ABUSE TRACKER

GROSSBRITANNIEN
Nachrichten

[A pedophile investigation has begun in Great Britain.]

In Großbritannien ist am Donnerstag nach erheblichen Startschwierigkeiten eine Untersuchung zu einem Skandal um Pädophilie-Fälle angelaufen, in den auch Politiker und Vertreter öffentlicher Institutionen verwickelt sein sollen. Nachdem das Verfahren bereits zwei Mal ins Stocken gekommen war, weil die beauftragten Juristen in den Verdacht der Befangenheit gerieten, beauftragte Innenministerin Theresa May die neuseeländische Richterin Lowell Goddard damit, die Vorgänge aus den 80er Jahren aufzuklären. Ihre Untersuchung biete Gelegenheit, institutionelle Fehler der Vergangenheit beim Schutz von Kindern aufzuzeigen, sagte Goddard.

“Der sexuelle Missbrauch von Kindern über mehrere Generationen hinterlässt dauerhafte Wunden, nicht nur bei den Opfern, sondern auch in der ganzen Gesellschaft”, sagte die neuseeländische Richterin zum Auftakt der Untersuchung. Nach vorläufigen Erkenntnissen müsse davon ausgegangen werden, dass in Großbritannien im Schnitt fünf Prozent der Kinder sexuellen Aggressionen ausgesetzt gewesen seien. Ihre Untersuchung werde voraussichtlich mehrere Jahre dauern.

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VATICAN CITY
Newsweek

By Felicity Capon 7/10/15

The criminal trial of a former papal diplomat on charges of child sexual abuse will get underway tomorrow in Rome, in a case that could set a historic precedent for how the Catholic church handles priests accused of sex abuse.

Polish-born Józef Wesołowski, 66, will face a criminal court of the Holy See, and will be the highest-ranking Vatican official ever to face criminal charges for paedophilia.

Wesołowski, ordained in 1972, later served as a papal diplomat in the late 1990s and 2000s. He was eventually named the nuncio, or ambassador, to the Dominican Republic in 2008. …

Some argue that the new tribunals set up by Pope Francis simply prove that the Vatican is attempting to handle the matter internally. David Clohessy, executive director of the US-based charity Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests, says: “Catholic officials across the world especially in Rome continue to be dreadfully secretive and irresponsible when it comes to clergy sex abuse and cover-up cases, and this one is no different. Church officials are doing everything to keep these cases as quiet as possible and as far away from secular authorities as they can.”

“We’re utterly not convinced,” Clohessy continues. “There’s a clear divide; either turn cases over to the independent unbiased professionals in law and enforcement or continue to handle them quietly and internally. That’s what happening here.” Clohessy also believes it is unlikely to emerge who helped Wesołowski conceal his crimes.

However, Gabrielle Shaw, chief executive officer of the UK’s National Association for People Abused in Childhood (NAPAC), believes the trial marks an important turning point in the Catholic church’s child abuse scandal.

“We think this is a good step forward for the Church facing up to child abuse in its own ranks,” she told Newsweek. “It is the first test of the new laws and guidelines Pope Francis has put in place for abuse of this type, and proof the Church is moving in the right direction. We’ll watch the outcome with great interest.”

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VATICAN CITY
Telegraph

By Nick Squires, Rome 10 Jul 2015

The former Vatican ambassador to the Dominican Republic will go on trial on Saturday in the Holy See charged with paying for sex with minors, in an unprecedented test of Pope Francis’s determination to tackle sex abuse by clergy.

Jozef Wesolowski, 66, from Poland, is accused of giving money to street children in exchange for sexual acts while serving as the Vatican’s nuncio, or ambassador, to the Caribbean country

“He seduced me with money,” a shoeshine boy who was 14 when he was abused by the archbishop, told The New York Times. “I felt very bad. I knew it wasn’t the right thing to do, but I needed the money.”

The landmark trial opens as Pope Francis conducts a three-country tour of his home continent of South America, visiting Bolivia, Ecuador and Paraguay.

It will take place in a Vatican tribunal inside the tiny city state, where Wesolowski faces charges of sexual abuse of minors and possession of child pornography on his computer. …

His trial is expected to conclude early next year.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The JC

July 10, 2015

A Jewish teacher and rabbi’s son who molested two teenage girls was “an utter hypocrite” who professed his Orthodox faith while “cynically condemning his victims to suffer”, a judge has said.
Todros Grynhaus, 50, was jailed for 13 years and two months on Friday.

He must pay one victim £45,000 and the other £35,000 in compensation as well as prosecution costs of £35,000.

Grynhaus had taught in Jewish schools in Britain and abroad before setting up a successful direct debit management business while filling a role as a respected figure within the Charedi community in Salford.

Sentencing him, Mr Justice Timothy Holroyde said: “This was a refined degree of cruelty on your part. You knew what you were doing and you knew what harm you would cause. You are an utter hypocrite. You professed your religion whilst cynically condemning your victims to suffer and giving false evidence seeking to cast blame on them.

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GEORGIA
Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A 78-year-old pastor was sentenced to 10 years behind bars for molesting two young girls at his church in Cobb County.

John Aubrey Pinkston, of Dallas, was found guilty on two counts of child molestation Thursday afternoon after the jury deliberated for only half an hour.

Two young girls testified that Pinkston touched them at Congregation of God Seventh Day, a Kennesaw church Pinkston founded and led. Pinkston admitted to police that he had touched one girl, saying it was a “stupid mistake” but that it lasted “only 15 seconds,” according to the Cobb County District Attorney’s Office.

“Not only did he not take responsibility, when he took the witness stand, he spit in everyone’s face with the nonsense that he used to try to manipulate that jury,” Cobb Assistant District Attorney Chuck Boring in a news release.

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UNITED KINGDOM
West Briton

THE FORMER communications chief for the Bishop of Truro has been jailed for seven years for abusing young boys in the 1950s and 1960s.

Jeremy Dowling, 77, of Church Path, Bude, admitted 15 counts of sexually abusing boys under the age of 13 while he was teacher at a boarding school in Cornwall.

The charges relate to offences against five young boys who were students at the school.

Truro Crown Court was told the victims were his “favourites” and he groomed them by giving them sweets and gifts.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

NCR Editorial Staff | Jul. 10, 2015
30 years later

EDITORIAL

It is inconceivable that any bishop would stand before a congregation and give them the following instructions:

If you commit a serious sin against the community, your first obligation is to conceal it.

If an accuser comes forward, deny the offense and condemn the accuser as someone who simply wants to besmirch your name.

If that doesn’t quiet the accuser, offer payment for the person’s silence.

If that fails, hire the best lawyers in town.

And if, finally, you have no escape, go to settlement and apologize to anyone who may have been hurt by your “mistakes.”

The scenario is unthinkable, but it is also descriptive of the very behavior that Catholics have witnessed among their leaders, with slight variations, for the past 30 years.

Those of us who have reported on the scandal for the past three decades, who have read through endless pages of horrific accounts and unfathomably slippery depositions, understand the descriptive exhaustion that Dominican Fr. Tom Doyle displays in his essay. There are no words left to adequately describe the level of deceit and corruption that existed in bishops’ residences and chancery offices across this land as thousands of priests, hidden and protected by bishops, abused tens of thousands of our children.

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OREGON
The Daily Beast

Nina Strochlic

This week, police alleged an Oregon priest either placed a camera in his church’s bathroom or covered for someone who did. He wouldn’t be the first religious leader to do so.

Attention churchgoers: your parish bathroom is no longer a respite from the tedium of mass or a place to seek refuge when you see the approaching embrace of your older aunt. In fact, it may be watching you.

Over the past few years, there has been a rash of hidden cameras found recording in church bathrooms across the country. In a creepy tale coming out of Oregon, a 34-year-old priest was caught in an elaborate ruse to prevent a 15-year-old parishioner from turning in the hidden camera he found in the bathroom to the police.

The unnamed boy had noticed a strange fixture next to the toilet and alerted Father Ysrael Bien. The priest assured the boy and his family that he had contacted the authorities, and they had launched an investigation.

When the boy’s father continued to check in for updates, the priest told him authorities had shut it down due to lack of evidence. But at further pestering from the family, Bien ultimately admitted that he had never reported the camera at all. He was afraid of “the consequences of losing the device,” he apparently told the father.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Telegraph

Lismore priest arrested 90 minutes before Crescent Head tribute over historic child sex allegations

ASHLEE MULLANY NEWS LIMITED JULY 11, 2015

A CATHOLIC priest based at a primary school and working part-time as a police chaplain is in custody after being charged with historic child sex offences.

Father John Patrick Casey was arrested 90 minutes before he was due to deliver a speech at a police ceremony for the 20th anniversary of the Crescent Head murders on Thursday.

Casey, a priest with the Lismore diocese, was arrested by Richmond detectives on Thursday morning following a five-month investigation into claims of sexual abuse.

The 67-year-old is accused of sexually assaulting two boys, aged nine and 11, while serving with the Lismore diocese in the 1980s.

NSW Police confirmed Casey was working as a chaplain with the force providing “spiritual welfare” and support to officers when he was arrested this week.

He was based at the church linked to the Mary Help of Christians Primary School in Sawtell, south of Coffs Harbour.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Washington Post

By Keith L. Alexander July 9

Barry Freundel, the once-influential Orthodox rabbi who was sentenced in May to 6 1/2 years in prison for videotaping dozens of women as they prepared for a ritual bath, will return to D.C. Superior Court on July 31 for a hearing after his attorney filed court documents arguing that his client was wrongly sentenced, which led to extra prison time.

Prosecutors have begun notifying the women about the hearing in front of Senior Judge Geoffrey M. Alprin, the same judge who oversaw the case.

Freundel’s attorney, Jeffrey Harris, argued in his motions with the court that Freundel should not have been sentenced 45 days for each of the 52 victims that he pleaded guilty to videotaping. Instead, Harris argued that Freundel should have been sentenced only for the single act of videotaping. Harris made the same argument at Freundel’s May 15 sentencing, though prosecutors and Alprin disagreed.

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ITALY
Catholic Culture

Catholic World News – July 09, 2015

A prosecutor in Rome has announced plans to halt the investigation into the death of Roberto Calvi in 1982.

Calvi, who had been the chairman of the Banco Ambrosiano, was found hanging from Blackfriar’s Bridge in London. Although his death was originally ruled a suicide, emerging evidence strongly suggested that Calvi had been murdered. An investigation prompted reports of Mafia involvement, likely connected with the loss of Mafia funds in the collapse of the bank that Calvi had managed.

The failure of the Banco Ambrosiano also led to sharp criticism of the Vatican. The Vatican bank, the Institute for Religious Works, had been heavily invested in the Banco Ambrosiano. Calvi’s ties to the Vatican had won him the nickname, “God’s banker.”

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AUSTRALIA
Broken Rites

A Catholic priest in northern New South Wales, John Patrick Casey, 67, appeared in court on 10 July 2015, charged with sexual offences, allegedly committed against two young boys in the 1980s. Casey has been denied bail. A magistrate said the charges are serious and could bring a custodial sentence if there is a conviction.

John Patrick Casey is a priest of the Lismore diocese, which covers the NSW north coast from Port Macquarie to the Queensland border. The city of Lismore is where the diocese has its headquarters.

John Patrick Casey is currently a priest for the “Mary Help of Christians” parish at Sawtell, near Coffs Harbour. (After he was charged, the diocese announced that Father Casey is standing down from this position.)

The police investigation was conducted by detectives from the NSW Police’s Richmond Local Area Command, which has headquarters in Lismore. The detectives were investigating information which had been received by Australia’s national child-abuse Royal Commission.

At 9.00am on 9 July 2015, John Patrick Casey was arrested by detectives and was taken to Kempsey Police Station where he was charged with nine offences. He was refused police bail and was placed behind bars.

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VATICAN CITY
Ukraine Today

Ex-Polish archbishop charged with paying for sex with minors

Catholics here in Warsaw are awaiting the Vatican’s first ever trial for sex abuse against a former archbishop from Poland. Jozef Wesolowski faces criminal charges of paying for sex with minors and possessing child pornography.

The trial begins this Saturday in the tiny-city state, the headquarters of the 1.2 billion-member Roman Catholic Church. A former long-term Vatican correspondent from Poland said the case shows the church’s approach to dealing with reports of paedophilia is changing.

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DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
Dominican Today

Santo Domingo (Acento.com.do).- For the first time in Catholic Church history, a prelate of the category of former ambassador will be tried in the Vatican state charged with sexually abusing children in the Dominican Republic.

Jozef Wesolowski, a confidant of John Paul II, was ambassador in Santo Domingo from 2008 to August 2013, when he was removed by Pope Francis after the journalist Nuria Piera denounced in her investigative program that the Vatican’s representative in Dominican Republic consumed alcohol and sexually abused children and adolescents.

The also journalist Addis Burgos in her program from Santiago accidentally uncovered that the then envoy also met with Polish priest Waldemar Wojciech Gil (who called himself Padre Alberto), pastor at Juncalito, and both sexually abused Dominican minors. Burgos interviewed a man in Juncalito who also revealed that “white man from the capital” who turned out to be Wesolowski, also accompanied Gil.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

23 June

On announcing the statutory Inquiry, the Home Secretary requested a moratorium on the destruction of material. On the 23 June 2015 the Inquiry sent out further guidance on the detail of what may or may not be destroyed across Government and by other agencies. These letters were sent to both the Cabinet Secretary and other relevant organisations setting out categories of documentation that must be kept pending further requests from the Inquiry. The letters are below:

Letter to Sir Jeremy Heywood

Letter to Religious Leaders

Letter to Police CCs

Letter to NHS CEOs

Letter to Local Authority CEOs

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UNITED KINGDOM
Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

9 July

The Inquiry has secured strong legal protection for whistleblowers. Following a process of discussion with the offices of the Attorney-General and the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Attorney-General gave an undertaking on 15 June 2015 that no document or evidence provided to the Inquiry will result in, or be used in, any prosecution under the Official Secrets Acts or any prosecution for unlawful possession of the evidence in question.

This undertaking provides the greatest possible protection for whistleblowers, consistent with the requirements of the public interest.

The full text of the Attorney-General’s undertaking is attached here.

Attorney-General Letter

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UNITED KINGDOM
Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

9 July

As part of her opening statement today the Chair announced the membership of the Victims and Survivors’ Consultative Panel (VSCP). Those appointed are:

Sheila Coates
Lucy Duckworth
Fay Maxted
Michael May
Peter McKelvie
Peter Saunders
Chris Tuck
Daniel Wolstencroft

Please see the attached statement from the VSCP.

Victims and Survivors’ Consultative Panel Collective Statement

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UNITED KINGDOM
Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

9 July

Today, the Chair of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, Hon. Lowell Goddard DNZM, officially opened the Inquiry at the Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre.

In her statement, the Chair set out the aims of the Inquiry, described its working methods and outlined its structure.

She confirmed that victims and survivors would be at the heart of the Inquiry. And she laid down the following challenge to those institutions that have a duty of care to protect children from sexual abuse:

“Take a proactive stance towards the Inquiry – review your files, records and procedures voluntarily and take the initiative to self-report instances of institutional failure, rather than waiting for us to come and see you. Above all, review your current safeguarding policies to make sure they are consistent with best practice, and take whatever steps you can to provide a safer environment for children now.”

The full text and summaries of the Chair’s opening statement are here:

Opening Statement

Executive Summary

Key Announcements

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BOLIVIA
Bloomberg

by Nathan Gill

Pope Francis asked for forgiveness for crimes committed by the Catholic Church during the colonization of the Americas at a summit in Bolivia, home to one of the region’s largest indigenous populations.

“I say with sorrow that the church has committed many serious sins against the indigenous peoples of America in the name of God,” Francis said to applause at a summit of popular movements in Santa Cruz, Bolivia on Thursday. “I humbly ask for forgiveness not only for the offenses of the church itself, but also for the crimes against native peoples during the so-called conquest of America.”

Pope Francis, on his second stop in a three-nation tour of Latin America, also defended the church and denounced the modern-day persecution of its members for speaking out against injustices and powerful interests.

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MISSOURI
The Raw Story

DAVID EDWARDS
09 JUL 2015

A former youth pastor was accused this week of sexually assaulting a girl over a five year period, beginning when she was 12 years old.

The St. Louis Dispatch reported that former Ballwin Baptist Church youth pastor Cameron Patterson, who also worked as an after school program supervisor for Wentzville School District, was charged on Wednesday in Lake Saint Louis with two counts of felony child molestation.

Court records indicated that Patterson had sexually assaulted the victims “hundreds of times” beginning at the age of 12 and continuing until she was 17 years old, The St. Louis Dispatch noted.

Patterson reportedly used email to apologize to the victim, court documents said.

He allegedly told her that he “wanted to seek professional counseling for his sins and to seek guidance from church officials and his parents.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Daily Beast

Nico Hines

Accused of raping and sexually assaulting three boys just hours after Britain’s largest inquiry into sexual abuse opens.

LONDON — A senior British police chief was charged with the rape and sexual assault of three boys Thursday, just hours after a massive public inquiry into child sex abuse was officially opened.

Gordon Anglesea, 78, a senior policeman in Wales for 34 years, is accused of abusing three boys between the ages of 11 and 16 in the late 1970s and ’80s.

His arrest comes after decades of systemic cover-ups that left thousands of children victimized. Lowell Goddard, the judge presiding over the long-awaited Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, said she had reason to believe that more than 1 in 20 British children were sexually abused while police and the authorities systematically downplayed the number of crimes reported to them. Britain’s police forces have only begun to properly investigate hundreds of cases of alleged child abuse in recent years.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Times

Sean O’Neill Chief Reporter
July 10 2015

The royal household will be asked to provide evidence to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, which began proceedings yesterday by stating that no powerful interest would be allowed to obstruct its investigations.

Justice Lowell Goddard, the New Zealand judge chairing the inquiry, initially left the royal household off her lengthy list of institutions — public and private — that would be examined over historical child sex abuse allegations.

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SCOTLAND
The National

TWO survivors have joined forces to found a new organisation to campaign for reparations for those who have been abused as children.

Andi Lavery and Chris Daly, both survivors of abuse as young boys, have established White Flowers Alba, which signifies the flourishing of hope and became a symbol of the Jacobite cause.

White roses were also worn by SNP MPs on the day of the Queen’s Speech in May.

White Flowers Alba joins the existing survivor groups In Care Abuse Survivors (Incas), and Former Boys and Girls Abused in Quarriers Homes. The organisation already has dozens of members and has secured legal representation from one of Scotland’s leading law firms, Beltrami & Company.

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VATICAN CITY
The Guardian

Stephanie Kirchgaessner in Rome
Friday 10 July 2015

The first high-ranking Vatican official to be charged with paedophilia will face a criminal court in the Holy See on Saturday, in an unprecedented test of Pope Francis’s commitment to tackling the church’s legacy of sexual violence against children.

The trial of the former nuncio Józef Wesołowski from Poland marks the first time that the church has used the criminal justice system put in place by the Argentinian pontiff to handle cases of alleged clerical wrongdoing.

Allegations that Wesołowski paid teenage boys for sexual acts while he was the Vatican’s top diplomat in the Dominican Republic rocked the Holy See when the story broke two years ago. Wearing a baseball cap low over his head, he allegedly trawled the promenade in Santo Domingo for victims among the shoeshine boys.

“He definitely seduced me with money,” Francis Aquino Aneury told the New York Times in 2014.

Aneury said he was 14 when a man the shoeshine boys used to call “the Italian”, because he spoke Spanish with an Italian accent, offered them large sums of money in exchange for sexual acts.

“I felt very bad. I knew it wasn’t the right thing to do, but I needed the money,” he said.

The outcome of the trial, and the way it is conducted, will either be seen as validation of the pope’s belief that the Vatican is capable of independently meting out justice against one of its own, or as confirmation of critics’ fears that the new tribunals will act as a church-sponsored shield to protect its hierarchy from other legal jurisdictions. …

Gabrielle Shaw, the chief executive of the National Association for People Abused in Childhood, a British charity whose founder, Peter Saunders, sits on the pope’s abuse commission, said the trial was welcome. “Generally we would like to see theses cases handled by law enforcement [in the countries where the alleged crimes occurred], but we need to give these new procedures a go,” she said. “If he is tried and found guilty and punished, it could mark a new beginning for how the Catholic church deals with this.”

Not every victim advocacy group shares that view. David Clohessy, the executive director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, believes the trial is a farce. “There are thousands of child-molesting priests, nuns, brothers, and yes, archbishops,” he said. “For the Vatican at this late stage to deem one of them guilty should not be considered earth-shattering by anyone.”

Clohessy said the trial was another “attempt to handle crimes quietly and internally”. Instead, Vatican officials should have raced to the Dominican Republic and publicly declared their concerns as soon as the rumours about Wesołowski emerged.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

The Catholic Church’s insurance company has been given a week to produce almost 2,000 files to the royal commission into child sexual abuse.

In February, Catholic Church Insurance (CCI) was issued with a subpoena to hand over documents about the Church’s response to child sexual abuse allegations.

CCI initially said it would take two months to produce them, but that deadline has well and truly passed, and today the royal commission held a special hearing to find out why.

The commission has heard CCI has gathered 1,960 files — some containing hundreds of pages — relating to more than 60 perpetrators the Church may have known had a propensity to offend.

But they have not yet been provided to the inquiry, and counsel assisting the royal commission, Gail Furness, said the delay was causing problems in the commission’s work.

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MAINE
Maine Public Radio

[with audio]

By PATTY WIGHT

PORTLAND, Maine – A defamation trial against a Freeport man who accused the founder of an orphanage in Haiti of sexually abusing children in his care is underway this week. The defendant, Paul Kendrick, took the stand in federal District Court in Portland Thursday.

Patty Wight was there and joins Maine Things Considered host Nora Flaherty with the latest details.

Nora Flaherty: Patty, first why don’t you tell us more on what this case is all about.

Patty Wight: This suit was brought by Michael Geilenfeld, who is the founder of an organization that provides a number of services to poor Haitian children, including an orphanage for boys. Another plaintiff is a nonprofit organization called Hearts with Haiti, which does fundraising for Geilenfeld’s organization.

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MAINE
Portland Press Herald

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

A Freeport man who was named in a defamation lawsuit after accusing the founder of a Haitian orphanage of child abuse defended himself in court on Thursday, saying he was trying to protect poor and vulnerable children.

Orphanage founder Michael Geilenfeld and Raleigh, North Carolina-based Hearts with Haiti brought the civil lawsuit against Paul Kendrick. Kendrick had accused Geilenfeld of molesting boys who were in his care.

Kendrick took the witness stand for the first time on Thursday, two days after lawyers gave opening statements.

Kendrick and his attorney say the trial will vindicate the boys’ accounts of sexual abuse, the Maine Public Broadcasting Network reported. Seven of the boys are expected to testify.

Geilenfeld filed his lawsuit in February 2013, alleging that Kendrick wrote repeatedly in emails and on a blog that Geilenfeld sexually abused boys at his orphanage in Haiti. Geilenfeld has denied the charges.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Catholic brother who taught at North Catholic faces sentencing in Australia for sexual assaults

July 10, 2015

By Peter Smith / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Before he arrived in Pittsburgh in 1986 for an 11-year teaching stint among unsuspecting youths, an American Roman Catholic religious brother left a trail of devastated young lives in Australia, a Melbourne court heard at a presentencing hearing this week following his sexual abuse conviction.

Victoria County Court heard victim-impact statements and other testimony Wednesday in the case of Brother Bernard Hartman, a member of the St. Louis-based Marianist Province of the United States.

He faces sentencing July 24 for his convictions this spring of sexually assaulting two girls and a boy during the 1970s and early 1980s, when he taught at a boy’s Catholic high school in suburban Melbourne. The boy was a student, and the girls were sisters of students.

“At the age of 50 I am unsure if I will ever gain what was taken from me in my childhood years,” Mairead Ashcroft of suburban Melbourne told the court.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Pirate FM

A Bude man who abused children for more than ten years is appearing in court to be sentenced.

Jeremy Dowling used to be a teacher before becoming press officer for the Diocese of Truro.

The 77 year old admitted the sex attacks on five youngsters and is due to be sentenced on Friday morning.

Dowling was charged with 15 counts of indecent assault.

It happened after five former pupils came forward to complain they were victims of sexual abuse.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Kent and Sussex Courier

A popular ex-teacher and assistant priest sexually assaulted two young boys who he bribed with cash, gifts and help with their homework, a court heard.

Chris Howarth, who is married, allegedly forced his victims to engage in a series of “weird” acts which included dirty talk, rubber shoes and a gas mask.

The court was told he abused the youths at his Uckfield home, at church, in his school office and in his caravan in return for payments of up to £100 a week between 2004 and 2012.

The 67-year-old is currently on trial charged with 20 counts of sexual activity involving the boys, who both attended Uckfield Community Technology College, where he taught subjects including maths, religious studies and languages – and was deputy head – for 38 years.

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MINNESOTA
Fox 9

by Paul Blume

ST. PAUL, Minn. (KMSP) –
A federal bankruptcy judge has ruled that Catholic churches in Minnesota do not have to play a video produced by a group of clergy abuse victims at Sunday mass. Attorneys representing clergy abuse victims had asked the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis to compel its 187 parishes to play the video this weekend.

“We don’t have the power to reach people in the pews,” attorney Jeff Anderson said.

The video encourages victims of abuse by priests to come forward before the fast-approaching Aug. 3 settlement deadline. They argued it was the best way to reach abuse victims still “hiding in the shadows.” The archdiocese said no, and on Thursday a federal judge agreed, ruling it was produced more as an advocacy piece than a true notification mechanism.

“The archdiocese being opposed to it is disturbing,” Anderson said. “It’s disgraceful and I fault them for not allowing for it to be played.”

“The video, personally to me, is a very touching and moving piece,” said Charlie Rodgers, an attorney for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. “And there is an appropriate place for it. I think the victim’s advocates will make sure it is widely disseminated where it should be disseminated. But perhaps it’s not proper to disseminate it in a Sunday mass.”

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AUSTRALIA
Wangaratta Chronicle

Jamie Kronborg
jkronborg@nemedia.com.au
July 10, 2015

THE appalling storm of child sexual abuse that gathered for decades – and has since publicly engulfed religious and other institutions in a $500 million Commonwealth royal commission – has not passed by the Anglican diocese of Wangaratta.

Bishop John Parkes – in a long interview with the Chronicle about the church, its standing and the challenges confronting it in contemporary society – has confirmed that sexual abuse took place.

He has apologised – saying “there can be no more hiding”.

He has also detailed the ways in which the church has moved strongly to abate risk – using codes of conduct and sophisticated mechanisms to screen clergy and other church workers.

These include psycho-sexual assessments of people seeking to become priests.

The bishop confirmed that decades ago a former rector had “viciously” abused a young person in one of the diocese’s smaller country parishes.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

A NSW Catholic priest and police chaplain denied bail over alleged child sex offences from 30 years ago was working at a primary school until his arrest yesterday.

John Patrick Casey faced the Port Macquarie Court this morning on nine offences.

They are alleged to have been committed against two brothers in the Lismore Diocese in 1985.

The diocese takes in the region from the Queensland border to Camden Haven, south of Port Macquarie.

More recently, the 67-year-old priest was based at the Mary Help of Christians Primary School in Sawtell until being taken into custody yesterday.

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MASSACHUSETTS
The New York Times

By JESS BIDGOOD

JULY 9, 2015

SCITUATE, Mass. — It was a bright Sunday morning at St. Frances Xavier Cabrini Church, and the building’s stained glass windows cast a jewel-colored glow over the service. An elegant 81-year-old woman led a few dozen congregants in Catholic prayer. A single flutist accompanied the hymns.

But there was no priest. The parishioners were not, in fact, supposed to be there. And there is nothing the Archdiocese of Boston would like more than for them to get out.

“We,” Jon Rogers, one of the organizers, said with some frustration, “are disobedient Catholics.”

The parishioners here gather every Sunday for acts of communion and epic resistance. The building is deconsecrated. The parish was, like dozens of others in the region, slated to close in 2004, but some of its members, who call themselves Friends of St. Frances X. Cabrini, have kept it open by keeping at least one member inside the church at all times — a dogged effort called a vigil.

Wielding baked goods, detailed sign-up sheets and fierce devotion, they have frustrated the powerful Archdiocese of Boston, of which they are a part, and officials there have taken their own parishioners to court to get them out. In the coming months, the two parties will meet again in court for the parishioners’ appeal. The petitioners filed their brief in a Massachusetts appeals court this week.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Examiner

A CATHOLIC priest and police chaplain from the Lismore Diocese, which includes Grafton, has been denied bail in the Port Macquarie Court this morning.

John Patrick Casey was charged with historical child sex offences, allegedly committed against two brothers aged nine and 11 in 1985.

Until yesterday, the 67-year-old priest was based at the Mary Help of Christians Primary School in Sawtell.

The ABC reported that in the courtroom, Casey’s lawyer argued he should be granted bail because he had no prior convictions and was not a flight risk.

But the Magistrate refused bail.

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AUSTRALIA
Coffs Coast Advocate

THE parish priest at Sawtell’s Mary Help of Christians is facing a range of historic child sex assault charges.

Father John Casey, 67, is facing charges from incidents which allegedly occurred in the Lismore Diocese in the 1980s.

Fr Casey was refused bail in Port Macquarie Local Court today this morning after being charged with five counts of a sexual assault on a person under 16-years-old, four counts of sexual assault and committing an act of indecency.

Bishop of Lismore, Reverend Geoffrey Jarrett, said Fr Casey has been stood down from his position, effective immediately.

The priest, who is also a part-time police chaplain, was arrested at 9am on Thursday and was taken to Kempsey Police Station.

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MINNESOTA
Northlands News Center

[with video]

By Eden Checkol

July 9, 2015

Duluth, MN (NNCNOW.com) — Seven priests have been “credibly accused” of sexually abusing children, and five of those priests served in Duluth for a portion of their priesthood.

Attorney Jeff Anderson, who represents sex-abuse survivors, released the names of the seven priests Tuesday, after a settlement was reached between a man identified as Doe 30 and the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, a Catholic order of priests and brothers.
.
The names of the priests are: Orville Lawrence Munie, Michael Charland, James Vincent Fitzgerald, Robert Reitmeier, Emil Twardochleb, Paul Kabat and Thomas Meyer.

A lawsuit Doe 30 filed against Fitzgerald led to the release of the six other names.

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Statement by Verne Wagner, Duluth SNAP director

We belong to a support group called the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP). We’re here to discuss the newly-outed five predator priests who have worked in Duluth. We’re here to warn parents and the public about the two of them who are still alive. And we’re here today to prod Duluth Catholic officials to find some courage, do what’s right, disclose more information and take real steps – not cosmetic ones, not superficial ones – to protect kids.

Let’s start with the obvious, the simple and the pressing: One of these clerics, Fr. Charland, is a psychologist in the Twin Cities. Other than being a priest, could there possibly be a more dangerous job for a child molester to have?

[Minnesota Public Radio]

Why isn’t there an alert on every Catholic website in Minnesota, saying “WARNING – a credibly accused child molester is now working as a therapist! Please don’t let your children near him!”

Facing legal pressure, Catholic officials have reluctantly but publicly put Fr. Charland’s name on a list of publicly and credibly accused abusers. They obviously admit he’s dangerous. But they refuse to take even a quick, cheap, simple step to keep kids away from him. Shame on them.

We beg every single Catholic lay person and staff person in the Duluth diocese to contact Bishop Sirba and urge him to warn families about Fr. Charland. He could literally be molesting a girl in his office this afternoon or a boy in his neighborhood this evening. Bishop: Stop splitting hairs and making excuses and claiming ignorance. Start taking action to prevent more devastating child sex crimes.

We have a few other requests today.
We beg who was hurt by any these priests to speak up and get help.
We beg them to call secular authorities, not church officials.
We beg them to call independent sources of help, like our support group.
We beg former Catholic employees in Duluth and across Minnesota to “come clean” with information or suspicions about these priests.
We beg these ex-employees to call police and prosecutors.

Current Catholic officials in Duluth and across Minnesota, we beg them to “come clean” with more information about the priests and to use their vast resources to aggressively seek out their victims.

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AUSTRALIA
New South Wales Police Force

Police Chaplain charged with historical child sex offences – Northern Region

Thursday, 09 July 2015

Catholic priest has been charged following alleged historical child sex offences in the Northern Rivers region of NSW.

In February 2015, Richmond Detectives commenced investigations into allegations against a priest, who is also a part-time police chaplain.

It is alleged the offences took place in the Lismore Diocese in the 1980s.

The investigation has been referenced at the Royal Commission.

At 9am today (Thursday 9 July 2015), detectives arrested the priest; he was taken to Kempsey Police Station and charged with nine offences.

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AUSTRALIA
Northern Star

A CATHOLIC priest working as a police chaplain will face court today over child sex offences alleged to have happened when he was working in the Lismore diocese in the 1980s.

In a statement, NSW Police say detectives from the Richmond Local Area Command have been investigating the priest since February after evidence raised in the Royal Commission into Institutional Child Sexual Abuse.

The commission is ongoing and is still accepting submissions from victims who were abused as children at or via institutions such as churches, schools, or sports clubs.

Detectives arrested the former Lismore priest on Thursday and charged him with nine offences at the Kempsey Police Station.

He was refused bail and will appear before Kempsey Local Court today (Friday July 10, 2015).

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MINNESOTA
The Legal Examiner

Posted by Mike Bryant
July 9, 2015

The Diocese of Duluth has had one list disclosure. I have looked at the list here:

The Diocese of Duluth Release Their List of 17 Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

There have also been other lists from other parts of the state.

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Adds 17 to List of Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

Diocese of Winona Release Their List of 14 Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Release Their List of 34 Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Release 9 More Names

St. John’s Abbey Release Their List of 18 Monks and Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

The Diocese of Crookston Release Their List of 6 Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors Mike Bryant | Jan 27, 2014.

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MINNESOTA
Pioneer Press

By Elizabeth Mohr
emohr@pioneerpress.com
POSTED: 07/09/2015

It’s not the job of the court to encourage claims against the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis for clergy sexual abuse, so it won’t require the church to promote a video doing that, a federal bankruptcy judge said Thursday.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Kressel said that he already established guidelines to notify people about the deadline to file claims with the court, but that a video produced by the committee of unsecured creditors — composed primarily of victims — goes beyond the purview of the bankruptcy court and skids into advocacy.

The committee had asked Kressel, who is overseeing the archdiocese’s bankruptcy case, to compel the archdiocese to promote the video, which features three victims who urge other victims to come forward.

The committee said the video, which it asked to be shown during Mass this weekend, was aimed at notifying more people of the impending Aug. 3 deadline to file claims against the church.

Attorneys for the archdiocese and its parishes objected to the request, saying the committee was asking the court to become an advocate and to go beyond its own notification order, which should be sufficient. Church representatives also argued that asking parishes to promote or show the video during Mass raised concerns about the court injecting its power into religious ceremonies.

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MINNESOTA
Minnesota Public Radio

Martin Moylan Jul 9, 2015

A federal bankruptcy judge on Thursday rejected efforts to have a video about clergy sex abuse played in parishes throughout the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Victim advocates and attorneys argued that playing the video would help alert abuse survivors of an Aug. 3 deadline for filing claims against the archdiocese.

But while the video is moving, it is aimed at people who already know about the deadline but can’t decide if they want to file a claim, Judge Robert Kressel said. That goes beyond simply giving people notice of the deadline and amounts to advocacy that is outside the creditors’ committee’s purview, he added.

Church leaders are not legally responsible for encouraging claims, archdiocese attorney Charlie Rogers said. “We’re not to be advocates. We’re not to be psychiatrists. We’re not to be counselors. But we’re to provide notice.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
Sky News

By Tom Parmenter, Sky News Correspondent

Despite promises that the Goddard Inquiry into child sexual abuse will cause no further harm, survivor Esther Baker has spoken of her fears that the process may compound some people’s suffering.

Ms Baker spoke exclusively to Sky News in May, alleging that she suffered sexual abuse throughout her childhood and was raped by VIPs in Staffordshire in the 80s and 90s – occasionally she said uniformed police officers stood guard.

Her allegations are now part of an active police investigation.

The inquiry has now formally opened with its chair, New Zealand judge Lowell Goddard, outlining the guiding principles that will shape it.

Ms Baker was one of the survivors who was involved in the early stages of the inquiry but she has since withdrawn after becoming disillusioned with the process.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Independent

TOM BROOKS-POLLOCK Thursday 09 July 2015

Almost exactly a year ago, home secretary Theresa May announced the creation of an independent panel to look into allegations of historical sexual abuse.

It will look at claims of abuse – some against high-profile figures – and its alleged cover-up by councils, the courts, schools, the church, the BBC and the Army, by assessing whether these institutions failed in their duty of care to protect children.

On Thursday, the inquiry finally opens, chaired by Justice Lowell Goddard, a judge from New Zealand. But the inquiry has been an almost constant headache for Mrs May.

Two proposed chairs – Baroness Butler-Sloss and Fiona Woolf – stood down amid criticism that there were too close to the Establishment, and the process has been beset by delays and wrangling over the terms of reference.

Opening the inquiry in London on Thursday, Justice Goddard said: “We want to hear from any individuals who were sexually abused as children in an institutional setting such as a care home, school or religious institution, anyone who reported abuse to a person in authority such as a police officer, social worker or teacher where the abuse was ignored or not properly acted upon.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Sandra Laville and Owen Bowcott
Thursday 9 July 2015

Thousands of victims of child sexual abuse are being invited to testify across the country in a truth project set up as part of the biggest public inquiry into criminality and corruption by public and private institutions in England and Wales.

Justice Lowell Goddard, the New Zealand judge appointed to run the long-awaited independent inquiry into child abuse within state and non-state institutions, vowed that no individual or institution however powerful would be able to obstruct her investigations.

The monarchy, government, politicians, church leaders, schools, hospitals and the media would all be examined, she said. Insurance companies which deny victims the truth to prevent compensation payouts, and internet providers who fail to tackle online abuse, will also be investigated.

While the inquiry – which has a budget of £17.9m from the Home Office for the coming year – would not be able to convict people or punish them, Goddard said it would not shrink from naming individuals who have abused children and the institutions which allowed it to happen.

“The naming of people that have been responsible for the sexual abuse of children or institutions that have been at fault in failing to protect children from abuse, is a core aspect of the inquiry’s function,” she said.

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UNITED KINGDOM
RTE News

Britain’s largest ever public inquiry will travel from the “corridors of power” in Westminster to the poorest parts of the country to uncover the true scale of child sex abuse, its chairwoman has vowed.

Judge Lowell Goddard issued a stark warning to individuals and institutions that they will face scrutiny, “no matter how apparently powerful”.

She said both victims and society had been left “scarred” by historic abuse and referred to estimates suggesting that one in 20 children in the UK has fallen victim as evidence of the “sheer scale” of the problem.

Finally opening the troubled inquiry, the judge stressed it will not hesitate to make findings relating to named people and organisations.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Josh Halliday
Thursday 9 July 2015

Child sexual abuse charities have slammed a £2m Home Office fund, set up as part of Justice Lowell Goddard’s inquiry, labelling it a “stitch-up” that has left dozens of support groups facing closure.

The sexual abuse victim support fund was announced by Theresa May to help struggling charities cope with the huge number of victims coming forward to give evidence to Britain’s biggest ever public inquiry, which began on Thursday.

Money from the £2m fund went to 34 charities with scores missing out and £170,148 – the second biggest single award – going to the charity Missing People, which has recently launched a helpline for sexual exploitation victims but does not specialise in helping child abuse survivors.

“That was a scandal. I’m furious about it. That was our lifeline and now we’re all in crisis,” said Gillian Finch, founder of the Hampshire-based charity Cisters, which offers counselling to women who have been sexually abused by a member of their family in childhood.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Christian Science Monitor

By Denise Hassanzade Ajiri, Staff writer JULY 9, 2015

Britain has launched a potentially years-long investigation into decades of alleged abuse in Britain’s schools, hospitals, and other institutions.

The independent inquiry will be spearheaded by New Zealand High Court Judge Lowell Goddard, who was brought in to chair the investigatory panel after previous chairs resigned due to potential conflicts of interest, the BBC reports.

The sweeping investigation could last until 2020, Justice Goddard said on Thursday, adding that the scope of the crimes could be much broader than is currently understood. One estimate, referenced by Goddard, suggests that as many as one in 20 children have endured some level of sexual abuse.

“No one, no matter how apparently powerful, will be allowed to obstruct our inquiries,” Godard said Thursday. “No one will be immune from scrutiny by virtue of their position.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Independent

Child sex abuse inquiry will be biggest ever established in England and Wales, says judge in charge

CAHAL MILMO Thursday 09 July 2015

The judge in charge of the public inquiry into child sex abuse vowed that “no-one, no matter how powerful” will be allowed avoid its scrutiny as it emerged that the wide-ranging investigation could take as long as a decade to complete.

Justice Lowell Goddard, the New Zealand judge brought in to head the inquiry after her two predecessors resigned over concerns about their links to the Establishment, said it would be the “largest and most ambitious” public inquiry ever established in England and Wales. Its scope would stretch across five key areas of society from “the corridors of power in Westminster to children’s homes in the poorest parts of the country”, the judge said.

Speaking at the formal opening of the inquiry in central London, Justice Goddard said she would name individuals and institutions who were found to have been involved in or covered up the sexual abuse of children after concern from victims that highly-placed perpetrators of abuse or institutions would escape being held to account. Among the organisations the judge said could expect to be scrutinised were Internet Service Providers over the distribution of online child abuse imagery and insurance companies, who must answer claims that they historically obstructed admissions of liability in abuse cases.

The inquiry was announced last year by Home Secretary Theresa May following the unveiling of evidence of a high-level cover-up of historical abuse by public figures, including Westminster politicians. Its remit is to look specifically at public and private institutions and whether they responded correctly to allegations of sexual abuse – as well as those responsible for that abuse – rather than cases that occurred solely within families.

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LATIN AMERICA
Truthdig

By Roisin Davis

Pope Francis this week embarked on a seven-day “homecoming” tour of Latin America on his unstoppable quest to defend the planet and the poor.

The continent—the most unequal region in the world, and the Argentine pontiff’s home turf—will likely provide fertile ground for more of his legendary sermons on poverty and inequality. After addressing a crowd of a million in Guayaquil, Ecuador, on Monday, Francis is scheduled to attend a meeting of grass-roots political activists and visit one of the continent’s largest prisons, in Bolivia, as well as a slum and a children’s hospital in Paraguay.

While he advocates for South America’s impoverished and disenfranchised, its prisoners, its indigenous peoples and its children, one group is unlikely to feature in Francis’ apparently radical agenda: its women.

Despite his efforts to champion his constituency—the world’s poor, of which the vast majority are women—the pope tends to overlook the feminized nature of poverty and inequality. …

Research shows that when women have access to contraception and are educated to make responsible choices, their income, employment and education levels rise, as do their children’s. As women’s choices expand, they have fewer unassisted labors and backstreet abortions, meaning maternal mortality is reduced, and, depending on the type of contraception used, life-limiting sexually transmitted diseases are contained.

But because the Vatican considers women second-class citizens, it goes without saying that the pope will not mention abortion or contraception during his South American tour.

Figures show that of the 4.4 million abortions performed in Latin America in 2008, 95 percent were unsafe, and about 1 million women are hospitalized annually for treatment of complications from such procedures. In this context, it should be noted that the pope has described the abortion-rights movement as a “culture of death” and has opposed Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner’s efforts to distribute free contraceptives.

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MISSOURI
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Thursday, July 9

For more information:

David Clohessy (314-566-9790 cell, SNAPclohessy@aol.com), Barbara Dorris (314-503-0003 cell, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org), Barbara Blaine (312-399-4747, bblaine@snapnetwork.org)

Three predator priests “outed” for first time
All worked in the Springfield Catholic diocese
They’re “credibly accused child molesters,” church admits
Long secret records about them were just released this week
More hidden documents will be disclosed in the months ahead
Two of them were in St. Louis area as recently as three & six years ago

Three Catholic priests who worked in the Springfield-Cape Girardeau Catholic diocese have been publicly identified for the first time as “credibly accused” child molesters and a victims group wants local church officials to “aggressively seek out and help” others who have been hurt by them.

[News-Democrat]

They are Fr. Thomas Meyer, Fr. James Vincent Fitzgerald and Fr. Michael Charland.

“It’s very likely others who were hurt by these priests are still suffering in shame, silence and self-blame,” said David Clohessy of St. Louis. A Drury University graduate, he heads an international support group called the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “Springfield’s bishop, other clerics and lay Catholics should do everything possible to find and console these wounded victims.”

According to the Official Catholic Directory, from 1998 to 1999, Fr. Meyer was pastor at St. Leo the Great Parish/IHM Parish in Mansfield. In 1987, Fr. Fitzgerald was pastor at St. William’s parish in Gainesville. From 1959-63, Fr. Charland attended seminary at Our Lady of the Ozarks in Carthage.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Jason Berry | Jul. 9, 2015
30 years ago

Editor’s note: This story is part of a weeklong series dedicated to looking back on 30 years of the abuse crisis in the Catholic church. Read all parts of the series.

The reports I did on clergy child molesters in the Lafayette, La., diocese changed my life in ways that reverberate still.

The June 7, 1985, NCR, with my long report on Fr. Gilbert Gauthe’s sex crimes, Arthur Jones’ piece on cases elsewhere, and NCR’s editorial calling for lay review boards, laid the issue before a national media that held back for years.

My piece condensed three articles I had done for the Times of Acadiana, an alternative weekly in Lafayette, the hub city of the regional oil industry (population 90,000). Editor Linda Matys, whom I had known in New Orleans, had given me a special assignment; it didn’t pay enough for the looming time investment.

I was aware of NCR but had never seen an issue when I called Editor Tom Fox, explaining the availability of documents from proceedings underway. He agreed to a joint assignment, which made the work financially feasible, barely. I had hit a brick wall with pitches to The New York Times Magazine, Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone and The Nation.

Laudato-Si_web.jpg Check out A Readers’ Guide to Laudato Si’, a free resource from NCR.
As a freelancer, I had been writing about oil waste dumping in Cajun country and was about to publish my second book, Up From the Cradle of Jazz, a history of New Orleans popular music. I was 35.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Channel 4

Opening the long-awaited inquiry into child sexual abuse, Judge Lowell Goddard pledges that “no matter how powerful”, no-one will be allowed to obstruct inquiries.

Admitting that the task ahead was “daunting”, Justice Goddard pledged that the inquiry panel would travel “from the corridors of Westminster to the poorest children’s homes in the country” to investigate historic abuse.

Promising to bring forward recommendations for future best practise, Justice Goddard said the inquiry would report “as soon as possible”, but acknowledged that its broad scope meant the inquiry would take time.

The inquiry will also investigate local authorities, the police, the crown prosecution service, the NHS, the media and the armed forces, and Justice Goddard vowed that “no-one, no matter how powerful, will be allowed to obstruct our inquiries into institutional failings” adding that “no-one will have immunity from scrutiny by virtue of their position.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
International Business Times

By Ewan Palmer
July 9, 2015

The government’s inquiry into historic child abuse has promised to investigate everywhere from the “corridors of power in Westminster” to children’s homes in the poorest parts of the country after it finally launched following an uneasy start.

Chair Justice Lowell Goddard said the “largest and most ambitious” inquiry Britain has ever seen has promised no one will be allowed to obstruct the investigation into child abuse and promised to name all individuals alleged to have been involved.

The inquiry has formally been opened just over a year after it was announced by home secretary Theresa May following a stuttering start due to the resignation of two previous chairs over concerns about their links to the establishment.

Goddard said as well as looking into allegations of a cover-up of a paedophile ring at Westminster, the inquiry will also look at religious organisation, schools and other education organisations, the police at other institutions such as the NHS and the BBC.

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AUSTRALIA
Broken Rites

By a Broken Rites researcher (article updated 8 July 2015)

In 2015, an American Catholic Brother (Brother Bernard Hartman, 75) has been convicted in Australia for committing a series of sexual crimes against Australian children while he worked at a Melbourne school more than 30 years ago. He is believed to be the first Catholic clergy member extradited from the United States to face court in Australia. In July 2015 he is in court in Melbourne for pre-sentence proceedings.

Brother Hartman, born in the United States, is a member of an international Catholic religious order known as the Marianist brothers and priests. He worked in Australian schools in the 1970s and early 1980s.

In court in Australia he was charged with sexual assaults on two boys and two girls while he was working at St Paul’s College in Altona, a suburb in Melbourne’s west. (This was then a boys’ school, operated by the Marianist religious order, but now has become one of the campuses of the Catholic Church’s co-educational Emmanuel College.)

The attacks, on victims aged between six and 16, occurred between 1976 and 1982 when Brother Hartman worked at the school. The court was told that the alleged assaults occurred both at the school and at the victims’ homes.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has published the written submissions into the Satyananda Yoga Ashram public hearing on its website.

The public hearing inquired into the response of the Satyananda Yoga Ashram located at Mangrove Mountain, New South Wales, to allegations of child sexual abuse by the Ashram’s former spiritual leader in the 1970s and 1980s.

The submissions can be found on the Case Study 21 page on the Royal Commission’s website.

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UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

Labour MP Tom Watson has warned that an independent inquiry opening today will have to deal with an “epidemic” of historical child sex abuse.

Watson, who first called for investigations into an alleged Westminster paedophile ring in 2012, said the inquiry must “meticulously” investigate “failures” that contributed to the alleged abuse – not just in public services and child protection systems but also other institutions.

The inquiry will open today in Westminster, with chair Justice Lowell Goddard outlining how evidence will be taken, timescales and areas of public life that will be examined.

Victims’ representatives have complained about delays to the launch of the inquiry, which followed the resignations of two previous chairs, Baroness Butler-Sloss and Fiona Woolf.

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UNITED KINGDOM
South Yorkshire Times

The woman who blew the lid on the child sexual exploitation scandal in Rotherham is to begin working on a national inquiry into historical child abuse today.

Professor Alexis Jay, who published a report which revealed that 1,400 children had been groomed and abused by largely Asian men in Rotherham while authorities turned a blind eye, is on a panel of experts set up last year amid claims of an establishment cover-up following allegations that a paedophile ring operated in Westminster in the 1980s.

Led by Judge Lowell Goddard, the inquiry has the power to compel witnesses to give evidence.

The inquiry’s terms of reference state that its purpose will include considering ‘the extent to which State and non-State institutions have failed in their duty of care to protect children from sexual abuse and exploitation’.

It will cover England and Wales.

Today Justice Goddard will outline how the inquiry will run, how evidence will be taken, timescales and areas of public life that will be examined.

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UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

[with video]

The chair of a major independent inquiry into historical child sexual abuse has warned of the “daunting” task ahead as it was officially opened.

Judge Lowell Goddard said the abuse of children had left “scars” on society as well as the victims.

The inquiry – which was set up last year amid claims of an establishment cover-up – has been beset by controversies and delays, including the resignation of two previous chairs.
The abuse of children has left “permanent scars on the victims and on society,” Justice Lowell Goddard said as she opened the independent inquiry into the matter.

The high court judge said “no one, no matter how powerful” they were would obstruct her investigation.

She added: “No one will have immunity from scrutiny by virtue of their position.

“The task ahead of us is daunting. We must difficult questions to politicians, faith leaders, headteachers, police officers and public officials of all kinds, and we will carry on putting those questions until we get the answers.”

Goddard also said:

* The inquiry will focus on England and Wales and further afield if relevant

* All victims will be anonymised and not made to feel like they are on trial

* A victim advisory board has been appointed to provide specialist advice

* Immunity from prosecution will be offered to ex-public servants who testify but not if they admit taking part in child abuse

* The inquiry is expected to last five years but has “no cut off” and regular reports and recommendations on its findings will be published

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UNITED KINGDOM
Sky News

By Tom Parmenter, Sky News Correspondent

A year and two days after it was announced, the inquiry into child sexual abuse in England and Wales has formally opened.

Inquiry chair Judge Lowell Goddard said the abuse has left “permanent scars” not only on the victims but society as a whole.

She said the inquiry “provides a unique opportunity to expose past failures of institutions to protect children”.

But she warned: “The task ahead of us is daunting.”

Justice Goddard told the inquiry there were suggestions that “one child in every 20 children in England and Wales has been sexually abused”.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Sky News

As the long-awaited child sex abuse inquiry officially opens, Sky News asked people with a close interest in the process to tell us what they want it to achieve.

Siobhan Pyburn – Abuse survivor and founder of Young Survivor Network

I feel that the inquiry needs to focus on practical solutions rather than theoretical considerations, as all we seem to have right now are ‘guidelines’ and ‘protocols’ which don’t actually need to be followed by organisations that work with children as a matter of legal obligation.

Sadly, recent scandals have demonstrated that colleagues of perpetrators are not above turning the blind eye to protect their own interests; the bottom line is, no one seems to want to face the scale and severity of the problem.

As a brand new organisation, we’ve been struggling both to secure funding and reach out to young survivors for whom the experience is relatively recent.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Sandra Laville
Thursday 9 July 2015

The long-awaited independent inquiry into child sexual abuse opens on Thursday in London amid renewed warnings to the cabinet secretary, religious leaders and public bodies not to shred documents which might be needed in evidence.

Justice Lowell Goddard, the New Zealand judge recruited as chair after two previous appointees resigned over their apparent links to the establishment, will open proceedings with an hour-long statement outlining the work ahead. She has written to Sir Jeremy Heywood, the head of the civil service and cabinet secretary, warning that there must be no “premature destruction of files or records that later become required as evidence”.

Goddard has issued similar warnings to religious leaders, chief constables, the NHS and local authority leaders and listed the types of documents she will be seeking as the inquiry continues.

These include reports, reviews, briefings, minutes and notes of correspondence relating to allegations about individuals, institutions, organisations and public bodies who may have been involved in or had knowledge of child sexual abuse.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Owen Bowcott
@owenbowcott
Thursday 9 July 2015

Justice Lowell Goddard’s child sex abuse inquiry will name individuals and organisations it concludes were involved in abuse, and pass on allegations for police to investigate.

It intends to search for patterns in the repeated failures that allowed serial offenders to exploit organisations working with children and will look at five key areas, including allegations of abuse by prominent people in public life.

At the opening of the hearing on Thursday, Goddard said she would also look at:

• Faith and religious organisations.

• The criminal justice system.

• Local authorities – including children’s services and children’s homes.

• National institutions such as the NHS and Ministry of Defence, including abuse of 16- and 17-year-olds in the armed forces.

Speaking at the beginning of the inquiry, Goddard said: “The task ahead of us is daunting. The sexual abuse of children over successive generations has left permanent scars not only on the victims themselves but on society as a whole.

“This inquiry provides a unique opportunity to expose past failures of institutions to protect children, to confront those responsible, to uncover systemic failures, to provide support to victims and survivors in sharing their experiences and to make recommendations that will help prevent the sexual abuse and exploitation of children in the future.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Telegraph

By David Barrett, Home Affairs Correspondent
09 Jul 2015

The sexual abuse of children has left “scars” on victims and society, the chair of the long-awaited independent inquiry into historical abuse has said.

Judge Lowell Goddard, formally opening the probe, said the inquiry “provides an opportunity to expose past failures of institutions to protect children”.

She added: “The task ahead of us is daunting.”

The inquiry was set up last year amid claims of an establishment cover-up following allegations that a paedophile ring operated in Westminster in the 1980s.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

One in 20 children may have been victims of abuse says chairman of abuse inquiry as she opens probe which will take five years

By RICHARD SPILLETT FOR MAILONLINE

The chair of the inquiry into child abuse has revealed fears that as many as one in 20 children in England and Wales may have been victims.

Judge Lowell Goddard gave a statement this morning as she launched the inquiry into the role of authorities in aiding or failing to tackle child abuse.

She said there were indications of systematic ‘under-recording and mis-recording’ of child sex abuse by the police and other agencies.

The New Zealand high court judge warned: ‘The true figures may be worse than the official figures estimate.’

The independent inquiry was set up last year amid claims of an establishment cover-up following allegations that a paedophile ring operated in Westminster in the 1980s.

But after a year of delays it was opened today and is expected to take up to five years to complete.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Salon

LONDON (AP) — A judge says Britain has been stunned by revelations about child sexual abuse, and the true scale of the crime may be worse than official estimates that one in 20 children has been a victim.

Justice Lowell Goddard opened a public inquiry into decades of abuse on Thursday, vowing that “no one, no matter how apparently powerful, will be allowed to obstruct our inquiries.”

In the past few years revelations of abuse have implicated everyone from taxi drivers to entertainers, clergy and senior politicians. There have been claims that police failed to investigate allegations of abuse for decades.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Today

Czarina Ong

09 July 2015

The Mennonite Church USA has bravely confronted its history of sexual abuse and offered apologies to victims whose wounds it failed to heal.

During its biennial convention, which culminated on Sunday, Mennonites offered a service of lament and a statement of confession regarding sexual abuse, according to Christian Headlines. And although his name was never mentioned, majority of them knew that they were addressing the sexual violations allegedly committed by one their most prominent members—the late theologian John Howard Yoder.

Yoder was known as one of the greatest theologians of the 20th century. Many of his books including “The Politics of Jesus,” which was first published back in 1972, are still being circulated today. However, the church leader allegedly used his status to prey on women—most of which were his students.

The sexual abuse raps started during the mid 70s, when Yoder suggested that Mennonites develop a new sexual ethic—one that allows intimate physical contact as an expression of non-erotic love among Christians. He sought the help of female students to demonstrate this ethic. There were some who declined his advances, but others allowed it.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

A Catholic priest and part-time police chaplain has been charged with historical child sex offences in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales.

In February, police began an investigation into allegations against the Catholic priest, who is also a part-time police chaplain.

It is alleged the offences took place in the Lismore Diocese in the 1980s.

Police said the investigation was referenced at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Mail

EXCLUSIVE: ‘That man was hand-picked by God!’ What a six-year-old girl was told by a nun when she tried to report sexual abuse by a priest during CONFESSION

By EMILY CRANE FOR DAILY MAIL AUSTRALIA

A woman who allegedly suffered horrific sexual abuse by a Catholic priest when she was just six years old has finally broken her silence after almost 50 years.

Gina Swannell claims she was abused several times over a six month period by Father Charles Holdsworth when she was a student at St Francis Xavier’s boarding school at Urana, in south-west NSW, in 1966.

For decades she kept the abuse secret as her life spiraled out of control, but now the 55-year-old is suing the Catholic Diocese of Wagga Wagga, which oversees the church, and the Presentation Sisters who ran the school at the time.

Ms Swannell was placed into the St Francis Xavier boarding school with her elder sister Kerrie in 1966 when their mother Patricia was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and told she had six months to live.

The alleged abuse started shortly after when Ms Swannell, who was only six years old at the time, was required to attend confession with Fr Holdsworth to prepare for her First Holy Communion.

‘I was told to go into the confessional box and tell him the things I had done wrong,’ Ms Swannell told Daily Mail Australia.

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AUSTRALIA
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Perth

Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB, the Catholic Archbishop of Perth, will launch a Safeguarding Project at the 11.00am Mass at St Mary’s Cathedral in Perth today, Sunday 05 July as a bold response to protect children and prevent further abuse. This is the first diocesan project of its kind to be established in the 28 dioceses of Australia’s Catholic Church.

“Child sexual abuse is a terrible problem,” said Archbishop Costelloe, “and it simply has to be dealt with.

“I believe there will be some very specific recommendations that will come out of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. But while we wait for these, we shouldn’t just sit back and do nothing. Children need to be protected today.

“The Safeguarding Project is at the heart of our determination to make sure the present and the future are completely different from the past.”

The Archdiocese of Perth’s Safeguarding Project, spearheaded by Andrea Musulin, Executive Officer of Protective Behaviours WA Inc and a police officer specialising in the areas of child protection, domestic violence, and school based policing, will establish at least two safeguarding officers in each of the Archdiocese’s 105 parishes. These officers will be at the heart of the local community and the first port of call for matters concerning the protection of children and any possible disclosure of abuse.

The project will educate parents, church personnel and members of the clergy. It will also instruct young children from age 4 to 18 years about sexual abuse and its prevention thereby seeking to significantly reduce future opportunities for sexual abuse to occur. This latter aspect of the project is believed to be a world first.

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ITALIA
Azzurra TV

[A priest is Italy was sentenced to six years for sexual abuse of minors but appealed. The judge reduced the sentence to four years in prison.]

Condanna a 4 anni in Appello per don Marco Rasia, il sacerdote accusato di violenza sessuale nei confronti di alcuni giovani (minorenni), che frequentavano l’oratorio di Castelletto Ticino dove prestava servizio come coadiutore. Il giudice ha ridotto di due anni la pena che gli era stata inflitta in primo grado dal Tribunale di Novara, a 6 anni.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Muetter Magazin

[Tteachers at a Catholic day care center in Mainz have been terminated but some are appealing. The day care center is subject to allegations of sexual abuse of children.]

Nach dem sexuellen Missbrauch unter Kindern an einer Mainzer Kita wurden die Erzieher gekündigt. Einige haben gegen ihre Entlassung geklagt. Sie wollen keinen Vergleich, sondern einen Prozess.

Der Streit über die fristlose Kündigung von sieben Erziehern, in deren Kindertagesstätte im Mainzer Stadtteil Weisenau es zu sexuellem Missbrauch unter Kleinkindern gekommen war, geht weiter. Sechs der Kinderbetreuer haben ihren bisherigen Arbeitgeber, das Bistum Mainz, verklagt und die fristlose Entlassung angefochten.

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MALLORCA
Radio Aleman

[The former parish priest of Selva in Mallorca must stand trial on suspicion of child abuse. The investigating judge made the decision Wednesday morning.]

Der ehemalige Gemeindepfarrer von Selva auf Mallorca muss sich wegen des Verdachts des Kindesmissbrauchs vor Gericht verantworten. Das entschied der Ermittlungsrichter in Inca nach einer Anhörung am Mittwochvormittag. Der Geistliche soll sich im Februar dieses Jahres an einem 12 Jahre alten Mädchen vergangen haben. Im Juni hatten die Eltern des Kindes Anzeige erstattet. Ärzte bestätigten, dass das Kind sexuell missbraucht worden war.

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OREGON
The Raw Story

BETHANIA PALMA MARKUS

atholic priest is under investigation after a parishioner found a camera hidden in the men’s restroom at his church. The camera disappeared after being reported to the priest – and it is still missing.

The device was found in April by a 15-year-old boy who noticed an electrical outlet in an odd place – at waist height next to the toilet in a bathroom near the church altar. He pulled out what appeared to be a camera and brought it to Father Ysrael Bien, who assured the boy and his parents that police would be called immediately, the Oregonian reports.

Instead of calling police, Bien later told investigators he put the camera in a drawer at St. Francis in Sherwood, Oregon. Later that day, when he went to retrieve it, the camera was missing. He told investigators that the camera had no memory card in it when the boy brought it to him.

Police weren’t called to investigate until nearly a month later, the Oregonian reports. They believe Bien either placed the camera there or helped the person who did it, but as of Tuesday he had not yet been named a suspect.

Instead of calling police as he promised, Bien continued to string the family along, telling them police had been called and were investigating. After two weeks of silence, the parents asked for an update. Reporting from a court affidavit, the Oregonian quotes a Facebook message sent to them by the priest, in which he seems to try and shake the parents off:

Sherwood police did not have enough to go with from the device. Two sets of fingerprints were found: mine and, by process of elimination, (your son’s). … They were hoping to find a third set of fingerprints to lead them to the perpetrator. But there was none. Not surprising because they said it is consistent with the modus operandi of the person they have in mind. The device – same style and model – is ‘affiliated’ with this person. Unfortunately, these are ‘circumstantial (sic). Because of insufficient and inconclusive evidence, they are not able to place the person they have in mind in our church bathroom. …

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Times

Sean O’Neill Chief Reporter
Published at 12:01AM, July 9 2015

Whitehall has been ordered not to shred, hide or lose any documents that could be relevant to the independent inquiry into child abuse.

Justice Lowell Goddard, the New Zealand judge who will formally open her inquiry today, has written to the cabinet secretary and leaders of more than 240 other bodies — including police, the NHS and churches — ordering them to search for and retain all material that may be of use to her.

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

The independent inquiry into historical child sexual abuse in England and Wales will open later [July 9], nearly a year after it was first announced.

It will examine how public bodies handled their duty of care to protect children from abuse.

Justice Lowell Goddard, who chairs the inquiry, will summarise how it will be run, including timescales and the areas of public life that will be examined.

The inquiry was first announced by Home Secretary Theresa May in July 2014.

It followed claims of a high-level cover-up of child sex abuse involving public figures, including politicians.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Sky News

By Tom Parmenter, Sky News Correspondent

A year and two days after it was announced, the inquiry into child sexual abuse in England and Wales will formally open later.[July 9]

At 10am New Zealand judge Lowell Goddard will outline the guiding principles that will shape what is expected to be the biggest inquiry ever seen in the UK.

It was set up by Home Secretary Theresa May following child abuse scandals that rocked various institutions including political parties, Government departments in Westminster, the police, churches, schools, children’s homes, the military and many others.

Survivors groups and individual survivors have been consulted and will give evidence as part of the process but the early stages have been dogged by in-fighting and controversy.

The first two women appointed to lead the inquiry, Dame Butler-Sloss and Dame Fiona Woolf, both had to step down because of their links to the British establishment which meant survivors could not trust them to be impartial.

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MICHIGAN
Macomb Daily

By Macomb Daily Staff

POSTED: 07/08/15

A man who worked as admissions director at a Catholic high school in Ray Township waived his right Wednesday to a preliminary examination on charges he sent sexually explicit email messages to a child.

As a result, Joseph Peter Sturza, of Macomb Township, now faces trial on multiple felonies, including child-abuse sexual activity, which carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison upon conviction.

Sturza also is charged with two counts of communicating with another person to commit a crime; and accosting children for immoral purposes.

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OREGON
KGW

Rachael Rafanelli, KGW News

SHERWOOD, Ore. — New information obtained by KGW News partner The Oregonian revealed a Sherwood priest failed for 24 days to report a hidden camera to police. Instead, documents said, he lied to parishioners that he notified police.

Record show Father Ysrael Bien of St. Francis Church said he put the device in a drawer at the church. Records show when he went back to get it later, it was gone. He said he didn’t contact police because he didn’t want to get in trouble for losing the device. But according to The Oregonian, records also show police believe Father Bien is either responsible for the camera, or is covering for the person who is responsible.

Back in April, A 15-year old boy found the hidden camera in the bathroom. It was disguised as an electrical outlet. He told the Father Bien, who said he would contact police.

But court records show that never happened. Over the weeks, the family repeatedly asked the priest for an update in the investigation, and documents show he repeatedly lied, even posting on Facebook that the investigation was over.

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MINNESOTA
Wall Street Journal

By TOM CORRIGAN

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and representatives for several hundred alleged victims of clergy sexual abuse are at odds over a seven-minute video that victims want to play following Mass in all 187 of the archdiocese’s parishes.

The video, in which three alleged abuse victims appear, urges others to come forward and file claims against the archdiocese ahead of an Aug. 3 deadline. Filing formal claims is a critical step for those seeking to share a court-brokered settlement with the archdiocese and its insurance carriers.

Lawyers for alleged victims have asked Judge Robert Kressel of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in St. Paul, Minn., to approve a motion that would send the video to all parishes and request that they play the video “in connection with each Mass service” on July 11 and July 12. The request stops short of asking the judge to explicitly order parishes to play the video.

According to victims’ lawyers, this is the first time any victims’ group has ever requested a diocese to include an outreach video during its weekend worship. The group’s filing says “a more personal, multimedia video presentation setting forth details of the relevant deadline in layman’s terms would greatly increase the likelihood of providing actual and effective notice to potential sexual abuse claimants.”

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ISRAEL
Arutz Sheva

By Tova Dvorin

The well-known rabbi from northern Israel accused by multiple women of sexual abuse has denied the allegations against him on Wednesday, speaking just after a hearing which extended his detention by eight days.

Eight separate women have accused him of sexual abuse, but the rabbi would not be swayed or intimidated.

“All of that is nonsense,” he told Channel 2. “We will meet the same women in court, they will have to look me in the eyes.”

The rabbi added religious context to the upcoming trial.

“We’ll check everything on its merits,” he said. “The days between the 17 of Tammuz and 9 of Av are days that we work to improve on baseless hatred between people.”

The rabbi, who was the dean of a yeshiva, was arrested while trying to flee Israel at Ben-Gurion airport last week. On Friday, soon after his arrest, he was admitted to Ziv Hospital in Tzfat after feeling unwell; he was released Tuesday afternoon in apparent good health.

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ILLINOIS
Belleville News-Democrat

BY GEORGE PAWLACZYK
News-Democrat

Seven former priests, including five who once had ties to the religious order that operates the National Shrine of Our Lady of the Snows near Belleville, have been publicly named in Minnesota as “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of minors, according to a written statement from the national Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate.

“Credibly accused” is the standard language used by the Catholic Church to describe a member of the clergy who, after an investigation by a diocese or religious order, is believed to have molested a minor and is unfit for further ministry.

Release of the names was part of a settlement in a Minnesota lawsuit in connection to a former priest — the late J. Vincent Fitzgerald — in which the defendants agreed to “public disclosure” of the names of all Oblate priests in the United States “against whom there has ever been a credible accusation of sexual abuse of a minor or possession of child pornography.” The lawsuit’s defendants were The Diocese of Duluth, the Diocese of New Ulm, Minn., and the Oblates. Other details of the settlement, such as monetary damages, were not released.

“The release of the names is as a result of the genesis of the Father Fitzgerald litigation,” said Patrick Wall, a paralegal with the Jeff Anderson & Associates law firm in St. Paul, which brought the legal action. Fitzgerald, who formerly was assigned to the Oblates in Belleville, had been accused in civil court of sexually molesting a number of young boys in several states, including on an Indian reservation.

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ILLINOIS//MISSOURI
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

FACT SHEET about credibly accused Oblate predator priests in IL & MO (7/8/2015)

Records about seven predator priests who worked in this area are being released as part of a lawsuit settlement. More litigation against their church supervisors is pending, so more information about them will be disclosed in the months ahead.

Six of them are being “outed” for the first time.
Each one was deemed “credibly accused” by his church supervisors.
Each also worked in Minnesota (largely in the dioceses of Duluth and New Ulm)
Each worked in several states.
Each belongs or belonged to a Belleville-based Catholic religious order known as the Oblates.

Each worked – sometimes for decades – in the St. Louis archdiocese, the Belleville diocese and/or the Springfield-Cape Girardeau diocese.

Six of them worked in the Belleville diocese: Fr. James Vincent Fitzgerald, Fr. Thomas Meyer, Fr. Emil Twardochleb, Fr. Michael Charland, Fr. Orville Munie and Fr. Paul Kabat (More details below.)

Two of them worked in the St. Louis archdiocese:

–Fr. Robert J. Reitmeier (In 1982, he was pastor of Holy Guardian Angels Parish.)
–Fr. James Vincent Fitzgerald (In 1969, he was at St. Michael’s Community in St. Louis.)

Two spent time in southern Missouri (in the Springfield-Cape Girardeau diocese).

–Fr. James Vincent Fitzgerald (In 1987, he was pastor at St. William’s parish in Gainesville.)
–Fr. Michael Charland (From 1959-63, he attended seminary at Our Lady of the Ozarks in Carthage.)

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MISSOURI
KMOV

By Laura Shay

LAKE ST. LOUIS, Mo. (KMOV.com) – The 26-year-old supervisor of an after-school program and youth pastor was charges with two felony counts of child molestation on Wednesday.

Cameron Patterson, an employee of Wentzville School District and Ballwin Baptist Church, is accused of sexually assaulting one victim while she was between the ages of 12 and 17. According to court documents, Patterson reportedly assaulted the victim hundreds of times over the course of five years.

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MISSOURI
Fox 2

JULY 8, 2015, BY JOE MILLITZER

LAKE ST. LOUIS, MO (KTVI) – A 26-year-old man working for the Wentzville School District’s Chautauqua Program since November 2012 has been charged with two counts of child molestation. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that Cameron Patterson works as a youth pastor at Ballwin Baptist Church and is a supervisor of a before-and-after school program. The school district says that the victim is not a student at their schools.

Prosecutor Tim Lohmar says that:

“The events that are alleged to have occurred between 2006 and 2011. If proven guilty, Mr. Patterson currently faces a maximum range of punishment of 15 years prison, and lifetime sex offender registration. Though the defendant regularly came into contact with children through his employment, we have no reason to believe that any of those children are victims of Mr. Patterson. Out of respect for the privacy of the victim, we cannot release any additional information about the victim’s identity. The investigation remains ongoing, and additional charges may be filed.“

Cameron was arrested at Piney Ridge Elementary School where he was working at summer school.

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MISSOURI
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

LAKE SAINT LOUIS • A 26-year old supervisor of a before-and-after school program who also works as a youth pastor was charged Wednesday with two counts of felony child molestation.

Cameron Patterson, of the first block of Quail Meadows Court in Lake Saint Louis, has worked for the Wentzville School District’s Chautauqua Program since November 2012.

A statement released by the district said that the allegations do not involve a student of the school district. Mary LaPak, a spokeswoman for the district, said Patterson had been placed on administrative leave.

Patterson also is a youth pastor at Ballwin Baptist Church, according to the church’s website. A church spokesman could not be immediately reached for comment.

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IRELAND
RTE News

Survivors of Protestant residential institutions have urged the Mother and Baby Home Commission to ask the Government to include a Cork rescue home in its terms of reference.

The survivors have also asked the Commission’s chairperson, Judge Yvonne Murphy, to clarify why the majority of former residents of the Westbank Home in Co Wicklow are excluded from the investigation despite indications to the contrary from Tánaiste Joan Burton.

The Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes between 1922 and 1998 was established last February following an outcry over the treatment – including the burial – of residents in an institution in Tuam, Co Galway which closed in the 1960s.

In a letter to Judge Murphy, Griffith College academic Niall Meehan highlights the exclusion of the now defunct Braemar Rescue Home for Protestant Girls in Cork City from the Commission’s terms of reference.

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MAINE
Ignatius Group

Thursday, July 9, 2015

Judge John A.Woodcock, Jr., presiding

8:30 a.m. / At Bankruptcy Court / Paul Kendrick expected to be cross examined by Plaintiffs’ Counsel.

2:30 p.m. / Court recesses for the day

We will publish a schedule of the next day’s witnesses by 6:00 pm each day.

Plaintiffs expect to present witnesses for two weeks, followed by one week for Defendant’s presentation.

Change of Venue Beginning
July 9 /

U.S. Bankruptcy Court
537 Congress Street
Portland, Maine 04101
207-780-3356

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OREGON
The Columbian

By Associated Press
Published: July 8, 2015

PORTLAND — Court records allege that a Catholic priest lied about a hidden camera that a boy found in his Sherwood church bathroom.

Capt. Ty Hanlon said Tuesday that 34-year-old Father Ysrael Bien is being investigated, the Oregonian reported. Police believe he was either responsible for the camera or knew how it ended up in the men’s bathroom at St. Francis Catholic Church.

According to an affidavit, a 15-year-old boy discovered what appeared to be a waist-high electrical outlet next to a toilet on April 26. He pulled the outlet, brought the camera to the priest and then told his father.

Bien allegedly lied to the boy’s family, saying that police were investigating the matter. Weeks passed before Bien, prompted by the family and the church deacon, admitted that he had never contacted police.

Records show the dad noted, “the information that Father was offering did not seem to make sense.”

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UNITED STATES
The Jewish Week

07/08/15
Hannah Dreyfus
Staff Writer

Two months after the sentencing of mikvah-voyeur Rabbi Barry Freundel, the Orthodox community’s leading rabbinical council has released what it calls the new “gold standard” for preventing rabbinic abuses of power during the conversion process.

The 22-page report was prepared by a special committee chosen last fall, made up of 11 members, including five women – two of whom are converts to Judaism. It seeks to improve the Rabbinical Council of America’s Geirus Protocol and Standards (GPS) conversion process that, ironically, was implemented by Rabbi Freundel in 2007. Though the GPS process initially sought to standardize and centralize conversion procedures, it allowed breaches in the system to go unchecked, the report notes.

“Don’t make the mistake of thinking the crime was just about the cameras,” said Bethany Mandel, a convert and one of the members of the review committee. “Freundel was abusing his power long before that.”

Aside from his crimes of voyeurism, the rabbi employed seemingly arbitrary benchmarks for assessing a candidate’s readiness for conversion, and was vague about how long the conversion process would take. The report found that Freundel was not alone in causing potential converts to feel unsettled about a lack of precise requirements and timetables.

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WISCONSIN
WHBL

DULUTH, MN (WTAQ) – A former Wisconsin priest accused of child sexual abuse had his name released for the first time Tuesday.

The Oblates of Mary Immaculate, a Catholic missionary order, announced the names of Michael Charland and 6 other former priests in a lawsuit settlement with an abuse victim.

Charland once led a program in Superior called “Teens Encounter Christ.” He and 4 of the other priests worked in the Diocese of Duluth Minnesota at one time.

An attorney for the diocese tells the Duluth News-Tribune it has no record of alleged sexual abuse to minors by any of the 5 priests except for James Fitzgerald, the subject of the victim’s lawsuit.

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Marie Rohde | Jul. 8, 2015
Milwaukee bankruptcy

Lawyers for Milwaukee Archbishop Jerome Listecki have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reconsider a federal appellate court ruling that a $55 million-plus cemetery trust fund is not shielded in bankruptcy court by the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) and the First Amendment.

Chances that the court will accept the case are slim. Of the more than 10,000 requests, the Supreme Court only accepts about 80 a year. A key factor in deciding what cases to accept is whether there are contradictory opinions on the key issues among the 13 federal appellate courts.

“That split does not exist,” said Marci Hamilton, a law professor at the Cardozo School in New York*, where she specializes in cases involving the religious freedom act. “The 7th Circuit wrote a complete and virtually unassailable decision in the Milwaukee case.”

Timothy Nixon, a lawyer for the cemetery trust fund, disagreed. In a written statement, he said:

“The 7th Circuit decision encroaches on religious freedom and curtails the protection in the First Amendment for the free expression of religion. The 7th Circuit decision is also directly at odds with previous decisions rendered by at least three other federal appeals courts in different parts of the country.” ...

James Stang, a lawyer representing the claimants in the Milwaukee case, said a number of states have local laws similar to the federal RFRA that allow some cases to be handled at the state level.

“In states that do not have these laws, bankruptcy is seen as a way of shielding assets from creditors,” he said. “This decision means they can’t hide under RFRA anymore.”

Hamilton agreed but added that if the Supreme Court takes the case and rules in favor of the archdiocese, it could have another impact: It could affect same-sex marriage, particularly in the 20 states where it had not been legal until the high court ruled last month that it was legal in all states.

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MINNESOTA
Grand Forks Herald

By Tom Olsen on Jul 7, 2015

DULUTH — A Catholic missionary order on Tuesday released the names of seven former Minnesota priests who have been accused of child sexual abuse — a list that includes five clergymen who worked within the Diocese of Duluth.

The list, made public through a settlement agreement between the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate and an abuse victim, includes previously unreported priests who worked at parishes throughout the county, including in Duluth, Superior, International Falls and Northome.

All seven were members of the Oblates, and five worked within the Diocese of Duluth at some point: James Vincent Fitzgerald, Michael Charland, Robert J. Reitmeier, Thomas Meyer and Paul Kabat who worked in Grand Forks from 1969 to 1970.

Several of the accused priests worked with children, including Reitmeier, who was principal at St. Jean’s School in Duluth, and Charland, who led “Teens Encounter Christ” programs in Superior and International Falls.

Only Fitzgerald, who was the subject of the lawsuit that prompted the release of the names, was previously included on the Duluth diocese’s list of credibly accused priests.

“We’ve conducted an exhaustive review of diocese files and there are, to my knowledge, no allegations of sexual abuse of minors that have been raised regarding any of the five, other than Fitzgerald,” said Susan Gaertner, an attorney for the diocese. “Simply put, the other four are essentially news to us.”

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Five local predator priests are “outed” for first time
All worked in Duluth but bishop claims to know nothing about them
Group calls on current & ex-church staff to “come clean” about abusers
Their direct church supervisors admit each of the men is “credibly accused”
Long secret records about them were released yesterday; More are on the way
Sirba’s “continuing secrecy” puts “kids in harm’s way,” support group contends
It wants diocese to “stop spending donated dollars on lawyers to keep secrets secret”

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will discuss

–the newly-outed five predator priests who have worked in Duluth,
–the just-released and soon-to-be-released secret records about them, and
–provide their photos and work histories.

They will also
— prod anyone who was hurt by the priests to speak up and get help, and
— prod Catholic officials in Duluth and across Minnesota to “come clean” with more information about the priests and aggressively seek out their victims.

WHEN
TODAY, Wednesday, July 8 at 1:30 p.m. (rain or shine)

WHERE
On the sidewalk outside the Duluth diocese headquarters (“chancery office”), 2830 E. 4th St. in Duluth

WHO
One-two individuals who belong to a support group called the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), including a Duluth man who was himself molested as a boy by a cleric

WHY
Records about seven Minnesota predator priests are being released as part of a lawsuit settlement. Five of them worked in the Duluth area: Fr. James Vincent Fitzgerald, Fr. Michael Charland, Fr. Robert J. Reitmeier, Fr. Paul Kabat and Fr. Thomas Meyer.

Duluth Catholic officials claim they know virtually nothing about these clerics and their tenure in Duluth. SNAP leaders do not believe this.

SNAP is calling on current and former church employees to “come clean” about these predators and share what they know, suspect or have heard about them with police, prosecutors and journalists.

The group also wants Duluth Bishop Paul Sirba to quit fighting to protect clergy who sexually abuse children. SNAP says the diocese “is spending tens of thousands dollars, donated by the faithful, to keep hidden their files on proven, admitted and credibly accused child molesting clergy.”

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UNITED STATES
Washington Post

By Thomas G. Plante
July 8

Thomas G. Plante is is the Augustin Cardinal Bea, S.J. University Professor at Santa Clara University, Clinical Adjunct Professor in Psychiatry at Stanford University, and author of several books on clergy sexual abuse including, “Sexual Abuse in the Catholic Church: A Decade of Crisis, 2002-2012.”

News of an FBI raid at the Indiana home of Subway spokesman Jared Fogle stunned the public on Tuesday. No charges have been filed against Fogle and authorities have remained mum on what they’re looking for, though a “shocked” and “very concerned” Subway said in a statement that it believes the search “is related to a prior investigation of a former Jared Foundation employee” — the organization’s executive director was arrested on federal child pornography charges this spring. The sandwich chain also announced the end of its relationship with Fogle.

After evaluating and treating clerical sex offenders in the Catholic Church, as well as treating a variety of men troubled with pornography and other sexual problems for about 30 years, I find myself saddened but certainly not shocked by such investigations.

The public typically maintains a highly stereotypical and largely inaccurate view of pedophiles, defined as adults or teens 16 and up who are sexually stimulated by pre-pubescent children (typically 11 and under). We imagine pedophiles as creepy men with shifty eyes, stubble and a trench coat. We think they lurk around schools and playgrounds, waiting to snatch children. We think of these men as despicable lowlifes whom we can spot when we meet them, which is why news of sex crimes against children are invariably met with disbelief. “Stunned” parents and community members say the same thing: “He never seemed like that type of person.” In my three decades working with many men who sexually violate children and teens, I’ve never met one person who fit “that type.”

Pedophiles come in all shapes and sizes and from all walks of life. Some are rich and others poor; some are highly educated while others aren’t; some are very socially skilled and delightful conversationalists and some more reticent. So often we hear that people would never in a million years expect so-and-so to harm children, be a pedophile or engage in child pornography because they’re charming, clean cut, fun to be around, successful in their careers, have a nice family life, and so forth. We wonder how such a winner could be a pedophile.

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BELLEVILLE (IL)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Six predator priests “outed” for first time
All worked in Catholic dioceses Missouri or Illinois
They’re “credibly accused child molesters,” church admits
Long secret records about them were just released this week
More hidden documents will be disclosed in the months ahead
Two of them were in this area as recently as three & six years ago

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will
–disclose the names of six predator priests who’ve never been “outed” here before,
–discuss just-released and soon-to-be-released secret records about them, and
–provide their photos and work histories

They will also

— prod anyone who was hurt by the priests to speak up and get help, and
— prod Catholic officials in St. Louis, Belleville and Springfield to “come clean” with more information about the priests and aggressively seek out their victims.

WHEN
TODAY, Wednesday, July 8 at 2:00 p.m. (rain or shine)

WHERE
On the sidewalk outside the Belleville diocese headquarters (“chancery office”), 222 South Third St. in
Belleville, IL

WHO
Three-four individuals who belong to

–a support group called the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), and/or
–a Catholic reform group called Faithful of Southern Illinois (FOSIL)

WHY
Records about seven predator priests who worked in the St. Louis area are being released as part of a lawsuit settlement. Only one of the priests has been publicly exposed in this area as credibly accused child molesters until now. One lived in Belleville as recently as 2012. Another was there until 2009. Two of them also spent time in the St. Louis archdiocese and three were in the Springfield-Cape diocese.

One of them spent seven decades as a priest in this area. From the 1940s until six years ago, Fr. James Vincent Fitzgerald split his time between six states including assignments in at least three towns in Illinois towns and two in Missouri.

The two who worked in St. Louis archdiocese are Fr. Robert J. Reitmeier (at Holy Guardian Angels Parish) and Fr. Fitzgerald (at St. Michael’s Community).

The five priests who worked in the Belleville diocese are:

Fr. Thomas Meyer worked in Belleville, Alton and Mansfield, MO.
Fr. Emil Twardochleb was in Belleville and Henry, IL.
Fr. Michael Charland was in Belleville, Sparta, Godfrey, and Carthage, MO.
Fr. Orville Munie was in Belleville, Toluca, Mendota, Bethany and Campus, IL.
Fr. Paul Kabat worked in Belleville.

More details about each of the predators and their specific work histories in Missouri and Illinois (including dates, parishes and photos) will be provided at the news conference and/or is available at AndersonAdvocates.com

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AUSTRALIA
Armidale Express

By LYDIA ROBERTS July 8, 2015

VICTIMS of child sex abuse perpetrators have decided to speak out.

They want their story told in this ongoing debate about child sex abuse in Australia; how such abuse has impacted their lives and those of their families.

At least three victims have written of their experiences; others are reluctant to give voice to painful memories.

Allan Keith Huggins, 68, who worked at Earle Page College, O’Connor Catholic School and The Armidale School during the 1980s has been found guilty of sexually assaulting seven boys in his care 25 years ago.

Two victims tell their stories of child sexual abuse at the hands of another perpretatrator.

The first wants to remain anonymous and Peter Jurd reflects on his brother Damian’s tragic suicide after being a victim of abuse.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

SHANNON DEERY HERALD SUN JULY 08, 2015

A CATHOLIC brother who molested young kids would have a tough time in jail because he’s American, a leading psychologist has warned.

In a submission that raised the eyebrows of County Court Judge James Parrish, forensic psychologist Patrick Newton said today that if jailed, American paedophile Brother Bernard Hartman would be a soft target because he was different.

“Anyone who’s different attracts unwanted attention,” Dr Newton said.

A member of the order of the Marianists, Hartman was stationed in Melbourne in the 1970s and 1980s before the order closed its Australian operations.

He returned to the US in 1983 where he continued work as a schoolteacher until reports of sexual misconduct were made to his superiors.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Thomas P. Doyle | Jul. 8, 2015
30 years later

Editor’s note: This story is part of a weeklong series dedicated to looking back on 30 years of the abuse crisis in the Catholic church. Read all parts of the series.

This essay is adapted from a speech by Dominican Fr. Tom Doyle at the 2014 annual convention of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. It has been edited here for length. The full text of the speech appears in a recently published biography, Whistle: Tom Doyle’s Steadfast Witness for Victims of Clerical Sexual Abuse, by Robert Blair Kaiser and now available at Amazon and Kindle.

A letter sent by the vicar general of the diocese of Lafayette, La., to the papal nuncio in June 1984 was the trigger that set in motion a series of events that has changed the fate of the victims of child sexual abuse by Catholic clergy and clergy of all denominations.

The letter informed the nuncio that the Gastal family had decided to withdraw from a confidential monetary settlement with the diocese. It went on to say the family had obtained the services of an attorney and planned to sue the diocese.

This began a long process that has had a direct impact on much more than the fate of victims and the security of innocent children and vulnerable persons of any age. It has altered the image and role of the institutional Catholic church in Western society to such an extent that the tectonic plates upon which this church rests have shifted in a way never expected or dreamed of 30 years ago.

I cannot find language that can adequately communicate the full import of this monstrous phenomenon. The image of a Christian church that enabled the sexual and spiritual violation of its most vulnerable members and, when confronted, responded with institutionalized mendacity and utter disregard for the victims cannot be adequately described as a “problem,” a “crisis” or a “scandal.” The widespread sexual violation of children and adults by clergy and the horrific response of the leadership, especially the bishops, is the present-day manifestation of a very dark and toxic dimension of the institutional church.

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