terril says. Police weren’t notified, he says, nor were his parents. The church allowed the alleged abuser, John Earl Jones, to continue spending time with Terril, and he molested the boy for years after, court documents say.

Around the same time, the mother of another boy in the congregation, Daniel Enholm, reported to the church that Jones had touched her son, too. Again, the other church leaders failed to…

View Cache

With the approach of the 105th anniversary of The Miracle of the Sun at Fatima in central Portugal, Catholics have been shocked by yet another revelation about the sexual abuse of children within the church.

The Vatican has at long last acknowledged that in 2020 a Nobel Peace Prize-winning Catholic bishop received “disciplinary restrictions” and was banned from “contact with minors” because of allegations that he raped and abused teenage boys.

Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo is accused of carrying out these crimes decades ago in the former Portuguese colony of East Timor. The Vatican first became involved in the case in 2019 if not before, but information about its disciplinary action only came last week, a day after a Dutch magazine, De Groene Amsterdammer, published the accusations in explicit accounts by two of the priest’s alleged victims.

Bishop Belo, 74, shared the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize with his friend José Ramos-Horta for…

View Cache

Parishioners of Our Lady of Hope Catholic Church in Rosemont have been notified that an allegation of sexual abuse of a minor has been filed against retired priest Fr. John Clemens.

The accusation is from an alleged incident nearly 50 years ago, according to a statement from the Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago.

Clemens served as pastor at Our Lady of Hope from 2008 to 2018 when he retired. He is currently the church’s pastor emeritus. The church serves Catholics in Rosemont, Des Plaines, travelers through O’Hare Airport, and other neighboring communities.

“I have asked Father Clemens to step aside from ministry until our independent Review Board can investigate the allegation and present its recommendation to me,” said Cardinal Blase Cupich in a recent statement. “We have reported the allegation to civil authorities and have offered assistance to the accuser. Father Clemens has agreed to cooperate fully with this process, and…

View Cache

The trial over the Secretariat of State’s financial scandal resumed Thursday, offering a preview of the prosecution’s witness list.

The trial over the Secretariat of State’s financial scandal resumed Sept. 28 in Vatican City, kicking off the second year of hearings in the case, and offering a preview of the prosecution’s witness list.

The beginning of a three-day slate of hearings saw the final appearance of a former senior lay official at the Secretary of State’s investment office, and the release of the first slate of witnesses to be called by the prosecution.

The court has been in recess since July. In the intervening months, the judges have been considering a list, submitted by prosecutors and lawyers, of proposed witnesses still to be called in the trial, now in its second year.

Before the court adjourned for the summer in July, chief judge Giuseppe Pignatone told the court that around…

View Cache

Thrissur: District Sessions Court rejected the bail plea of a priest who sexually abused a woman on the pretext of “special puja”. The accused Alappuzha native Vadassery Nikarthil Kailas (45) had allegedly raped a woman by intoxicating her with psychotropic drugs while conducting puja.

The incident pertaining to the case happened in April 2021. The priest misled the woman by offering her milk and tamarind solution as “Prasadam”, which was already laced with drugs. Later, the priest sexually abused the woman and recorded the act when she went unconscious.

The complainant informed the court that she was raped again threatening that the videos would be leaked. By considering the arguments of the prosecutor KB Sunil Kumar, the court observed that the case exists prima facie against the accused and dismissed the bail petition.

View Cache

Germany’s bishops are meeting in Fulda, a town in the center of the country, this week ahead of a crucial trip to the Vatican.

Their fall plenary meeting, which began on Monday, is dedicated to two major themes: the controversial “synodal way” and the bishops’ November ad limina visit to Rome.

The stakes are high: The Vatican has repeatedly expressed misgivings about the synodal way – the multi-year German initiative bringing together bishops and lay people to discuss four main topics: power, the priesthood, women in the Church, and sexual morality.

In July, the Vatican’s Secretariat of State underlined that the synodal way has no power “to compel the bishops and the faithful to adopt new ways of governance and new approaches to doctrine and morals.”

Earlier this month, the bishops attended an acrimonious session of the synodal way at which they endorsed documents proposing new ways of governance and new approaches to doctrine and…

View Cache

The United Nations and advocacy groups for survivors of clergy sexual abuse are urging Pope Francis to authorize a full investigation of Catholic Church archives on three continents to ascertain who knew what and when about sexual abuse by Nobel Peace Prize-winning Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, the revered independence hero of East Timor.

The Vatican’s sex abuse office said last week that it had secretly sanctioned Belo in 2020, forbidding him from having contact with minors or with East Timor, based on misconduct allegations that arrived in Rome in 2019. That was the year Francis approved a new church law that required all cases of predator prelates to be reported in-house and established a mechanism to investigate bishops, who had long escaped accountability for abuse or cover-up during the church’s decades-long scandal.

But a brief statement by the Vatican, issued after Dutch magazine De Groen Amsterdammer exposed the Belo scandal by…

View Cache

The building at 60 Sloane Avenue in London is at the center of the Vatican’s historic corruption trial, which began at the end of July 2021.

After a break of over two months, the Vatican trial on financial corruption in the Secretariat of State continued this week with the interrogation of witnesses for the prosecution.

The court reconvened Sept. 28, 29, and 30, to begin the questioning of the first of what the prosecution expects to be a total of 41 witnesses it will call.

The witness list includes Vatican gendarme Stefano De Santis, who assisted the Vatican’s now chief Prosecutor Alessandro Diddi during the trial’s preliminary investigation; he is expected to testify at the next scheduled hearing on October 12. 

A British-Italian architect, Luciano Capaldo, has been called to testify by the prosecution the same week. Capaldo was the registered director of the holding company London 60 SA Ltd,…

View Cache

Over a year into the proceedings, the Vatican mega-trial of 10 individuals accused of defrauding the Catholic institution’s finances through a controversial real estate deal began again this week after a summer recess with an interrogation of the prosecution’s witnesses.

The trial, which resumed Wednesday (Sept. 28) after being on break since July, revolves around a 2018 London real estate purchase by the Vatican’s Secretariat of State that ultimately cost the institution well over $200 million, mainly taken from papal funds destined for charity.

After more than a year of hearing from defendants, including Cardinal Angelo Becciu, judges will now be presented with testimony from the Vatican prosecutor’s submitted list of 27 witnesses.

On Friday, Revisor General Alessandro Cassinis Righini described to judges a culture of mismanagement within the Vatican’s Secretariat of State. Righini was appointed to oversee Vatican budgets and transactions by Pope Francis in March 2021 but had…

View Cache

The Vatican auditor general said he was surprised by the lack of ethical standards demonstrated by officials considering investment opportunities, including a failed London property development deal.

During the Vatican trial of 10 defendants accused of various charges related to financial malfeasance, Alessandro Cassinis Righini, auditor general of the Holy See and Vatican City State, criticized the mismanagement of funds as well as the Vatican’s association with people “with clear conflicts of interest,” which resulted in the loss of millions of euros.

“That was not the way to manage funds from Peter’s Pence,” Cassinis told the court Sept. 30, referring to the papal fund used for charity and to support the running of the Roman Curia and Vatican embassies around the world.

When asked by Vatican prosecutors if he was sure that funds from the annual collection were used in the London property deal, Cassinis replied, “Yes.”

The trial, which…

View Cache

Pope Francis reconfirmed the leadership of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors and expanded its membership from 17 to 20 people, naming 10 new members and reappointing 10 returning members.

U.S. Cardinal Seán P. O’Malley of Boston, president of the commission, said, “Coming from all over the world with varied backgrounds and a common passion for the well-being of children and vulnerable people, the members announced today include advocates and practitioners of prevention and protection to the many areas in which the church ministers to children.”

The members include “representatives from canon law, social work, the medical and psychological professions, law enforcement and the judiciary as well as pastoral experts who currently work in dioceses and religious congregations,” he said in a statement Sept. 30, the day the appointments were announced.

“They have all spent significant amounts of their professional lives listening to and supporting victim/survivors of sexual…

View Cache

A pastor and his son have been booked for raping a college girl in Tamil Nadu. The pastor’s son refused to marry her after sexually exploiting her on the promise of marriage. The girl had leveled rape charges against the father and another pastor as well.

Pastor David Jacob runs a Pentecostal church named Zion Prayer House near Panagudi in Tirunelveli. His son Anis Paul(25) made acquaintance with a 22 year old MCA student who attended the church. Anis Paul proposed to her and took her out on many occasions. As per Tamil media reports he also promised to marry her.

On this promise he sexually exploited the girl. But when she started asking him to marry her Paul stopped talking with her. He asked her to stay away from him for 2 years as their relationship would bring bad repute to his family…

View Cache

A 62-year-old man who served as pastor of a Baptist church in Missouri City will spend a decade in prison after pleading guilty to the charge of aggravated sexual assault of a child.

William Benjamin Woodward pleaded guilty June 14, but he elected to have his punishment assessed by U.S. District Judge J. Christian Becerra. The first-degree felony is punishable by five to 99 years, or life, in prison and a fine of up to $10,000. 

Woodward was executive pastor at Heritage Baptist Church from 2009 until his arrest in April 2021. The church was rebranded and the name was changed to Horizon Baptist Church a few weeks after Woodward’s arrest.

By pleading guilty to the crime and waiving his right to a jury trial, Woodward became eligible to ask the court for deferred adjudication, a form of probation. During the hearing June 20, his attorney argued that his client was…

View Cache

A former Missouri City pastor has been sentenced to prison after he pled guilty to aggravated sexual assault of a child on June 14, according to the Fort Bend County District Attorney’s Office.

William Benjamin Woodward, 62, previously served as pastor for a Baptist church in Missouri City from 2009 until his arrest in April 2021, according to the DA. Woodward elected to have his punishment assessed by Judge J. Christian Becerra of the 434th District Court.

Aggravated sexual assault of a child is a first-degree felony, punishable by 5 to 99 years, or life in prison and a fine up to $10,000.

Woodward’s hearing was held on June 20 where his attorney argued that he was an excellent candidate for deferred adjudication because he had no criminal history, had served his community as a church leader, and had immediately started sex offender therapy after the child in this case…

View Cache

U.S. District Judge Ronnie L. White on Thursday sentenced a former youth pastor from New York to 13 years and four months in prison for the sexual abuse of a Missouri 15-year-old in 2013.

Judge White also ordered Jesse E. Vargas, 38, to pay $146,594 in restitution to his victim.

Vargas originally met the then 11-year-old girl at a religious camp in Michigan where he worked.

“Over the course of the next four years Jesse played with my family and I like frogs in a pot,” the victim said in court during Thursday’s hearing. “Slowly increasing the temperature of his manipulation until we each were unaware of the water we had been submerged in, let alone its suddenly scalding temperature. By age thirteen I abandoned most of my spiritual leaders and friendships at his suggestion. By fourteen he even guided me to push away my two closest friends,” she said.

…

View Cache

A former youth pastor from New York was sentenced to 13 years and four months in prison.

Jesse Vargas, 38, originally met the girl when she was 11 years old at a religious camp in Michigan. Vargas kept in touch with the family for the next four years and came to her St. Louis home in January 2013, preached at her church and then sexually assaulted her. He returned in March of that year and assaulted her again. He arranged for her to go to New York in June and abused her again.

Vargas pleaded guilty to two felony counts of travel with the intent to engage in illicit sexual contact and coercion and enticement of a minor.

View Cache

A Hartford Superior Court jury on Tuesday convicted minister Robert Lee Nichols of touching a 10- or 11-year-old boy in sexual ways during a 10-day visit to Nichols’ family’s Manchester home in the summer of 2009 or 2010.

The year of the visit was disputed, but the real issue was whether the sexual touching happened. The boy testified Monday morning that it did, and Nichols, 43, flatly denied that in testimony later that day. Nichols’ wife, Tamara, subsequently took the witness stand and corroborated important parts of his testimony.

The six-member jury convicted Nichols of two felonies, risk of injury to a child and fourth-degree sexual assault. He faces a mandatory minimum of five years in prison and a maximum of 25 years when Judge Michael Gustafson sentences him Nov. 29.

The judge raised Nichols’ bond to $500,000 after the verdict. Online court records showed Wednesday that he had posted…

View Cache

In a rare admission of sexual harassment in Japan’s military, its army chief apologized Thursday to a former soldier for suffering caused by a group of servicemembers.

Yoshihide Yoshida, head of Japan’s Ground Self-Defense Force, said an internal investigation found evidence that several servicemen were involved in the case brought by former soldier Rina Gonoi last month.

“Representing the Ground-Self Defense Force, I deeply apologize to Ms. Gonoi for the pain she had to suffer for a long time,” Yoshida told a news conference. “We offer a sincere apology.”

The investigation is continuing and further details, including the assailants and their punishment, have not been released.

Gonoi welcomed the apology and thanked those who supported her, but added that “my battle is not over.”

“I’m determined to get an apology directly from the perpetrators,” she tweeted.

Japan’s Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada earlier this month ordered a ministry-wide investigation into growing…

View Cache

Cambodia urges China to do more in combatting human trafficking

The death toll from a boat that capsized at sea on the Cambodian-Vietnamese maritime border has risen to 11 after eight bodies were washed ashore on an island off the south coast, officials said.

The incident has been tied to human traffickers and is under investigation.

Forty-one Chinese were reported lost at sea almost a week ago after their boat, believed to be headed for Sihanoukville on Cambodia’s south coast, got into trouble.

Authorities from both countries launched a search, rescued 30 people, and reported another three people had died. A statement released from city hall in Sihanoukville this morning said the missing eight had been found on a beach, on the Vietnamese island of Phu Quoc.

A separate statement from Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security said two of the bodies were carrying Chinese identification papers in their pockets.

“The bodies found were…

View Cache

The many survivors of convicted pedophile, Kenneth Estabrooks’ horrendous sexual abuse are deeply saddened and hurt by the recent decision not to hold anyone liable for decades of sexual abuse of vulnerable children by a Saint John Police officer. Estabrooks was a Saint John City police officer for over two decades.

The evidence at trial was unequivocal and uncontested that he used a City of Saint John police car to kidnap young children. He used a City of Saint John police-issued gun to threaten them and their families. He used City of Saint John police-issued handcuffs to restrain the young children while he raped them.

Class Counsel advised they will immediately launch an appeal to the New Brunswick Court of Appeal on behalf of the class.

John McKiggan, co-lead counsel said: “This is the most devastating decision I have seen in 32 years. The city employed Kenneth Estabrooks. The City gave him his uniform. The City issued him his gun. The City owned the vehicle…

View Cache

The Vatican acknowledged Thursday that it imposed restrictions in 2020 on the ministry and residency of Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, a Nobel Peace Prize winner who is accused of sexually abusing teenage boys decades ago.

But Vatican officials will almost certainly face more questions about those restrictions, and about the bishop’s past, as details of the allegations against Belo come into focus in the weeks to come.

The Vatican’s admission came after a Dutch magazine reported this week the serial abuse allegations against the bishop, who has been regarded as a hero of the fight for independence in his native country of East Timor.

The allegations are grave. The bishop is accused of raping young men in the 1980s and ‘90s, and of taking advantage of their poverty, and his power, to keep them silent.

The Holy See’s restrictions on Bishop Belo might seem familiar to U.S. Catholics — the bishop…

View Cache

Advocates for victims of clergy sexual abuse delivered a list of more than 300 publicly accused abusers to the Roman Catholic archbishop of San Francisco on Thursday as they urged him to release his “secret” files on credibly accused priests.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests took aim at Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone for being one 15 U.S. bishops — representing fewer than 10% of all dioceses — not to publicly name abusive clerics.

“Every bishop is his own king and they can do what they want with these lists. About 158 bishops in the United States have released lists over the past three or four years,” said Dan McNevin of SNAP, and a church abuse survivor. “But the archbishop of San Francisco will not publish a list. And so we think it’s really important to get this list out, to get it published, to update it, to provide…

View Cache

Catholic women across the world are calling for a wide range of reforms to the church, according to the results of our survey of more than 17,000 Catholic women from over 100 countries published this month.

A substantial majority were concerned about the prevalence of abuse, racism, and sexism in church contexts, and many raised issues relating to transparency and accountability in church leadership and governance.

The International Survey of Catholic Women is one of the most extensive surveys of Catholic women ever undertaken, and its findings should inform lasting and genuine change in the Catholic Church.

Why we did this survey

The survey was initiated by Catholic Women Speak in response to the invitation of Pope Francis for the Catholic Church to engage in a process of “synodality” for the 2021-2023 Synod of Bishops. The Synod will examine how the church comes together and is considered to be of great importance…

View Cache

A group of people claiming to be survivors of sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church demanded Thursday that San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone publicly release a list of priests and others who have been accused of abuse in the San Francisco archdiocese.

Dioceses and archdioceses across the country — including in the Bay Area — have released lists of the men accused of sexual abuse of minors as part of an effort to atone for the abuse scandal.

But San Francisco remains a holdout.

The group, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, has prepared its own list of 312 priests, brothers and lay people active in the archdiocese’s 88 churches in San Francisco, San Marin and San Mateo counties — and planned to release it Thursday.

They’re calling on the archdiocese to release its own list, a move they say is important.

The archdiocese told The Chronicle…

View Cache

[Via Catholic Philly]

After a Dutch newspaper published an investigation into abuse allegations against retired Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo of Dili, the Vatican said it had become aware of the allegations several years ago and placed restrictions on him.

The newspaper De Groene Amsterdammer said it began its investigation in 2002. It used the first-person stories of two young men, then aged 14 and 16, who graphically detailed their interactions with Bishop Belo, claiming that he gave them money after certain physical encounters.

“He knows that the boys have no money. So when he invited you, you came over and (he) gave you some money,” one of the alleged victims was quoted as saying. “But meanwhile, you are a victim. That’s the way he did.”

“From the research carried out by De Groene, it appears Belo had more victims,” the story said. “De Groene spoke with 20 people with knowledge of…

View Cache

East Timor’s Catholics reacted with shock but also expressions of support Friday for revered independence icon and Nobel Peace Prize winner Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo following allegations he sexually abused boys decades ago in the impoverished Southeast Asian nation.

The Vatican admitted Thursday that its sex abuse office had secretly sanctioned the bishop in 2020, restricting his movements and contacts with minors and forbidding him from having contact with his homeland. The Vatican revealed the restrictions after the Dutch magazine De Groene Amsterdammer exposed the claims against Belo by two of his alleged victims and reported there were others, too.

The Holy See has not responded to questions about when church officials first suspected possible misconduct by Belo, why he was allowed to retire two decades early in 2002 and why he was then sent to Mozambique to work as a missionary priest with children. He has said he retired…

View Cache

After accusations against him became public, the Vatican said that in 2020 it had punished Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, a hero of the independence movement in his native East Timor.

Rome – A Nobel Peace Prize-winning Catholic bishop received “disciplinary restrictions” and was banned from “contact with minors,” the Vatican revealed on Thursday, based on allegations that the prelate, Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, had raped and abused teenage boys decades ago in East Timor.

The church’s acknowledgment came a day after a Dutch magazine, De Groene Amsterdammer, aired the accusations in an explicit account of abuse by two of the priest’s alleged victims.

“The Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith was first involved in this case in 2019, in the light of the accusations it received concerning the bishop’s behavior,” the Vatican spokesman, Matteo Bruni, said in a statement.

In September 2020, the Vatican limited Bishop Belo’s movements…

View Cache

France’s Catholic Church has paid financial compensation to 23 victims of child sexual abuse by priests or other church representatives under a recently launched reparation process, the body in charge of compensation decisions said Friday.

Representatives of the Independent National Authority for Recognition and Reparation said during a news conference that over 1,000 victims have come forward to claim compensation since the body was established this year.

France’s Catholic bishops’ conference agreed to provide reparations after a report issued last year revealed a large number of child sex abuse cases.

Some 60 reparation decisions have been made, out of which 45 include financial compensation that range from 8,000 to 60,000 euros ($7,806 to 58,548), the INIRR said. It said 23 people have received the money.

At the request of victims, reparations also may include non-financial support such as discussion groups, art therapy and meeting with local church representatives, according to…

View Cache

[Via Union of Catholic Asian News]

Mansour Labaky, 82, resides in Lebanon which does not extradite its nationals

Beirut – An elderly Lebanese priest found guilty in France of sexually assaulting children has been defrocked by the Vatican, the Assembly of Catholic Patriarchs and Bishops of Lebanon said Tuesday.

APECL said it was notified of the Vatican’s decision to demote Mansour Labaky to “secular status”.

“We pray… for the victims of sexual assault,” it said.

In 2021, a French court sentenced Labaky to 15 years in prison after convicting him in absentia for sexually abusing girls in a dormitory he opened and managed for Lebanese orphans in Douvres-la-Delivrande in the Normandy region of northern France between 1991 and 1998.

Labaky, 82, resides in Lebanon which does not extradite its nationals.

An international arrest warrant was issued against him in April 2016, but Beirut has not taken action.

Labaky has repeatedly…

View Cache

As Catholic dioceses across the state are getting hit with hundreds of new child sex abuse lawsuits, San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone remains the only California bishop yet to release an internal list of priests “credibly accused” of sexually abusing children.

Northern California’s most powerful bishop steadfastly refuses to release an internal list of priests accused of sexually abusing children, even as hundreds of new lawsuits hitting Catholic dioceses across the state suggest new depths to the church’s sex abuse scandal.

San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone remains the lone bishop in California declining to take the significant step towards transparency, and pressure is mounting for him to do so. 

“When you don’t publish a list and tell people the truth proactively, it’s a lie,” said Dan McNevin, a clergy sex abuse survivor and local leader for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP). “And this is a religious…

View Cache

The allegations come at a time when Catholic dioceses across California are being hit with a wave of new child sex abuse lawsuits enabled by a recent state law

The 1982 scene is still imprinted in Steven Chavez’s mind: His mom sitting at the kitchen table of their Santa Clara home, an ashtray brimming with cigarette butts in front of her, holding a letter that spelled out her son’s likely death sentence. 

Chavez was heading to West Point after graduating from high school at the top of his class, he said, but that was before a blood test revealed HIV in the teen’s system.

“They told me I had less than six months to live,” Chavez said. “To get my things in order.”

Chavez’s story began just a year before, in 1981, as a South Bay teenager. The altar boy and straight-A student had his sights set on the White…

View Cache

Performances will run this fall at The Tank.

Vatican Falls, the controversial play written by Frank J. Avella that closely examines the Catholic sex abuse scandal, will make its world premiere this fall in a limited off-Broadway run. Performances will be held from October 27-November 20 at The Tank. Avella co-directs with Carlotta Brentan.

Vatican Falls tells real survivor stories while exploring the fictional journey of one particular survivor. The play has had seven world premieres canceled in four different countries in the last decade due to its controversial content. The cast if this off-Broadway world premiere will star Broadway veteran Ace Young (Hair, American Idol), along with Carlotta Brentan, Tucker Aust, and Alice Barrett Mitchell. Rounding out the company are James Gracia, Danny Hilt, Kenon Veno, Edward L. Simon, Ryan Wright, and Jacopo Constantini.

The plot of Vatican Falls is described as follows: “Based on factual accounts, spanning decades and set against the…

View Cache

Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo of East Timor won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996. Now he has been accused of sexually abusing several teenage boys.

Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo of East Timor has been accused of sexually abusing several teenage boys, according to a report published Wednesday in a Dutch news magazine.

Belo, 74, came to international attention in the 1990s for his outspoken role in opposing the Indonesian occupation of East Timor, which lasted from 1975 until 1999.

The bishop was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996 for his work “towards a just and peaceful solution to the conflict in East Timor.” He shared the prize with  José Ramos-Horta, who went on to become president of East Timor.

But in a Sept. 28 report, several men have claimed they were sexually abused by the bishop when they were teenagers. The allegations were reported by De Groene Amsterdammer,…

View Cache

‘What I want is apologies’

For years, Timor-Leste’s Nobel Peace Prize winner Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo has been sexually abusing boys, survivors and others claim. Meanwhile, the Catholic church imposed travel restrictions on Belo. ‘We have to talk about it, and shout it out louder to the world.’

There is also a Dutch translation of this article available.

It was Sunday morning. Paulo was standing among the other faithful listening attentively to the mass Bishop Belo was holding in the tropical garden at his residence in Dili, the capital city of Timor-Leste. After the mass, Belo walked up to Paulo, then a teenager of fifteen or sixteen years old. ‘He asked me to come to his place’, says Paulo, now 42, who wishes to stay anonymous for the privacy and safety of himself and his family.

It was an honour to be invited. ‘I was very happy,’ says Paulo. Bishop…

View Cache

It was a frigid Sunday evening at the Catholic Newman Center in Salt Lake City when the priest warned parishioners who had gathered after Mass that their right to private confessions was in jeopardy.

A new law would break that sacred bond, the priest said, and directed the parishioners to sign a one-page form letter on their way out. “I/We Oppose HB90,” began the letter, stacked next to pre-addressed envelopes. “HB90 is an improper interference of the government into the practice of religion in Utah.”

In the following days of February 2020, Utah’s Catholic diocese, which oversees dozens of churches, says it collected some 9,000 signed letters from parishioners and sent them to state Rep. Angela Romero, a Democrat who had been working on the bill as part of her campaign against child sexual abuse. HB90 targeted Utah’s “clergy-penitent privilege,” a law similar to those in many states that exempts…

View Cache

The priest served at two metro Atlanta parishes from 2005 to 2008

Sacramento police have charged a former Atlanta area priest with eight counts of sexual abuse of an underage girl in California between 1996 and 1998.

A felony warrant has been issued for the priest, Roberto Jaramillo, 70, who is believed to have moved to his home diocese in Colombia after serving for a decade in several parishes in Sacramento and Roseville, Calif. He later served in the Atlanta Archdiocese, according to a press release on the Diocese of Sacramento’s website and an article in The Sacramento Bee.

His name has been added to the Sacramento Diocese’s list of clergy “credibly” accused of sex abuse. In the warrant, which was signed in August, he is referred to as Roberto Leon Jaramillo-Alzate and is charged with eight counts of lewd and lascivious acts on the girl.

The…

View Cache

A former pastor at St. Andrew Church in Westwood who resigned in 2018 amid allegations of sexual misconduct from over three decades ago has been reassigned as chaplain to a Catholic resource facility in Newark that offers services to help pregnant, post-abortion, and sexual abuse victims “who need a safe and supportive environment.”

Former pastor James Weiner was found to be working at The Mercy House, a “family-oriented resource and referral center in the heart of Newark with a focus on assisting pregnant and parenting women who need a safe and supportive environment.”

The center also provides services and programs for post-abortion and sexual abuse healing.

Following a sexual abuse allegation raised anew in 2018 by the Rev. Desmond Rossi, Weiner stepped down from his new position as pastor at St. Andrew voluntarily, eventually resigning before an interim and then a new pastor was appointed at the church.

Rossi’s charges…

View Cache

A former pastor in Nashua is facing 10 felony charges of possessing child sexual abuse images after being indicted by a grand jury.

The investigation of former pastor Stephen Bates began in 2016 when police received a tip from the online chat service Skype that someone had uploaded child sexual abuse images, police said.Sign up for our Newsletters

The charges each carry a potential sentence of 7 1/2 to 15 years in prison and a $4,000 fine.

The indictments detail graphic information about what was allegedly contained in the images, which include still pictures and videos, investigators said. The still pictures and the videos allegedly feature young girls, and, in one case, a young boy. One also includes adult male genitalia, officials said.

Bates was the former pastor at the Bible Baptist Church in Nashua. He was living at the parsonage until the…

View Cache

A Catholic priest was arraigned Monday at the Resident Magistrate’s Court in Moshi over allegations of raping and sexually assaulting more than 10 children.

He had been in police custody since September 20.

His arraignment came after he was accused of giving a Standard Six pupil and a Form One student Tsh3,000 ($1.29) and Tsh5,000 ($2.14), respectively, for sexual favours.

The children had been attending First Holy Communion and Confirmation classes.

Regional Commissioner Nurdin Babu said “it is a disgraceful incident”.

Parents had raised the alarm that the priest had abused many students and planned to march in protest to Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa’s office before the priest was arrested.

Sources said that the parents had reported the allegations to the leadership of the Catholic Church in Moshi and to the police.

View Cache

The 55-year-old Father Vincent Pereira of Pune in western India has been accused of sex abuse many times since 2014

An Indian Catholic priest already under suspension following sex abuse complaints has fresh charges of sexual assault being lodged against him by a minor boy and his father, sparking calls for his dismissal from the priesthood.

Father Vincent Pereira, 55, was originally suspended from public priestly ministries after police arrested him in September 2018 for sexually assaulting a teenage boy in a school where he was the principal. Released on bail in March 2020, he now lives in the pastoral center of the Pune diocese in western India.

“He should be dismissed from priesthood forthwith because he attacked my son and even dared to violate me,” says Mathew Kuriokose, 55, a Catholic from Pune.

Kuriokose told UCA News on Sept. 20 that Father Pereira assaulted his 15-year-old son while visiting his…

View Cache

In a Tuesday afternoon hearing, Judge Thomas Pyle set a preliminary hearing and ordered that Department of Social Services Children’s Division workers have 24-hour access to Agape Boarding School’s campus to observe the students there.

The preliminary hearing is set for Oct. 13 and 14. Pyle was assigned to the case after the Attorney General’s office requested a new judge. Cedar County Circuit Court Judge David Munton had initially been assigned.

Previous reporting

The Missouri Attorney General’s office filed a new petition Monday, requesting that Agape Boarding School be shut down and its students removed to safety. The new petition comes after the AG office expressed intention to dismiss the Sept. 7 petition.

In a phone conference Monday morning, Cedar County Circuit Court Judge David Munton dissolved the order that allowed Missouri Department of Social Services Children’s Division workers to remain at Agape Boarding School.

The attorney representing Agape Boarding…

View Cache

In a court hearing today, closed to the public, a judge will consider rejecting a lawsuit seeking to close a controversial Christian boarding school where horrific child abuse – sexual, physical, and emotional – has long taken place and been ignored or concealed.

The action is brought by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmidt against the Stockton-based Agape Boarding School. Schmidt wants the facility to be closed. For the safety of kids and the healing of victims, we at SNAP agree. 

Over just the past four months, Missouri investigators have substantiated ten cases of physical abuse at the Stockton-based ‘reform” school. Civil lawsuits have also been filed against the facility.

One victim and advocate said that “hundreds” have been victimized at Agape over the years. Some have described “being physically restrained, sexually abused, starved as a form of punishment, and taken off prescribed medications while reassured…

View Cache

The Traunstein Regional Court in Bavaria has requested a deposition of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI over a lawsuit filed by a man who was abused by a priest, court spokeswoman Andrea Titz has confirmed.

“The defendants have the opportunity to indicate their willingness to defend themselves within two weeks, after which they have four weeks, or one month, to respond,” she explained.

As reported by German media when the complaint was filed, the plaintiff is a 38-year-old man from Bavaria who alleges he was sexually abused by the priest as a child.

The complaint is directed not only against Benedict XVI, when he was archbishop of Munich and Freising, as well as his successor Cardinal Friedrich Wetter.

The archdiocese also received the complaint earlier this week, its spokesman Christoph Kappes confirmed. “We do not comment on the ongoing court proceedings,” he has merely mentioned.

The so-called declaratory action is not…

View Cache

Most students in psychology and psychiatry programs today are too young to have any firsthand memory of the moral panic engendered by the recovered memory movement in the 1980s and early 1990s. This was a time when therapists proudly advertised their ability to help clients unearth supposedly repressed memories of childhood sexual abuse; the accusations that followed shattered families and communities across the country.

The belief that such memories could be repressed and then recovered through special techniques was widespread among mental health professionals for well over a decade. In books and on television, therapists portrayed themselves as the first generation of healers to understand both these mechanisms of repression and how to unlock them without contaminating the story that emerged. The results were dramatic: Patients often recovered abuse memories that began in infancy and lasted for decades. Some came to believe not only that they had repressed memories but…

View Cache

70-year-old Father Roberto Jaramillo is believed to have served in the Atlanta area from 2005-2008.

A catholic priest who once served in Atlanta is now accused of rape, with warrants out for his arrest in California.

The Atlanta Archdiocese confirmed the allegations Monday. According to the Diocese of Sacramento, where the charges stem from, he left California in 2005 and served in the Atlanta area until leaving for his home diocese in Colombia in 2008.

According to the Sacramento Diocese, 70-year-old Father Roberto Jaramillo faces criminal warrants for three instances of alleged sexual abuse going back more than two decades – the alleged “repeated” rape and abuse of a girl between 1996 and 1999, kissing a juvenile boy in 1999 and sexually abusing an adult male in 2001. 

Meanwhile, a local group focused on helping sex abuse survivors is calling for more transparency in the…

View Cache

When she began facilitating safe environment training in the Diocese of Palm Beach in 2005, Donna Eurich did not know that child protection would become her vocation and full-time work in the future. She was a middle school religion teacher at the time. Now she is the director of child and youth protection and the victim assistance coordinator for the Diocese of Tulsa and Eastern Oklahoma, and the first graduate of the online Certificate in Child Protection and Safe Environments offered by the National Catholic School of Social Service at The Catholic University of America. 

A year ago, Tulsa Bishop David Konderla asked Donna if she were interested in completing the online certificate program at Catholic University, promising that the diocese would fund this education. Eurich enthusiastically answered yes. 

Eurich took courses online that addressed sexual abuse and exploitation, social work responses to trauma, and law and policy as it relates…

View Cache

[Via National Catholic Reporter]

Australian Archbishop Mark Coleridge will conduct an investigation into retired Bishop Christopher Saunders of Broome, using a process established by Pope Francis in 2019.

Young Aboriginal men from towns and bush communities in the remote Kimberley region of Western Australia accused Saunders of sexual misconduct. The bishop has denied the allegations.

Local media reported the inquiry in February, but it was not confirmed until late September.

Brisbane’s Coleridge is president of the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference.

The church investigation comes 14 months after police closed a three-year investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct against Saunders, who was not charged. While the church’s investigation is underway, the Vatican ordered that Saunders leave the diocese, where he has continued living since resigning in August 2021.

During 2020 and 2021, retired Bishop Peter Ingham of Wollongong traveled to Broome and interviewed parishioners, diocesan staff and volunteers about Saunders’ management style and financial management,…

View Cache

A Catholic priest was arraigned Monday at the Resident Magistrate’s Court in Moshi over allegations of raping and sexually assaulting more than 10 children.

He had been in police custody since September 20.

His arraignment came after he was accused of giving a Standard Six pupil and a Form One student Tsh3,000 ($1.29) and Tsh5,000 ($2.14), respectively, for sexual favours.

The children had been attending First Holy Communion and Confirmation classes.

Regional Commissioner Nurdin Babu said “it is a disgraceful incident”.

Parents had raised the alarm that the priest had abused many students and planned to march in protest to Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa’s office before the priest was arrested.

Sources said that the parents had reported the allegations to the leadership of the Catholic Church in Moshi and to the police.

View Cache

[Note from BishopAccountability.org: Labaki also worked in the United States.]

Mansour Labaki is believed to have sexually abused more than 50 individuals [in France and twice that number in Lebanon].

The Vatican defrocked former Lebanese priest and convicted paedophile Mansour Labaki on Tuesday, ten years after he was found guilty of the sexual abuse of minors.

The Assembly of the Catholic Patriarchs and Bishops of Lebanon issued a statement saying that Pope Francis decided that both Labaki and Priest George Karim Badr, will be “returned to their secular state.”

The statement added that they will “pray for the priests … so that the Lord may strengthen them in their testimony …. and help them over their weakness and we pray especially for the victims of sexual abuse.”

Labiki, 82, was a famous Maronite priest in Lebanon before the revelations of sexual abuse, founded an orphanage and has written several books. He abused…

View Cache

A leading German bishop said on Thursday that he will remain in office despite a damning report on the handling of abuse cases in his diocese.

Bishop Franz-Josef Bode told journalists at a press conference on Sept. 22 that he had discussed whether to resign as bishop of Osnabrück, northwestern Germany, with the safeguarding expert Fr. Hans Zollner, S.J.

Zollner is a member of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors and the founding president of Rome’s Centre for Child Protection.

Bode said he had decided to stay in post to see the process of strengthening safeguarding procedures through to its conclusion.

The bishop held the press conference two days after Osnabrück University published a 600-page interim report scrutinizing abuse cases in the Diocese of Osnabrück since 1945. The study accused Bode and his predecessors of safeguarding failures.

It said: “In the first decades of his term of office, Bishop Bode repeatedly…

View Cache

A bill aiming to protect kids online has been introduced in the New York state senate, and it could force social media companies to implement a host of safety features — including bans on advertising to youngsters and on mining their data.

The legislation, introduced by state Sen. Andrew Gounardes (D-Brooklyn) on Friday, is modeled after a California bill that Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law earlier this month despite searing opposition from Big Tech groups.

The Golden State’s Age-Appropriate Design Code Act — a first of its kind law in the US — requires that online platforms design their products with children in mind and put up guardrails to protect their privacy.

The New York legislation, while similar, takes further steps by including a number of provisions meant to help families in the event of serious harms committed against kids online.

“We want to make the Internet safe for everybody and…

View Cache

Center for SafeSport is supposed to investigate alleged abusers. But no one has accused Jonathan Little of a crime

This is a tale full of Kafkaesque twists about the efforts of the U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) and its affiliated national sport governing bodies (NGBs) to make it look as if they’re doing something about their sexual abuse problem. It’s also a story that gets pretty deep in the weeds and one that bumps up against a basic reality: Although many millions of viewers watch the Summer and Winter Olympics and debate the internal or international drama hyped up by multibillion-dollar broadcast rights holder NBC, very few of them know or care anything about USOC’s lords of the rings or their apparatchiks’ day-to-day operations, far from the flag-waving captured on TV.

One effect of that is near-total public indifference toward the exploitation of local age-group clubs as faux community-based programs for…

View Cache

According to its website, the Catholic Conference of Oklahoma is “the official voice of the Catholic Church in Oklahoma on matters of public policy.” Founded five years ago to lobby state officials on issues of interest to the church, the organization is run by Brett Farley, an experienced political operative with extensive Republican Party ties.

“The shorthand of my job is that I’m a lobbyist for the bishops,” Farley said in an interview. “So I carry forward their thoughts, their commitments, their values as they shepherd the church.”

According to Farley, the organization is guided solely by Catholic doctrine and, if you boil it down, the Great Commission, in which Christ told his followers to “make disciples of all nations.”

“If the goal is to make disciples of all nations, we have to also consider the things that each individual is dealing with in their life here on Earth,” Farley…

View Cache

A priest stood up and asked Ed Gavagan how he found hope after all that he’s endured. As a room full of Catholic clergy looked on, Ed told the priest that he had none. None at all.

Gavagan had been shaken when he walked into the community room attached to Sheridan’s Holy Name Catholic Church on Monday. The seats were filled by 50-some priests, plus a half-dozen nuns, all gathered to watch a documentary that follows Gavagan and five other men as they work to heal from the trauma they say they suffered at the hands of priests decades ago. He’d done this before, mostly: He and two of the other men from the film had attended two screenings in the preceding days, and they’d held Q&As after both. He’s talked about the film to reporters and audiences and critics for a year.

This was different. He hadn’t been in…

View Cache

A priest who formerly was with the Catholic Diocese of Sacramento has been added to the list of clergy accused of child sex abuse, and authorities are searching for him.

Roberto Jaramillo, who served at multiple churches in the Sacramento region for 10 years, is accused of rape and other sexual assault involving a girl under the age of 14 between 1996 and 1999. The Sacramento Police Department confirmed on Saturday that a felony warrant had been issued.

Between 1995 and 2005, Jaramillo served at Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish, Immaculate Conception Parish and St. Rose Parish in Sacramento and St. Rose Parish in Roseville. Jaramillo, 70, left the Diocese of Sacramento to work for the Archdiocese of Atlanta before returning to his home diocese in Colombia in 2008.

The diocese was notified of the allegations by a third party in 2021, according to a statement released Friday. They have…

View Cache

The Archdiocese of Chicago today announced that it has asked three retired priests to remain out of ministry while its Independent Review Board investigates allegations of sexual abuse of minors against them. The priests are: Father John J. Rudnik, 87, Father James E. Flynn, 80 and Father John W. Clemens, 75. Each has one allegation against him, all dating from nearly a half century ago and all are cooperating fully with the process. The persons making the allegations have been offered the services of the Archdiocese Victim Assistance Ministry and civil authorities have been notified. In addition, parishioners in the parishes where these priests served have been notified.

“We take every allegation seriously and follow the policies and procedures we have had in place for decades,” said Cardinal Blase J. Cupich, archbishop of Chicago. “Only by conducting an impartial and thorough investigation can we fulfill our promise to protect the…

View Cache

Three retired Chicago area priests are being asked to remain out of the ministry pending the investigation of nearly 50 year old allegations of sex abuse against minors, the Archdiocese announced Saturday.

Father John J. Rudnik, Father James E. Flynn and Father John W. Clemens are each facing allegations dating back nearly half a century and are fully cooperating in the process, church officials said.

The persons making the allegations have been offered services of the Archdiocese Victim Assistance Ministry and authorities have been notified, the Archdiocese said. Parishioners in the parishes where these priests served have also been notified.

“We take every allegation seriously and follow the policies and procedures we have had in place for decades,” said Cardinal Blase J. Cupich, archbishop of Chicago. “Only by conducting an impartial and thorough investigation can we fulfill our promise to protect the young people in our care and, if the…

View Cache

The results of discussions ordered by Pope Francis’ Synod on Synodality

Catholics in the United States are deeply divided over issues as disparate as LGBTQ inclusion, clerical sexual abuse and celebrating the liturgy, according to a summary of consultations carried out in dioceses across the country in recent months as part of Pope Francis’ Synod on Synodality.

“Participants felt this division as a profound sense of pain and anxiety,” the U.S. bishops wrote in a summary released Monday (Sept. 19) to the public after being sent to the Vatican last month.

In 2021, Francis launched a global discussion, requiring parish churches and a host of other religious organizations to gather their congregations to talk about how they view the hierarchy and issues facing the church. The discussion would inform a summit of bishops at the Vatican scheduled for October 2023 on the topic “For a Synodal Church: Participation, Communion and…

View Cache

ONE of Northern Ireland’s most notorious paedophile priests has admitted yet another breach of his life-long sexual offences prevention order.

A court has been told the case of Daniel Gerard Curran “is to proceed by way of a guilty plea” to the single charge against him.

In August this year, the creep breached his lifelong SOPO by ‘loitering’ around Tollymore National Outdoor Centre in Newcastle.

A prosecution lawyer said Curran had walked into the activity centre “with a box of books for dissemination”.

But staff recognised him as the infamous child abuser he is and reported him to the cops.

At the hearing in Downpatrick on Thursday, the judge said she was “familiar with this defendant” and his “lengthy record”.

“He knew very well that he wasn’t supposed to go near the centre,” said Amanda Brady who added “I’m not dealing with this” without a pre-sentence report.

Curran, from Bryansford Avenue in Newcastle, didn’t appear in court…

View Cache

FBI agents have questioned Lawrence Hecker, 91, who worked as a Catholic priest in New Orleans until 2002 despite the archdiocese being aware of molestation accusation since 1988

In arguably the clearest sign yet that he is under active criminal investigation, a retired Catholic priest from New Orleans who has been publicly accused of molesting “countless” children but never charged has acknowledged that the FBI recently questioned him.

Lawrence Hecker, 91, declined to elaborate on exactly when FBI agents met with him or what they asked him as they reportedly lead an investigation into whether clerics serving a Louisiana region that is home to nearly half a million Catholics took children across state lines to abuse them. But, in a brief conversation with the Guardian, Hecker admitted that FBI agents had spoken with him.

“I told them I needed to speak to my attorney, and that’s where we left it,” Hecker…

View Cache

The Diocese of Sacramento today added Roberto Jaramillo, a priest who worked in Sacramento and Roseville between 1995 and 2005, to its listing of clergy who have been credibly accused of child sex abuse. Jaramillo, aged 70, is accused of raping and sexually assaulting a girl between 1996 and 1999. In 2005, Jaramillo left the Diocese of Sacramento to work for the Archdiocese of Atlanta before returning to Colombia in 2008.

A third party brought concerns of the 1996 rape and abuse to the diocese’s notice in 2021. To investigate the problem, the diocese alerted police authorities and according to a statement by the diocese, they purportedly made many attempts to reach and interview the victim.

The diocese had additional claims against Jaramillo. Jaramillo was accused of kissing a young boy in 1999. Jaramillo disputed the claim, and investigations conducted at the time by both the diocese and…

View Cache

A priest with the Diocese of Sacramento has been added to a list of clergy accused of child sex abuse and now authorities have a search warrant out for his arrest.

Roberto Jaramillo, 70, was added to the list of accused clergy this week. He served as a priest in multiple churches across the Sacramento and Roseville area between 1995 and 2005, according to the Diocese of Sacramento.

The churches he served in were Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish in downtown Sacramento, St. Rose Parish in Roseville, Immaculate Conception Parish in Oak Park and St. Rose Parish in south Sacramento.

Jaramillo has been accused of repeated sexual abuse and rape of a girl in the late 1990s, spanning from 1996 to 1999. The diocese was notified of the allegations by a third party in 2021.

They said they repeatedly tried to reach and interview the victim.

“The Diocese is cooperating…

View Cache

A bipartisan group of senators is introducing new legislation Thursday aimed at improving the way the FBI interacts with underage victims and witnesses in sex abuse and trafficking cases.

The Respect for Child Survivors Act is the latest effort by Congress to address the FBI’s failures in its handling of the Larry Nassar investigation.

The former USA Gymnastics doctor is serving decades in prison for abusing underage athletes over several years. The FBI knew about the allegations in 2015 but failed to act, allowing him to continue to prey on gymnasts and other minors for more than a year.

“It takes tremendous courage for young victims of sexual assault to tell their story and overcome the fear that they may not be taken seriously, may be ignored, or may be wrongfully blamed,” said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, one of the bill’s sponsors.

“To avoid re-traumatizing victims during the investigation…

View Cache

President Biden on Friday signed a bill that will eliminate the statute of limitations for people who were sexually abused as minors to file civil claims.

The Eliminating Limits to Justice for Child Sex Abuse Victims Act was passed by the House by voice vote on Tuesday after passing the Senate by unanimous consent in March.

The bill eliminates time constraints for survivors to file civil claims related to sex abuse crimes against minors, including forced labor, sex trafficking, sexual abuse and sexual exploitation of children.

Previously, minors who survived such abuse were able to file federal claims until they reached the age of 28 or until a decade after the violation or injury was discovered.

No federal statute of limitations was in place for criminal claims regarding child sex abuse.

The bill was initially introduced by Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and co-sponsored by Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), John Cornyn…

View Cache

A former minister at the Unitarian Church of Harrisburg was among five people arrested by Montgomery County officials after allegedly using social media to attempt to solicit sex from minors.

In a statement Friday, the president of the board of trustees for the Unitarian Church of Harrisburg confirmed that David Kohlmeier was a minister at the church and has since been relieved of his duties.

According to a Thursday release from the office of the Montgomery County district attorney, detectives affiliated with Pennsylvania Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) and members of the Montgomery County Detective Bureau developed a proactive effort to protect children by identifying and arresting people who use social media to arrange to meet and have sexual relations with minors.

Last week, the release from the district attorney’s office says, an undercover operation took place on multiple social media platforms, and during that operation, five suspects allegedly independently…

View Cache

Unitarian Universalist Church of Harrisburg minister David Kohlmeier, 46, of Devon, was one of five men arrested Monday on felony charges after they were allegedly caught trying to solicit sex from an undercover officer posing as a 14-year-old.

Police departments in Montgomery County, along with Homeland Security Investigations and the Pennsylvania Internet Crimes Against Children task force, discovered the suspects’ individual attempts to use social media platforms to contact minor children to have sexual relations with the children, according to a news release from the county district attorney’s office.

Each engaged in sexually explicit electronic communications with a person they believed was a minor child, and some of them also sent sexually explicit photos to the purported 14-year-old, according to the release. Each of the five defendants then appeared at an agreed-upon meeting location in Conshohocken with the intent of having sexual relations with the minor child, police said.

View Cache