ABUSE TRACKER

NEW YORK
The Legislative Gazette

Longtime sponsor out of office, but governor is now calling to extend statutes of limitation for child victims of sexual abuse

Advocates for the Child Victims Act are once again calling on state legislators to reform the statutes of limitation on justice sought by child sex abuse victims.

Outspoken reformers such as Bridie Farrell, an Olympic speedskater and advocate for sexually assaulted children in New York, shared her own story of abuse, which shocked the sports world a few years ago.

“If you’re like most New Yorkers, you probably have happy, positive memories of the Capital Region, Saratoga’s race tracks and the Olympic sights in Lake Placid,” Farrell said. “For me those happy memories are overshadowed by childhood sexual abuse nightmares.”

Farrell was repeatedly sexually assaulted as a child by her trainer, Andy Gabel, in 1997 and 1998.

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MISSOURI
Ozarks First

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — The state legislature is being asked to remove the time limits in which a person can be prosecuted for sex crimes against children. Two bills have been filed to address these restrictions.

A Senate committee is considering Sen. Scott Sifton’s (D-Affton) measure, which removes the statutue of limitations of child abuse prosecutions. A House bill sponsored by Cody Smith (R-Carthage) has not been assigned to a committee.

Jason Lamb with the Missouri Association of Prosecuting Attorneys says the state must remove those barriers for people to report such crimes.

“There is no more difficult case to prosecute than a child abuse case. Yet, they are among the most important cases to prosecute,” says Lamb. “In no other type of case does the victim rely so much on the state, on the system as a whole, to speak for them.”

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Written by Janela Carrera

Weekly collections at the Dulce Nombre de Maria Cathedral Basilica have decreased since the removal of its former rector Msgr. James Benavente, who has since been reassigned to the St. Anthony Catholic Church in Tamuning.

Guam – The Archdiocese of Agana has revealed that their mother church, the Dulce Nombre de Maria Cathedral Basilica, is broke. Because of this, Archbishop Michael Byrnes has decided to place the Cathedral under receivership.

“We are putting the parish of the Dulce Nombre de Maria Cathedral, the Agana cathedral basilica parish under receivership,” announced Archdiocesan Finance Council President Richard Untalan at a press conference at the Chancery Office.

It’s a remedy of a last resort, but Untalan emphasizes that it’s a remedy that’s necessary.

“In the last two and half years it incurred a debt of $1.9 million, $800,000 of which is a refinance portion of a loan and the rest are outstanding payables,” said Untalan.

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GUAM
KUAM

[with video]

Statement from Archbishop Michael J. Byrnes

Statement from the Rev. Melchor T. Camina, chancillor, regarding the receivership committee

Updated: Mar 24, 2017

By Krystal Paco

It’s a first for Guam – the mother church of the Archdiocese of Agana has been placed in receivership in an effort to get out of a nearly $2 million debt that resulted from the controversies surrounding Guam’s Catholic Church.

$2 million in the last two years…the Agana Cathedral Basilica is clearly in trouble. Archdiocesan Finance Council president Richard Untalan said, “It cannot meet its obligations. Within the last two and a half years it incurred a debt of $1.9 million, $800,000 of which is a refinanced portion of a loan and the rest are outstanding payables.”

That’s money owed to the local and federal government and countless vendors who’ve shown mercy to the church. Part of the problem: parishioners are giving less. Weekly collections once averaged around $10,000, compared to today at $4,000. Coincidently, the decline in donations to the church occurred around the time Monsignor James Benavente was removed as rector of the Cathedral by Archbishop Anthony Apuron.

The monsignor has since been reassigned to St. Anthony Catholic Church in Tamuning. The rector of the Cathedral today is Father Paul Gofigan. “The first thing I looked at was the financial statements,” he summarized. “Upon looking at the financial statements, I knew right away there was going to be problems with trying to get above water. I knew that the basilica was pretty much deep in debt. It was drowning.”

To remedy the situation, Guam’s coadjutor, Archbishop Michael Byrnes, put in place an Archdiocesan Receivership Committee consisting of finance professionals Art llagan, Duenas, and Antoinette Sanford. Sanford admits there’s no plan of action or timeline, but the hope is to regain the public’s trust and bring people back to the church.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio , heugenio@guampdn.com March 24, 2017 | Updated 2 hours ago

The Dulce Nombre de Maria Cathedral Basilica, in Hagåtña, incurred $1.9 million in new debt during the past two and a half years, and it is having difficulty paying it back, church leaders said during a press conference Friday, announcing a plan to help stabilize its finances.

Weekly collections at the cathedral of about $10,000 dropped to as little as $4,000 because of ongoing controversy, they said.

The cathedral is now under an internal receivership, which has taken over its financial management and operations to help pay off its debt and meet its monthly obligations.

Archbishop Michael Jude Byrnes, in consultation with his presbyteral council and the Archdiocesan Finance Council, said he placed the cathedral under temporary receivership as a last resort.

The Archdiocese of Agana currently faces the possibility of paying at least $155 million in damages in 33 clergy sex abuse lawsuits filed in local and federal court. The cases have not gone to trial, and the church has not yet filed a response to any of the lawsuits.

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ROME
Boston Globe

By Nicole Fleming GLOBE CORRESPONDENT MARCH 24, 2017

Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley said at a seminar on safeguarding children in Rome that Pope Francis is “thoroughly committed” to protecting minors and others from sexual abuse within the Roman Catholic Church, according to press reports.

“Let there be no doubt about it: Pope Francis is thoroughly committed to rooting out the scourge of sex abuse in the church,” O’Malley said Thursday, according to a story published on the website of The Pilot, the official newspaper of the Boston archdiocese.

But, he added, “effectively making our church safe for all people demands our collaboration on all levels.”

O’Malley, president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, delivered the opening prayer and gave an address at the seminar sponsored by the commission at the Pontifical Gregorian University.

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ROME
Herald Malaysia

On Thursday a Vatican event on the prevention of child abuse narrowed in on the importance of education in schools and parishes in the safeguarding of children – not only for teachers, but for parents and children – and on the Church’s role.

Mar 24, 2017

By Hannah Brockhaus

On Thursday a Vatican event on the prevention of child abuse narrowed in on the importance of education in schools and parishes in the safeguarding of children – not only for teachers, but for parents and children – and on the Church’s role.

Led by Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley of Boston, head of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, he said at the March 23 event that Catholic schools are, of course, a very important part of the Church’s and Commission’s ministry.

There are “60 million children in our care in Catholic schools and so this kind of a conference is extremely important for the ministry of the Church,” O’Malley said.

“And we were very gratified that so many cardinals made time to be a part of this.”The seminar was attended by five different cardinals in addition to O’Malley, including Cardinal João Braz de Aviz, head of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, and Cardinal Marc Ouellet, head of the Congregation for Bishops.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Written by Janela Carrera

John A.B. Pangelinan claims former Guam priest Father Louis Brouillard took nude photographs of him.

Guam – A 33rd lawsuit has been filed against the Archdiocese of Agana, naming once again former Guam priest Father Louis Brouillard as the alleged sexual predator. This time the alleged victim is seeking $10 million in damages which is double the amount previous accusers are seeking.

This latest lawsuit was filed by John A.B. Pangelinan who is now 67 years old. The sexual abuse, he claims, happened when he was 11 or 12 years old and a member of the Boy Scouts.

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VIRGINIA
Roanoke Times

By Neil Harvey neil.harvey@roanoke.com 981-3376

A Roanoke pastor was charged last week with committing aggravated sexual battery against two juveniles.

Antonio Jones, 47, was arrested March 17. Jones, who has no middle name listed, was released on bond Tuesday.

Jones is listed as founder of Kingdom Harvest Church International in northwest Roanoke on the church’s Facebook page, which describes Kingdom Harvest as “a multi-cultural, non-denominational church” with more than 150 members. A call to the church Thursday afternoon was not returned, and no one answered the door there.

According to Roanoke Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court records, the offenses are alleged to have occurred against the first subject sometime between 2008 and 2010, when the juvenile would have been younger than 13.

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AUSTRALIA
Wingham Chronicle

Joanne McCarthy
24 Mar 2017

FORMER Maitland-Newcastle diocese Vicar General Barry Tunks has been charged with child sex offences after a man alleged he was sexually abused by two Catholic priests and another man in the Taree area in the late 1970s.

Father Tunks, 76, was charged at Waratah police station on Thursday by detectives from Manning/Great Lakes Local Area Command. He will appear in Forster Local Court in April charged with three counts of indecent assault.

A man, 46, told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in 2014 that he was between 9 and 12 years old when he was allegedly sexually abused by two priests and another man in locations including Catholic Church facilities. The man also named a fourth alleged sexual abuser – a Catholic employee, now deceased.

The man later made a statement to police.

In a statement on Thursday Maitland Newcastle Bishop Bill Wright confirmed that a priest of the diocese had been charged with historic child sex offences relating to matters alleged to have occurred in the 1970s.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australia

MEGAN NEIL
Australian Associated Press
March 24, 2017

The small local churches that make up the bulk of Australia’s largest Pentecostal movement do not have the funds to compensate victims of child sexual abuse, an inquiry has heard.

The more than 1000 affiliated churches of the Australian Christian Churches include the multi-million dollar global Hillsong Church, but the group’s leader says most are not high-profile.

The child abuse royal commission heard the Australian Christian Churches is committed to providing all necessary and appropriate care for survivors of abuse, but each local church must consider its own approach to financial redress.

Australian Christian Churches national president Wayne Alcorn said the smaller churches were concerned about their ability to pay redress, although all the affiliates were committed to providing a quick response and support to survivors.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

Megan Neil – AAP on March 24, 2017

The head of the global Hillsong Church says it has done everything it can to ensure it is safe for children.

Hillsong founder and senior pastor Brian Houston says new child protection policies and procedures have been rolled out across the whole church, including setting up a safe church office.

“We have really I think done everything we can to set the framework within the culture of our whole church where everybody, especially obviously those in any form of leadership, understand the processes/procedures that would be rolled out,” Mr Houston told the child abuse royal commission.

“We have been very very supportive of the goal to make sure our church is as safe a church as it could possibly be.”

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Rachel Browne

The multimillion-dollar Hillsong Church does not have a policy of offering financial compensation to people who have allegedly suffered child sexual abuse within the organisation, a royal commission has heard.

Founder and senior pastor of the global church, Brian Houston, returned to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse on Friday to show how safety procedures have improved since he first gave evidence to the inquiry in 2014.

The commission heard Hillsong had adopted robust policies that cover improved training and screening of staff, complaints handling and response to alleged victims.

Hillsong has no financial redress policy but Mr Houston told the inquiry: “That doesn’t mean that we’re not open to it.”

The church offers non-monetary support to alleged victims such as counselling and psychological care, the inquiry heard.

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AUSTRALIA
Oberon Review

23 Mar 2017

THE Anglican Church has admitted it tried to silence child sex abuse victims and cared more about its reputation than those who had been harmed.

Church records show 1082 people have made complaints about 569 alleged perpetrators in the Anglican Church in Australia, which includes 18 complaints in the Bathurst Diocese.

The church has paid nearly $31 million in compensation to victims, data released by the child sex abuse royal commission on Friday showed.

Since December 2015, the Bathurst Diocese has paid more than $750,000 in redress to abused people, Bishop Ian Palmer said in his report in the October 2016 edition of Anglican e-news.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse Analysis of Complaints of Child Sexual Abuse Received by Anglican Church Dioceses in Australia report breaks down the complaint figures in each diocese.

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ROME
America

Gerard O’Connell
March 23, 2017

Opening today’s seminar at the Gregorian University in Rome on “Safeguarding children in homes and schools worldwide,” Cardinal Seán O’Malley, president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, told participants: “Let there be no doubts, no other topic is more important for the life of the church. If the church is not committed to child protection, our efforts at evangelization will be to no effect; we will lose the trust of our people and gain the opprobrium of the world.” Indeed, he said, “there is simply no justification in our day for failures to enact concrete safeguarding standards for our children, young men and women, and vulnerable adults.”

The importance of the seminar was underlined by the presence of six cardinals (including the secretary of state), several bishops, other Vatican officials, ambassadors, rectors of pontifical universities and colleges, authorities from the Italian state police and the Vatican gendarme, as well as professionals in the field from all continents and many countries.

Cardinal O’Malley: ‘There is simply no justification in our day for failures to enact concrete safeguarding standards for our children.’

The Boston cardinal, who enjoys great credibility in this field, repeated what he told the Consistory of Cardinals in February 2015, namely, that abuse “is not a Catholic problem or even a clerical problem, it is a human problem,” but “when abuse is perpetrated by a priest the damage is even more profound.” He recalled that Pope Francis gave the P.C.P.M. the task of “promoting responsibility in local churches” and assisting them through an exchange of best practices and programs of education, training and developing adequate responses to sexual abuse.

Today’s seminar, organized by the abuse commission’s working group, headed by Australia’s Kathleen McCormack, and Center for Child Protection at the Gregorian University, headed by Hans Zollner, S.J., brought together experts from Argentina, Australia, Colombia, Mexico and Italy who presented a stark picture of the abuse happening in their countries and the multiple efforts being made by the church, N.G.O.s and state bodies to combat it.

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AUSTRALIA
Sky News

A Catholic priest who allegedly abused a young boy on the NSW mid north coast almost four decades ago is due to face court next month after being granted conditional bail.

The victim, now 46, came forward in March 2014, a year after the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse was established.

His alleged abuser, a 76-year-old, was charged with three counts of indecent assault on Thursday.

The younger man was between the ages of nine and 12 at the time the alleged abuse occurred at the hands of two priests and a third man.

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AUSTRALIA
Southern Cross

VICTIMS of historic sexual abuse at Bathurst’s St Stanislaus’ College will receive a formal public apology on June 16.

Head of College Dr Anne Wenham announced the date for the apology following the sentencing of disgraced former priest Brian Spillane in the District Court last Thursday.

In a letter to the school community, Dr Wenham said details of Spillane’s crimes had been distressing to read and she was deeply sorry for what his young victims had experienced during their time as students at the college.

Dr Wenham said the college and Oceania Province of the Congregation of the Mission (Vincentians) agreed a formal apology to victims was important.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio , heugenio@guampdn.com March 24, 2017

A man said a former priest, who also was his scoutmaster, took nude photos of him at a Mangilao church rectory and sexually abused him in the early 1960s.

John A.B. Pangelinan, 67, said he was about 11 or 12 when former priest Louis Brouillard sexually abused him in or around 1961 or 1962. Brouillard was a scoutmaster in the Boy Scouts of America.

Pangelinan, now living in Mangilao, is the 33rd man to file a Guam clergy sex abuse lawsuit. He’s demanding at least $10 million in damages, double the minimum amount requested by others. the lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court of Guam Friday afternoon, also names the Boy Scouts of America and the Boy Scouts of America Aloha Council Chamorro District as defendants.

The lawsuit says Brouillard approached Pangelinan when he was hanging out with a group of boys after a scouting event. The complaint states Brouillard told Pangelinan he wanted to take some pictures of him, and the boy thought it was for the Boy Scouts.

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ILLINOIS
The Times

David Giuliani, davidg@mywebtimes.com, 815-431-4041

The former Marquette Academy science teacher accused of physically abusing students was fired from her previous job at a Bureau County school district, a decision the school board later rescinded before giving her a $60,000 severance package.

Tammy Tieman, 46, who started at the Ottawa Catholic school in 2016, was charged last week with five felony counts of aggravated battery to a child and one misdemeanor count of battery. The crimes are alleged to have involved six students on Marquette school grounds.

Tieman, of Princeton, worked at the LaMoille School District in Northeastern Bureau County for 22 years before joining Marquette.

The LaMoille school board fired Tieman, who made $57,000 a year as a high school and junior high science teacher, in May, but the district gave no public reason for its decision.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

Melissa Davey
Thursday 23 March 2017

In February 2014, Greg Thompson returned to Newcastle in New South Wales to serve as bishop of the Anglican diocese, the same place he was abused almost four decades earlier as a teenager.

He had spent the previous seven years serving as bishop in the Northern Territory but thought it would be somewhat fitting to finish his working life in Newcastle, near where he grew up in the Upper Hunter and where he first became interested in the ministry.

He believed his experiences working with Indigenous people in Arnhem Land and victims of family violence and drug abuse would be useful to the Newcastle diocese, which he wanted to direct towards a stronger focus on social justice and community engagement.

That this was the place that he was sexually abused by friends of his family as a child, and by senior figures of the Newcastle Anglican church as a young adult, was something Thompson had disassociated himself from, as many abuse survivors do. He had never spoken of it except to his wife and children.

But, in May 2014, shortly into his tenure as bishop, Thompson received a summons to appear before the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse. On the list of persons of interest was the name Ian Shevill. When Shevill was the bishop of Newcastle in 1975, he and another senior church figure sexually abused Thompson, who was then just 19.

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NEW YORK
BishopAccountability.org

Summary of Case: Richard Gorman was ordained for the Archdiocese of New York in 1982. His first assignment was as an assistant at St. Barnabas in the Bronx. From there he spent three years at Stepinac High School in White Plains before joining the faculty of Spellman High in the Bronx where, from 1997 on, he was in residence. From 1997 to 2004 Gorman was Associate Director of the Department of Social Research for Catholic Charities, after which he is noted in the Official Catholic Directory to have been retired for several years. In the early 2000s he earned a law degree. Gorman served as a judge for the archdiocese’s Metropolitan Tribunal and, from 2010 to 2016, he was the Prison Apostolate director. Gorman was known for his community activism; for over twenty years he was chairman of Community Board 12 in the Bronx.

In mid-2015 a man reported to law enforcement and to the archdiocese that Gorman had sexually abused him when he was a 13-year-old St. Barnabas parishioner. The man said Gorman took him to a church facility in Westchester County, where the abuse took place. The investigations reportedly yielded several additional alleged victims and witnesses. Gorman denied the accusations, which the archdiocese deemed “credible but not yet substantiated.” He was placed on leave in January 2016.

Ordained: November 6, 1982

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ROME
Religion News Service

By Josephine McKenna

ROME (RNS) Despite turmoil on the commission he created to deal with sex abuse in the Catholic Church, Pope Francis is committed “to rooting out the scourge,” Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley said.

O’Malley, who heads the panel, spoke Thursday (March 23) to an international conference on the subject in Rome. He said the church was committed to carrying out the pope’s directive despite recent complaints that the commission’s work was being obstructed by the Vatican itself.

“There is simply no justification in our day for failures to enact concrete safeguarding standards for our children, young men and women, and vulnerable adults,” O’Malley said.

“We are called to reform and renew all the institutions of our church. … And we certainly must address the evil of sexual abuse by priests.”

The conference, organized by the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, was titled “Safeguarding in homes and schools.” It included presentations from academics, clergy and experts from South America, Australia and Italy.

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IRELAND
Limerick Leader

Norma Prendiville
23 Mar 2017
Email: normap@limerickleader.ie

THE Christian Brothers have dropped the threat of legal action against abuse survivor Tom Wall of Glin, Fianna Fail TD Niall Collins confirmed this Thursday.

The threat arose over the legal ownership of documents saved from a fire by Tom Wall at the Industrial School in Glin in 1973 and lodged with UL two years ago.

Now, Deputy Collins said, the Christian Brothers had confirmed to him that they would be “satisfied with copies of the documents” and had “no interest in engaging in legal action”.

Deputy Collins raised the issue of the documents in the Dail on Wednesday where he claimed the documents “effectively sold into slavery” some of the boys sent to Glin.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

Joanne McCarthy
24 Mar 2017

A HUNTER Catholic priest has been charged with child sex offences after a man alleged he was sexually abused by two Catholic priests and another man in the Taree area in the late 1970s.

The priest, 76, was charged at Waratah police station on Thursday by detectives from Manning/Great Lakes Local Area Command. He will appear in Forster Local Court in April charged with three counts of indecent assault.

A man, 46, told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in 2014 that he was between 9 and 12 years old when he was allegedly sexually abused by two priests and another man in locations including Catholic Church facilities. The man also named a fourth alleged sexual abuser – a Catholic employee, now deceased.

The man later made a statement to police.

In a statement on Thursday Maitland Newcastle Bishop Bill Wright confirmed that a priest of the diocese had been charged with historic child sex offences relating to matters alleged to have occurred in the 1970s.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Fiach Kelly

The existing redress scheme for victims of residential child abuse could be reopened to cover those abused as children in mother and baby homes, an unpublished report to the Government has recommended.

The proposal is contained in the second interim report of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes, The Irish Times has learned. It has caused alarm in Government circles, due to the cost of the existing scheme.

It says the redress scheme established in 2002 could be used again to provide compensation for those who were abused as children in mother and baby homes.

The redress board was set up under the Residential Institutions Redress Act 2002 to make “fair and reasonable awards” to those who were abused as children “while resident in industrial schools, reformatories and other institutions subject to State regulation or inspection” from the mid-1930s to the 1970s.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Niall O’Connor
March 23 2017

MINISTERS will next week discuss the prospect of reopening the State’s redress scheme for survivors of the Mother and Baby Homes.

Children’s Minister Katherine Zappone will bring an expert commission report to Cabinet which recommends the reopening of a 2002 scheme that previously paid out compensation for institutional abuse.

The scheme, which has to date cost almost €1.5bn, closed to new applicants in September 2011.

But there have been calls to reopen the scheme after the Commission for the Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes found that hundreds of remains of babies were discovered at a site in Tuam.

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ROME
National Catholic Reporter

Joshua J. McElwee | Mar. 23, 2017

In the midst of a month in which the effectiveness of Pope Francis’ measures to fight clergy sexual abuse has come into question, Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley pledged Thursday that the pontiff is still “thoroughly committed to rooting out the scourge of sex abuse.”

O’Malley, the head of Francis’ Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, told participants of an education seminar hosted by the group that “there is simply no justification in our day for failures to enact concrete safeguarding standards for our children.”

“Let there be no doubts: no other topic is more important for the life of the church,” said the cardinal. “If the church is not committed to child protection, our efforts at evangelization will be to no effect; we will lose the trust of our people and gain the opprobrium of the world.”

The pontifical commission, created by Francis in 2014, was hosting an educational seminar Thursday, March 23, at the Pontifical Gregorian University, presenting different perspectives on safeguarding children, by advocates from Argentina, Australia, Colombia, Italy, Mexico and the United States.

The event comes just three weeks after one of the commission’s members, abuse survivor Marie Collins, resigned from the group March 1. In an article for NCR that day, Collins said she was resigning due to frustration with Vatican officials’ reluctance to cooperate with the commission’s work to protect children.

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HAWAII
Hawaii Tribune-Herald

By JOHN BURNETT Hawaii Tribune-Herald

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Honolulu has settled one of three civil lawsuits that allege a prominent retired Big Island priest sexually molested teenage boys decades ago, according to the attorney for the plaintiffs in the cases.

Oahu attorney Mark Gallagher said Monday the settlement of the 2013 suit brought by two men known only as John Roe 6 and 7, concerns only the diocese and “there is no dismissal of any claims against Father George DeCosta.”

For almost three decades, DeCosta, now 79, was the parish priest at Malia Puka O Kalani Catholic Church in Keaukaha. The two anonymous plaintiffs said the alleged abuse took place in the 1960s when they were students at Damien Memorial School in Honolulu and DeCosta was the school chaplain.

The school and Congregation of Christian Brothers of Hawaii, which operates the school, also are defendants in the suit filed in Honolulu Circuit Court.

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HAWAII
U.S. News

HILO, Hawaii (AP) — The Roman Catholic Diocese of Honolulu has settled a lawsuit alleging a retired Big Island priest sexually abused two boys decades ago.

The Hawaii Tribune-Herald reports (http://bit.ly/2nfHVAQ) that attorney for the plaintiffs Mark Gallagher says the settlement of the 2013 lawsuit only concerns the diocese and no claims have been dismissed against Father George DeCosta.

The alleged victims in the case say the abuse took place in the 1960s when they were students at Damien Memorial School in Honolulu and DeCosta was the school chaplain.

The lawsuit is one of three filed against the diocese alleging sexual abuse by DeCosta and that the diocese knew or should have known about the abuse.

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ROME
U.S. News

By Philip Pullella

ROME (Reuters) – Catholic leaders must come down “from the pulpit” to acknowledge that clergy sexual abuse of children and cover-ups had broken the Church’s heart and to do more to prevent it, speakers at a conference said on Thursday.

The gathering at a pontifical university in Rome took place as the Vatican was still stinging from the shock resignation on March 1 of Marie Collins from a commission advising Pope Francis on how to root out sexual abuse.

Collins, who as a teenager was abused by a priest in Ireland, quit in frustration, citing “shameful” resistance to change within the Vatican.

“Child sexual abuse has broken the heart of the Catholic Church,” Francis Sullivan of Australia said in his address to the conference, held by the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors – the group Collins left – and attended by top Vatican officials.

“We have never really appreciated that the decisions our leaders made in order to facilitate and cover up actually broke the heart of what it meant to be Catholic. And we need to go back and fully confront that,” Sullivan said.

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NEW YORK
BishopAccountability.org

Summary of Case: Thomas J. Gaffney was ordained for the Archdiocese of New York in 1950. Early in his career he was an assistant priest in Rosendale, High Falls and Bronx parishes. He spent most of the following three decades as a high school educator – at Cardinal Hayes’ in the Bronx 1955-1974, then St. Joseph by the Sea on Staten Island 1973-1982. For a time, he served as Assistant Dean at Cardinal Hayes, and he was Supervising Principal and then Principal at St. Joseph’s. He was in residence for five of those years at a Staten Island mission for ‘homeless and destitute’ children. In 1982 Gaffney was named pastor of St. Charles on Staten Island, and he was elevated to Monsignor in 1987. He remained at St. Charles’ until his death in 2004.

In October 2003 a 29-year-old man reported to law enforcement and to the archdiocese that Gaffney had sexually abused him over a three-year period, beginning when the man was a sixth-grader and altar boy at St. Charles. The man’s attorney said he had evidence that Gaffney had also abused seven other children. Charges could not be filed due to the expiration of the statute of limitations. After the man went public in January 2004, a second man surfaced with similar allegations, which he said occurred when Gaffney was St. Joseph by the Sea’s principal. Gaffney vehemently denied the allegations and countersued his first accuser. He was kept in ministry.

Gaffney died March 27, 2004.

Ordained: 1950
Died: March 27, 2004

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MARYLAND
Washington Post

By Patricia Sullivan March 23

Cardinal William H. Keeler, who headed Baltimore’s archdiocese for 18 years and took a leading role in making the Catholic Church more responsive to the 2002 sexual-abuse scandal, died March 23 at a home for the aged in Catonsville, Md. He was 86.

Archbishop William Lori announced the death. No cause was disclosed.

Cardinal Keeler, a conservative leader on matters of faith, gained a reputation for social action and ecumenical diplomacy, creating and improving relationships with Protestant, Jewish and Muslim communities.

Late in his career, Cardinal Keeler published the names of hundreds of priests who had been accused of sexual abuse and disclosed that the archdiocese and its insurers had spent more than $5.6 million in 20 years on legal settlements, counseling and other expenses stemming from incidents of child sexual abuse by priests.

It was one of the most comprehensive accounts provided by any diocese.

“Ultimately, there is nothing to be gained by secrecy except the avoidance of scandal,” Cardinal Keeler wrote in a letter to 180,000 families registered in the Baltimore Archdiocese, which comprises nine Maryland counties and the city of Baltimore. “And rather than shrinking from this scandal — which, too often, has allowed it to continue — we must address it with humble contrition, righteous anger and public outrage. Telling the truth cannot be wrong.”

He supported the decision of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to remove sexual offenders from any job connected with the church. He was among the cardinals who met with representatives of abuse survivors, and he apologized for his decision in 1993 to return an accused priest to his parish.

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ROME
Associated Press

BY NICOLE WINFIELD
ASSOCIATED PRESS

ROME (AP) — Pope Francis’ top sex abuse adviser insisted Thursday the pope is “thoroughly committed” to ridding the church of abuse, but acknowledged his advisory commission must regroup following the clamorous resignation of Irish survivor Marie Collins.

Cardinal Sean O’Malley told a seminar on protecting children that the commission has always maintained a “victims first” priority and that the issue of continued survivor involvement in its work would be discussed at the group’s plenary meeting starting Friday.

The key question facing the commission, he said, is “how can victims and survivors continue to have a powerful voice in our work and help guide us?”

Collins resigned March 1 citing the “unacceptable” lack of cooperation from the Vatican’s doctrine office in implementing the experts’ proposals. Her departure dealt a blow to the commission’s credibility, leaving it without any survivor participation, and again raised questions about the Vatican’s commitment to fighting abuse, caring for survivors and accepting expertise from outside clerical circles.

Her resignation, which followed the suspension of the only other survivor on the board, was also a blow to Francis, who has won praise for creating the commission in 2014 and voicing “zero tolerance” for pedophiles, but has earned criticism for some problematic appointments, for scrapping a proposed tribunal to judge negligent bishops and for reducing penalties against a handful of abusers.

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UNITED STATES
America

John Smith March 22, 2017

“Forgive me. I have sinned.” I’ve always counted it a privilege to hear these words, to offer forgiveness. But for years, it was tainted with self-recrimination: You’re a hypocrite. Indeed, who was I to forgive or offer counsel, when I struggled with sin that I myself refused to confess because I couldn’t give it up and wasn’t sure I wanted to? Now, I have a confession to make.

It began during seminary, scanning photo galleries of models and actresses that I was attracted to. It seemed harmless, no threat to my celibate commitment. I took that promise seriously. I had no illusions that it would be easy, and it wasn’t. This might take the edge off, I thought.

I had no fears about its effects on my everyday life. I maintained proper boundaries in my work. I was especially vigilant when I was aware of my attraction to someone. I stayed away from sexually suggestive comments, and never flirted or acted inappropriately. I was the model of propriety, even as my browsing turned from the scantily clad to the unclothed.

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UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage

William D. Lindsey

Among many disappointing aspects of the papacy of Francis: the stepped-up clericalism.

We’re really supposed to be riveted by a confession of a priest in America Magazine that he suffers from a (non-existent) addiction to porn?

As if priests are the center of the church, live lives more engrossing and larger than the lives of the rest of us, and the church is some kind of reality-show theater in which the rest of us are sitting and watching in fascination as those larger than life lives play out on a grand stage?

America really wants us to be concerned about a priest’s so-called addiction to porn, in the era of Donald Trump?

Talk about diversionary moral analysis!

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MARYLAND
The Baltimore Sun

Doug Donovan and Jacques Kelly
The Baltimore Sun

Cardinal William Henry Keeler, the longtime leader of the Archdiocese of Baltimore whose influence in the Catholic Church spanned international borders over nearly six decades, died Thursday. He had turned 86 this month.

The retired archbishop of Baltimore, who led the region’s nearly 500,000 Catholics from 1989 until 2007, died while under the care of the Little Sisters of the Poor at St. Martin’s House for the Aged in Arbutus, the archdiocese announced.

During his 17 years as archbishop, Cardinal Keeler hosted Pope John Paul II in 1995, voted in the conclave that chose Benedict XVI to succeed him, and raised well over $100 million for programs, schools and scholarships for low-income city students.

The cardinal was a leading national voice against abortion, and he built an international reputation for forging ties with believers of other faiths.

The cardinal was also thrust into the national spotlight by the priest sexual abuse scandal that gripped the church, when a Baltimore man shot a priest who was later convicted of molesting him as a child.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

Megan Neil – AAP on March 23, 2017

Jews who shun Jewish child sex abuse survivors are themselves committing a sin and are complicit in the abuse, the senior leaders of Australia’s Jewish community say.

The leaders say there is no role for Jewish laws or halachic principles when it comes to child sexual abuse, which must be reported to secular authorities.

It is wrong to shun victims for coming forward or label them a moser or informer, they told the child abuse royal commission on Thursday.

“In my view to shun is to be complicit in the abuse that has been perpetrated on the victim and there is no place for that in our society whatsoever,” Executive Council of Australian Jewry president Anton Block said.

The royal commission has found leaders of Yeshivah Melbourne and Yeshiva Bondi failed to act on reports of abuse and some members of the orthodox communities were discouraged from reporting abuse because of the way Jewish law concepts were applied.

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GERMANY
L’Expresso – Settimo Cielo

[Warum sehe ich BILD.de nicht? – Bild]

Sandro Magister

The saga of the Knights of Malta has been expanded with a new chapter, staged by the Grand Chancellor of the order, the German baron Albrecht Freiherr von Boeselager, in an interview in the widely read German newspaper “Bild” on March 16.

In the interview, conducted by Nikolaus Harbusch, a well-known journalist who specializes in financial crimes, the Grand Chancellor conformed that at the beginning of this month the order received the first installments of a donation of 30 million Swiss francs, after verifying the correct provenance of the sum and the reliability of the person with whom on March 1 it signed the transfer agreement, identified by the “Bild” as Ariane S. and a fiduciary of the CPVG trust in Geneva, registered in New Zealand, which is the trustee of the money.

According to the investigations of the “Bild,” however, the trail of this endowment still has its obscure points. And the order of Malta itself had initially reported the fiduciary of the CPVG trust to the Geneva courts for embezzlement, an accusation that was withdrawn shortly before the framework agreement lat March 1.

The following is Boeselager’s complete interview with the “Bild.” Immediately followed by a few notes on the questions that it raises.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Marie O’Halloran

Reflecting on the oppressive Ireland of mother and baby homes makes it easy to understand how Adolf Hitler was able to do what he did, the Dáil has heard.

Sinn Féin deputy Martin Kenny said that when he was growing up, “I often wondered about Hitler, the Germans and what happened to the Jews and how he was able to do what he did.

“If you sit and think about the kind of Ireland we had,” Mr Kenny said, “it is very easy to understand how people were able to do these things.”

The Sligo-Leitrim TD was speaking during a debate on the commission of investigation confirming human remains on the site of the former Tuam mother and baby home.

He highlighted the case of a woman born in Tuam whose earliest memory was of hunger. He said that she and other children “used to scrape the dirt off the walls and eat it”. Her childhood was one of fear and of the “very worst horrors we could imagine”.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Niall O’Connor and Eilish O’Regan

March 23 2017

The Government is considering the reopening of a State redress scheme for survivors of the mother and baby homes, the Irish Independent understands.

Coalition sources have revealed that an unpublished report carried out by an expert commission recommends the reopening of a 2002 scheme that previously paid out compensation for institutional abuse.

Education Minister Richard Bruton said last week that there are no plans to reopen the scheme, which has already paid out €1.5bn to those who suffered abuse in religious institutions.

However, sources last night revealed that the Commission for the Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes has recommended reopening the scheme for compensation purposes.

The Commission recently revealed details of hundreds of children’s remains at a site in Tuam.

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IRELAND
IrishCentral

Professor James M. Smith
@IrishCentral
March 23, 2017

Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny visited the US last week for what many in Ireland see as his farewell, St. Patrick’s Day tour. But by traveling to America, Mr. Kenny also briefly escaped a scandal that shows no sign of abating back home. Recent news headlines scream, “Tuam mother and baby home a chamber of horrors says Taoiseach” and “Enda Kenny says babies … were treated like ‘some kind of sub-species.’”

Tuam was ostensibly a maternity home, providing services to unmarried mothers and their illegitimate children. It was owned by Galway County Council, managed by Catholic nuns, and inspected by the State.

Earlier this month, the government’s “Commission of Investigation” vindicated the claims of local historian Catherine Corless, who asserted in 2014 that 798 children had died at the Tuam Home. Tests now confirm the presence of human remains in a series of underground chambers, consistent with young children from the period in which the Home operated (1926-1961).

The Sisters of the Bon Secours interred infant remains in what Minister for Children Katherine Zappone—who visited Boston last week—describes as “a series of chambers that may have formed part of sewage treatment works.”

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

Thursday, March 23, 2017

Concealed pregnancies are still occurring in this country even though mother-and-baby homes no longer exist and the women, choosing to hide pregnancies, are of all ages and social backgrounds, according to research from Trinity College Dublin, writes Claire O’Sullivan.

The research, which is to be published in full early in the summer, found that some of the women had suffered “traumatic life experience” and some had found difficulties during pregnancy in accessing information around adoption.

Many of the 30 women interviewed believed adoption had been the right decision for them and their child. All of the women would have avoided antenatal healthcare.

The authors of the research had harsh words for elements of the press whose “sensationalist, insensitive and negative” reporting of the Baby Maria and Baby Alannah cases in 2015 and 2016 may have served to further drive affected women underground.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Rachel Browne

A Jewish leader has admitted to a royal commission he was not across the detail of his organisation’s child protection principles.

Leader of Bondi’s Yeshiva Centre Rabbi Pinchus Feldman told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse he was “not familiar” with the policies.
Child abuse Royal Commission: a look back

Painful and difficult stories in their thousands emerge from the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

The commission heard the centre, which comprises a synagogue, a bath house and a youth group, had “unclear” policies on child protection.

The Bondi centre and Yeshivah Centre Melbourne are part of the ultra-orthodox Jewish movement, Chabad-Lubavitch, which was rocked by child sex abuse claims that emerged from the royal commission’s initial inquiry into the organisations in 2015.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Karen Percy and Jade MacMillan

Ultra-orthodox Jews believed it was a sin to report allegations of child sexual abuse to the police, and shunned those who did, a royal commission has heard.

Some victims in Melbourne and Sydney said they were subjected to ultra-orthodox interpretations of Jewish laws which made it a sin to give evidence against fellow Jews to secular bodies, like the police.

At least three people, including a rabbi, have been convicted of multiple offences of sexual abuse at Jewish schools or centres.

Melbourne whistleblower Manny Waks has spoken extensively about how he and his family were ostracised when he first went public in 2011.

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AUSTRALIA
Goulburn Post

Louise Thrower
Louise Thrower@ThrowerLouise

23 Mar 2017

Archbishop Christopher Prowse will visit Goulburn on Tuesday to hear community concerns about institutional abuse within the catholic archdiocese.

His ‘listening tour’ follows evidence given by all of Australia’s archbishops at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Sexual Abuse.

“In a sincere gesture of pastoral care on this fragile matter, I intend to visit the Archdiocese in the final weeks of Lent, and listen carefully to those who wish to gather with me,” Archbishop Prowse stated in a circular.

He will be at Mary Queen of Apostles Parish meeting room, Verner Street, Goulburn from 7pm Tuesday, March 28.

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JAMAICA
The Gleaner

On Sunday, before the nine a.m. worship service, a congregant of the Boulevard Baptist Church told me that a very close family member of his was recently raped. It is causing unimaginable pain for the victim, an academically gifted child.

Can anyone imagine the trauma, pain and hurt when raped? This man has friends in the police force but those dealing with the case seem to be most unhelpful.

After church, the midday newscast related that in Australia, the Anglican Church has uncovered 1,000 complaints about child sex abuse between 1980 and 2015 involving 22 of the 23 dioceses. Significantly, the main reason for indecisive action was to save the reputation of the church. Obviously, reputation is overrated.

As I understand it, the arrest of Latoya Nugent was based on the allegation of her damaging the reputation of persons named as sexual predators. My understanding is that she has named persons as sexual predators based on the testimony of others. It was shocking to learn that libel is now a criminal offence. We should go back to the system of libel being a civil matter where the one whose reputation has been damaged is allowed to take the case to court.

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MINNESOTA
St. Cloud Times

Gerald C. Mertens, St. Cloud
March 22, 2017

I am sharing an open letter I have sent to Jeff Anderson, the attorney who has played an important role in the effort to find justice for victims of sexual molestation by Catholic priests. I feel there is a message in my letter to Jeff that is important for readers of the St. Cloud Times, as I fear justice will not take place without a public opinion shift to correct this injustice.

A strong message is for our church to help those we — the Church — hurt.

“Hi Jeff Anderson,

We have never met. I do NOT believe that you have received many (or possibly any) letters like this; I would be pleasantly surprised if I am incorrect.

I wish that many thinking Catholics would express their gratitude to you for being a “conscience” inspiring us Catholics to do the right thing. As I see it, most Catholics who become aware of the damage that Catholic priests caused via their child sexual molesting have become aware of the seriousness because of your work. This harm has been swept under the rug for far too long by poor Catholic leadership.

Beyond just making us Catholics aware, your work on priest molestation gives “thinking Catholics” a much deeper understanding of a problem we must continue to work on. The need exists for an active contrition with a firm purpose (and a plan) for amending the wrong inflicted. It is NOT okay to escape doing something about the molestation of children and women. In good faith (perhaps even a pun), the Catholic Church should show they are trying to end this sexual abuse of children and poor treatment of women.

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AUSTRALIA
Great Lakes Advocate

Update:

Catholic Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle Bishop Bill Wright has released a statement confirming a priest from diocese has been charged with historic child sexual offences.

The charges related to matters alleged to have occurred in the 1970s, the statement says.

“The priest concerned and I have agreed that he stand aside from ministry,” Bishop Wright said.

“We are unable to comment further on this matter at this time, other than to say again that we have and will continue to co-operate with NSW Police in their investigations and that we have confidence in our criminal justice system to deal properly with this matter in due course.”

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AUSTRALIA
New South Wales Police Force

Thursday, 23 March 2017

A Catholic priest will appear in court after being charged with alleged sexual assaults upon a boy in the Mid North Coast area between 1979 and 1980.

In 2013, the Commonwealth Government established a Royal Commission into Institutional response to child sex abuse. The Commission commenced hearing evidence from witnesses and victims.

In March 2014, a 46-year-old man alleged he was sexually abused by two Catholic priests and another man. The boy was between the age of nine and 12 at the time the alleged abuse occurred.

Following inquiries, about 12pm today (Thursday 22 March 2017) detectives from Manning/Great Lakes Local Area Command arrested a 76-year-old Newcastle man, at Waratah Police Station.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

Australian Associated Press
March 23, 2017

A Catholic priest has been charged over the alleged sexual assault of a young boy on the NSW mid north coast in the late 1970s.

Police say the victim, now 46, came forward in March 2014, a year after the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse was established.

It’s alleged the man was sexually abused by two Catholic priests and another man between 1979 and 1980.

The alleged assaults happened when the victim was aged between nine and 12.

Detectives on Thursday arrested one of the accused priests in Newcastle and charged him with three counts of indecent assault on a male.

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INDIA
Nyoooz

Summary: Thiruvananthapuram: A circle-inspector in Thiruvananthapuram was placed under suspension on account of dereliction of duty by IG Manoj Abraham. The suspension was following allegations of procedural lapses he committed in probing a case related to sexual abuse of a minor boy. It was based on this report, the IG took the action against the cop. The accused in the case was a priest, Father Thomas Pareckal, who was the in-charge of the seminary. The case pertained to the sexual abuse of a 16-year-old boy, who pursued Theology course in a seminary at Puthur near Kottarakkara in Kollam.

Thiruvananthapuram: A circle-inspector in Thiruvananthapuram was placed under suspension on account of dereliction of duty by IG Manoj Abraham. The suspension was following allegations of procedural lapses he committed in probing a case related to sexual abuse of a minor boy. CI S M Riyaz of Poovar was suspended pending inquiry for the delay of action from his part, which facilitated the escape of the accused.

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AUSTRALIA
Australian Jewish News

ALLEGED child sexual abuser Velvel Serebryanski has apologised to one of his alleged victims.

Serebryanski, who now lives in New York, was in his mid-20s when he allegedly sexually abused 11-year-old Manny Waks on Shavuot in 1987 in Melbourne’s Yeshivah Centre.

Over the next few months Serebryanski allegedly abused Waks again at the centre and at the Russian Chabad House.

When Serebryanski, who has never been charged, was confronted by Waks recently, a conversation took place during which he blamed the victim.

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CALIFORNIA
NBC Los Angeles

By Bill Hetherman/City News Service

The Archdiocese of Los Angeles has settled a lawsuit brought by a 29-year-old man who alleged he was forced to read verses from the Bible while being sexually molested in the 1990s by his head parish priest.

Lawyers for the plaintiff, identified in his Los Angeles Superior Court complaint only as John CP Doe, filed a notice of settlement Thursday with Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Ruth Kwan. No terms were divulged.

In their court papers arguing for dismissal of the plaintiff’s case, archdiocese attorneys stated that the plaintiff admitted there were no witnesses to his alleged abuse by Monsignor Alfred Hernandez, and that he could not provide evidence the archdiocese knew of the molestation he claimed to have suffered.

The plaintiff’s court papers stated that Hernandez used his position to get access to the plaintiff when the boy was in the first grade and a student at the parish school he attended. His court papers did not identify the parish and school, but lawyers for the archdiocese stated in their documents that

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IRELAND
Limerick Post

Andrew Carey | March 22, 2017

School survivor and book author Tom Wall at entrance of former industrial school in Glin

THREATS of legal action by the Christian Brothers against the last pupil to be incarcerated at Glin Industrial School were described this week as “contemptible”.

In 1952, when he was just three years old, Tom Wall was the last child to be sent to St Joseph’s Industrial School for Boys in Glin. In his book, ‘The Boy From Glin’, he documents his 13 years at the County Limerick institution where he was regularly beaten and sexually abused.

65 years later, the European Province of the Congregation of the Christian Brothers has threatened to sue him over the return of documents he saved from being destroyed and subsequently donated to the University of Limerick.

Mr Wall said he was ordered by the School Superior Brother Murray to burn the school records when the Christian Brothers were leaving Glin in 1973. Brother Murray told him he could keep his own records and any other documents he was interested in.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Culture

By Phil Lawler
Mar 22, 2017

Three weeks have passed since Marie Collins resigned from the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors (PCPM), complaining that the group’s work has been thwarted by resistance from within the Roman Curia. A few days after her public announcement, Cardinal Gerhard Müller, the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF)—which was the main target of Collins’ criticism— defended his office and denied any foot-dragging on the abuse issue. Collins quickly shot back, rebutting the cardinal’s arguments. Since, then, silence.

Where do we stand? Is this special papal commission really acting under restraint? Or do its members have unrealistic expectations? Is there evidence that the Vatican has adopted a tough new attitude on abuse, or is it all talk and no action? Let’s review the available evidence.

Bear in mind that the announcement of Collins’ resignation was not a bolt from the blue. She had frequently shown signs of impatience with the work of the PCPM. Nor was she the first member of the commission to leave. Peter Saunders—who, like Collins, is an abuse victim—had been asked to resign last year, after issuing a series of angry comments; he refused to resign, but was placed involuntarily on an indefinite “leave of absence.” Then another member, Claudio Papale, resigned last September without any public explanation.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Register

Edward Pentin

VATICAN CITY — The resignation of Marie Collins from the Vatican’s commission helping to protect minors from clerical sex abuse is being seen as another wake-up call for the Vatican in how it deals with such cases.

One of just two clerical-abuse survivors appointed to the 17-member Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors when it was established in 2014, Collins resigned as a member March 1, citing a “lack of cooperation” by the Roman Curia as a principal factor.

In her March 1 resignation statement, she criticized the Vatican for a “lack of resources” and “inadequate structures,” as well as “slowness” and “cultural resistance.” She also cited the failure of the Vatican to distribute the commission’s template for safeguarding guidelines to national bishops’ conferences.

An Irish native, Collins added that the “most significant problem” was reluctance in some of the Curia to implement the commission’s recommendations, despite the Pope’s approval. Specifically she lamented the refusal of one dicastery “to ensure all correspondence from victims/survivors receives a response.”

“I have come to the point where I can no longer be sustained by hope,” Collins wrote. “As a survivor, I have watched events unfold with dismay.”

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GUAM
The Guam Daily Post

Mindy Aguon | For The Guam Daily Post

A former Santa Barbara Catholic School student has alleged that a former priest sexually abused him inside a room at the Tumon Catholic Church when he was a young boy.

Jive Lee Kaai, 45, filed a lawsuit in the District Court of Guam accusing former priest Raymond Cepeda of sexual abuse when he was 12 or 13 years old.

According to the lawsuit, between 1981 and 1982, Kaai was attending school at Santa Barbara Catholic School in Dededo and Cepeda was a priest at the Dededo parish and appeared to be in charge at the school.

Court documents state the Catholic school students were taught to honor and respect not only the nuns, but also the priests and do whatever they told them to do.

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PENNSYLVANIA
WTAE

PITTSBURGH —
A priest in the Pittsburgh Catholic Diocese will be allowed to retire after the Vatican was unable to prove that he sexually abused a child, the diocese said Wednesday.

The Rev. John P. Fitzgerald, 68, was most recently the pastor at Our Lady of Peace in Conway, Beaver County. He has been on leave since July 31, 2014, because of the abuse allegation.

“It could not be determined with certainty whether the abuse did or did not occur,” the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said, according to the diocese.

The sex abuse was alleged to have happened in the late 1990s and was reported to the diocese in 2014. The diocese said it also brought the allegation to the district attorneys in Allegheny and Lawrence counties.

“Father Fitzgerald has maintained his innocence throughout. At the same time, the person who brought the allegation has maintained that the abuse did occur,” the diocese said.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Tribune-Review

NATASHA LINDSTROM | Wednesday, March 22, 2017

A Beaver County priest accused two years ago of child sexual abuse will retire following a Vatican ruling that the allegation “has not been proven,” the Roman Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh said Wednesday.

The Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith decided there was not enough evidence to prove the Rev. John “Jack” P. Fitzgerald abused a child in the late 1990s.

“It could not be determined with certainty whether the abuse did or did not occur,” the Pittsburgh diocese said in a statement.

Fitzgerald, 68, whose last assignment was pastor of Our Lady of Peace Parish in Conway, has been on administrative leave and prohibited from administering sacraments or identifying himself as a priest since July 31, 2014.

Bishop David Zubik now has granted the retirement request from Fitzgerald, who once served as chaplain at Pittsburgh International Airport and an Air National Guard station.

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INDIA
BLive

Kannur: Three more co-accused, including two doctors, in the Kottiyoor rape case in which priest Robin Vadakkancheril is accused of sexually exploiting and impregnating a minor girl, were arrested by the police in Kannur today. The co-accused gynaecologist Sister Tessy Jose, paediatrician Dr Hydrali and hospital administrator Sister Ancy Mathew surrendered before the Kannur Circle office around 630 this morning.

With the arrest of these three co-accused, the number of people nabbed by the police has gone up to eight. Those already arrested include the prime accused priest Robin. Two more nuns are still absconding and search is on to nab them, police said.

The sex abuse victim, a plus one student at a school in Kottiyoor, had given birth to a child on February 7 at a private hospital.

The co-accused helped priest Robin in hiding the newborn in the orphanage at Vythiri and the doctors and hospital authorities failed to report the incident to the police, government or Child Welfare Committee (CWC) then.

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FLORIDA
Florida Record

TALLAHASSEE — Bruce Charles Fehr, who was admitted to the Florida Bar more than 20 years ago, was disbarred from practicing law in Florida by the state Supreme Court on Jan. 29 after he pleaded guilty to one count of possession of child pornography.

According to an report by TV station WSAV, Fehr was working as an Episcopal priest in the Savannah, Georgia area when he was arrested for downloading the child pornography. Fehr will serve three years in prison for the criminal conviction after making his plea on Nov. 18, 2015 in U.S. district court in Georgia, according to court documents. A plea agreement was accepted on Nov. 30, 2015. Fehr was sentenced on March 30, 2016, and surrendered himself to a federal prison on April 29, 2016, to serve his sentence.

The attorney’s conduct violated the Rules Regulating The Florida Bar Rule 4-8.4(b), which states that “a lawyer shall not commit a criminal act that reflects adversely on the lawyer’s honesty, trustworthiness or fitness as a lawyer in other respects.”

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AUSTRALIA
Australian Jewish News

MORE than 18 months after Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Telsner resigned as the Yeshivah Centre’s senior rabbi, admitting that his conduct towards child sexual abuse victims and their families was not in line with the values of Yeshivah, he is still being paid “his regular salary”.

The stunning revelation came to light when The AJN asked the Yeshivah boards, including the Chabad Institutions of Victoria Limited (CIVL) board, questions to mark 100 days since they were elected.

“He is receiving his regular salary,” CIVL said.

“Until now, there has not been a governing body with authority to address this.

“It should be noted that his employment contract allows for certain financial compensation should his position be vacated. His official position has been in suspension since the resignation letter.”

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UNITED STATES
These Stone Walls

POSTED BY FR. GORDON J. MACRAE ON MARCH 22, 2017

Ever so slowly awakening across America is a long-suppressed awareness of an ugly part of history that keeps repeating itself. There are prophets arising among us who are finding the courage to speak truth to power – in this case the power of mob justice. One of them is columnist Michelle Malkin whose recent article, “Fighting for the Falsely Accused” was sent to me last month.

Michelle Malkin tells the gruesomely familiar tale of former Fort Worth, Texas police officer, Brian Franklin. Convicted of the sexual assault of a 13-year-old girl in 1995, he spent the last twenty-one years in prison for a crime he had nothing to do with. As Ms. Malkin describes, “There were no witnesses. There was no DNA.” There was just one person’s word against another’s, and the jury – after lots of media hype – was conditioned to bring no skepticism to the heavily coached testimony of a distraught teen.

The sole evidence was a medical report of a physical examination concluding that the girl had in fact been sexually assaulted. That, and a claim that the assault occurred in the backyard of her biological father who was a friend of the police officer-suspect, was enough to satisfy prosecutors and a jury.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

PETER SMITH
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
petersmith@post-gazette.com
MAR 22, 2017

A Roman Catholic priest is retiring and will not participate in public ministry after a Vatican investigation found it could not determine whether a single allegation of past sexual abuse by him could be proven.

Bishop David Zubik granted the Rev. John P. Fitzgerald’s request for immediate retirement, the diocese said in a statement Wednesday.

Father Fitzgerald, 68, had most recently served as pastor of Our Lady of Peace Parish in Conway, Beaver County. He was placed on leave in July 2014 after the diocese received an allegation he had sexually abused a minor in the 1990s.

“It is the only allegation against him ever brought to the Diocese of Pittsburgh,” the diocese said in a statement. “Father Fitzgerald has maintained his innocence throughout. At the same time, the person who brought the allegation has maintained that the abuse did occur.”

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INDIA
The News Minute

Wednesday, March 22, 2017

The three co-accused who allegedly helped Kottiyoor priest Robin Vadakkumchery in hushing up the rape of a child, after which the minor gave birth to a baby, surrendered before the investigation officer on Wednesday morning.

Dr. Tessy Jose, a nun and gynaecologist at Christu Raj Hospital Thokkilangadi, who delivered the survivor’s child, Dr. Hyderali, paediatrician in the hospital and Sr Ancy Mathew, nun and hospital administrator, surrendered before the Peravoor Circle Inspector Sunil Kumar after the Kerala High Court rejected their anticipatory bail plea.

As of now, including the prime accused Robin, eight accused have surrendered in the case.

Former Wayanad Child Welfare Committee (CWC) chairman Fr. Joseph Therakam, Sr. Ophilia, the Superintendent of Holy infant Mary orphanage at Wayanad, where the infant of the survivor was taken to immediately after the delivery and another nun Sr. Betty of CWC had surrendered last week.

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PENNSYLVANIA
WPXI

CONWAY, Pa. – A Beaver County priest accused of sexually abusing a minor in the late 1990s will be allowed to retire, the Diocese of Pittsburgh announced Wednesday.

The Rev. John Fitzgerald, 68, has been on administrative leave since July 2014. His last assignment was at Our Lady of Peace parish in Conway.

The diocese said Wednesday that the Vatican’s congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith ruled that the accusation against Fitzgerald “has not been proven.”

“It could not be determined with certainty whether the abuse did or did not occur,” the diocese said in a news release.

The congregation directed Bishop David Zubik to take appropriate action that provides for the welfare of all parties involved, including the welfare of the public, the diocese said.

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CALIFORNIA
CBS SF Bay Area

SAN JOSE (CBS SF) — A Roman Catholic priest who once ran the Vietnamese Catholic Center for the Diocese of San Jose was convicted in federal court Tuesday of 14 counts of bank fraud for diverting parishioners’ donations into his personal bank account.

Hien Minh Nguyen, 57, was found guilty by U.S. District Judge Beth Labson Freeman of San Jose, who conducted a nonjury trial on the charges in February.

The donations, which were made between 2005 and 2007, were intended for the Vietnamese Catholic Center and totaled $19,000.

Nguyen previously pleaded guilty before Freeman in August to four additional counts of evading taxes for the tax years 2008 through 2011.

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MASSACHUSETTS
The Brattle Theater

Trinity
at 12:00 PM
SINGLE FEATURE • DCP • NO BRATTLE PASSES •

Director: Skip Shea
Screenwriter: Skip Shea
Cast: Sean Carmichael, David Graziano, Aurora Grabill, Lynn Lowry
2016 | USA/Italy | DCP | 85 min.

A man accidentally bumps into the priest who abused him when he was a child, sending him on a twisted journey through his past.

In his first feature, Massachusetts’ own Skip Shea plumbs the depths of loss, trauma, and guilt through the story of Michael, a stoic artist (Sean Carmichael) who stops for coffee only to encounter the priest (David Graziano) who once sexually abused him. What would you do if you came face-to-face with the man who ruined your life?

Trinity explores that moment as a dreamlike journey through time past, a route that carries the troubled Michael in and out of churches, a dimly lit bathroom stall, and the tables of tarot card readers. We meet Father Tom’s other victims, most memorably the haunting Angel (Aurora Grabill), and a cadre of Michael’s chatty adulthood friends who seem to discuss the tenets of Catholicism as others casually discuss their theories about Westworld. Their removed, academic dissections rarely consider that the scars of abuse do not always fade with time. The experiences continue to strangle and suffocate the victims long after they’ve left the physical proximity of their tormentors.

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FRANKREICH
Profil

[A group of French investigator journalists laid open systematic abuse in the Roman Catholic Church in France.]

Von Ines Holzmüller ( 22. 3. 2017 )

Eine Gruppe französischer Investigativjournalisten legte systematischen Missbrauch in der römisch-katholischen Kirche in Frankreich offen.

Das französische investigativjournalistische Portal “Mediapart” legte am Dienstag einen großen Missbrauchsskandal in der französischen römisch-katholischen Kirche offen. 25 Bischöfe, von denen fünf noch heute im Amt sind, sollen über Jahrzehnte sexuellen Missbrauch durch 32 Priester systematisch gedeckt haben. 339 Kinder sollen diese seit den 1960-Jahren mindestens missbraucht haben.

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FRANCE
Rutube

[This is the complete Cash Investigation program that appeared on French television on Tuesday night.]

[For nearly a year, journalists have investigated one of the best kept secrets of the Church of France, revealing that religious condemned for pedophilia are still active, sometimes even in contact with children.]

Pendant près d’un an, des journalistes ont enquêté sur l’un des secrets les mieux gardés de l’Église de France, révélant ainsi que des religieux condamnés pour pédophilie sont toujours en activité, parfois même au contact d’enfants…

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio , heugenio@guampdn.com March 22, 2017

A former student at Santa Barbara Catholic School in Dededo said a former priest sexually abused him while two other students were told to wait outside an office of a Tumon parish in 1981 or 1982.

Jive Lee Kaai, now 47, said he was only 12 or 13 and a student at Santa Barbara Catholic School when former priest Raymond Cepeda sexually abused him at St. William’s Catholic Church in Tumon. The church is now the Blessed Diego de San Vitores.

Kaai, represented by attorney David Lujan, is the 32nd man to file a Guam clergy sex abuse lawsuit. The case was filed in the U.S. District Court of Guam, and it demands a minimum $5 million in damages and a jury trial.

In a complaint filed Wednesday afternoon, Kaai said the sexual abuse happened after he and several other Santa Barbara students were given detention for getting into trouble at school. Part of their punishment was to clean around the campus, the lawsuit says.

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AUSTRALIA
SBS

Derryn Hinch wants to set up a parliamentary committee to inquire into how the recommendations from the child sex abuse royal commission are implemented.

The crossbench senator will move on Thursday to establish the joint committee to inquire into the implementation of recommendations by governments and the relevant not-for-profit organisations.

It would also inquire into the operation of the federal government’s redress scheme and support of survivors, presenting a final report by December 2018.

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IRELAND
The Cork

22 March 2017
By Tom O’Sullivan
tom@TheCork.ie

Sinn Féin TD for Cork East Pat Buckley has called on the Government to support a Sinn Féin motion to establish a Truth Commission to investigate conditions at Mother and Baby Homes across the state following the revelations of mass graves at a home which had operated in Tuam. He said that the full truth being revealed was the only way to address the stain on Irish society caused by the scandal and to allow healing for survivors.

Deputy Buckley said:

“If one thing is clear about how we must proceed with addressing the shameful scandal of abuse, neglect and imprisonment represented by the Mother and Baby Homes which operated in this state, it is that we must as a principle accept the word of and believe the survivors of these crimes.

“I believe the survivors of places like Bessborough and Bethany and others.

“I believe them when they describe a kind of existence which if perfectly honest I don’t want to believe. However, I know from their dignity and resolve and from the catalogue of already exposed outrages, that these horrors they speak of are true and that they must be brought out into the light.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

The Royal Commission will hold a public hearing to inquire into the current policies and procedures of Yeshivah Melbourne and Yeshiva Bondi in relation to child-protection and child-safety standards, including responding to allegations of child sexual abuse.

The public hearing will commence 23 March 2017 at the Royal Commission’s hearing rooms in Sydney.

Location
The hearing will be held at Level 17, Governor Macquarie Tower, 1 Farrer Place, Sydney.

The scope and purpose of the public hearing is to inquire into:

1. The current policies and procedures of Yeshivah Melbourne and Yeshiva Bondi in relation to child protection and child-safe standards, including responding to allegations of child sexual abuse.
2. Factors that may have contributed to the occurrence of child sexual abuse at Yeshivah Melbourne and Yeshiva Bondi.
3. Factors that may have affected the institutional response of Yeshivah Melbourne and Yeshiva Bondi to child sexual abuse.
4. The responses of Yeshivah Melbourne and Yeshiva Bondi to relevant case study report(s) and other Royal Commission reports.
5. Any related matters.

The purpose of this public hearing is not to inquire into individual sets of facts or particular events as has occurred in previous Royal Commission case studies.

Leave to appear

The Royal Commission may invite selected individuals or organisations to speak to, or give evidence about, the submissions they have previously provided, however it is not proposed that leave to appear will be granted to these individuals or organisations, on the basis that they are speaking or giving evidence in this capacity.

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NORTH CAROLINA
WSPA

By Brianna Smith
Published: March 21, 2017

RUTHERFORD Co., NC (WSPA) – Word of Faith members accused of beating a former member could go on trial in May.

In 2015, five church members were indicted on kidnapping and assault charges after deputies say Matthew Fenner was beaten because he was gay.

Justin Covington, 20, of Rutherfordton; Brooke Covington, 56, of Rutherfordton; Robert Walker Jr., 26, of Spindale; and Adam Bartley, 25, of Rutherfordton have been indicted on one count each of second-degree kidnapping and simple assault.

Sarah Covington Anderson, 27, of Rutherfordton, faces the same charge and one count of assault inflicting physical injury by strangulation.

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FRANCE
Franceinfo

[VIDEO. “Cash Investigation”. Pedophilia: A global network for those who have survived abuse of priests.]

D’après une étude commandée par l’Eglise catholique américaine, 4% des prêtres ont commis des agressions sexuelles sur mineurs. Ces victimes se sont réunies à Chicago, aux Etats-Unis, pour le congrès annuel de leur association, le Snap (en anglais), le Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, un acronyme pour le Réseau de celles et ceux qui ont survécu aux abus de prêtres.

A la tribune, Phil Saviano, cofondateur : “Je pense qu’on est encore plus nombreux que l’année dernière. C’est une bonne nouvelle. Combien d’entre vous sont là pour la première fois ?” demande-t-il. Face à la forêt de bras qui se lèvent, il précise : “Presque 40% !”

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FRANCE
LCI

[SEXUAL ABUSES – Earlier this week, “Cash Investigation” and Mediapart revealed that 25 French bishops had covered 32 pedophile priests for years, evoking in particular a vast system of international exfiltration. An implacable observation even though since April 2016, the church of France has stepped up its fight against pedophilia.]

ABUS SEXUELS – En début de semaine, “Cash Investigation” et Mediapart ont révélé que 25 évêques français avaient couvert 32 prêtres pédophiles pendant des années, évoquant notamment un vaste système d’exfiltration internationale. Un constat implacable même si depuis avril 2016, l’Eglise de France a intensifié sa lutte contre la pédophilie.

L’enquête a fait l’effet d’une bombe. Selon les investigations menées conjointement par Mediapart et Cash Investigation, 25 évêques français – dont cinq toujours en poste – ont couvert pendant des années 32 prêtres auteurs d’abus sexuels sur des mineurs. Des prêtres français qui ont laissé derrière eux 339 victimes présumées sans en informer la justice. Dans un documentaire diffusé mardi soir, l’équipe d’Elise Lucet a en outre révélé que plus de 90 prêtres impliqués dans des affaires de pédophilie ont été déplacés par l’Eglise de par le monde afin de leur permettre d’échapper à la justice.

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FRANCE
L’Express

[While Cash Investigation came to supplement the revelations of Mediapart on pedophilia in the church, the representatives of the French bishops attack the methods of the journalist.]

Alors qu’un numéro de Cash Investigation est venu compléter les révélations de Médiapart sur la pédophilie dans l’Eglise, les représentants des évêques de France s’attaquent aux méthodes de la journaliste pointant une émission à charge.

La ténacité d’Elise Lucet et les séquences désormais cultes où la journaliste court après grands patrons, ou hommes politiques dérangent. Cette fois, c’est l’Eglise catholique française qui s’attaque aux méthodes de l’ancienne présentatrice du 13 heures de France 2.

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FRANCE
20 Minutes

[VIDEO. “Cash Investigation”: Élise Lucet challenges Pope Francis on pedophilia and impresses Twitter.]

Marie de Fournas
Publié le 22.03.2017

Thug Life. Mardi soir, l’émission Cash Investigation dévoilait une enquête menée depuis un an sur la gestion par l’Église catholique de prêtres mis en cause dans des affaires de pédophilie. Alors qu’une enquête de Mediapart vient de diffuser la liste de 32 prêtres accusés de pédophilie qui auraient été couverts par des évêques, France 2 s’est intéressée de très près au pape François. Selon l’émission, il aurait, lorsqu’il était archevêque de Buenos Aires, « tenté de faire innocenter un prêtre jugé pour pédophilie ». Pourtant réputé pour sa tolérance zéro vis-à-vis de ces agissements, le Saint-Père aurait transmis à la justice en 2010, une contre-enquête à décharge avant le procès en appel de l’accusé, le père Julio César Grassi.

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FRANCE
Europe 1

[Bishop Olivier Ribadeau Dumas, spokesman for the Conference of French Bishops (CEF), said on Wednesday he was determined to act against pedophilia in the Church after the accusations of cover-up by bishops in the Mediapart and Cash Investigation television program.]

Mgr Olivier Ribadeau Dumas dénonce par ailleurs une enquête “uniquement à charge et qui ne met pas en valeur tout ce qui a été fait depuis un an.”

Le porte-parole de la Conférence des évêques de France (CEF), Mgr Olivier Ribadeau Dumas, a dit mercredi sa “honte” mais aussi sa “détermination” à agir contre la pédophilie dans l’Église, après les accusations de Mediapart et de l’émission Cash Investigation.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

AAP

An offender advocating child sexual abuse has been stopped from attending church in Sydney, an inquiry into the Anglican Church has heard.

Dozens of other child abusers or people deemed to be a potential risk to children are allowed to worship in the Anglican Church but are monitored under safety plans, the child sex abuse royal commission has heard.

The Diocese of Sydney is managing 32 people on safety plans but its professional standards director Lachlan Bryant says two offenders have been deemed unsuitable to attend parishes.

“One of them is an offender who was essentially proselytising child sexual abuse,” Mr Byrant told the royal commission on Tuesday.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

Rebekah Ison – AAP on March 22, 2017

Sydney’s Anglican archbishop has delivered a public apology to the mother of an abuse victim, whose untimely death has sparked a new protocol in his name.

Wayne Guthrie, 47, died in December 2015, the month before he was supposed to give evidence at the royal commission about his abuse at the hands of Church of England Boys Society leader Simon Jacobs.

Archbishop Glenn Davies said Mr Guthrie’s mother should have been able to expect the St Ive’s CEBS group, which her son joined in 1979, was a safe environment.

Mr Guthrie’s abuse came to the attention of the local church leadership in the early 90s but nothing was done, he said.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

Megan Neil – AAP on March 22, 2017

Confession should not be used to cover up child sexual abuse, a senior Anglican official says as the church affirms that confessions are invalid if an abuser will not go to the police.

Unlike the Catholic Church where the seal of confession cannot be broken, the Anglican Church in Australia’s position is that there is scope to disclose child sexual abuse.

The Anglican Church’s general synod in September will be asked to abolish any church rule that would require a member of the clergy to keep a confession of child sexual abuse confidential, its Professional Standards Commission chair Garth Blake SC says.

The unanimous view among the bishops is that is an appropriate way for the church to move, Mr Blake told the child abuse royal commission on Wednesday.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Main Post

[Eight new abuse allegations within one year.]

Christine Jeske
21. März 2017

Vor zwei Wochen wurde bekannt, dass Professor Klaus Laubenthal nicht mehr der externe Missbrauchsbeauftragte der Diözese Würzburg sein möchte. Auf den Tag genau sieben Jahre – bis zum 18. März, nahm er diese Aufgabe wahr. „Diesen Jahrestag habe ich zum Anlass genommen, meine Aufgabe abzugeben“, informierte Laubenthal.

Am Montag übermittelte der Inhaber des Lehrstuhls für Kriminologie und Strafrecht an der Uni Würzburg seine letzte Jahresbilanz an Bischof Hofmann und Generalvikar Thomas Keßler. Im Zeitraum vom 11. März 2016 bis 18. März 2017 wurden acht Vorwürfe wegen sexualbezogener Missbrauchshandlungen und Grenzüberschreitungen unterhalb der Schwelle der Strafbarkeit übermittelt, teilte die Pressestelle des Bistums mit. Sie richten sich gegen zwei Priester, zwei männliche und eine weibliche Ordensangehörige sowie einen kirchlichen Mitarbeiter.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

AAP

Sydney’s Anglican Archbishop has expressed his ‘profound disappointment’ at what he says are less than robust child protection systems in some of the country’s dioceses.

Archbishop Glenn Davies told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse not all of the nation’s 23 dioceses had implemented policies suggested by the church.

“I take it there are some (dioceses) that don’t have robust systems?” counsel assisting Gail Furness SC asked him in Sydney on Wednesday.

“That would be true,” Archbishop Davies replied.

The royal commission has previously heard a persistent culture of diocesan independence has hampered the nationwide implementation of a consistent Anglican misconduct regime.

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IOWA
Des Moines Register

Linh Ta , lta@dmreg.com March 21, 2017

A former Boone pastor was arrested after allegedly sexually exploiting a teenage girl at Grace Community Church and “grooming” her for several years, according to court documents.

Joel Waltz, 47, of Boone, was charged with sexual exploitation by counselor or therapist on March 13. He was booked into Story County Jail and posted bail on March 20.

According to court documents, Waltz and the victim first met at Grace Community Church while he was the youth pastor. The victim was 11 and in foster care at the time.

The victim told police that Waltz would pick her and her sister up from foster care and take them to lunch. She said he was “extremely nice” to her, and she began to trust and confide in him.

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IRELAND
The Journal

FINE GAEL’S EDUCATION Minister, Richard Bruton has said that there are no “plans” to reopen the State’s redress scheme for new entrants in light of the Tuam Baby scandal.

However, with the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes underway, it is important to start thinking about the process of redress that is likely to be set up after the investigation is completed.

Looking back at the experience of survivors incarcerated in Industrial and Reformatory Schools in applying for redress from the Residential Institutions Redress Board (RIRB), we can identify what a redress process should and shouldn’t look like.

I interviewed 25 men and women about their experience of applying for redress from the RIRB, and this is what they had to say about the process.

Re-traumatisation

A major issue for most survivors was that by the time the redress process was over, they felt re-traumatised. An inquiry should seek to limit this trauma; however, this is not possible in its current format because of the legalistic overtures that characterise the process.

First, many were dissatisfied with the way their solicitors dealt with their claims, and felt that the legal system had benefitted financially from their trauma. The Redress Board’s Annual Report (2008) stated that “the average costs and expenses paid to an applicant’s solicitor at the end of 2008 amounted to €10,845 per application, or 16.9% of the award”.

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IRELAND
Galway Independent

No evidence of suspicious deaths has so far been uncovered at the former Tuam Mother and Baby Home site, according to the Department of Justice. As a result, there is no criminal investigation taking place at the site, although Gardaí are continuing to liaise with the Coroner’s Office.

“In the course of any coronial investigation, it is open to a coroner to call on the support of the Gardaí and any other authorities as he may deem necessary,” stated a spokesperson for the Justice Department.

The spokesperson added that “a critical part of the role of a coroner is to determine as far as possible, the cause of a death reportable to him by law, particularly in the case of deaths that may have occurred in a violent or unnatural manner.”

The Coroner would not normally be involved in conducting an investigation “where a person has died naturally and a death certificate from an attending doctor was provided.”

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IRELAND
Galway Independent

Calls have been made to set up a ‘Truth Commission’ following the revelations that human remains have been found on the site of the former Tuam Home.

Sinn Féin TD for Cork South Central, Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire has published a motion which will be debated in the Dáil this week calling for a Truth Commission to establish the facts about Mother and Baby Homes.

A Truth Commission, if set up, would be tasked with discovering and revealing past wrongdoings and its results would go some way to resolving issues of the past. Truth Commissions have previously been set up in El Salvador, Congo, Kenya, and other countries. As part of it, the Truth Commission can hold public hearing where survivors can share their stories.

The revelations of recent weeks at Tuam, and subsequent reports regarding the records and treatment of children, and their mothers, have shocked and angered Irish people, said Deputy Ó Laoghaire.

“The suffering and mistreatment of children and mothers in these institutions is a matter of national shame and, in many respects, there are many questions unanswered, and those responsible have yet to be brought to account.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Marie O’Halloran

The commission of investigation into mother and baby homes established two years ago is not fit for purpose and has “only scratched the surface” in dealing with what happened to women and children there, the Dáil has heard.

Sinn Féin spokesman on children Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire said its terms of reference and the model were “utterly inadequate” and survivor groups had criticised the behind-closed-door hearings and lack of transparency.

He said they had to ensure that the system established for survivors “is something they can engage with and have trust in”.

In the wake of the discovery earlier this month of significant human remains in the mother and baby home in Tuam, Mr Ó Laoghaire was introducing a private members’ motion to introduce a truth commission based on best international practice of other countries such as South Africa and Colombia.

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IRELAND/UNITED STATES
Irish Central

Cormac McConnell @IrishCentral March 22, 2017

Here is a heartwarming true story from about 20 years ago which began on the pages of the Irish Voice. I am deliberately recalling it now in an effort to slightly balance that dreadful discovery in Galway recently of the bodies of scores of infants secretly buried in septic tanks on the grounds of a home for unmarried mothers and their babies run by an order of nuns for decades up until the late fifties.

That horror from our immediate past will now be fully investigated but, in the meantime, here is the story of a lovely woman called Mary Kowalski from New Jersey as far as I can remember, whom I met because I read in the Irish Voice that she was coming over from the U.S. to Co. Clare to try and contact her birth mother. I will never forget Mary, and if perchance she reads this I hope she is as happy today as she was the last time I saw her.

Mary’s mother became pregnant outside marriage, you see, and in the priest-ridden Ireland of the time there was a great stigma and shame attached to that. The homes run by orders of nuns were about the only refuge there was apart from flight to England forever.

It is now known clearly that both the state and the religious orders failed to live up to their responsibilities on that front. There were many abuses at every level, and this was reflected in a mortality rate for the poor babies which was thrice the level of other infants.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Nicole Chettle

Child abusers used the Anglican Church as a “safe haven” because their activities would not be monitored and they would be offered “cheap forgiveness”, a royal commission has heard.

The Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Glenn Davies, has told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse that laypeople were the main perpetrators of abuse.

He said that in the past, offenders were given access to youth groups and other church-run organisations too easily.

“Perpetrators or potential perpetrators seek a safe haven where their activities will not be monitored,” Dr Davies said.

“Inadequate screening of our laypeople in past years allowed people with corrupt motives to abuse young boys, in particular, but also girls.”

He said complaints were made against 17 clergy since the 1960s, and were sustained in four cases.

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UNITED STATES
Verdict

22 MAR 2017 MARCI A. HAMILTON

The latest sex abuse scandal in the headlines paints USA Gymnastics in as bad a light as you can imagine. Indeed, it is so bad the successful president of the organization, Steven Penny had to resign. This scandal, amidst a series of other sports scandals, has pushed the U.S. Olympic Committee to create a new board to investigate claims of sex abuse, SafeSport, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, with bipartisan support, to introduce the Protecting Young Victims from Sexual Abuse Act. The latter mandates that anyone who suspects abuse in a National Governing Body (NGB) of an Olympic sport must report the suspected abuse to the authorities, extends the statute of limitations for civil suits against perpetrators, bans one-on-one time between coaches and athletes, and imposes other specific requirements on NGBs.

These are important developments that we can only hope will make elite sports safer for children, a need I discuss here. At the same time, bells should be ringing. We have been here before. These Olympic sports-related developments should bring to mind the Roman Catholic Bishops’ Dallas Charter, which established a new “zero-tolerance” policy for abuse in the church following a scandal of huge proportions. The same is true for the Boy Scouts and countless of other organizations. As each of these silos of abuse has been disclosed, organization-specific policies have sprouted.

It is now time to connect the dots between the scandals.

When Sex Abuse Was Not Reported and the Perpetrators Were “Mr. Stranger Danger”

There was a time when sex abuse was rarely reported. It is impossible to measure how much of the silence was due to denial and how much ignorance, but to be sure the combination kept it buried, and the victims were locked away in a closet of silence. No one, least of all the media, wanted to discuss it. Those stories that made it into the newspapers were literally unavoidable, like the prosecution of Fr. Gauthier in Louisiana for the sex abuse of numerous boys in the early 1980s.

With the reporting of sex abuse being sporadic at best, it was nearly impossible to see the patterns of cover up within various organizations. The mass assumption was that the Gauthier case was unusual, and so were the few other cases that bubbled up into the media on occasion. These were distinct data points and there was no reason to suspect that anyone was responsible for the abuse other than the perpetrator, who was a lone wolf monster preying on children. We were so uninformed that we even called the predators “Mr. Stranger Danger,” signaling he was outside the child’s circle of family, school, and extra-curricular activities.

The Organizational Scandals Appear on the Horizon

Then there was the Spotlight investigative team at The Boston Globe and other reporters like Marie Rhode at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, who started to dig into the issue in the Roman Catholic Church. A diocesan-based pattern surfaced in 2002 as these hard-working reporters connected the dots. Here is what they saw to their horror: the perpetrators were not acting alone. Rather, bishops covered up seriatim sex abuse by their priests. Then there was Penn State and Jerry Sandusky, with striking similarities. Once the paradigm was visible, the same dynamic was seen at work in many other organizations as well

The response was outrage, from those inside the organization to prosecutors to the general public. How could these trusted leaders let this happen? Everyone agrees this is the most despicable of crimes and that anyone who allows it to happen is no better than the direct perpetrator. They also agree that this must be excised from our social fabric. But how? For most, the answer has been: just make it stop. Now. It’s as though we discovered someone we knew maliciously beating a stranger and all we needed to do was pull him off and then we could just walk away, whistling in the wind.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Rachel Browne

Not every Anglican diocese has robust child protection measures, with Sydney Archbishop Glenn Davies telling a royal commission the lack of national consistency is “extremely disappointing”.

In the final day of a public hearing into how Anglican institutions have responded to child sexual abuse, Archbishop Davies acknowledged that not all the country’s 23 dioceses had rigorous mechanisms in place.

“There has been a failure of the national church to have consistency across the board but it shouldn’t be forgotten that there are a number of robust systems in place in most dioceses,” he told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Counsel assisting the commission Gail Furness, SC, asked: “I take it there are some that don’t have robust systems?”

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AUSTRALIA
Sky News

Archbishop Glenn Davies told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse not all of the nation’s 23 dioceses had implemented policies suggested by the church.

‘I take it there are some (dioceses) that don’t have robust systems?’ counsel assisting Gail Furness SC asked him in Sydney on Wednesday.

‘That would be true,’ Archbishop Davies replied.

The royal commission has previously heard a persistent culture of diocesan independence has hampered the nationwide implementation of a consistent Anglican misconduct regime.

Australia’s most senior Anglican cleric, Melbourne Archbishop Philip Freier, said he would be interested to know more about Archbishop Davies’ concerns, adding that he thought all dioceses were committed to child protection.

– See more at: http://www.skynews.com.au/news/national/nsw/2017/03/22/dioceses-accused-of-lack-of-child-protections.html#sthash.DgB0xVyT.dpuf

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PENNSYLVANIA
WFMZ

By: Amanda VanAllen

A church leader in Berks County spoke out Tuesday, one day after a man surrendered to detectives on child sexual assault charges.

Authorities said the man was doing technical work at a church function in 2006 when he sexually assaulted a 15-year-old girl.

“In the fall of this past year, a member of my congregation came to me with a phone call that she was confused and concerned over,” said Pastor Richard Moore, St. John’s Lutheran Evangelical Church in Sinking Spring

Moore said that phone call was from the mother of a young girl who said she had been sexually assaulted at a church function in 2006.

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AUSTRALIA
Western Advocate

Eighteen complaints made in the Bathurst Diocese are included in a report released on Friday into child sex abuse complaints in the Anglican Church in Australia.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse Analysis of Complaints of Child Sexual Abuse Received by Anglican Church Dioceses in Australia report breaks down the complaint figures in each diocese.

It details child sex abuse complaints received by each diocese between January 1, 1980 and December 31, 2015, though the alleged abuse does not have to have happened during that specific time period.

The report shows that of the 18 complaints in the Bathurst Diocese, 22 per cent involved alleged physical abuse.

It also shows 75 per cent of the complainants in the Bathurst Diocese were male and 25 per cent were female.

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INDIA
The New Indian Express

KOLLAM: A vicar under Punalur diocese was arrested on Tuesday for allegedly sexually assaulting a minor boy who had pursued theology in his seminary.

Thirty-year-old Fr Thomas Parekala a native of Kannur and vicar of St Mary’s Church at Puthoor, near here, had earlier slipped from police custody. He was nabbed from Usilampatti, near Madurai in Tamil Nadu by the special team with the Kollam Rural SP. According to Puthoor police, the incident took place in July 2016 at Holy Cross church seminary at Pullamala, Thevallapuram where Fr Thomas Parekala was the teacher.

According to police, the victim was subjected to unnatural sex by the priest for about one year after he joined the seminary to pursue theology. The boy has revealed that the priest had also abused two other boys during the period.

The incident came to light only last week when the parents of the 14-year-old boy approached the Child Welfare Committee at Thiruvananthapuram.

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AUSTRALIA
Mercury

PATRICK BILLINGS, Mercury
March 21, 2017

TASMANIA’S Anglican Diocese has paid out $2.23 million to victims of child sex abuse, according to a new report.

The report by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse shows the payments were made to 34 victims.

Overall the diocese has received 56 complaints related to 34 perpetrators.

Six of the complaints related to Anglican schools while 10 were connected to the Church of England Boys Society (CEBS), which was examined by the Royal Commission last year.

The commission’s lawyers have alleged that a far-reaching paedophile ring was active within CEBS, a Scout-like offshoot of the Anglican Church.

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