ABUSE TRACKER

PROVIDENCE (RI)
Providence Journal

BY W. ZACHARY MALINOWSKI
Journal Staff Writer
bmalinow@providencejournal.com Twitter@billmalinowski

PROVIDENCE — Victims of sexual abuse gathered for a news conference on Wednesday to condemn the Catholic Diocese of Providence for allegedly failing to properly investigate more than 800 allegations of sexual abuse over the past 20 years.

Among those presenting in a downtown hotel conference room stories of abuse by local parish priests were Ann Hagan-Webb, a representative from Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, SNAP; and Jeffrey Thomas, of Massachusetts, and Helen McGonigle, a lawyer from Connecticut.

Thomas and McGonigle said they were raped as children by the Rev. Brendan Smyth, an Irish priest who was at Our Lady of Mercy Church in East Greenwich from 1965 to 1968. Smyth returned to Ireland and pleaded guilty to 141 counts of sexual abuse there. He died in prison in Ireland in 1997.
Thomas and McGonigle had made similar allegations about Smyth at a news conference in December 2009.

The victims said Wednesday they want the office of Attorney General Peter F. Kilmartin and U.S. Attorney Peter F. Neronha to launch an in-depth investigation into what they said were 831 complaints of pedophilia and sexual abuse filed with the diocese. They also said many of the abusive priests continue to serve in parishes in Rhode Island and elsewhere. …

The Diocese of Providence issued a statement claiming they always forward allegations of sexual abuse to the state police or local law enforcement.

“It has been a consistent policy and practice of the Diocese of Providence to report many different issues including those of clergy abuse of minors to law enforcement,” the statement read. “The diocese is not aware of any priests currently in ministry, who have credible allegations of sexual abuse of minors against them.”

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

CANADA
Nunatsiaq Online

DAVID MURPHY

Day three of the Eric Dejaeger trial at the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit heard from a witness who said she had been raped and drugged by the priest with a “little green pill” at the St. Stephen’s Catholic Church in Igloolik decades ago.

The woman, who cannot be identified, told court she was about eight when the sexual assaults took place.

Even before answering Crown prosecutor Doug Curliss’s questions, the witness started wincing at having to recall specific incidents in the church.

The first memory she described took place in the church’s bedroom upstairs on a bunk bed.

“At first he asked me to get undressed. I was scared of him. He told me not to tell anybody,” the witness said.

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

WISCONSIN
SNAP Wisconsin

Statement by Peter Isely, SNAP Midwest Director
CONTACT: 414.429.7259

Fr. Ireneusz Chodakowski, pastor of St. Peter Catholic Church in Kenosha, has been permanently removed from his parish by the Archdiocese of Milwaukee and is under police investigation.

According to the Kenosha News, an employee of the parish allegedly confronted Chodakowski about pornography being posted through his Facebook page, to or seen by minors.

While the police will not comment on what, exactly, they are investigating, the Archdiocese of Milwaukee is saying that Chodakowski simply exercised “lack of good judgment” in his social media usage. How lacking? Enough for Archbishop Listecki to take the most severe, immediate action he could take against him.

Despite being under investigation and fired from his parish, Chodakowski was back posting on his Facebook page again today.

Chodakowski, a native of Poland, is a member of the Massachusetts based religious order, Marians of the Immaculate Conception (“MIC”). He was recruited and officially assigned to run St. Peter’s parish and grade school by Listecki in 2010.

Chodakowski, according to a profile posted on the order’s website, has worked as a priest in Poland and England. More recently, he was pastor of St. Louis Catholic Church in Portland, Maine from 1998-2009 where, according to the parish website, he was assigned to Thomson, Connecticut. The MIC’s operate Marianapolis Prep School in Thomson.

As is typical with the Milwaukee Archdiocese, while they have removed Chodakowski from his post and are freely pontificating on this case, they also claim to allegedly have no information or authority over Chodakowski because he is a religious order priest. Over half the priests working or living in the Milwaukee Archdiocese under Listecki belong to religious orders. Ironically, the website for St. Peter’s Parish in Kenosha states: “We are associated with other Catholic parishes under the direction of the Archbishop of Milwaukee.” Perhaps the Archbishop should inform the parish that this is, in fact, not the case.

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

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Dan Box
From: The Australian
November 21, 2013

THE Anglican Church failed to take disciplinary action against three alleged paedophile priests – one of whom was later convicted for indecent assault – despite receiving several reports they had abused children, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse heard this morning.

All three men were allowed to continue to publicly describe themselves as a priest and attend worship.

One, the Reverend Campbell Brown, had a licence to officiate at church services until June this year, the commission has heard.

The former Professional Standards Director of the Anglican Diocese of Grafton in northern NSW, Phillip Gerber, told the commission he did not report allegations of abuse committed by Reverend Brown to police for over a year.

“I’m not trying to defend myself. It might have potentially … put other people at risk, children and vulnerable people at risk. I’m appalled that my actions might have caused that,” he told the commission.

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

MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

Article by: TONY KENNEDY , Star Tribune Updated: November 20, 2013

Minnetonka priest has been renting townhouse to a former priest who admitted to child sex abuse in 1984.

A Catholic priest in Minnetonka who told his parishioners two weeks ago that the church needs to rid itself of priests involved in sexual misconduct and “hold those who covered it up very much accountable” has been renting his townhouse to an abusive priest since 2006.

The Rev. David Ostrowski said in an interview Wednesday that his renter, ex-priest Fran Hoefgen, has been a friend since they were monks together at St. John’s Abbey nearly 30 years ago. Ostrowski, who is pastor of Immaculate Heart of Mary, said his housing relationship with Hoefgen it is merely an act of friendship.

“I know some people will see it as a criticism of me, but I was just trying to be a friend to him, that’s all,” Ostrowski told the Star Tribune.

Hoefgen admitted to police in 1984 that he sexually abused a 17-year-old boy at a parish in Cold Spring, Minn., where he served as a priest. He wasn’t charged with a crime, and church officials reassigned him to a parish in Hastings without telling parishioners about the previous abuse. On Tuesday, Hoefgen was accused in a new lawsuit of sexually abusing a boy at the Hastings parish.

Hastings Police Chief Bryan Schafer said Wednesday that his department has opened a criminal investigation into the matter.

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

PENNSYLVANIA
Seattle PI

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio (AP) — Twenty-five additional sex-abuse claims have been filed in the case of a Franciscan brother who killed himself after allegations emerged at a Catholic high school, the Youngstown Diocese said Wednesday.

The diocese said it would review the additional claims and the demand for $1 million in compensation for each alleged victim.

The alleged victims’ attorney, Mitchell Garabedian, said the abuse occurred from 1985 to 1992.

The diocese and Franciscans settled 11 earlier abuse claims against the brother for $75,000 each.

If the latest claims are found credible, Bishop George Murry said the diocese would offer financial assistance for counseling.

Brother Stephen Baker killed himself Jan. 26 at St. Bernardine Monastery in Hollidaysburg, Pa., after the allegations emerged at John F. Kennedy High School in Warren.

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

WISCONSIN
Fox 6

November 20, 2013, by Bret Buganski

KENOSHA (WITI) — The priest at St. Peter’s Church in Kenosha is being investigated by police, and placed on administrative leave — and Facebook may have played a role.

The Kenosha parish learned this past weekend that its priest is no longer heading the congregation.

A deacon with St. Peter’s Catholic Church has confirmed the priest was placed on administrative leave for what is being called “a lack of good judgement.”

Kenosha police say the department is investigating a case involving a priest who has been removed from the parish because of his use of Facebook — but it is unclear what specifically the priest is accused of doing on Facebook, as is who may have uncovered his alleged activities.

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

PENNSYLVANIA
WJAC

Updated: Wednesday, November 20 2013

JOHNSTOWN, Pa. — As the attorneys for the alleged victims of Brother Stephen Baker continue to form their cases and seek out who knew what and when, an organization that helps victims of sexual abuse is seeking the truth themselves.

Road to Recovery was in Johnstown Wednesday, urging alleged victims and anyone at Bishop McCort Catholic High School who knew something to come forward. Luke Bradescu was 29 years old when he took his life.

For 11 years, his family struggled to figure out why. “What was wrong?” his mother, Barbara Aponte asked through tears Wednesday.

“He seemed happy, he knew he was loved. We knew he loved us.” It wasn’t until this past January when allegations against Baker surfaced and many of Bradescu’s old high school friends in Ohio came forward, that Aponte found her answer.

“The story broke and it was like a flood of images and memories, things that seemed so insignificant just popped out,” said Aponte. “I was like, ‘Oh my God. This is it.”

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

SPRINGFIELD (IL)
The Freethinker (UK)

BY BARRY DUKE – NOVEMBER 20, 2013

NO news is good news, so we assume that Illinois still exists, and has not been destroyed amidst roiling black clouds, fire pouring down from the heavens and people spewing pea soup – despite an exorcism that was due to take place today to protest the state’s approval of gay marriage.

I can find no reports that the exorcism by the Church’s Head Ju-Ju man in that neck of the woods actually took place. Bishop Thomas Paprocki of the Springfield diocese may well have changed his mind, given the outpourings of scorn that followed his announcement last week that he would offer prayers:

Of exorcism in reparation for the sin of same-sex marriage.

Paprocki is no stranger to confronting The Forces of Evil. In October Frankie’s Capped Crusader single-handedly prevented a:

Blasphemous, scandalous, and sacrilegious recitation of the Most Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary by the Rainbow Sash Movement within the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception before the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

According to this report:

In a culture where the concept of exorcism is primarily shaped by a 1970s horror film, the announcement stirred confusion and discomfort, which Paprocki has declined to resolve. Even the Chicago Archdiocese’s designated exorcist declined to answer questions about the public rite that is more often private.

In fact, some Catholics believe the ritual could cast off more Catholics than demons. Yesterday, 14,000 petitioners called on the bishop to cancel the event.

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

PROVIDENCE (RI)
NBC 10

[I-Team: Letters detail alleged sex abuse in diocese
I-Team: Letters raise questions about alleged sex abuse in diocese]

Updated: Nov 20, 2013
By Katie Davis

PROVIDENCE –
Alleged victims who said they were sexually abused by priests in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence demanded Wednesday for a full investigation by the attorney general’s office and the U.S. Attorney.

In a recent investigation, the NBC 10 I-Team obtained through a records request 88 pages detailing sexual abuse by priests going back more than 30 years.

In each case, a letter detailing allegations of sexual abuse was sent to the Rhode Island State Police by the diocese.

The diocese began the practice around 2003, although there’s no legal mandate requiring the letters. A total of 45 letters were sent to state police between 2003 and 2013.

The documents which were stamped “confidential” were heavily redacted by state police.

The names of priests were blacked out, even those people who are already dead. Dates and locations were blacked out. The names of the churches were blacked out too.

“This has to change if we’re going to help children,” said Ann Hagan Webb, who joined other victims at a news conference at the Renaissance Hotel in Providence. …

“The red flags that remain in these letters are sufficient to cause great concern that children are at risk in this diocese,” said Anne Barrett Doyle of the watchdog group Bishop Accountability.

Barrett Doyle said she believes some of the priests described in the letters may still be working in local churches, based on details that weren’t blacked out by state police.

But the diocese said in its statement that’s not the case.

“The diocese is not aware of any priests currently in ministry, who have credible allegations of sexual abuse of minors against them,” the statement said.

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

CANADA
The Windsor Star

Nov 20, 2013

Don Lajoie

A Windsor woman who offers support for victims of clergy sex abuse wants to expand the service nationwide.

Brenda Brunelle is seeking federal incorporation as a not-for-profit organization that would offer help to victims across Canada. She began the service in Windsor last year.

Brunelle, who was sexually abused by local priest Rev. Michael Fallone when she was a girl, sued the Catholic church four years ago and reached a settlement in 2012.

Brunelle said the local chapter of the U.S.-based international Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests has helped dozens of victims come to terms with their experiences — participants come from as far away as Sarnia and Cambridge to take part in regular meetings. The first session she chaired in Toronto recently drew 16 people, despite little advance notice.

“The experience was overwhelming,” she said. “It was the first time many had ever met someone else who had been abused and the emotions were high. People were still talking in the parking lot well after the meeting ended. They didn’t want to leave. It was the rawest moment I’ve ever experienced in my life.”

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

SPRINGFIELD (IL)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2013

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

Springfield Bishop Thomas Paprocki often seeks the media limelight to trumpet his views loudly (like with today’s exorcism). But he still quietly sits on child sex abuse allegations for weeks.

In September, Paprocki let a priest who’s accused of child sex crimes temporarily resign, instead of suspending him. Before that, however, Paprocki kept the allegations secret for weeks, giving the accused predator plenty of time to destroy evidence, intimidate victims, threaten witnesses, discredit whistleblowers, fabricate alibis and even flee the country.

[State Journal-Register]

Weeks ago, Paprocki temporarily let Fr. Robert “Bud” DeGrand resign from his posts at Catholic parishes in Sigel, Neoga, Green Creek and Lillyville.

First, Paprocki should have suspended Fr. DeGrand. That’s what the US bishops pledged to do when credible child sex abuse reports surfaced. That’s what the US bishops’ official sex abuse policy mandates. There’s a difference between someone stepping aside and someone being TOLD to step aside. To let a credibly accused child molesting cleric decide whether to temporarily step down minimizes the horror he or she allegedly committed.

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

CANADA
CBC News

A witness testifying at the trial of a priest accused of sexual assault told a court in Iqaluit on Wednesday that the accused once used food to lure her.

The 41-year-old woman said her family in Igloolik, Nunavut, was sometimes hungry for days at a time between 1978 and 1982, the years when Eric Dejaeger was the priest in the remote community.

The Roman Catholic priest, 66, is on trial for dozens of sexual abuse charges, relating to incidents alleged to have occurred while Dejaeger was in Igloolik.

Some shocking allegations have already been made in court this week, including alleged abuse against young girls, boys and animals.

The witness this morning testified that she was sexually assaulted numerous times by Dejaeger. She told the court how her grandmother, who was raising her, often sent her to the church for a meal.

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

WISCONSIN
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

By Annysa Johnson of the Journal Sentinel Nov. 20, 2013

A Catholic priest has been removed from his post at a Kenosha parish while authorities investigate his postings of videos on Facebook, the Kenosha News has reported.

The Rev. Ireneusz Chodakowski’s removal was announced to parishioners at St. Peter’s Catholic Church over the weekend.

Kenosha Police and the Archdiocese of Milwaukee did not immediately return telephone calls on Wednesday.

The Kenosha News quotes an anonymous parishioner as saying Chodakowski was being investigated for allegedly sharing pornography. It said a spokeswoman for the archdiocese characterized his alleged offense as “a lack of good judgment” in his use of social media.

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

PROVIDENCE (RI)
Providence Journal

November 20, 2013

BY W. ZACHARY MALINOWSKI
PROVIDENCE — Victims of alleged sexual abuse gathered for a news conference on Wednesday to condemn the Diocese of Providence for failing to properly investigate more than 800 allegations of sexual abuse over the past 20 years.

Among those presenting harrowing tales of abuse by local parish priests were Ann Hagan-Webb, a representative from Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, SNAP; and Jeffrey Thomas, of Massachusetts, and Helen McGonigle, a lawyer from Connecticut.

Thomas and McGonigle said they were raped as children by the Rev. Brendan Smyth, an Irish priest who was at Our Lady of Mercy Church in East Greenwich from 1965 to 1968. Smyth returned to Ireland and pleaded guilty to 141 counts of sexual abuse. He died in prison in 1997.

The victims said they want the office of Attorney General Peter F. Kilmartin and U.S. Attorney Peter F. Neronha to launch an in-depth investigation into the 831 complaints of pedophilia and sexual abuse.

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

WISCONSIN
Kenosha News

BY BILL GUIDA
bguida@kenoshanews.com

An ongoing investigation has led to the removal of the Rev. Ireneusz Chodakowski as pastor of St. Peter Catholic Church.

The probe, according to a spokeswoman for the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, is for Chodakowki’s alleged “lack of good judgment” regarding use of social media.

An anonymous parishioner told the Kenosha News that Chodakowski is “accused of using his Facebook account to share pornography, primarily with adults, but occasionally with minors.”

The parishioner said he was at Saturday’s Mass when the Rev. Bill Hayward read a prepared statement saying Chodakowski would be replaced by another priest “for at at least three weeks until somebody else could replace him more permanently.”

According to the parishioner, Chodakowski allegedly rebuffed a parish employee’s requests that he “make changes in the video content of his Facebook account,” apparently to prevent minors from seeing “pornographic images (Chodakowski) was distributing.”

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

WISCONSIN
WTMJ

[with video]

By Jonah Kaplan

KENOSHA – A stunning change at a Catholic Church: a priest let go potentially because of his social media accounts.

St. Peter Catholic Church has a fill-in priest now, and officials tell parishioners they plan to find a full time replacement soon.

Church members confirmed they heard the abrupt announcement during mass about the fate of their priest, Father Ireneusz Chodakowski. Some parishioners told a Kenosha newspaper it’s because he shared porn on his Facebook account.

Church officials refused to answer our questions, but some church members weren’t so shy.

“With all that’s been in the news with what’s been happening in the churches – to have that here, that’s tough,” comments Tom Odegaard, who grew up at the church.

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

CANADA
Ottawa Citizen

BY THE CANADIAN PRESS NOVEMBER 20, 2013

IQALUIT, Nunavut – A witness at the trial of a priest accused of child abuse in the North says the cleric used hunger to force children into sex.

BORDERLINE: GRAPHIC CONTENT MAY DISTURB SOME READERS

“When I was a child, sometimes we had nothing to eat,” the witness said Wednesday at the trial of Eric Dejaeger. “Mama (her grandmother) would have to leave me there (at the church) so I could eat.”

The witness, who was about eight years old in 1980 when the alleged assault took place in Igloolik, Nunavut, broke down in tears and sighed heavily to compose herself before she could continue her testimony.

She said one night, after Dejaeger fed her, he took her into his bedroom and told her to get undressed.

“I was scared of him,” said the witness, who recalled that the priest was wearing his long black church robe. “He told me not to tell anybody and then he said he was going to do something to me.”

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

CANADA
Sun News

QMI AGENCY

A woman testified a Nunavut priest raped her when she was eight years old after she went to the church for a meal because there was no food at home.

The woman, who cannot be identified, testified against former Roman Catholic priest Eric Dejaeger in an Iqaluit courtroom Wednesday.

She said she told her grandmother, who was caring for her, about the rape, but she didn’t believe her, The Canadian Press reported.

On Tuesday, defence lawyer Malcolm Kempt cross-examined another woman who said she was taped to Dejaeger’s bed. Kempt questioned the woman about the details of the alleged attack, and a $16,000 out-of-court settlement from the church, the CBC reported.

Dejaeger, 66, is accused of sexually assaulting Inuit children between about 1978 and 1989 during his time in Igloolik and Baker Lake.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter

NCR Staff | Nov. 20, 2013

KANSAS CITY, MO. NCR’s board of directors has appointed Caitlin Hendel chief executive officer and president of National Catholic Reporter Publishing Company. The appointment takes effect Jan. 1.

Thomas C. Fox will remain publisher of the company. Fox’s work will focus on development and directing the Global Catholic Sisters Initiative, a multiyear reporting project funded with a grant from the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation. Hendel’s responsibility will include oversight of NCR’s editorial products as well as the day-to-day business operations of the company.

The appointment came after a nationwide search for a CEO/president and was made Nov. 16 during the NCR board’s annual fall meeting.

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

IRELAND
The Journal

JUSTICE MINISTER ALAN Shatter has confirmed that his Department needs an extra €32 million this year in order to make up a shortfall in the garda budget and to provide compensation for women who were in the Magadelene Laundries.

Speaking at the Justice Committee today, Shatter criticised Fianna Fáil’s justice spokesperson Niall Collins for raising the issue earlier this week and claiming that there would be a €51 million shortfall in the An Garda Siochána budget for next year.

He said that though an additional €51 million is required for the garda budget, as well as €5 million for the payments to victims of the Magdalene Laundries, almost €24 million can be saved from other areas in the Department of Justice’s budget.

This will mean that overall an additional €32 million will be needed for this year.

Some of the savings have been identified in the Prisons Service, the Courts Service, the Property Registration Authority and the overall Justice and Equality Budget, Shatter said.

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

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Catholics4Change

by Susan Matthews

First Father Paul resigned from Our Lady of Calvary, where he remained as pastor while under investigation and review for two allegations of child sex abuse. A week later, without announcement, the archdiocese temporarily removed his faculties and he will not be able to celebrate Mass in public pending the outcome of the canonical investigation. This has been confirmed by an archdiocesan official. The only reason we discovered Father Paul’s removal is because Kathy Kane monitors the clergy list for just such changes.

– Why, after leaving him as pastor during much of the investigation, remove him from ministry now?

– Why wasn’t there a public announcement of this removal? Other victims might be prompted to come forward.

– Do the parishioners of Our Lady of Calvary know Father Paul has been temporarily removed from ministry? The families were not informed of the allegations until he resigned. The archdiocese did not consider them “pertinent parties.” Which is odd, given the Safe Environment statement on the Archdiocesan website. “Parents are the first and most influential teachers of children and are responsible for their spiritual, moral, emotional, physical, and intellectual development. This is an awesome and sometimes daunting responsibility. When armed with proper information, parents can best protect their children from predators.”

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

MINNESOTA
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis via KSTP

November 19, 2013

CONTACT
Jim Accurso
Media and Public Relations Manager
T: 651-291-4480
M: 651-261-6070
accursoj@archspm.org

We are investigating the claims in today’s lawsuit which involves Francis Hoefgen, a former priest of St. John’s Abbey who served in the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis in the mid-1980’s. In 1992, Hoefegen’s faculties were restricted by the abbey, and he was no longer allowed to serve in public ministry. He was laicized in December 2011.

The Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis continues to encourage anyone who suspects abuse of a minor or vulnerable adult within Church ministry—or any setting including the home or school—to first contact law enforcement. Any act of abuse against a minor or vulnerable adult is reprehensible and morally repugnant and we will not tolerate it.

Our first priority is to create and maintain safe environments where the Gospel of Jesus Christ can flourish. This means ensuring that clergy, employees, volunteers, and the young are aware of healthy boundaries and the societal problem of sexual abuse. It also means creating an environment for and implementing productive steps to promote a healthy clergy.

Anyone having knowledge of sexual abuse within a parish should call the proper authorities, and is encouraged to notify the archdiocese’s Victim Assistance Coordinator at 651-291-4497.

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MINNESOTA
KSTP

Suit: Priest Admitted Abuse, Stayed Active

By: Cassie Hart

Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis released the following statement on Francis Hoefgen, a former priest of St. John’s Abbey who served in the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis in the mid-1980’s.

A lawsuit claims Francis Hoefgen was at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton church in Hastings when he molested the plaintiff, who was 10 to 13 years old at the time.

Statement Regarding Francis Hoefgen

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CANADA
The StarPhoenix

BY THE CANADIAN PRESS NOVEMBER 20, 2013

IQALUIT, Nunavut – A witness at a child abuse trial in the North is describing how a priest once used hunger to force children into sex.

The woman says her family in Igloolik, Nunavut, was sometimes hungry for days at a time between 1978 and 1982, the years when Eric Dejaeger (deh-YAY’-guhr) was the priest in the remote community.

She says her grandmother, who was raising her, often sent her to the church for a meal.

The witness says that after one such meal, when she was eight years old, Dejaeger took her upstairs and raped her.

She says she was bleeding after the assault and Dejaeger took her into the bathroom to clean herself up, then spread garbage bags on his bedroom couch so she wouldn’t stain it.

The witness says she told her grandmother about the rape, but the woman didn’t believe her.

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

CHICAGO (IL)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Cases settle against a nun and a priest
Both abused kids elsewhere but worked in Chicago
SNAP blasts Catholic officials for “on-going secrecy”
It urges Cardinal George to add names to his predators’ list
Group also praises governor & lawmakers for “major child sex reform law”

What:
Holding signs and childhood photos, clergy sex abuse survivors and their supporters will

–disclose that two Catholic clerics – a nun and a priest – molested kids elsewhere but also worked in Chicago, (lawyers settled cases against both of the clerics,) and
–prod Chicago Catholic officials to add their names (and dozens of other child molesting clerics) to the list of such offenders on the archdiocesan website and update the list of Chicago area child molesting clerics regularly and publicly.

They will also
–praise Illinois’ governor and legislators for recently-enacted “major child safety reform” that will enable more child sex abuse victims to file criminal and civil cases against predators, and
–urge citizens, especially Catholics, to spread the word about the opportunity to seek justice in court.

When:
Wednesday, Nov. 20, 1:30 p.m.

Where:
On the sidewalk outside of the Archdiocese of Chicago (835 N Rush St, Chicago)

Who:
Three-four members of a support group called SNAP (the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), including a Chicago woman who is the organization’s founder and president.

Why:
Catholic officials have paid settlements to victims of two credibly accused child molesting clerics who worked in Chicago. Both clerics were exposed as abusers for the first time. Neither cleric has been publicly “outed” in the Chicago area until today.

1. In September, Fr. Victor Phelan was “named publicly as an alleged abuser for the first time” according to the Associated Press.

[BishopAccountability.org]

Fr. Phelan was “outed” by Boston attorney Mitchell Garabedian (617-523-6250, 617-388-5252, garabedianlaw@msn.com). Garabedian reached a settlement with Catholic officials on behalf of a victim who was sexually assaulted by Fr. Phelan in Plainfield NJ in the Newark Archdiocese in 1977.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier

By PATRICK BYRNE Nov. 20, 2013

A PEAK body representing the Catholic Church’s response to clerical child sex abuse has called on all states to immediately adopt a national compensation framework for victims.

Speaking to The Courier before giving a speech at St Patrick’s Cathedral Hall last night, Truth Justice Healing Council chief executive officer, Francis Sullivan, said an independent compensation body was needed.

“I wrote yesterday, to all attorney generals in Australia, putting on their agenda that it’s time to put in place this national compensation scheme,” Mr Sullivan said.

“Not in, say, three or four years when the royal commission recommends it.

“I totally get that bit about people saying ‘well this is all very fine, but when are we going to see real action?’”

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

MARK SCHLIEBS THE AUSTRALIAN NOVEMBER 21, 2013

THE Catholic Church has dragged out for more than a year the case of a seriously ill abuse victim who is seeking substantially more than the $40,000 he received as part of a settlement in 2011.

This is despite an admission by the church that the man had been sodomised by several clerics.

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CANADA
Sylvia’s Site

As everyone knows the Father Eric Dejaeger sex abuse trial in Iqaluit was cancelled today due to a raging blizzard which swept throught the area. Believe it or not, this is the same storm which devastated Washington Illinois, caused havoc and power outages in southern Ontario, roared through Quebec, and on up to Nunavut with a blizzard which shut down the entire community of Iqaluit. And yes, that was it for the trial. It was under way for the day, but shortly thereafter the weather deteriorated to a point that the trial was cancelled and courthouse was shut down.

Hopefully the snow plows will be running full tilt through the night and the roads of Iqaluit will be open for travel by morning. Right now the temperature is -23 C with blowing snow and reduced visibility. Conditions are expected to improve by morning.

Let’s cross our fingers that the case can proceed, and that those witnesses who were to finish testifying today can do so tomorrow and then get back home to their family and friends.

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AUSTRALIA
lewisblayse.net

Phillip Aspinall, head of the Australian Anglican Church (known elsewhere as the Episcopalian Church or the Church of England), knew the details of the horrific abuse at his church’s North Coast Children’s Home for a long time, but did not intervene because he felt that the local diocese responsible was an “autonomous organisation.”

Prime Minister Tony Abbott could claim that Liberal MPs who disgraced themselves could ignore him because they were responsible to their local constituency committee. Similarly, President Obama could do the same with a corrupt Democrat congressman and U.K. Prime Minister Cameron could distance himself from a Conservative MP. Naturally, they would not do this, as no-one would believe they had no other influence over the problem lawmaker.

For Aspinall to claim no influence over disgraced Grafton bishop, Keith Slater (see previous posting) beggars belief. Yet, this is what his professional standards staffer, Rod McLary, told the Royal Commission today. Mr McLary claimed that Aspinall’s national role was “to encourage, offer counsel and attempt to persuade other bishops and archbishops on certain matters.”

Aspinall was, however, privy to the details of the abuse, from several quarters. Victim “Tommy” Campion had written him a long letter, and had a meeting with Aspinall, detailing the abuses. Lawyer Simon Harrison (see yesterday’s posting), who represented victims, had written to Aspinall, again detailing abuses. Mr Harrison told the enquiry that he was never told that Aspinall had been in touch with the then Bishop of Grafton, Keith Slater, and he would have expected to have correspondence from Aspinall telling him what he was doing.

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MASSACHUSETTS
Southcoast Today

By Matt Camara
mcamara@s-t.com
November 20, 2013

NEW BEDFORD — About a dozen parishioners have formed a committee to reinstate the Rev. Marek Chmurski as the pastor of St. Lawrence Martyr Church and the parish remains divided over Bishop George W. Coleman’s decision to remove him.

“We strongly believe that there was no consensus by the congregation on the issues raised against Father Chmurski. We believe that documentations presented were not objectively written,” the group called Parishioners Seeking Justice for Father Chmurski wrote in a letter to The Standard-Times.

The group objects to an attempt by other parishioners who last year wrote the bishop concerned about Chmurski’s ministry.

The Fall River Diocese conducted a year-long inquiry into Chmurski’s ministry of St. Lawrence — New Bedford’s oldest parish — and removed him in a Sept. 30 decree. The decree came after the bishop had asked for Chmurski’s resignation the previous June.

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RUSSIA
Interfax

St. Petersburg, November 20, Interfax – Priest Gleb Grozovsky, who is accused of molesting schoolgirls, has been suspended from service for the period of the investigation into his case.

“He cannot administer service during this period,” the St. Petersburg Metropolia told Interfax-Religion on Tuesday.

An international search warrant has been issued for Father Gleg, who has been arrested in absentia by a Russian court.

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PROVIDENCE (RI)
BishopAccountability.org
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

New records show accused Catholic priests are still in RI parishes
One of them, ousted this year, was accused months or years earlier
Groups say hundreds of abuse reports seem to be missing from police release
They call on AG and US Attorney to launch investigation of Providence diocese

WHAT
Holding poster-size blow-ups of selected documents, clergy sex abuse victims and a leader of a research/watchdog group will:

— point to new evidence that RI Catholic officials continue to keep accused priests in ministry without informing the public
— highlight “shocking revelations” in newly public records of alleged sex abuse by RI priests, and
— urge prosecutors to investigate whether the diocese’s retention of accused priests is putting minors at risk

WHEN
1:30pm, Wednesday, November 20

WHERE
Renaissance Providence Downtown Hotel
5 Avenue of the Arts [120 Francis St., if using GPS]
Providence, RI
Meeting room: The Handel Room, Temple Level

WHO
– Two survivors of sexual abuse by RI priests, including the New England spokesperson for SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests)
– A leader of a national Catholic abuse research group based in MA

WHY
On Wednesday 11/19, a RI TV station made public a collection of 45 confidential sex abuse reports from the Providence diocese to the RI State Police. The letters were posted tonight on the website of WJAR-TV (Ch. 10 – NBC), which had obtained them from the State Police by filing a public records request. All 45 letters are signed by diocesan official Robert N. McCarthy, a retired state police lieutenant. Since 1992, McCarthy has handled all sex abuse allegations against Providence priests. See:

[NBC 10]

At the news conference, the survivors and researchers will point to letters that raise disturbing questions about three recent cases:

1. In a January 8, 2013 letter, McCarthy recounts confronting an active pastor about sexual misconduct allegations by three complainants. Two were age 16 and one was 18 when the alleged abuse occurred. McCarthy refers to an investigation he had conducted involving the priest and one of the complainants during a previous winter. Did that previous investigation concern possible sexual misconduct? Why wasn’t the priest removed from ministry then?

On January 13, 2013, the Providence diocese announced the removal of Rev. Barry Meehan, pastor of St. Timothy’s Church in Warwick RI, because of “a credible allegation of sexual misconduct that allegedly took place more than 25 years ago.” See:

[BishopAccountability.org]

Is Rev. Meehan the active pastor described by McCarthy in the January 8, 2013 letter? If so, why did the diocese tell the public that Meehan had only one alleged victim, when the letter indicates he was accused by three? And why did the diocese’s announcement about Meehan refer only to a recent allegation and not the situation that McCarthy had investigated in a previous winter?

If the January 8, 2013 letter refers to a different priest, who is he? And if the diocese has removed him, why hasn’t that been announced?

2. An April 17, 2012 letter reports allegations of child molestation by two brothers against a priest who appears to be running a RI parish today. Did the diocese or State Police investigate the allegations? On what basis did the diocese decide to retain the priest?

3. In a May 9, 2011 letter about possible recent sexual abuse of a female parishioner by an active Providence priest, McCarthy cites three previous reports about the priest, including a 1994 warning and a 2002 allegation that he had molested two high school girls. Given repeated signs that the priest was dangerous, why did the diocese allow him to stay in ministry for years? Who is he, and is he still active today?

Although the State Police redacted from the letters the names of priests, parishes, towns and dates, they did not black out the dioceses’s file numbers, which suggest an “astonishingly high number” of complaints, according to Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of BishopAccountability.org, a MA-based research group that has studied the abuse crisis since 2003.

The gaps in the file numbers point to the fact that an “enormous number of abuse reports is missing from this collection,” says attorney Helen McGonigle. McGonigle was raped as a six-year-old in East Greenwich RI by the Rev. Brendan Smyth. She reported her abuse to the diocese in 2006 but no letter about her abuse is included in the new release.

As a measure of what is missing, the RI letters can be compared to a similar release of public records in New Hampshire. In 2009, the NH Attorney General’s office made public all the abuse reports it had received since 2003 from the Manchester NH diocese, which is smaller than Providence. The release included more than 125 complaints – and the AG chose to keep the names of most accused priests visible. In contrast, the reports to the State Police from the Providence diocese during the same period – 2003 to 2009 – total only 8. Where are the missing reports? See the Catholic abuse records released by the NH AG:

[BishopAccountability.org]

Finally, the letters reveal McCarthy’s “profound lack of respect for victims,” says Dr. Ann Hagan Webb, a licensed psychologist in RI and MA. Webb was sexually assaulted beginning at age five by Msgr. Anthony DeAngelis in West Warwick RI. In many of the letters, McCarthy provides gratuitous details about a victim’s unemployment, addictions or use of medication. These details seem intended to undermine the credibility of the complainant, Webb says.

For these four reasons – 1) the diocese’s persistence in keeping accused priests in ministry; 2) its high number of complaints; 3) the fact that they may have withheld many reports to the State Police; and 4) the disregard shown by its intake official for the truthfulness of victims – the state Attorney General and the US Attorney for Rhode Island must investigate the Providence diocese, the survivors and research group believe.

Common sense suggests that this diocese requires oversight, says Doyle. “Providence church officials are still taking chances with priests who have been reported for abuse. They are secretive and unaccountable. Rhode Island prosecutors should step in and investigate, as prosecutors have done in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, and Pennsylvania. The safety of children demands it.”

*
About BishopAccountability.org
Founded in 2003, BishopAccountability.org is the world’s largest public library of documents related to the abuse crisis in the Roman Catholic Church. An independent non-profit, it is not a victims’ advocacy group and is not affiliated with any church, reform, or victims’ organization.

About SNAP
SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, is the world’s oldest and largest support group for clergy abuse victims. SNAP was founded in 1988, is based in Chicago and has more than 12,000 members in 65 nations (but we have heard from victims in more than 100 countries). Despite the word “priest” in our title, we help people who were molested by religious figures of all denominations, including nuns, rabbis, bishops, and Protestant ministers. Our website is SNAPnetwork.org.

CONTACT

Anne Barrett Doyle, BishopAccountability.org, barrett.doyle@comcast.net, 781-439-5208 cell
Dr. Ann Hagan Webb, RI Abuse Survivor & Spokesperson for SNAP, Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, annhaganwebb@gmail.com, 617-513-8442 cell
Helen McGonigle, Attorney and RI Abuse Survivor, 203-300-2107 cell
Terence McKiernan, BishopAccountability.org, mckiernan1@comcast.net, 508-479-9304

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NEDERLAND
KNR

S-HERTOGENBOSCH – UTRECHT – De voorzitters van Bisschoppenconferentie en Konferentie Nederlandse Religieuzen (KNR) maken bekend dat er een sluitingsdatum komt per 1 juli 2014 voor meldingen en het indienen van klachten inzake seksueel misbruik tegen overledenen en klachten betreffende seksueel misbruik dat verjaard is.

De Bisschoppenconferentie en KNR treden op korte termijn in overleg met de slachtoffergroepen en Beheer en Toezicht (B&T) inzake de uitwerking. De Bisschoppenconferentie en KNR hechten aan een zorgvuldige voorbereiding en een stappenplan dat met de slachtoffergroepen is opgesteld. Er moeten belangrijke randvoorwaarden worden vervuld, zo hebben de slachtoffergroepen de Bisschoppenconferentie en de KNR laten weten. Nu reeds roepen de Bisschoppenconferentie en de KNR slachtoffers op zich te melden, indien zij dit nog niet hebben gedaan.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

Convicted pedophile priest Gerald Ridsdale will be sentenced next year after pleading guilty to new child sex charges.

The defrocked Catholic priest was formally arraigned in the Victorian County Court on Wednesday, pleading guilty to 28 counts of indecent assault, one count of carnal knowledge of a child and one count of buggery.

Ridsdale has admitted abusing three girls and 11 boys between the 1960s and 1980, when he was parish priest at churches in regional Victoria and Melbourne.

Ridsdale, 79, is serving a long jail sentence for multiple child sex offences.

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AUSTRALIA
J-Wire

November 20, 2013

The 49-yr-old businessman has been charged with three offences of gross indecency on young boys aged 12, 14 and 16 over 20 years ago.

Hayman left Sydney to live in the USA and indictment has cast a shadow over those responsible for running Sydney’s Yeshiva Centre where Hayman met his alleged victims.

A spokesperson for the Yeshiva Centre told J-Wire that Hayman did act as a volunteer at Yeshiva events and camps but was never employed by them.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

November 20, 2013

Emma Partridge
Crime Reporter

A businessman accused of sexually assaulting under-age boys he met through Bondi’s Yeshiva Centre was expected to return to his family home in Los Angeles after $1 million was posted for his bail

Daniel Robert Hayman, 49, was granted permission to leave the country despite being charged with a third offence, relating to the indecent assault of a 12-year-old.

Documents tendered to the court reveal he “exposed his naked body” to the young boy in the 1980s.

Mr Hayman appeared before Waverley Local Court on Wednesday charged with a further two counts of gross indecency against two males, aged 14 and 16.

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AUSTRALIA
Maribymong Weekly

By Goya Dmytryshchak

An Altona Meadows woman who spoke at last week’s Rally of Hope at Victoria’s Parliament House has criticised Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s defence of Cardinal George Pell over the Catholic Church’s handling of child sex abuse.

Mairead Ashcroft addressed Wednesday’s rally (pictured), which coincided with the tabling of a state government report on clergy and non-religious institutions’ child sex abuse.

Ms Ashcroft gave evidence before the Victorian inquiry into the handling of child abuse that she had been abused by Catholic brother Bernard Hartman, from age 8 to 11.

Hartman, 73, has been charged with 14 counts of indecent assault and is scheduled to face court next Thursday.

The day after the rally, Mr Abbott told Fairfax radio that he ‘‘had a lot of time for Cardinal Pell”. Mr Abbott said he hadn’t read the parliamentary report, which states Cardinal Pell’s evidence revealed “a reluctance to acknowledge and accept responsibility for the Catholic Church’s institutional failure to respond appropriately to allegations of criminal child abuse”.

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DELAWARE
The News Journal

[with video]

Written by
Sean O’Sullivan
The News Journal

WILMINGTON — A federal jury awarded $2.4 million Monday to a New Jersey man who was repeatedly sexually abused by a Marist brother some 30 years ago.

Brian Elliott, 44, of Cedar Knolls, N.J., testified that Damian Galligan, a member of the Marist Catholic religious order, sexually abused him starting in 1977 when Elliott was 8 years old and continued until he was 14.

Two of those hundreds of incidents of abuse occurred in Delaware in the summer of 1981 when Galligan took the young Elliott on a trip across state lines to visit Washington, D.C., which is what brought the case to the U.S. District Court in Delaware.

While Elliott said he was abused by Galligan in at least four states – including New Jersey where he lived, New York where Galligan lived and Virginia – it was only in Delaware that Elliott could file a civil suit.

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DELAWARE
The Star-Ledger

By Jeff Goldman/The Star-Ledger
on November 19, 2013

WILMINGTON, Del. — A Morris County man said he doesn’t expect to see any of the $2.4 million a Delaware court awarded him Monday for being sexually abused as a child by a cleric in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Brian Elliott, 44, of the Cedar Knolls section of Hanover Township said he was abused by Brother Damian Galligan from 1977 until about 1981, according to a report on DelawareOnline.com. Galligan admitted in a 2012 video deposition that he abused Elliott during a trip to Washington D.C.

The abuse also took place “hundreds, if not thousands” of other times, the report said.

The jury in Delaware ordered that Elliott receive $1.4 million in compensatory damages and $1 million in punitive damages.

Galligan, 86, lives in a retirement home in St. Louis and is thought to have few significant assets, the report said.

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DELAWARE
USA Today

A federal jury Monday awarded $2.4 million to a New Jersey man who was repeatedly sexually abused by a Marist brother some 30 years ago. This portion of the video deposition of Brother Damian Galligan was played for the jury. The (Wilmington, Del.) News Journal

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AUSTRALIA
NEWS.com.au

ALL Catholics must take action on child sex abuse, the head of the body set-up to represent the Catholic Church says.

Truth Justice and Healing Council chief executive Francis Sullivan said the various inquiries into abuse provided an opportunity to reform the church and address a scandal that has driven people from it for so long.

The church has been at the centre of three inquiries, including the now-concluded Victorian inquiry, the royal commission and a NSW inquiry into abuse in the Diocese of Maitland and Newcastle.

Mr Sullivan said community disgust and outrage will be unleashed as the inquiries continue, but all Catholics could work to restore trust in the institution with “action and authenticity”.

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AUSTRALIA
Sky News

A royal commission has heard a witness saw a young girl pinned down and gang raped by five older boys at the Anglican-run NSW orphanage at the centre of abuse allegations.

A former resident of the Lismore children’s home has told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse sitting in Sydney he witnessed the attack and was scared into silence.

The witness, known as CD, says he arrived at the North Coast Children’s Home aged six, and was regularly whipped with a pony whip and cane by matron Jean O’Neill.

He says he once saw a group of about five older boys pin down one of the young girls who lived in the home, and they all raped her.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Ashleigh Raper

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has heard an alleged victim threatened suicide during a lengthy compensation battle with the Anglican Church.

The commission this week began its third round of public hearings, this time to examine the alleged sexual and physical abuse of up to 200 children at the North Coast Children’s Home in Lismore.

The hearing will consider what happened at the home and how the Anglican Diocese of Grafton responded to allegations of abuse.

Solicitor Simon Harrison was holding negotiations with the head of the Anglican Church, Dr Phillip Aspinall over a compensation settlement.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

November 20, 2013

Barney Zwartz
Religion editor, The Age.

Victoria Police evidence about child sexual abuse that savaged the Catholic Church was unfair and an attempt by the force to distance itself from its own failures, a state government report says.

It took 16 years, and issues becoming public, before police paid attention to the fundamental problems in the way the church in Melbourne dealt with complaints – a process to which police had originally agreed – the report says.

Betrayal of Trust, the report of the parliamentary inquiry into how the churches handled child sexual abuse, was tabled last week.

In testimony to the inquiry last October, police accused the church of deliberately impeding their investigations into child abuse, dissuading victims from reporting to police, failing to engage with police, protecting sexual offenders and alerting suspects of allegations against them.

Police also attacked the Melbourne Response independent commissioner, Peter O’Callaghan, QC, and complained that not one case had been referred to them.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

ADRIENNE FRANCIS – ABC
November 20, 2013

The new Catholic archbishop of Canberra and Goulburn says the church could do more to support victims of child sexual abuse.

Former Victorian bishop Christopher Prowse has been installed as the new Catholic archbishop during a solemn mass at St Christopher’s Cathedral in Forrest.

In delivering the homily, Archbishop Prowse mentioned the Royal Commission and parliamentary inquiries into child sexual abuse, telling the packed congregation he truly felt for its victims.

“We can always do a lot more,” he said.

“First of all, we have got to listen to their stories. I think we need to really improve on that.

“The victims, these courageous and brave people, coming out to share their horrendous stories and we want to stand alongside them and be supportive of them in these fragile times.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Legal fight like being ‘raped’ again, child abuse victim tells Royal Commission

Dan Box
From: The Australian
November 20, 2013

A VICTIM of child abuse, who was repeatedly raped as a young girl while living in a children’s home, has said the experience of dealing legally with the Anglican church about what took place “was like being raped all over again.”

In a written statement read to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse this morning, the woman said she was seven when she entered the home in the Anglican Diocese of Grafton, northern NSW.

“It smelt terrible, like faeces, and there was vomit on the ground. I could see about twenty-odd children, all dirty.

“It was horrific. I felt that I couldn’t protect myself or my sister … I was told, and I heard other children being told, that we were ‘dirty little heathens’,” her statement said.

Decades later, the woman joined roughly 40 other former residents seeking compensation from the church, which spent years challenging their claims and denying any liability for what happened at the home.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

November 20, 2013

Barney Zwartz

Ordinary Catholics have to take responsibility for the church as it emerges from the abuse crisis and tries to rebuild trust, says church spokesman Francis Sullivan.

In a speech on Wednesday evening in Ballarat – deliberately chosen as one of the regional centres most scarred by clergy sexual abuse – Mr Sullivan said the church was at a critical juncture and warned that revelations soon to emerge at the royal commission would dishearten and disillusion Catholics around the country.

“Community disgust and outrage will again be unleashed,” he said.

The royal commission next month begins a public session examining the Catholic response Towards Healing, and how the church dealt with four separate victims.

The Victorian inquiry into how the churches handled clergy child sexual abuse was scathing about the church in its report last week, and the church has since endorsed the report’s wide-ranging recommendations for legal and other reforms.

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AUSTRALIA
Perth Now

BY ANNETTE BLACKWELL AAP NOVEMBER 20, 2013

PROTECTING investors in a multimillion-dollar diocesan investment fund debt took priority over the claims of abuse victims from a NSW Anglican children’s home, an inquiry has heard.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Sydney was told on Wednesday that the Diocese of Grafton was $12 million in debt after building a private school at Clarence Valley, which never attracted enough students.

The diocese has been accused of mishandling compensation settlements and claims from people who were brutally abused from the 1940s to 1980s at a Church of England orphanage in Lismore.

In evidence by video link, Anthony Newby said when he became registrar at Grafton in October 2010 the school debt was not being serviced.

An oversight committee was set up to open lines of credit involving other dioceses – not an easy task as only two, Perth and Adelaide, eventually came on board.

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MINNESOTA
KARE

[with video]

John Croman

ST. PAUL, Minn. — In his latest John Doe sex abuse lawsuit, attorney Jeffrey Anderson targets a former Twin Cities priest and the order he belonged to until 2011, based at St. John’s Abbey in Collegeville.

The plaintiff is a man who alleges he was sexually abused between 1989 and 1992 by Father Francis Hoefgen, who at the time served at Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton Catholic Church in Hastings.

Anderson and his legal team maintain that Hoefgen should’ve been kept from taking that post in Hastings based on his prior behavior in a different parish.

The alleged victim said the abuse started when he was 10 and ended when he was 13, at the same time Hoefgen was reassigned to another church facility in Frontenac.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

Royal commission into child sexual abuse hears more harrowing evidence against Anglican Diocese of Grafton

MATTHEW BENNS THE DAILY TELEGRAPH NOVEMBER 20, 2013

THE whoosh of the riding crop and the screams of the children echoed through the corridors of the Anglican Church children’s home, the royal commission into child sexual abuse heard yesterday.

“I remember hearing the whoosh of the riding crop every time Matron hit the child,” a victim from the former North Coast Children’s Home in Lismore said in a statement read to the commission.

“The whoosh noise filled me with intense fear,” said the victim, who can only be identified as CM.

Matron Jean O’Neill would take children into her office and close the door. “I heard her whipping children in her office with the crop and the children screaming.

“I would be whipped for the most trivial things like not using my manners,” said CM, who was seven when first whipped with the leather covered, steel riding crop. “It would leave red marks, bruises and cuts on me which sometimes took two weeks to heal.”

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

[with audio]

The Royal Commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse has been told that the Anglican Church took a hardline and antagonistic approach to dealing with abuse victims from the North Coast Children’s Home. An advisor to the Anglican Primate of Australia told the inquiry that there was concern about how the diocese was handling the negotiations, but couldn’t intervene.

Transcript

MARK COLVIN: The child abuse Royal Commission has heard that the Anglican Church took a harsh and antagonistic approach to victims of abuse from the New South Wales North Coast Children’s Home.

The inquiry’s been told that the Grafton Diocese which ran the home took a legal hard line against compensation claims by the former residents of the orphanage.

The lawyer representing the group said the Grafton Diocese had “gone rogue” and the Church’s key negotiator had “an attitude of machismo on par with Clint Eastwood.”

A warning: some parts of Emily Bourke’s report may distress some listeners.

EMILY BOURKE: The Royal Commission has heard more shocking accounts from survivors of abuse at the North Coast Children’s home.

A statement from witness CN was read to the inquiry.

CN (read statement): I was raped three times by older boys who lived in the home. I was told and I heard other children being told by staff that we were dirty little heathens. I was told I was bad and horrible. I was made to feel worthless by the people in the home.

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MINNESOTA
Pioneer Press

By Emily Gurnon
egurnon@pioneerpress.com
POSTED: 11/19/2013

A former Hastings priest and St. John’s Abbey are among defendants in a lawsuit filed Tuesday by a Minnesota man who alleges the priest sexually abused him after “graduating” from a sex-offender treatment facility.

The plaintiff, now in his 30s, also sued the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and the treatment center, St. Luke Institute of Silver Spring, Md.

Francis Hoefgen admitted to police in 1984 that he sexually abused a minor, then was assigned the next year to St. Elizabeth Ann Seton church in Hastings after an evaluation at the institute, said the plaintiff’s attorney, Jeff Anderson, of St. Paul, in a statement.

Hoefgen sexually abused the plaintiff, identified as John Doe 27, at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton from about 1989 to 1992, the suit claimed. The boy was then 10 to 13 years old.

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MINNESOTA
St. Cloud Times

Written by
David Unze

The file containing details of the investigation into allegations of sexual abuse by the Rev. Fran Hoefgen likely was destroyed in the 1990s as part of a routine purging of records from cases in which no charges were filed.

Stearns County Attorney Janelle Kendall released two documents Tuesday from the state Department of Administration that showed that numerous adult and juvenile case files in which no charges were filed were ordered destroyed in two document purges, one in May 1996 and the other in February 1998.

Then-County Attorney Roger Van Heel was listed as the person reporting the document destruction to the state in one instance and First Assistant County Attorney Patrick Strom was the reporting party in the other instance.

The county attorney’s office has case files dating back to the 1960s, said Mike Lieberg, head of that office’s criminal division, but those are files in which criminal charges were filed.

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MINNESOTA
KSTP

[with video]

By: Scott Theisen
A Minnesota man who claims he was sexually abused by a priest from 1989 through 1992 sued the Twin Cities archdiocese, St. John’s Abbey and a center that treats clergy with psychological issues on Tuesday.

The lawsuit claims Francis Hoefgen, a former monk and priest, was at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton church in Hastings when he molested the plaintiff, who was 10 to 13 years old at the time. It alleges the defendants were negligent and should have known Hoefgen was a danger because he admitted to abusing a teenage boy just a few years earlier. It also alleges church officials didn’t warn Hoefgen’s new parish about the risk.

“This is quite disturbing, quite alarming. But also quite familiar and quite typical,” said Jeff Anderson, an attorney for the plaintiff, who’s identified in the lawsuit as Doe 27. “All of these entities made conscious choices to conceal, instead of reveal, the truth about the hazard and because of it, countless kids were hurt.”

Hoefgen did not return a message seeking comment. His attorney, Robert Stich, said Tuesday he had just received the complaint and was in the process of analyzing it.

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MINNESOTA
KSTP

[with video]

By: Leslie Dyste
A Minnesota man who claims he was sexually abused by a priest from 1989 through 1992 sued the Twin Cities archdiocese, St. John’s Abbey and a center that treats clergy with psychological issues on Tuesday.

The lawsuit claims Francis Hoefgen was at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton church in Hastings when he molested the plaintiff, who was 10 to 13 years old at the time. It alleges the defendants should have known Hoefgen was a danger because he admitted to abusing another boy just a few years earlier. It also alleges church officials didn’t warn Hoefgen’s new parish about the risk.

“This is quite disturbing, quite alarming. But also quite familiar and quite typical,” said Jeff Anderson, an attorney for the plaintiff, who’s identified in the lawsuit as Doe 27. “All of these entities made conscious choices to conceal, instead of reveal, the truth about the hazard and because of it, countless kids were hurt.”

Click here to watch ‘part 2’ of the news conference.
Click here to read the full story.

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CANADA
CBC News

The defence lawyer for a priest facing dozens of sex abuse charges involving Inuit children is questioning the memory and motivation of the complainants.

Eric Dejaeger faces 68 charges related to the sexual abuse of children in Igloolik three decades ago. Yesterday, he pleaded guilty to eight counts of indecent assault.

This morning, Dejaeger’s defense lawyer Malcolm Kempt cross-examined a 43-year-old woman who says the accused taped her face-down by her wrists and feet to a bed frame and violated her when she was a little girl.

Kempt asked the witness what Dejaeger was wearing at the time and requested she outline specific events around the attack. He also queried her about a $16,000 out-of-court settlement she got from the Catholic Church.

Kempt has said the memory and credibility of alleged victims about events 30 years ago are key to Dejaeger’s defence.

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SCOTLAND
Independent Catholic News

By: Dan Bergin, Michael Glacken
Posted: Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Scottish parishioners walked out of Mass at St John Ogilivie’s Church in High Blantyre on Sunday, in protest at the sudden dismissal of their parish priest, Father Matthew Despard the night before.

Father Despard, 48, published his book ‘Crisis in the Priesthood’ on Amazon after the resignation of Cardinal Keith O’Brien, who admit ted that he had gay relationships over a number of years and was accused by some priests of making unwanted homosexual advances towards them.

In April this year, the previous Bishop of Motherwell Bishop Joseph Devine, had said that no sanctions would be taken against Fr Despard. On Saturday Bishop Toal told the congregation that a ‘penal judicial process’ had been instituted against Fr Despard because of the book.

When acting Bishop Joseph Toal came to say Mass in the parish with Fr William Nolan, who has been appointed temporary administrator, one woman got up to speak in defence of Fr Despard. The majority of the congregation then stood up and walked out. Many were in tears. Parishioners have now begun a petition calling for Fr Despard’s reinstatement.

A spokesman for Bishop Toal said: “Since there is a canonical case in progress at the present time, Bishop Toal felt it was appropriate to remove Fr Matthew Despard from Parish Ministry until the judicial process has run its course. This action does not prejudice the case in any way.”

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MINNESOTA
Mankato Free Press

By Dan Nienaber
dnienaber@mankatofreepress.com

NEW ULM — A Minnetonka attorney has filed a second lawsuit against the Catholic Diocese of New Ulm, claiming officials there allowed a priest to continue working at churches under its control when they should have known he was sexually abusing teenagers.

The diocese responded to the allegations by Patrick Noaker and his client, identified as John Doe 107, with a news release listing the locations Rev. William Marks worked while he was a serving as a priest from 1936 through 1979. The diocese in New Ulm wasn’t created until 1957, but the allegations claim the boy was sexually abused from about 1957 to 1960 while he was an altar boy at the Church of St. John in Hector.

The incident will be investigated, but there is no additional information at this time, the news release said. It also said the diocese regrets the “devastating effects of sexual misconduct on the part of clergy” and that it is working diligently to provide a safe environment at its churches.

A similar response was issued after Noaker filed his first lawsuit against the diocese in June that claims another client was sexually abused by Rev. Francis Markey while Markey was serving as a substitute priest at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Henderson. The victim was about 15 years old when he was allegedly assaulted in 1982.

A third lawsuit, filed in September by another attorney, names two women who claim they were sexually assaulted by Rev. David Roney while he was serving as a priest in Willmar during the late 1960s and early 1970s.

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MINNESOTA
Daily Journal

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First Posted: November 19, 2013

MINNEAPOLIS — Prosecutors have charged a Maplewood priest for allegedly fondling a female parishioner while giving her spiritual guidance.

The Rev. Mark Huberty, 43, pastor of the Church of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, was charged Tuesday in Hennepin County.

Huberty is charged with fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct, a felony. He was charged by summons and is not in custody.

According to the complaint, Huberty and the woman met in 2008 when the woman came to him for spiritual counseling.

The woman went to police in May. The priest went on leave and was removed from the church rectory in September pending the investigation.

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DELAWARE
Houston Chronicle

RANDALL CHASE, Associated Press | November 19, 2013

DOVER, Del. (AP) — A Delaware man who reached a $1.7 million settlement in a priest sex abuse case has been killed in a motorcycle accident.

State police say 43-year-old Joseph Curry was riding his motorcycle at high speed Tuesday morning on U.S. 40 when he ran a red light and crashed into a utility trailer.

In 2011, Curry reached a settlement with St. Dennis parish in Galena, Md., over claims that he was molested as a boy by the late Rev. Edward Carley. Carley was one of several pedophile priest identified by the Catholic Diocese of Wilmington.

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MINNESOTA
KDUZ

Another lawsuit has been filed against the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, by a man who claims he was one of at least 27 molested by a cleric who served in Hastings, Hector, and other southern Minnesota towns.

MNN reports the personal injury lawsuit filed on behalf of John Doe 107 names the late Revered William Marks as his abuser, and also names the Diocese of New Ulm.

Bob Schwiderski of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests says he was abused by the same priest in the early 60′s and he is appalled by the refusal of church officials to name every priest credibly accused of molesting children — referring to the story outlined in Luke 25-through-37. Schwiderski says “They have not been good Samaritans. As they have been on that path, riding their donkeys, and they see those lying at the side of the road bleeding they refuse to get off their donkeys and help those that have been harmed”.

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RHODE ISLAND
NBC 10

Part 1 – I-Team: Letters raise questions about alleged sex abuse in diocese

[with copies of the letters]

Updated: Nov 19, 2013
By Katie Davis

PROVIDENCE –
In a recent investigation, the NBC 10 I-Team obtained through a records request 88 pages detailing sexual abuse by Rhode Island Roman Catholic priests, going back more than 30 years.

In each case, a letter detailing allegations of sexual abuse was sent to Rhode Island State Police by the Diocese of Providence.

The diocese began the practice around 2003, although there’s no legal mandate requiring the letters.

A total of 45 letters were sent to state police between 2003 and 2013.

The documents which were stamped “confidential” were heavily redacted by state police.

The names of priests were blacked out, even those people who are already dead. Dates and locations were blacked out. The names of the churches were blacked out too.

But the details that remained were stories from victims who say there were sexually assaulted, raped and told to keep quiet.

Some where children forced to engage in oral sex and were told no one would believe them.

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AUSTRALIA
The Morning Bulletin

Jessica Grewal 20th Nov 2013

AFTER apologising for his failure to handle child abuse claims, Grafton’s outgoing Anglican bishop Keith Slater chose as his replacement a man who for 10 years helped run the home where untold horrors were alleged to have been committed.

The revelation came yesterday, the second day of an inquiry into the Grafton diocese’s response to allegations of sexual abuse at Lismore’s North Coast Children’s Home.

Former acting registrar Anne Hywood was questioned for much of the day about her role in the events leading up to former Grafton Bishop Slater’s exit earlier this year.

She told of how she had become so concerned about the way in which Bishop Slater and then registrar and Clarence Valley councillor Pat Comben had handled allegations of sexual abuse at the home that she wrote to senior clergy members in Sydney.

She believed the pair managed claims on their own for many years, without complying with the professional standards protocol and had looked at the situation from a legal position rather than the obligation of the church.

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NEW YORK
The Journal News

NEW YORK — Faced with a priest shortage and dwindling attendance, the Archdiocese of New York is looking to close and merge some parishes.

The Wall Street Journal says the archdiocese is in discussions with its 368 parishes. It expects to deliver recommendations to Cardinal Timothy Dolan by June.

The decision on closings and mergers is to be announced in September, archdiocese spokesman Joseph Zwilling said.

The archdiocese closed 21 parishes in 2007. This year, it also closed 24 Catholic schools.

The Rev. John O’Hara, who’s leading the church’s effort, says the archdiocese has many churches with attendance well below the building’s capacity, making them financially unviable. He says the Catholic church would like to spend more money on education programs.

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MINNESOTA
Minnesota Public Radio

by Tom Scheck, Minnesota Public Radio
November 19, 2013

ST. PAUL, Minn. — Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman filed criminal sexual misconduct charges Tuesday against the Rev. Mark Huberty, who served as pastor at Church of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Maplewood from 2007 until September.

According to the charges, Huberty inappropriately touched a woman under his spiritual care. They later engaged in other sexual activity over several months in the woman’s Maplewood home, at the church and in Huberty’s car.

Huberty and the woman were scheduled to go on a vacation to Kansas City in April, the complaint says. He later canceled the vacation, upsetting the victim. She later approached Huberty asking how she could stay in the church and attend mass knowing what they did together. Huberty “revealed that other women friends seemed to have no problem remaining active in the church when their relationship with him ended,” the complaint says.

The victim filed a report with the Maplewood Police Department in May after Huberty encouraged her to not tell her husband about the relationship.

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MINNESOTA
St. Cloud Times

Written by
David Unze

ST. PAUL — A civil lawsuit filed Tuesday accuses a former St. John’s Abbey priest of sexually abusing a child at a Hastings parish where he was assigned after his superiors knew he had sexually abused a boy in Cold Spring.

The Rev. Francis “Fran” Hoefgen admitted in March 1984 that he had sexually abused a boy in the St. Boniface parish residence in Cold Spring. Hoefgen was sent to St. Luke Institute in Maryland for evaluation and treatment and never was charged criminally in Stearns County.

Officials in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis then assigned Hoefgen to a parish in Hastings, where he sexually abused another boy from 1989 to 1992, according to the lawsuit. The victim in the Hastings abuse was 10-13 at the time and is suing Hoefgen, St. John’s Abbey, St. Luke Institute and the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Hoefgen’s superiors were aware of his record of abuse when they assigned him to Hastings, said attorney Jeff Anderson, who filed the lawsuit. But they did nothing to tell anyone in Hastings about it.

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MINNESOTA
KEYC

[with video]

By Mitch Keegan, Anchor, KEYC News

The Diocese of New Ulm has been named in a new lawsuit filed over alleged sexual abuse by a priest.

Minnetonka attorney Patrick Noaker filed the lawsuit in Ramsey County on behalf of a Colorado plaintiff referred to as John Doe 107.

The complaint says Father William Marks, who died in 1979, sexually abused the plaintiff while serving at the Church of St. John in Hector.

The lawsuit also names the Archdiocese of Minneapolis and St. Paul, which was Father Marks’ jurisdiction before the New Ulm Diocese was created in 1957.

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday, Nov. 19 2013

Statement by Minnesota SNAP leader Megan Peterson (218-689-9049, Survivor19@live.com)

We are glad Father Mark Huberty faces criminal charges for sexually exploiting a parishioner. It’s virtually always hurtful – and often illegal – for clerics to have any sexual contact with a congregant.

[Pioneer Press]

If a criminal embezzles from a bank, no one talks about their “financial relationship.” So no one should ever talk about “a relationship” between a predatory priest and a parishioner. It’s a crime. It should be treated and described as a crime. It should not be minimized or mischaracterized by words or phrases that suggest consent when no genuine consent is possible.

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DELAWARE
The News Journal

[with video

Joseph L. Curry, one of the first victims of clergy sexual abuse to tell his story publicly in Delaware, died today when his motorcycle slammed into another vehicle on U.S. 40 near Bear.

State police say Curry, 43, of New Castle, was speeding eastbound on U.S. 40 at about 9:21 a.m. when he went through a red traffic light. Police say Thomas B. Christy, 50, of West Chester, Pa., was turning left onto U.S. 40 from Church Road in a 2006 GMC Sierra pickup truck with a utility trailer behind it.

The motorcycle struck the side of the utility trailer, pinning both Curry and the motorcycle underneath it, according to state police spokesman Sgt. Paul Shavack.

Curry was taken to Christiana Hospital Trauma Center, where he was pronounced dead. Christy was not injured.

Curry was among dozens of abuse victims who filed suit against the Catholic Diocese of Wilmington under provisions of the 2007 Child Victims Act. The Delaware law made it possible for those whose cases would otherwise be barred by the statute of limitations to file suit in civil court.

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MINNESOTA
KMSP

ST. PAUL, Minn. (KMSP) –
A Minnesota man filed a lawsuit Tuesday against St. John’s Abbey, the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and the St. Luke Institute, alleging they should have known the priest who abused him was a sexual predator.

The lawsuit claims Rev. Fran Hoefgen sexually abused the victim between 1989 and 1993, when he was 10 to 13 years old. The alleged abuse occurred during Rev. Hoefgen’s tenure at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Catholic Church in Hastings, Minn.

The lawsuit alleges the defendants should have known Hoefgen was a danger to children because he sexually abused another boy at the St. Boniface School in Cold Spring, Minn. in 1983.

Hoefgen confessed to the St. Boniface abuse in a signed statement to police, but was never charged. Instead, the priest was sent to the St. Luke Institute for mental health evaluation, then returned ministry.

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CANADA
The Record

By Record staff

A retired Anglican priest from Cambridge has been found guilty of sex offences dating back almost 25 years.

Rev. George Ferris, 66, faced two counts of sexual assault and one count of sexual exploitation in connection with offences that took place in Brant County between 1983 and 1989.

His trial in October was held in Ontario Court in Brantford. The Brantford Expositor reports a 42-year-old witness testified he was molested over several years from the age of about 13, in a situation that escalated from embraces to oral and anal sex. The court was also told the witness asked Ferris for “hush” money in 2006, and received $5,000 deposited in his bank account.

Ferris served at St. James’ Anglican Church on Ellis Road in Cambridge for about nine years until his retirement at the end of December 2010. He served as interim priest at St. James’ Anglican Church in Ingersoll in 2011.

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MINNESOTA
Pioneer Press

By Emily Gurnon
egurnon@pioneerpress.com
POSTED: 11/19/2013

Prosecutors have charged a Maplewood priest with criminal sexual conduct, alleging he had a sexual relationship with a female parishioner while giving her spiritual guidance.

Mark Andrew Huberty, 43, of the Church of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, was charged Tuesday in Hennepin County District Court.

While meeting regularly with the woman to discuss issues raised in her catechism classes, Huberty asked her to be his friend, according to the criminal complaint.

Huberty “explained that a rule of their friendship was that any touching would be above the waist and over clothing,” and began to regularly visit her in her home, the complaint said.

As time went on, Huberty began to slip his hands under the woman’s pants and fondle her buttocks, as well as fondle her breast while hugging her, the complaint said. The behavior progressed to Huberty asking the woman to stroke his genitals, charges said.

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MINNESOTA
WCCO

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO/AP) — The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis is facing new accusations of child sexual abuse by a priest.

Those claims are part of a new lawsuit filed by a Twin Cities man who said he was molested by Father Francis Hoefgen, who had already admitted to sexually abusing children. Lawyers held a news conference Tuesday on the matter and are asking the church to hand over more information.

The plaintiff in this suit wants the names of clerics and priests who have been credibly accused of molesting children. Attorneys named the priest at the center of this lawsuit, Hoefgen, and explained why he should not have still been in the priesthood.

The lawsuit filed Tuesday says Rev. Francis Hoefgen molested the man from 1989 through 1992 when the victim was 10 to 13 years old. Hoefgen was at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton church at the time.

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DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
Dominican Today

Santo Domingo.- The Justice Ministry on Monday said it concluded the investigation into ousted Vatican envoy Jozef Wesolowski with depositions from five victims.

It said the prelate’s case file and has medical exams were sent to the Vatican, with taped the testimony from some of the victims, as well as statements from the deacon Francisco Javier Occis, who was allegedly aware of the Catholic bishop’s actions and affirmed he had intercourse with Wesolowski.

Among the victims is a boy who is18 years of age today, but was abused for several years when he was a minor.

In his deposition, the deacon said that “he (Wesolowski) apparently smoked and took passes (snorted cocaine). He never did it in front of me. He bought the drug on the street,”

The Pope has the audios by the victims and the versions of the deacon.

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UNITED STATES
LA Progressive

By John MacMurray

“As it was in the beginning, it now and ever shall be…” pretty much sums up what most of us know about the history of the Catholic Church; it’s always just sort of been there just like it is.

And priests have always been celibate, so stories about young parishioners being molested have been part of Church history since, well, since forever.

Not so, in fact.

The Roman Catholic Church has changed greatly over its long life, and one of the points that has changed is the issue of celibacy for the Clergy.

Until about the 13th century, celibacy was seen as optional.

In fact, most priests and other officials in the early Church were married. The first 39 Popes, from St. Peter (AD32-AD67) to St. Anastasius I (AD399-AD401), were married. During this time also, women were ordained to the priesthood; but that came to an end in AD494.

It was 13th Century Medieval politics that forced the issue. The Church leadership decided that the best way for it to stay out of the nepotism and succession problems was to have an unmarried clergy that was not involved in the fights.

This might be a good time to explain the difference between priests and clerics. A priest is engaged in a vocation of service, a spiritual calling from God. A cleric occupies an organizational position in the institutional church. A man can be a priest without being a cleric.

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MINNESOTA
The Journal

November 19, 2013
By Kevin Sweeney – Journal Editor , The Journal

NEW ULM – The Diocese of New Ulm has been named as a defendant in a second lawsuit that accuses the diocese of failing to protect parishioners from sexual abuse from a priest that it should have known was a sexual predator.

The lawsuit was filed in Ramsey County Monday on behalf of a defendant identified as John Doe 107, now an adult residing in Colorado. The suit names the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and the Diocese of New Ulm.

The lawsuit claims the plaintiff was sexually abused by the Rev. William J. Marks, who was a priest in the two dioceses from 1948 to 1979. Marks, who died in November 1979, was assigned to parishes including St. Dionysus in Tyler, St. John’s Catholic Church in Hector, and St. Clotilde in Green Valley. All were located within the Archdiocese until 1959, when the Diocese of New Ulm was formed.

The suit alleges that the plaintiff was abused by Fr. Marks from 1957 to 1960, when he was 10 to 14 years old and served as an altar boy at St. John’s in Hector. The plaintiff said Marks would hug the boy hard, and slide his hands into and over the boy’s pants, usually before and after mass when the boy was changing into or out of his altar boy robes.

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AUSTRALIA
lewisblayse.net

Abuses at the North Coast Children’s Home have been detailed to the third “case study” hearing of the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Sydney this week. The institution was run by the Anglican Church (known elsewhere as the Episcopalian Church or the Church of England), although their officials have denied this, claiming it was, in fact, run by a committee, and therefore the church was not morally or legally responsible for what happened there.

The audacity of the church’s attempts to deny responsibility can be shown by the inclusion of the sign on the main gate to the Home (pictured above) clearly identifying the “Church of England” (as the Anglican Church was then known). The above photo was tended to the enquiry as evidence.

An insight into Phillip Aspinall’s (see previous posting) church’s duplicity was given by the testimony, today, of lawyer, Simon Harrison, who represented some of the victims. He testified that the way the Anglican Church dealt with the claims was the most “scurrilous and mean-minded” he has ever seen. He said that a lawyer for the Grafton diocese, Peter Roland, claimed there were limited funds for Mr Harrison’s clients.

“He was pleading poverty, but I have seen that so many times with churches I just took it as a matter of course. Out of all the claims I’ve dealt with over quite a few years, the way this was dealt with by the church was perhaps the most scurrilous and mean-minded attitude I’d ever come across quite frankly.” When Mr Harrison represented a former resident, known only as CA, who sought compensation after the group settlement had been reached in 2007, he was told the North Coast Children’s Home file was closed.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Insider

In an interview with the National Catholic Register, the Archbishop of Boston says “the Church is not a democracy” but a place of “dialogue and prayer”

MARCO TOSATTI
ROME

In two weeks’ time, the international group of eight cardinals Bergoglio chose to advise him on Curia reform will be holding their second meeting to discuss the progress of the work being done. The process of reform will not necessarily be a quick one: Paul VI’s reforms were several years in the making and even John Paul II’s Curia, which was decidedly smaller, took about two years to reform completely. After December’s meeting and another meeting in February on the occasion of the Consistory announced for the feast of the Chair of St. Peter, there will be yet another, apparently informal, meeting between members of the College of Cardinals. During this meeting it is likely that cardinals will at least be given some general guide lines. For now, very little information has been given about concrete plans.

The interview the Archbishop of Boston, Cardinal Sean O’Malley gave a few days ago to the National Catholic Register doesn’t seem to provide any clues either. “As has been announced, there is a desire to reform the curia, to make it more at the service of the Holy Father and the local Churches. The goal is to make the curia more efficient and thus to allow the Holy Father to govern more effectively. It is important to review the functions of the dicasteries and pontifical councils, to see how they can work better.”

Then there is the question of internationalisation, a subject which has been debated for many years and which has been dealt with at the top levels of the Catholic Church (this is the third non-Italian Pope in a row) but perhaps not so much at other levels. “The Church has grown so much and is more international. So there is a desire to internationalize the curia to some extent. That could be difficult, however, because of linguistic challenges and the need for people to live in Rome.”

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COLOMBIA
El Tiempo

[Summary: Obeying Vatican orders, the Colombian Catholic Church has begun taking measures to avoid child sexual abuse by priests.]

Denuncias ante las autoridades civiles y un mayor filtro en los seminarios, parte de las medidas.

Obedeciendo a órdenes vaticanas, la Iglesia Católica colombiana empezó a impartir una lista de medidas con las que se busca evitar casos de abusos sexuales a niños por parte de sus sacerdotes.

Se trata de una serie de decretos, producto de una asamblea plenaria de obispos realizada en junio pasado –con instrucciones de la Santa Sede que surgieron desde el pontificado de Benedicto XVI- que ya están siendo implementados en varias jurisdicciones eclesiásticas del país. Las primeras son las diócesis de Ibagué y Espinal (Tolima), Tunja (Boyacá) y Girardota (Antioquia) pero las demás se irán sumando paulatinamente.

En general, estas medidas prometen que habrá tolerancia cero con los sacerdotes involucrados en casos de pederastia. Según monseñor José Daniel Falla, secretario general de la Conferencia Episcopal, se busca establecer una política integral de protección a los menores de edad para prevenir, investigar y sancionar eventuales delitos sexuales en las instituciones de la Iglesia.

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SPRINGFIELD (IL)
The American Conservative

By ROD DREHER • November 16, 201

… while leaving a legion of them in one’s own:

Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois has announced that he will conduct prayers of exorcism at the city’s cathedral on November 20, the date when Illinois Governor Pat Quinn will sign into law a bill recognizing same-sex marriage.

In a statement released by the Springfield diocese, Bishop Paprocki explained that the ritual of exorcism is designed not only for cases of demonic possession, but also for circumstances when the work of the devil is evident in public activities “and in various forms of opposition to and persecution of the Church.”

I’ll bet there’s not a bit of difference between my view of SSM and Bishop Paprocki’s. But I wonder if Bishop Paprocki has publicly exorcised his chancery. From a 2006 investigation then-Bishop Lucas ordered into his predecessor’s behavior:

Bishop Ryan engaged in sexual misconduct with adults and used his authority to conceal this misconduct. Although denied by Bishop Ryan, this behavior did occur and caused scandal in the Church by leading others to do evil. It resulted in feelings of hurt and anger, as well as thoughts of doubt and mistrust both in the Church as an institution and in its leaders. There is anecdotal evidence of local Catholics abandoning the faith as a result of that behavior. Bishop Ryan no longer resides in the diocese and no longer participates in public ministry.

From the Catholic News Service’s report on the results of the investigation:

Retired Springfield Bishop “engaged in improper sexual conduct and used his office to conceal his activities” when he headed the diocese, said an investigative report released by the diocese Aug. 2.

It said Springfield’s bishop from 1984 to 1999, fostered “a culture of secrecy … that discouraged faithful priests from coming forward with information about misconduct” by other clergy in the diocese.

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MINNESOTA
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on November 19, 2013

On October 5, the Archdiocese of St. Paul & Minneapolis, which has been mired in a sex abuse and cover-up crisis, announced that an “independent” task force will convene to investigate how archdiocese officials handled abuse allegations, as well as review policies and procedures in place.
.
The official announcement stated that “The Vicar [Fr. Reginald Whitt] and the task force, which will convene this week, will have full authority and all the resources needed to complete their work. The findings and recommendations of this task force will be released publicly when the final report is complete.”

Then, less than two weeks later in a letter to clergy, Rev. Reginald Whitt wrote “Access to these files will be within my control, and limited only to what is necessary for the Task Force to be able to make an informed decision with respect to their policy review.”

Sound familiar? It’s the same tactic that bishops have been using with lay review boards for years: make a big announcement about being “open and transparent,” appoint a review board, then, when media attention dies down, tie the board members’ hands behind their back and throw them under the bus.

It’s public relations, nothing more.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

NCR Editorial Staff | Nov. 19, 2013

EDITORIAL

The documents we reprinted as a pullout in the center of the Nov. 22-Dec. 5 issue of the newspaper were sent to NCR by someone who feared the questionnaire from the Vatican about next year’s Synod of Bishops on the family wouldn’t get as wide a distribution as intended, at least here in the United States. The bishops of England and Wales put the questionnaire online for all to examine and respond to, but the instructions from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops didn’t seem to push for widest possible distribution.

NCR posted the documents online Oct. 31. At first, a couple church officials said NCR was making too much of this questionnaire — “We get requests like this all the time. We’ll handle it in the usual manner,” they said. The Vatican spokesman, Jesuit Fr. Federico Lombardi, told another news outlet Nov. 2 that it is “only a document sent to bishops’ conferences” and a part of the habitual “praxis” of the Synod of Bishops. To say the document was more than that, he said, was “not true.”

But on Nov. 5, the Vatican had called a news conference to explain the documents and it too posted them online. The Synod of Bishops’ general secretary, Archbishop Lorenzo Baldisseri, said he expected pastors would provide summaries of the views and experiences of their parishioners, and that their findings would be “channeled” in turn through national bishops’ conferences for ultimate consideration by the synod. However, he also welcomed individual Catholics to communicate directly with the synod’s offices at the Vatican. Synod staff would consider that input for the synod’s working document, which should be published in May 2014, he said.

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FORT WORTH (TX)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday, Nov. 19, 2013

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

Msgr. Michael F. Olson has been named the bishop of the Ft. Worth Catholic diocese.

[Star-Telegram]

We are glad every time a newly named bishop comes from outside a chancery office. Olson is no “outsider.” But we are encouraged because his last position wasn’t inside a diocesan headquarters.

Still, we urge Ft. Worth citizens and Catholics to be skeptical. Vigilance protects kids. Complacency protects no one. So while it’s tempting to give the new guy “the benefit of the doubt,” we urge parishioners and the public to report known and suspected clergy sexual misdeeds to secular officials, not church officials.

There are 12 publicly accused Ft. Worth child molesting clerics (according to BishopAccountability.org). We suspect the real number us three or four or five times higher. We hope the new bishop will scour the files and disclose the names, photos, whereabouts and work histories of every proven, admitted and credibly accused child molesting cleric who lives/lived or works/worked in the diocese (whether living or deceased, religious order or diocesan). And we hope he will update the list regularly and publicly.

Finally, we hope he will aggressively seek out others who saw, suspected or suffered child sex crimes by Father William Paiz. Last year, Fr. Paiz was accused of assaulting a child at All Saints Catholic Church, St. George Catholic Church and other locations. He worked at Nolan High School.

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FORT WORTH (TX)
National Catholic Reporter

Dennis Coday | Nov. 19, 2013 NCR Today

This is a press release from the U.S. bishops’ conference this morning:

Pope names seminary rector bishop of Fort Worth, Texas

November 19, 2013

WASHINGTON—Pope Francis has named Msgr. Michael Olson, 47, a priest of the Diocese of Fort Worth, Texas and rector of Holy Trinity Seminary at the University of Dallas in Irving, Texas, as bishop of Fort Worth.

The appointment was publicized in Washington, November 19, by Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, apostolic nuncio to the United States.

He succeeds Bishop Kevin Vann, who was named bishop of Orange, California, September 21, 2012.

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FORT WORTH (TX)
National Catholic Reporter

Michael Sean Winters | Nov. 19, 2013 Distinctly Catholic

“Il Santo Padre Francesco ha nominato Vescovo di Fort Worth (U.S.A.) Mons. Michael F. Olson, del clero della medesima diocesi, finora Rettore del Seminario Holy Trinity a Irving, Texas.”

Placet! I remember Bishop-elect Olson when he was a Basselin Scholar at Theological College when I was also an inmate there. He was very smart and very, very funny. I also like the idea of bishops being chosen from within a diocese, not always, but a good candidate should not be excluded simply because he is a priest of the diocese in question. The good people of Ft. Worth are getting a very good man as their bishop. Ad multos annos!

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Register

by ANDREA GAGLIARDUCCI/CNA 11/19/2013

VATICAN CITY — At least 30 priests employed in Vatican departments may be removed from their posts and sent to dioceses in the following months, according to three different Vatican sources.
“The Congregation for Clergy will be the first of the list,” a Vatican source familiar with the congregation told CNA.

Four priests employed in the congregation have been called to serve in dioceses. Among them is Msgr. Luciano Alimandi, who had been private secretary for a number of years to the department’s former head Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos.

According to the source, Msgr. Alimandi and the other three were “all part of the Cardinal Mauro Piacenza’s inner circle.” He was prefect of the Congregation for Clergy until last September.

Cardinal Piacenza was appointed to lead the Vatican’s Apostolic Penitentiary tribunal on Sept. 21. Archbishop Beniamino Stella replaced him as prefect for the Congregation of the Clergy.

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MINNESOTA
Westport News

By AMY FORLITI, Associated Press
Updated 12:48 pm, Tuesday, November 19, 2013

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A Minnesota man who claims he was sexually abused by a priest in Hastings is suing the Twin Cities archdiocese, St. John’s Abbey, and a center that treats clergy with psychological issues.

The lawsuit filed Tuesday says Rev. Francis Hoefgen molested the man from 1989 through 1992 when the victim was 10 to 13 years old. Hoefgen was at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton church at the time.

The lawsuit alleges defendants should have known Hoefgen was a danger because he molested another boy in 1983 at St. Boniface rectory in Cold Spring. Hoefgen admitted the abuse to police in a signed statement but wasn’t charged.

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MICHIGAN
The Mining Journal

MARQUETTE – Officials of the Catholic Diocese of Marquette have deemed credible a recent allegation of sexual abuse of a minor made against a deceased religious order priest from Belgium.

The allegation was lodged against the Rev. Bernard (“Father Ben”) Van der Schueren, S.J., a priest of the Society of Jesus, commonly called the Jesuits. The complaint deals with an incident involving a boy that happened during July of 1989 when Van der Schueren filled in for a diocesan priest at St. Michael Parish in Marquette, according to a press release from the diocese.

Van der Schueren died in 2009 at the age of 86.

As soon as the allegation was received, diocesan officials immediately began following the Diocese of Marquette’s Policy on Sexual Misconduct in Ministry, the release said. In keeping with that policy, the complaint was referred to Jesuit leadership, in this case, the Chicago-Detroit Province.

In addition, the Office of the Administrator of the Diocese of Marquette informed the Diocesan Review Board for the Protection of Children and Young People of the complaint, and the diocesan attorney reported the allegation to the Marquette County Prosecutor’s Office.

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MINNESOTA
Pioneer Press

By Emily Gurnon
egurnon@pioneerpress.com
POSTED: 11/19/2013

A former Hastings priest and St. John’s Abbey were among those named Tuesday in a lawsuit by a Minnesota man who alleges the priest sexually abused him after “graduating” from a sex-offender treatment facility.

The alleged victim, now in his 30s, also sued the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis and the treatment facility, Saint Luke Institute of Silver Springs, MD.

Rev. Francis Hoefgen admitted to police in 1984 that he sexually abused a minor, then was assigned the next year to St. Elizabeth Ann Seton in Hastings after an evaluation at the institute, said the plaintiff’s attorney, Jeff Anderson, of St. Paul, in a statement.

It was at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton that Hoefgen sexually abused the plaintiff, identified as John Doe 27.

Hoefgen, a member of St. John’s Abbey, remained in ministry until 1992, serving in Cold Spring, Minn., as well as Hastings, Anderson said. Public records show him living currently in Columbia Heights. He was only 42 when his priestly assignments ended.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

Article by: TONY KENNEDY , Star Tribune Updated: November 19, 2013

Tuesday’s lawsuit claims prominent clergy treatment center and archdiocese concealed threat to minors.

Lawyers filed suit Tuesday morning in St. Paul against a Catholic-run treatment facility that cared for an abusive priest who then was sent to a new parish where he allegedly targeted a 10-year-old boy for years of repeated abuse.

Jeff Anderson, the St. Paul attorney who filed the suit on behalf of “Doe 27,” said it is the first lawsuit under Minnesota’s new Child Victims Act to name St. Luke Institute as a defendant. The facility in Silver Spring, Md., has been a popular destination for the treatment of Minnesota Catholic monks and priests who have been accused of sexual abuse of children, other sexual misconduct and addiction. The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and St. John’s Abbey in Collegeville are also being sued on behalf of Doe 27.

Coupled with a separate sexual abuse lawsuit filed Monday on behalf of a victim of another priest, the archdiocese has been sued at least 21 times since the Child Victims Act lifted the statute of limitations for childhood sexual abuse cases and gave past victims a three-year window to bring previously barred claims.

Susan Gibbs, a spokeswoman for St. Luke Institute, said she had not seen the lawsuit and had no immediate comment. The archdiocese could not be reached immediately for comment.

According to the latest complaint, the Rev. Francis Hoefgen, now 63, openly admitted to police in Cold Spring, Minn., that he sexually abused a 17-year-old boy while assigned to St. Boniface of Cold Spring in 1983. Then-Abbot Jerome Theisen, who was in charge of monks and priests from St. John’s Abbey, learned of the abuse in March 1984 and directed him to St. Luke’s, where he resided for about six months.

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WORCESTER (MA)
BishopAccountability.org

Summary of Case: Ares was a priest of the Worcester diocese, ordained in 1987. He was was indicted in late 1993 on charges of rape and indecent assault on a male youth who had gone to him for counseling. The case ended in a mistrial when the jury couldn’t reach a verdict. Ares died in 1998.

Ordained: 1987

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GALLUP (NM)
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on November 19, 2013

Months after the Diocese of Gallup announced intentions to seek bankruptcy protection, Gallup Bishop James Wall FINALLY filed a declaration with the federal bankruptcy court to officially begin the process.

Why the delay? Why were James Wall and church officials stalling? Perhaps it was this astonishing revelation:

Bishop Wall says in his declaration that there are 105 victims of sexual abuse in the Diocese of Gallup. According to the Gallup Independent, those survivors are alive.

When you compare the number of victims in Gallup with other dioceses, the shocking nature of the numbers is clear:

According to Catholic-Hierarchy.org, in 2006 (the last year that numbers were available), there were 60,000 Catholics in the Diocese of Gallup. The total population was 470,000.
Now, let’s compare:

In 2003, California opened a one-year civil window for victims of child sexual abuse. During that year, 97 victims came forward in the Diocese of Orange. At the time, there were 1,280,159 Catholics in Orange. The total population was slightly over 3 million.

That same year a little farther south, 150 victims came forward and filed child sex abuse and cover-up lawsuits against the Diocese of San Diego. That year, there were approximately 919,000 Catholics in that diocese. Total population was 3.1 million.

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CANADA
CTV

The Canadian Press
Published Tuesday, November 19, 2013

IQALUIT, Nunavut — The defence lawyer for a priest facing dozens of sex abuse charges involving Inuit children is questioning the memory and motivation of the complainants.

Malcolm Kempt has cross-examined a woman who says Eric Dejaeger taped her face-down by her wrists and feet to a bed frame and violated her when she was a little girl.

Kempt asked the witness what Dejaeger was wearing at the time and requested she outline specific events around the attack.

Canada allowed priest charged with sex abuse to leave the country: church leader
He also queried her about a $16,000 out-of-court settlement she got from the Catholic Church.
Kempt has said the memory and credibility of alleged victims about events 30 years ago are key to Dejaeger’s defence.

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday November 19, 2013

Statement by Barbara Dorris, Outreach Director, 314-862-7688 SNAPdorris@gmail.com

An unusual new clergy child sex abuse and cover up suit charges that a Catholic facility is negligent for enabling predator priests to be put back on the job, sometimes even after the clerics admit to sexually assaulting kids. We applaud this novel approach. Kids are safer when all institutions the protect pedophiles are held responsible, not just the sex offenders’ direct supervisors.

[Anderson Advocates]

This is the second time in a week that a Twin Cities area predator priest who admitted molesting kids and was put back on the job is in the news. (The other: Fr. Clarence Vavra)

St. Luke’s has evaluated and housed hundreds of credibly accused child molesting clerics, enabling them to flee and stay hidden, often until a controversy blows over. It has likely seen more priests accused of molesting kids than any other church facility, and has dealt with many of the most notorious serial clergy predators.

St. Luke’s has often refused to tell police when its “patients” tell its “therapists” about child sex crimes. St. Luke officials claim they are not legally required to make such reports.

In many cases, predators have left St. Luke’s and been assigned to a parish only to continue molesting children.

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NEW MEXICO
Gallup Independent

Published in the Gallup Independent, Gallup, NM, Nov. 18, 2013

By Elizabeth Hardin-Burrola
Independent correspondent
religion@gallupindependent.com

ALBUQUERQUE — For more than a decade, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Gallup has declined to specify how many alleged victims have come forward with allegations of clergy sex abuse.

But during the diocese’s first hearing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court on Friday — mixed into the courtroom’s opening discussion of how to keep the diocese operational and how the Chapter 11 process will begin to move forward — a startling number emerged against the backdrop of mundane details. It was a number that was repeatedly referenced in discussions about mailing lists, notices that had to be sent, and names and addresses that had to be kept confidential.

Based on statements made by Judge David T. Thuma, as well as by attorneys for both the diocese and for some of the abuse survivors, apparently 105 people have come forward and said they are survivors of clergy sex abuse in the diocese. That number includes people who have already signed financial settlements with the diocese in the past, people who came forward with allegations but did not seek settlements and those who have current claims against the diocese.

Because the 105 names are included on the case’s confidential mailing list, presumably all 105 individuals are still living.

This figure significantly boosts any previous estimates as to the total number of clergy sex abuse victims in the Gallup Diocese. A number of alleged victims are deceased, including some who have committed suicide and others who have died of alcohol and drug abuse, based on past reporting. It is also possible that more abuse survivors could come forward.

As part of the Chapter 11 process, a “bar date” deadline will be set. Abuse survivors who want to file a claim against the Gallup Diocese must come forward by that date.

According to the hearing Friday, the court will be approving a plan to provide notice to abuse survivors and the public, and a creditors’ committee will be formed. In church bankruptcy cases, the creditors’ committees generally have five to seven members who are clergy sex abuse survivors.

Also Friday, Thuma ruled that employees of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Gallup can continue to be paid and receive benefits during bankruptcy protection proceedings.

For those interested in reading the documents the Diocese of Gallup initially filed in bankruptcy court, they are available for download via the Voice of the Southwest website. They are located in the “News” section under the headline “Chapter 11 Filing: Documents from November 12 and 13.”

— The Associated Press contributed to this story
Online: www.voiceofthesouthwest.org/category/news/

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CALIFORNIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday November 19, 2013

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

We are worried that some victims of child sex crimes will be even more afraid to report predators in light of the damage award in the recent case involving a Catholic school teacher.

[NBC Bay Area]

It’s extremely tough for men, women and kids who were sexually assaulted as children to speak up, get help, expose wrongdoers, protect others and start healing. Most victims never tell of the horror they endured. So most predators are never charged, convicted or jailed. And so the horrific cycle of violence and pain continues, and millions of children’s lives are shattered every year.

One way to help end this tragedy is to make it easier, not harder, for victims to disclose their suffering and pursue their perpetrators.

Again, we fear this $362,000 award will scare more already-wounded and struggling victims into staying silent.

So we call on San Jose Bishop Patrick J. McGrath to educate his flock about how rare false abuse allegations are leveled against Catholic employees.

The overwhelming majority of child sex abuse charges against Catholic officials are legitimate.

Consider:

–According to BishopAccountability.org: “Fewer than 2 percent of sexual abuse allegations against the Catholic church appear to be false.”

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NEW MEXICO
Gallup Independent

Published in the Gallup Independent, Gallup, NM, Nov. 14, 2013

By Elizabeth Hardin-Burrola
Independent correspondent
religion@gallupindependent.com

ALBUQUERQUE — The Diocese of Gallup filed its petition for Chapter 11 reorganization in Albuquerque’s U.S. Bankruptcy Court late Tuesday, after claiming mounting clergy sex abuse claims forced the decision.

The diocese’s newly hired bankruptcy attorneys are set to appear before Judge David T. Thuma for an emergency hearing Friday morning to ask the court to approve a number of motions to keep the diocese operating. Included in the motions are requests to use existing bank accounts and cash management system, prohibit utility service providers from discontinuing services and the payment of wages to its employees.

The diocese, incorporated in both New Mexico and Arizona, filed more than 400 pages of documents. Listed creditors include a couple of banks, a number of local and national utility companies and about 50 employees, including six priests out of the 38 priests reported to be working in the diocese. It is unclear why the remaining priests are not listed as employees.

The main creditors are expected to be individuals with clergy sex abuse claims against the diocese. Currently, 13 men and women, represented by attorneys Robert E. Pastor, of Phoenix, and John C. Manly, of Irvine, Calif., have filed clergy sex abuse lawsuits against the diocese in Arizona’s Coconino County Superior Court. The diocese has said there are another eight pending claims not in litigation, and it expects more claims to be filed. Pastor and Manly are listed as attorneys for tort claimants, as is Houston attorney Richard T. Fass.

Bishop’s declaration

“I believe it is in everyone’s best interests to move the Reorganization Case expeditiously to conclusion,” Gallup Bishop James S. Wall stated in a declaration document he filed supporting the petition. “Otherwise, estate assets will be consumed with the costs of the Chapter 11 as opposed to being primarily used to compensate those who have been harmed.”

Wall admitted the diocese “will be challenged just to pay the costs of administration of the Reorganization Case, without regard to funding a plan to compensate those who have been abused.”

Certainly the diocese’s bankruptcy attorneys — who charge hundreds of dollars per hour — might walk away from the Chapter 11 with more money than any claimant who was sexually abused as a child by a Gallup priest.

Those attorneys are Susan Bowell, Elizabeth Fella and Lori Winkelman, of Quarles & Brady in Tucson, Ariz., and Thomas D. Walker, of Walker & Associates in Albuquerque. Boswell, the top bankruptcy attorney, has previously represented other Roman Catholic dioceses.

In addition, the diocese hired Keegan, Linscott & Kenon, a Tucson tax, accounting and business consulting firm, after its chief financial officer, Deacon James Hoy, resigned just two months before the Chapter 11 announcement was made.

Bankruptcy strategy

Where the diocese will be getting the money to pay these attorneys, accountants and creditors was not explained by the bishop in his declaration document. However, the bishop appears to hint at the diocese’s bankruptcy strategy through the following points:

-Wall claims the Gallup Diocese is the poorest Roman Catholic diocese in the country.

-Wall emphasizes the large Native American population in the diocese’s geographic area even though the majority of Catholics in the diocese are Hispanic and Anglo, and the majority of Native Americans are not Catholic.

-Wall offers considerable explanation as to how the Gallup Diocese and its parishes “are separate ecclesiastical entities in their own right” and that their debts and assets are separate from each other. The only exception to that is St. Anthony’s Parish in McNary, Ariz., which “simply does not have the resources to support itself,” Wall states.

-Wall states, “The diocesan bishop … does not have the right to possess, sell, encumber or otherwise dispose of parish property.”

-Wall also states that although in many instances the Diocese of Gallup is listed on the deeds to parish property as the title holder, this “does not reflect the true ownership of the property.”

-Wall admits that shortly before the diocese filed the Chapter 11 petition, he and a representative of every parish “executed and caused to be recorded in the public records of the county in which the real property was located a notice of the trust relationship” between the diocese and the parish. Wall said this was done in “order to avoid any confusion about the ownership” of parish property.

-Wall continues to claim most of the clergy abuse allegations date back to the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s even though a number of publicly accused abusers remained in ministry in the 1980s and 1990s and last decade.

In contrast, although the bishop has stated the need for Chapter 11 reorganization was caused by rising numbers of clergy sex abuse claims, Wall, in his submitted document, does not provide any information about the names of the clergy sex abusers whose crimes against children led the diocese into bankruptcy court, nor does he offer information about the total number of alleged victims who have come forward or the total number of abuse allegations.

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CANADA
Nunatsiaq Online

DAVID MURPHY

The Nunavut Court of Justice heard stories of child rape, bestiality and defecation as a means to escape sexual assault on Nov. 18, day one of the Eric Dejaeger trial in Iqaluit.

A lean Dejaeger, 66, showed up in court wearing a shaggy grey beard hanging down to his chest and blue standard-issue prison garb.

At the start of the day’s sitting, Dejaeger pleaded guilty to eight charges of indecent assault.

That leaves 69 more charges, most of them sex-related allegations involving minors, to be tried before Justice Robert Kilpatrick, who is sitting alone without a jury.

Reporters and supporter witnesses packed the courtroom to hear from three witnesses whose evidence is related to nine of the 69 charges.

The trial began with a witness who testifying about her experience with “Father Eric” inside the Catholic church in Igloolik between 1978 and 1982.

None of the witnesses may be indentified.

The first witness said Dejaeger put his hand into her pants and stroked her vagina under her underwear while she sat on his lap in the mass area of St. Stephen’s church.

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CANADA
Nunatsiaq Online

BY DAVID MURPHY)

Father Eric Dejaeger might not be sitting in an Iqaluit courtroom this week if it hadn’t been for the work of Godelieve Halsberghe.

She’s the person who discovered Dejaeger had been living and working in Belgium for 15 years in spite of outstanding arrest warrants against him issued in Nunavut and by Interpol.

This ultimately led to the priest’s return to Canada to face numerous sex charges, most of them flowing from his stay in Igloolik in the later 1970s and early 1980s.

That was in 2010. Now her niece, Lieve Halsberghe, is visiting Iqaluit to see her aunt’s work completed.

“She gave me this file and I took it on and I have to finish,” Halsberghe said in an interview with Nunatsiaq News.

She’s travelled more than 7,500 kilometers to get from Beligum to Iqaluit to attend Dejaeger’s trial, which began Nov. 18.

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