ABUSE TRACKER

AUSTRALIA
Morung Express

SYDNEY, February 16 (Reuters) – Australia’s Catholic Church has paid A$276 million ($213 million) in compensation to thousands of child abuse victims since 1980, a government inquiry heard on Thursday — the first time the total compensation paid by the church’s schools, orphanages and residences has been revealed.

A report at a royal commission into institutional abuse said 3,066 victims had received some form of compensation from a Catholic body in the 35 years to 2015.

Cash payments of A$258.8 million amounted to an average A$91,000 per person. Some compensation was in non-cash payments.

The institution which paid the most was global order the Christian Brothers, which paid A$45.5 million to 763 people, averaging A$61,000 per person. The Jesuits paid the most per complainant, at A$257,000 each, on average.

The average time between a person experiencing abuse and filing a complaint was 33 years, state prosecutor Gail Furness said in the report, adding that “many survivors face barriers which deter them from reporting abuse to authorities and to the institution in which the abuse occurred”.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

Joanne McCarthy
16 Feb 2017

THE Catholic Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle has made some of Australia’s highest average compensation payments to one of the country’s largest groups of child sexual abuse survivors, new data about the distribution of $276 million in total Australian Catholic Church payments to survivors has shown.

A comparison of church authorities across the country, released by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse on Thursday, shows 128 Hunter survivors of clergy abuse received significantly higher average payments of $208,000 than thousands of other Australian Catholic abuse survivors, with a total Maitland-Newcastle payout figure of $26.6 million.

The data release includes confirmation of a shocking 763 payments to abuse survivors from Christian Brothers institutions, including children’s homes, with an average payment of just $64,000.

It also includes payments of an average $109,000 to 286 men sexually abused as children at schools run by the Marist Brothers, including Hamilton and Maitland Marist Brothers, with a total payout of $31.3 million.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Echo

Alex Winter

ABUSE claims are taken seriously, church representatives have said after a choir conductor was jailed.

David Everett, of Hankinson Road in Bournemouth, was a member and conductor of the Priory Church Choir in Christchurch when he sexually abused a teenage boy in the early 2000s.

As reported in the Daily Echo, Everett was approaching middle age at the time of the offences.

At a sentencing hearing held at Bournemouth Crown Court, Judge Peter Crabtree OBE said the defendant was “trusted” by the victim’s parents.

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NEW HAMPSHIRE
Seacoast Online

Posted Feb 15, 2017

Seabrook, New Hampshire resident Keith Townsend shows great bravery in sharing his story about allegations of sexual abuse against a former Catholic priest.

Townsend said he thought Paquin was going to be in jail for life for past convictions and was stunned when he was released from jail after raping an altar boy and said “no one is safe” if Paquin, now 74, is free. Paquin, formerly of the Boston archdiocese, served prison time for abusing an altar boy from 1989 to 1992 while serving as associate pastor of St. John the Baptist Church in Haverhill, Massachusetts. He pleaded guilty to charges in relation to those crimes in 2002 and was released in 2015.

So, Townsend, now 42, is one accuser who went to police and a subsequent investigation has led to Paquin facing 29 new indictments for sexual abuse of young boys. A York County Grand Jury handed down the indictments last week.

Townsend, who said he was molested by Paquin approximately between the ages of 8 and 13 during trips to a camp in Kennebunkport, didn’t stop there. He told his story to the Boston Globe and Seacoast Media Group this week. Townsend said he was one of about 10 other young boys abused together and explained in great detail how Paquin gave them alcohol and let them drive his vehicle and gradually started touching them before eventually raping them while the boys were drunk and alone and he remained sober.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

By Emily McPherson

A 92-year-old widow taking on the Catholic church over her daughter’s alleged rape and sexual abuse now has an army of almost 50,000 supporters behind her.

Eileen Piper’s daughter Stephanie tragically took her own life 23 years ago, one year after police charged disgraced priest Gerard Mulvale over her alleged rape.

Mulvale and the Catholic Church have denied knowing about Stephanie’s sexual abuse, but Mulvale was later convicted of sex crimes against two boys in her friendship circle and sentenced to three years’ jail.

“They’ve been brutal and heartless,” Ms Piper said of the church. “They’re hoping I’ll die so that they don’t have to deal with me anymore or pay me proper compensation for the heinous sexual abuse to Stephanie.”

Determined to get justice for her only daughter, Ms Piper started a Change.org petition, becoming Australia’s oldest online petition starter.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Wayne Independent

By Kevin Kearney
kkearney@wayneindependent.com

HONESDALE – An imprisoned former Roman Catholic priest who is up for parole this year should remain in jail until he serves the maximum sentence of 18 years, victims advocates believe.

Steven J. Wolpert, 63, was sentenced in 2008 to nine to 18 years in state prison after pleading guilty to involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child younger than 13.

The defendant, who served as a priest in Brooklyn, N.Y., was charged after he abused the 8-year-old boy in Hawley between 2006 and 2007.

The prospect of the sex offender serving only have his sentence does not sit well with Michele Minor Wolf, executive director of Honesdale-based Victims’ Intervention Program.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Sean Rubinsztein-Dunlop

A “wickedly manipulative” serial paedophile priest has had his jail sentence extended until at least 2026 for the sexual abuse of boys at St Stanislaus College in Bathurst in the state’s central west.

Brian Spillane, 74, was found guilty last year of sexually abusing seven students between 1974 and 1990, in what a Sydney court heard was likely to be the last in a series of child abuse cases against him relating to more than 30 children.

District Court judge Robyn Tupman today sentenced him to at least nine years in jail and a maximum of 13 years for 16 offences including buggery against boys as young as 12.

Judge Tupman said Spillane abused his position of trust as a teacher and chaplain and “used religious rituals to increase his power over his victims”.

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AUSTRALIA
Catholic Leader

BRISBANE Archbishop Mark Coleridge described the Church as “a law unto ourselves”, and said Pope Francis and the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse were catalysts for cultural change.

Archbishop Coleridge was a panellist on the third day of the Royal Commission hearing in Sydney discussing Catholic Church structural and cultural issues, including accountability and transparency.

Archbishop Coleridge said the Church must put a “culture of concealment” behind it.

“The Catholic Church in Australia has at times looked the other way, been a law unto itself, and seen that it does things its own way,” he said.

Commissioner Robert Fitzgerald asked whether it was too harsh to say the Church in Australia still had not embraced the notion of transparency as good practice.

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GUAM
KUAM

[with video]

Updated: Feb 16, 2017

By Krystal Paco

Visiting Vatican officials are receiving testimony relative to the ongoing canonical trial against Archbishop Anthony Apuron in Rome. Among those subpoenaed is Roland Sondia, one of many men to accuse Apuron of molestation that occurred decades ago when Apuron was still a priest.

Thursday’s meeting with officials from the Vatican went exactly as Attorney David Lujan expected.

“The gist of it is that Roland will not be represented in there and they will not allow me in there,” said the lawyer. As a result, he and his client, Sondia, walked away without providing a deposition regarding his allegations against Archbishop Apuron. Rather than receive the deposition in person, Vatican officials will just have to read about it.

“Our position is that Roland will not be deposed live,” Lujan continued. “However, we are willing to submit a declaration, or an affidavit in writing.”

Here on island to investigate Apuron as part of the ongoing canonical trial in Rome are Cardinal Raymond L. Burke who will act as a presiding judge over the secret tribunal; Father James Conn who will serve as the prosecutor; and Father Justin Wachs who will perform duties similar to that of a court reporter. Lujan noted seeing another canon lawyer in the room who reportedly represents Apuron, but did not disclose his name to media.

Immediately following the closed-door meeting, Lujan expressed lack of confidence – particularly in Father Conn, who previously made contact directly to his clients. In addition to Sondia, Conn made attempts to communicate with Roy Quintanilla, who resides in Hawaii and Walter Denton of Arizona. Each of the men were altar boys at Mount Carmel Parish in Agat when they were allegedly sexually molested by Apuron, who was a priest at the time.

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AUSTRALIA
Malaysian Digest

The Australian Catholic Church has paid A$276m (£171m; $213m) to victims of sexual abuse since 1980, an inquiry has heard.

The money was divided between thousands of victims, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse was told.

The data, released on Thursday, showed the average payment was A$91,000.

The landmark royal commission was set up in 2013 and is also investigating abuse at non-religious organisations.

The Catholic Church made the payments in response to 3,066 of 4,445 child sexual abuse claims between 1980 and 2015, the inquiry heard. More than 40% of claims were received by a handful of male orders.

They included compensation, treatment, legal and other costs, said Gail Furness, the lead lawyer assisting the commission in Sydney.

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PHILIPPINES
Aljazeera

Al Jazeera investigation reveals the growing problem of sexual misconduct in the Philippines’ powerful Catholic church.

Sexual misconduct in the Catholic church is a growing problem in the Philippines, an Al Jazeera investigation has revealed, and priests suspected of abuse are seldom prosecuted.

Oscar Cruz, a retired archbishop overseeing the investigation, told Al Jazeera’s 101 East programme that in recent years more cases had come to the church’s attention.

“Yes, yes, yes… [there are] more reports on paedophilia and homosexuality,” Cruz said. “It is a heinous crime, you know. And a priest at that? Violating a minor? Come on!”

For centuries, the Catholic church has wielded considerable influence in the Philippines, with more than 80 percent of a 100 million-strong population following the faith.

“If clerical abuse victims take on the most powerful institution in the Philippines, it is a David and Goliath battle,” 101 East’s Drew Ambrose, reporting from the capital Manila, said.

In an interview with Al Jazeera, “Imelda” said she was sexually assaulted by a priest three years ago, when she was 15.

After she filed a police report, two members from her village church paid her $150 to drop the case, she alleged.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio , heugenio@guampdn.com Feb. 16, 2017

An 18th clergy sex abuse lawsuit was filed Thursday in the U.S. District Court of Guam.

Anthony Lujan, 50, of Barrigada, alleged former island priest Louis Brouillard sexually abused him when he was an altar boy, a Boy Scouts of America scout, and while attending San Vicente Catholic School in or about 1979. He said he was about 12 years old at the time.

Brouillard, now 95 and living in Minnesota, publicly admitted to sexually abusing more than 20 altar boys when he was on Guam from the late 1940s to 1981.

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AUSTRALIA
Bendigo Advertiser

Jane Lee
16 Feb 2017

A man who abused teenage girls and still believes his Wiccan religion condones his crimes could do “catastrophic” harm to possible future victims, a court has heard.

The secretary of the Department of Justice, Greg Wilson, is challenging a Supreme Court decision to revoke a decade-long supervision order against Robin Fletcher, who previously served eight years in prison for sexually abusing two teenage girls in the 1990s.

The order restricts him to living at a particular address, which he can only leave under strict conditions. He cannot move from that address without the Adult Parole Board’s approval.

Justice Phillip Priest last week ruled that Fletcher, 60, posed no greater risk of sexual reoffending “than the average sex offender released into the community”. He said there was a “low” risk he would reoffend in the same way, based on psychological evidence, the fact he is now legally blind, his age and his physical weakness.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Written by Janela Carrera

This is now the 10th accuser to file suit against former Guam priest Father Louis Brouillard.

Guam – Another alleged victim has come forward with allegations of sexual abuse against the Archdiocese of Agana, making it the 18th lawsuit filed against the church.

The latest lawsuit was filed by Anthony Lujan, 50, who says he was sexually abused by former Guam priest Father Louis Brouillard.

According to Lujan, he was 12 years old when he was sexually abused by Brouillard while he was serving as an altar boy at the San Vicente Parish in Barrigada.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Written by Janela Carrera

Attorney David Lujan says all the accusers say the sexual abuse occurred in Inarajan while Bishop Emeritus Tomas Camacho was serving as a priest.

Guam – More lawsuits for civil claims of sexual abuse are expected to be filed against retired Saipan Bishop Tomas Camacho.

Attorney David Lujan, who represents Melvin Duenas, 55, the first individual to accuse Camacho of sexually assaulting him, announced today that he’s been in communication with at least three other individuals who intend to sue the retired bishop.

All of the accusers, Lujan said, claim they were sexually abused at the Inarajan parish where Duenas said he was sexually assaulted when he was just 10 years old.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Melanie Kembrey

Serial paedophile and former priest Brian Joseph Spillane​ has been sentenced to another 13 years in jail for abusing young boys, many of whom were homesick and turned to him for help, at a private Catholic boarding school.

Spillane, 74, kept his back turned to his victims and their families as the sentence was handed down in a packed court room in the Downing Centre District Court on Thursday.

The former teacher, chaplain and head of discipline at St Stanislaus’ College, Bathurst, in central west NSW preyed on young boys who came from strictly Catholic families who revered priests.

Spillane used religious rituals, purporting to perform exorcisms, prayers and to speak in tongues, as a ruse to sexually abuse the boys.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Philly.com

by Julie Shaw , Staff writer @julieshawphilly | shawj@phillynews.com

A Montgomery County day-care teacher has been charged with sexually abusing a 3-year-old girl who was in his care, authorities said Wednesday.

Michael Barbee, 32, worked as a teacher at the Early Learning Center Program of St. Francis Parish, on Hamilton Street in Norristown.

According to an affidavit of probable cause, Norristown police on Feb. 8 received a report that Barbee assaulted the girl with his finger and covered her mouth while they were in his classroom. The girl complained of pain.

Barbee, of Yeadon, went to the Norristown Police Department on Friday and eventually admitted forcibly touching the girl on Feb. 7, the affidavit says. According to his statement, he told police he did so after the girl called him “stupid.” He said he went to her cot during nap time and assaulted her, the affidavit says.

Barbee was charged with involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, aggravated indecent assault, unlawful contact with a minor, and related offenses.

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PENNSYLVANIA
WPVI

NORRISTOWN, Pa. (WPVI) — A Catholic school teacher in Norristown is facing multiple sexual abuse charges involving a 3-year-old girl.

32-year-old Michael Barbee, a teacher from the early learning program at Saint Francis of Assisi Parish, is being held on $750,000 bail.

Charging documents say Barbee admitted to touching the child during nap time.

According to the police affidavit, a 3-year-old girl who attended the Learning Center complained and said Barbee covered her mouth when he touched her.

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GUAM
Radio New Zealand

Vatican representatives are due to hear evidence today from one of the former altar boys who accused Guam’s Archbishop Anthony Apuron of sexual abuse.

Pacific Daily News reports groups of Catholics plan to be there to show support for Roland Sondia and other abuse survivors.

Archbishop Apuron is undergoing a canonical trial sparked by allegations he raped and sexually abused altar boys in the 1970s.

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VATICAN CITY
Associated Press

By NICOLE WINFIELD

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican has sent conservative Cardinal Raymond Burke to the Pacific island of Guam to investigate an important case of sexual abuse, dispatching a seasoned jurist who has clashed repeatedly with Pope Francis for a sensitive mission halfway around the world.

The Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith back in October named Burke the presiding judge in its trial of Guam Archbishop Anthony Apuron, who is facing multiple allegations of sex abuse of altar boys in the 1970s, the Vatican press office said Wednesday. Apuron has denied the charges and has not been criminally charged.

Burke, a Rome-based American, is due to interview a former altar boy in Guam on Thursday who says he was sexually abused by Apuron, the Pacific Daily News reported. Such special missions are not uncommon for cardinals, and interviews with witnesses are a key part of any canonical trial.

Survivors of clerical abuse, though, have long criticized Burke’s record as an archbishop in the U.S. in handling cases of abusive priests. Burke has said every act of abuse by clergy is a “grave evil.” But he has also blamed gay clergy for the church’s sexual abuse crisis, saying priests “who were feminized and confused about their own sexual identity” were the ones who molested children.

Burke, a top canon lawyer, had headed the Vatican’s high court until 2014, when Francis removed him and named him patron of the Knights of Malta religious order. Francis recently sidelined Burke from that position after Burke was involved in the problematic ouster of a senior knight.

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GUAM
Guam Daily Post

Mindy Aguon | For the Post

A canon law expert said confidential documents obtained by the Post, which summon one of Archbishop Anthony Apuron’s accusers to appear before a Vatican-sent tribunal, are the first pieces of evidence that Apuron faces the church’s version of a criminal case, rather than an administrative proceeding.

“These documents are a big affirmation that there’s at least a semblance of truth because they’re moving against Apuron,” said attorney Patrick J. Wall, a former priest and an advocate for victims of clergy abuse. “This is a criminal case. It’s the first piece of evidence that (they) believe he committed a crime of some sort.” Wall is with Jeff Anderson & Associates, a U.S. law firm recognized as one of the nation’s premier law firms to represent survivors of clergy sexual abuse.

A Feb. 3 decree signed by Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, who will be the presiding judge over the secret tribunal scheduled to take place at the Archdiocesan Chancery today, summoned Sondia to appear for “the purpose of giving said testimony,” according to the documents.

Sondia is one of several former altar boys who accused Apuron of sexual abuse in the 1970’s. At the time, Apuron was a Guam parish priest.

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ROME
Crux

Cindy Wooden
February 15, 2017
CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

ROME – Cardinal Raymond L. Burke, a church law expert and former head of the Vatican’s highest court, arrived in Guam Feb. 15 as the presiding judge in a church trial investigating allegations of sexual abuse leveled against Archbishop Anthony S. Apuron of Agana.

The Vatican press office confirmed a “tribunal of the first instance” was constituted by the Vatican Oct. 5 and its presiding judge is Cardinal Burke. Four other judges, all of whom are bishops, also were appointed, the press office said.

“When an action is in a ‘first instance’ court, that indicates that it is in the initial trial phase,” according to the website of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which handles accusations of clerical sexual abuse.

Three men have publicly accused Apuron of sexually abusing them when they were altar boys in the 1970s. The mother of a fourth man, now deceased, also accused the archbishop of abusing her son.

Apuron has refused to resign, but in late October, Pope Francis named former Detroit Auxiliary Bishop Michael J. Byrnes as coadjutor archbishop of Agana and gave him full authority to lead the archdiocese.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Daily Times

By Oscar Gamble, ogamble@21st-centurymedia.com, @OGamble_TH on Twitter

NORRISTOWN >> A teacher at St. Francis of Assisi School’s Early Learning Center Program is facing charges of involvement in deviate sexual intercourse with a child, aggravated indecent assault and related offenses stemming from an incident that occurred Feb. 7, according to court documents.

Michael Barbee, 32, of Yeadon, was arrested Feb. 10 and arraigned in district court Feb. 11. He remains behind bars with bail set at $750,000.

According to a letter the school sent out to parents, Barbee was immediately placed on administrative leave after parish officials were notified he was under criminal investigation.

“These charges are serious and disturbing. The parish will cooperate fully with law enforcement regarding this matter and remains fervently committed to preventing child abuse as well as protecting the children and young people entrusted to its care,” the letter read.

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PENNSYLVANIA
CBS Philly

NORRISTOWN, Pa. (CBS) — A Catholic school teacher in Norristown is accused of sexually assaulting a young child.

The Norristown Borough Police Department arrested Michael Barbee, a teacher at the Early Learning Center Program of Saint Francis of Assisi Parish. Barbee has been charged with 16 counts of child sexual abuse, including involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child, indecent assault of a child, and endangering welfare of children.

Barbee is accused of a horrific sexual assault against a 3-year-old girl during naptime.

The Archdiocese of Philadelphia said in a statement that Barbee was placed on administrative leave on Friday after the parish learned he was under investigation.

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PENNSYLVANIA
NBC 10

A Montgomery County Catholic school early education teacher remained behind bars Wednesday, suspended from his job, after being charged with multiple child sex assault counts stemming from an alleged incident with a 3-year-old girl.

A judge arraigned Michael Barbee, 32, of Yeadon, Pennsylvania on Saturday with involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a minor under 16 years old, aggravated indecent assault of a minor under 13 years old, unlawful contact with a minor and related charges. The charges date to Feb. 7, online court records said.

Barbee teaches at Saint Francis of Assisi School’s Early Learning Center in Norristown, Pennsylvania. The school referred NBC10’s calls to the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

The Saint Francis Parish placed Barbee on administrative leave Friday after learning of the criminal investigation, archdiocesan spokesman Kenneth Gavin told NBC10.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

AAP

The principal of a Victorian school where Christian Brothers sexually abused students says the college is now a safe place.

The child sex abuse royal commission’s final hearing into the Catholic Church will on Thursday focus on issues in Catholic education.

The panellists include John Crowley, the principal of Ballarat’s St Patrick’s College.

The royal commission has yet to release its findings on Catholic Church authorities in Ballarat, one of Australia’s worst centres for priests and religious brothers sexually abusing children.

Mr Crowley has said St Patrick’s now has robust child protection policies and mandatory reporting practices to safeguard students.

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GUAM
KUAM

Updated: Feb 15, 2017

By Krystal Paco

While there’s been speculation about the ongoing canonical trial in Rome for accused child molester Archbishop Anthony Apuron, officials confirm investigators from the Vatican are on island to gather evidence.

It was last summer Roland Sondia publicly accused Archbishop Anthony Apuron. At the time, he said, “He put his right arm around my shoulders and pulled me closer and asked, ‘Do you want to try me?’ Before I could do anything he started rubbing my privates. I loudly asked him ‘What are you doing?’ I told him to stop, but he didn’t.” That was a summer night in 1977, when Sondia was an altar boy at Mount Carmel Church in Agat. Come Thursday, he’ll have the audience of representatives from the Vatican.

Of the 17 accusers to file suit in the District Court of Guam, four have accused Apuron of sexually molesting them as altar boys resulting in the ongoing canonical trial in Rome. On Thursday, Sondia is anticipated to provide his deposition. He is represented by Attorney David Lujan, who said, “Whoever is going to be there tomorrow, we have no idea who’s going to be there. But I believe someone from the church, not the Guam church, but Rome is going to be there, as I understand it, the canon lawyer for Apuron and, of course, my client and me.”

Also anticipated to be present are members of the Concerned Catholics of Guam and the Laity Forward Movement who have demanded Apuron be defrocked. “We are going to be up there and we’re going to support Mr. Sondia. Seeking justice and we are also wanting the cardinal and others from the Vatican who may be in town to know our disgust with Archbishop Apuron,” said CCOG president David Sablan. “We are hoping and seeking a speedy trial for him.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

RHIAN DEUTROM
The Australian
February 16, 2017

Former governor-general Peter Hollingworth has been found to have misled an inquiry about his knowledge and involvement in the handling of child sexual abuse ­allegations at two exclusive Brisbane private schools.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse yesterday released two reports into various responses by the Anglican diocese of Brisbane, and Brisbane Grammar and St Paul’s Anglican School, to alleg­ations of child-sex abuse against staff members.

The reports found Dr Hollingworth, who was the archbishop of Brisbane and later ­governor-general, had been told by his assistant bishop, John Noble, of a case of sexual abuse by convicted pedophile priest John Elliot at the Church of England Grammar School in 1993.

After meeting with Elliot’s allege­d victim, the report found, Dr Hollingworth allowed the convicted pedophile to “remain in the ministry as rector of Dalby until he turned 65, when he would retire”.

“Dr Hollingworth’s decision to permit Elliot to continue in the ministry was a serious error of judgment which focused overly on Elliot’s needs to the exclusion of those of (the victim) and his family and of the need to protect children more generally,” it concluded. In a previous inquiry, commissioned by Brisbane Archbishop Philip Aspinall in 2002 and known as the “Brisbane inquiry”, Dr Hollingworth was asked to account for his version of events.

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PENNSYLVANIA
York Daily Record

Dylan Segelbaum , dsegelbaum@ydr.com

Feb. 15, 2017

A woman has settled a lawsuit against the Spring Grove Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses and two of its supporting organizations, which alleged that elders failed to report instances of sexual abuse to law enforcement to protect their own reputation.

In the lawsuit, the woman said she’s suffered physical and emotional injuries after being abused between ages 14 and 16 by Terry Monheim, whom she met through the church.The Jehovah’s Witnesses became aware of it and “did nothing” to protect her, according to court documents.

The lawsuit was settled on Monday in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas. The terms of the agreement are confidential.

“A matter with the Jehovah’s Witnesses has been resolved,” said Jeffrey Fritz, an attorney who represented the woman, now 28, of Lancaster County. The York Daily Record/Sunday News is not identifying her because she’s the survivor of a sexual crime.

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MINNESOTA
WJON

By Jim Maurice February 15, 2017

UNDATED – The Diocese of St. Cloud has scheduled a series of listening sessions, as well as a service of healing, to talk about claims of sexual abuse by clergy.

The healing service is at 7:00 p.m. Thursday at Holy Angels Performing Arts Center in St. Cloud.

The upcoming meetings are in response to 74 claims made against 31 clergy members under the Minnesota Child Victims Act, which ended last May.

The gatherings have three primary goals: to assure parishioners of Bishop Kettler’s support and assistance, offer a process where sexual misconduct issues and concerns can be voiced, and allow other victims the opportunity to come forward.

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IRELAND
Galway Independent

Further excavation works are continuing at the site of the former Mother and Baby Home in Tuam.

The excavation of the Memorial Garden off the Dublin Road in Tuam began in late January and is expected to last up to three weeks. The works are being conducted by a specialist team of archaeologists lead by a Forensic Archaeologist, with the co-operation of An Garda Síochána.

The excavation, organised by Mother and Baby Homes Commission, follows on from initial works last November. The excavation aims to resolve a number of queries that the Mother and Baby Homes Commission has “in relation to the interment of human remains” at the site. The excavation works are focusing on timelines and stratigraphy, a branch of geology which studies rock layers. A fraction of the site will be excavated through test trenches, the location of which have been informed by a geophysical survey carried out at the site in October 2015. Meanwhile, the deadline for anyone wishing to meet the Commission’s Confidential Committee, who are investigating the Tuam Home, is Wednesday 1 March. The Commission would like to hear from anyone who was resident in or who worked in the Tuam Home or any of the other 13 Mother and Baby Homes or four County Homes under investigation.

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DEUTCHLAND

[Investigation is ongoing into allegations against a pastor in Kalbach.]

KALBACH
Zehn Monate nachdem der damalige Kalbacher Pfarrer sich selbst angezeigt und die Gemeinde verlassen hat, dauern die Ermittlungen der Staatsanwaltschaft noch an. Das erklärte der Sprecher der Staatsanwalt Fulda, Harry Wilke, auf Nachfrage unserer Zeitung.

Um welchen Vorwurf es sich genau handelt, ist nicht bekannt. Stets war jedoch von einem Sexualdelikt die Rede.

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SCHWEIZ
Rhein Zeitung

[Swiss victims of clerical abuse will receive compensation.]

BERN – Die Enthüllung eines Opfers sexueller Gewalt durch einen Priester hat die Entschädigungsfrage wieder auf die Tagesordnung der Katholischen Kirche gebracht. Die von den Schweizer Bischöfen eingesetzte Kommission hat sich Ende Januar konstituiert.

Das Fachgremium “Sexuelle Übergriffe im kirchlichen Umfeld” besteht aus sechs Mitgliedern. Aufgabe der Kommission wird sein, die Gesuche um finanzielle Genugtuung der Opfer sexueller Gewalt in der katholischen Kirche zu prüfen, wie Joseph Bonnemain, Mitglied des Fachgremiums, am Dienstag der Nachrichtenagentur sda sagte.

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NEW YORK
Syracuse.com

By John O’Brien | jobrien@syracuse.com

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — A Syracuse woman admitted today that she used a 10-year-old girl to produce child pornography.

Kerry Smith, 41, pleaded guilty in federal court to sexual exploitation of a child. She was arrested last year on charges of producing the images then texting them to another child pornographer, Jason Kopp.

Kopp, 40, of Liverpool, was sentenced to 235 years in prison in September for sexually exploiting two children for the purpose of making child pornography.

Kopp pleaded guilty in May to taking sexually explicit photos of two children with help from an aide at All Saints Elementary School in Syracuse. Neither of those victims was a student at the school.

The aide, Emily Oberst, is accused of exploiting those two victims, plus a third who was a student at the school and photographed naked in a bathroom, sources have told Syracuse.com.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic World Report

David F. Pierre, Jr.

Years ago, a number of Catholic World Report articles argued the case that the group SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) – whom the media has called upon repeatedly over the years as a reliable voice to bash the Catholic Church over its handling of the sex abuse crisis – was actually nothing more than a front group for contingency lawyers and was driven by a deep ideological animus against the Church.

Now, recent lawsuits against the organization, including one by SNAP’s own former director of development, have, if anything, revealed that those arguments were too modest in their estimation of SNAP’s inner workings.

And in the wake of these lawsuits, SNAP’s most high-profile leaders—its founder and president, Barbara Blaine, and the group’s national director, David Clohessy—have suddenly announced their resignations.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

AAP

Catholic leaders including priests, brothers and nuns should have to be licensed or regulated to practise, a royal commission has heard.

Franciscan Friar Dr David Leary said there were very few professions that did not have mandated supervision and that the Church had to “bite the bullet” and realise it was effectively an employer.

“I think that’s the way we have to move, and I think it’s inevitable that people who practise will be licensed or regulated in some way,” he said at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Sydney on Wednesday.

“Services benefit from a wide range and comprehensive sense of being held both accountable (and) supported… and at the end of the day, that’s for the benefit of people who are most vulnerable.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Advertiser

Megan Neil, Australian Associated Press
February 14, 2017

Sydney’s elite Cranbrook School has given headmaster Nicholas Sampson its full support despite his failure to report a teacher accused of abuse during his time at Geelong Grammar.

Geelong Grammar School’s 2001-2004 headmaster organised for Jonathan Harvey to be paid his entire 2005 salary to retire a year early after a staff member complained his brother was abused by the teacher in the 1970s.

Mr Sampson left in July 2004 to head England’s prestigious Marlborough College and Harvey remained at Geelong Grammar for the remainder of the year before retiring.

Mr Sampson did not report the allegation to the police or the Victorian Institute of Teaching, the child sex abuse royal commission said.

The commission accepted Mr Sampson attempted to act in the victim’s best interests in securing Harvey’s resignation without disclosing the former student’s identity but said it was clear he should have notified the institute.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Eryk Bagshaw Rachel Browne

The headmaster of one Sydney’s most expensive private schools, Cranbrook, wrote “misleading” letters about a teacher accused of child sexual abuse at his former school and failed to report the allegations to a higher authority, a royal commission has found.

Nicholas Sampson, then the headmaster of Victoria’s Geelong Grammar, paid teacher Jonathan Harvey to retire early in 2004 to avoid any formal complaints of child sex abuse being made against him.

Former Geelong Grammar headmaster Nicholas Sampson faces questions about how the school dealt with allegations of sexual misconduct by former teacher Jonathon Harvey.
Harvey was later found guilty of sexually abusing a 16-year-old boy known as BLF by repeatedly plying him with alcohol, fondling his genitals and forcing him into a threesome with another man in the 1970s.

Mr Sampson told the commission he was alerted to allegations against Harvey by the victim’s brother, BLW, and conducted a “fairly cursory” investigation before asking Mr Harvey to retire early.

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AUSTRALIA
Bay 93.9

Rebecca McDonald / 15 February 2017

Geelong’s most prestigious school has apologised after being slammed by the child abuse Royal Commission.

The Commission has found long-time headmaster John Lewis, who later went on to run England’s elite Eton College, knew of allegations about a teacher accused of abuse, but did not take steps to protect students.

The school has also been criticised for not investigating an abuse complaint against a teacher in 1989, before expelling the 14-year-old who spoke out. Meantime an elite Sydney school has given its full backing for a former principal who has also been blasted by the Commission.

Nicholas Sampson organised for a teacher to receive a year’s salary so he could retire early, after another staff member raised allegations of sexual abuse.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

AAP

Geelong Grammar accepts some of its former leaders failed students sexually abused by staff at the prestigious school.

The child sex abuse royal commission has criticised the way a number of senior Geelong Grammar staff, including headmasters, handled abuse accusations and their failure to investigate or report the allegations.

Geelong Grammar School principal Stephen Meek has again apologised to victims of the “appalling” abuse.

“We are also very sorry that some of the school’s former senior staff neglected to respond to some of our past students with the respect and protection they so rightfully deserved,” Mr Meek said in a letter to the school community.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

One of Victoria’s most prestigious private schools, Geelong Grammar, has vowed to learn from its mistakes in handling allegations of child sexual abuse.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has handed down its report into allegations of abuse by Geelong Grammar staff between 1956 and 1989.

In its findings, the commission noted times when no action was taken against an offending teacher and a victim was asked to leave the school for talking about abuse.

“The royal commission found that the principal at the time … should have ensured the allegations were investigated and the school council notified,” it said.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier-Mail

Lauren Martyn-Jones, The Courier-Mail
February 14, 2017

TWO of Brisbane’s most elite private schools have come under fire for failing to protect students and dismissing allegations of child sexual abuse.

The Royal Commission investigating Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has released a scathing report into Brisbane Grammar School and St Paul’s School at Bald Hills, finding both schools failed in their duty to keep students safe.

The Commission has this morning formally responded to the evidence former students gave about the sexual abuse they suffered from Kevin Lynch — who was a teacher and counsellor at BGS between 1973 and 1988, and a counsellor at St Paul’s between 1989 and 1997 — and Gregory Robert Knight, who was a teacher at St Paul’s between 1981 and 1984.

During Lynch’s 15 years at Brisbane Grammar School, the Commission heard he sexually abused a large number of students, and that abuse had a devastating effect on his victims.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

RHIAN DEUTROM
The Australian February 15, 2017

Two prestigious Queensland schools have been revealed as sites of significant historical child sexual abuse, with “no systems, policies or procedures” in place to deal with allegations made against two staff with a long history of alleged child sexual abuse.

The Royal Commission released it’s findings into two Brisbane schools, including Brisbane Grammar School, an affluent boarding school for boys, and St Paul’s School, a coeducational private school operated by the Anglican Church, this morning.

It comes after a number of former students from both schools gave evidence to the Royal Commission, claiming they were sexually abused by Mr Kevin Lynch and Gregory Robert Knight while they were teachers between 1973 and 1997.

Mr Kevin Lynch worked as a teacher and then counsellor at Brisbane Grammar school, in Spring Hill, and St Pauls School, in Bald Hills.

He was found to have “sexually abuse a large number of students” during his time at Brisbane Grammar.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Nick Wiggins and Matt Eaton

A prestigious Brisbane private school harboured a culture in which children making allegations of abuse were treated as liars, the royal commission into child sexual abuse has found.

The commission has handed down its report into what it calls Case Study 34, examining allegations of abuse at Brisbane Grammar School in Spring Hill and St Paul’s School in the northern Brisbane suburb of Bald Hills.

It heard evidence that school counsellor Kevin Lynch sexually abused “a large number of students” while he was working at Brisbane Grammar between 1973 and 1988, and continued abusing student as a counsellor at St Paul’s between 1989 and 1997.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse found then Brisbane Grammar headmaster Maxwell Howell (who died in 2011) was aware of one specific complaint, but did not investigate allegations and did not refer the matter to police.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Avani Dias

After enduring years of horrific sexual and physical abuse, 71 former residents of a home for Indigenous Stolen Generation children in Darwin will be compensated in what their lawyer says is the largest class action in the Northern Territory’s history.

They are also the first group across the country to attain compensation from the Federal Government following evidence heard by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, which has been holding hearings around Australia for almost four years.

The former residents of the Retta Dixon Home took civil action in 2014 against a number of defendants, including convicted paedophile and the home’s former house parent Donald Bruce Henderson, the Commonwealth, and Australian Indigenous Ministries Christian organisation which ran the home.

The plaintiffs allege physical and sexual assaults by staff at the home from 1946 to 1980, and sought compensation for a failure of duty of care by the defendants, saying they suffered damage and loss as a result.

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AUSTRALIA
news.com.au

FEBRUARY 15, 2017

Megan Neil
Australian Associated Press

Two prestigious Queensland schools failed to protect students from sexual abuse, doing nothing about complaints from victims who were not believed, a royal commission has found.

The culture at Brisbane Grammar School for 24 years under former headmaster Dr Maxwell Howell meant boys who alleged abuse were not believed, the commission said on Wednesday.

After counsellor Kevin Lynch moved on to the Anglican St Paul’s School where he again sexually abused students during counselling sessions, two boys who went to headmaster Gilbert Case were labelled liars.

Mr Case’s inaction when told Lynch and teacher Gregory Robert Knight had sexually abused children meant he did not achieve his most fundamental obligation to keep students safe, the commission said.

It said Mr Case, who was headmaster at St Paul’s from 1979-2000, was put in charge of all Anglican schools in Brisbane despite former archbishop and governor-general Peter Hollingworth and diocese general manager Bernard Yorke, knowing about allegations he took no action when told of abuse by Lynch.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

Australian Associated Press
Tuesday 14 February 2017

Two prestigious Queensland schools failed to protect students from child sexual abuse, doing nothing about complaints from victims whose allegations were not believed, a royal commission has found.

Former long-time headmasters of Brisbane Grammar School and the Anglican Church-run St Paul’s School did not investigate allegations and failed to ensure students were safe, the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse has found.

The inaction of Gilbert Case, headmaster of St Paul’s from 1979 to 2000, on allegations counsellor Kevin Lynch and teacher Gregory Robert Knight had sexually abused children meant he did not achieve his most fundamental obligation of keeping students safe, the commission said.

It found former governor general and Brisbane Anglican archbishop Peter Hollingworth and another committee member knew about allegations that Case had failed to act on an abuse claim when they put him in charge of all of Brisbane’s Anglican schools in 2000.

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AUSTRALIA
news.com.au

FEBRUARY 15, 2017

Lucy Hughes Jones
Australian Associated Press

Former child residents who suffered years of abuse at a Northern Territory Aboriginal children’s home have become the first group in Australia to win compensation from the federal government following evidence at the sex abuse royal commission.

The 71 former residents of Darwin’s Retta Dixon home, who alleged physical and sexual assaults by staff between 1946 and 1980, launched a civil lawsuit in 2015 against a convicted paedophile, the Commonwealth and the religious group that ran the home.

“It is hoped that the settlement of this claim will enable those who suffered to reach a form of closure on this period of their lives,” a spokesperson for the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet said.

The home for stolen generation children was run by Australian Indigenous Ministries and overseen by the federal government.

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OREGON
Statesman Journal

Whitney M. Woodworth , Statesman Journal

A former Silverton youth pastor was sentenced to 10 years in prison for sexually abusing a teen girl over the span of three years.

Andrew Stutzman, 38, pleaded guilty to 10 counts of second-degree sex abuse and was sentenced Monday in Marion County Circuit Court.

Stutzman started a youth group with his wife and had frequent contact with teens, according to police. He also co-owned a local coffee shop before his arrest.

Police began investigating Stutzman in June when the victim came forward. During the weeks-long investigation, Silverton police Detective Josh Boatner interviewed the victim, who said Stutzman began the abuse when she was 16.

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SOUTH CAROLINA
WYFF

Myra Ruiz
Anchor/Reporter

GREENVILLE, S.C. —
A woman whose sexual assault case inspired the country’s first sex offender registry spoke at a luncheon on Tuesday to benefit the Julie Valentine Center.

Allison Black Cornelius, who was sexually assaulted by her Sunday school teacher at the age of 7, was the keynote speaker at the annual Julie Valentine Luncheon at the T.D. Convention Center.

Cornelius came forward when she was in her 20s, after learning that her offender was working as a youth pastor.

“That ended up with a trip to the Supreme Court,” Cornelius said. “We won that case against him in criminal court. It was the oldest rape ever convicted in the United States.”

Cornelius went on to spearhead the passage of Megan’s Law in 36 states.

“At the end of the day, I believe a family’s right to know that an offender is living near them trumps whatever cost — whatever we have to do,” Cornelius said.

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SAIPAN
Marianas Variety

BISHOP Ryan Jimenez on Tuesday issued the following statement:

“My dear brothers and sisters in Christ in the Diocese of Chalan Kanoa:

“It is with deep sadness and great bearing to learn of the sexual abuse allegations in a civil claim against then-priest and now Bishop Emeritus Tomas A. Camacho by Guam resident Melvin Duenas. I request for your prayers for everyone affected by this news — those who have sought and continue to seek redress from abuses, the accused and their journey to realize due process, the families on each side that are struck with a heavy weight of pain that comes with each sharing, and everyone within our midst who are affected one way or another.

“The Church shall act, consistent with our faith, with justice and mercy. We have communicated with the Archdiocese of Agana where then-Father Camacho served as a priest at the time alleged in the lawsuit. Our prayers go out to Mr. Duenas and his family. We also ask for prayers for Bishop Tomas and his family. Since this is a matter in litigation, the Diocese of Chalan Kanoa can offer no further comment on this matter. We give our full cooperation with civil authorities.

“Our Diocese is committed to the protection of children and young people. The Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People (established by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops) sets the norms for our diocese. We are working hard to maintain a safe church environment, especially through education and transparency. Three years ago, we started a series of trainings and workshops on child protection for all our church workers and volunteers. We will continue this training and formation for the clergy, Catholic schools personnel, CCD instructors, diocesan staff and others in positions of authority.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

15 February, 2017

The Royal Commission’s report into Case Study 34 – The response of Brisbane Grammar School and St Paul’s School to allegations of child sexual abuse – was released today.

The report follows a public hearing held in Brisbane in November 2015, which heard about the experiences of former students at Brisbane Grammar School at Spring Hill and St Paul’s School at Bald Hills. The public hearing also examined how the schools and others responded to allegations of child sexual abuse of former students.

At the public hearing a number of former students of the schools gave evidence of having been sexually abused by:

* Kevin Lynch (deceased) – a teacher and later counsellor at Brisbane Grammar between 1973 and 1988 and a counsellor at St Paul’s between 1989 and 1997

* Gregory Robert Knight – a teacher at St Paul’s between 1981 and 1984.

The Royal Commission heard evidence that, during the period of Kevin Lynch’s employment at Brisbane Grammar, he sexually abused a large number of students. There was evidence that a number of complaints against Kevin Lynch were made to senior staff at Brisbane Grammar and to the then headmaster, Dr Howell (now deceased).

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AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

Jorge Branco

A former headmaster of one of Queensland’s most prestigious schools ignored a complaint of sexual abuse by a serial paedophile who went on to abuse many more boys, a royal commission has found.

In not investigating the complaint, former Brisbane Grammar School head Maxwell Howell failed to protect his students, a report released on Wednesday stated.

The child sex abuse royal commission report also made findings against former St Paul’s School headmaster Gilbert Case, who accused students of lying when they complained about being abused, and former governor-general Peter Hollingworth.

The findings came 15 months after hearings in Brisbane heard details of shocking abuse committed by notorious paedophiles Keith Lynch and Gregory Robert Knight at Brisbane Grammar School and St Paul’s School in the 1980s and ’90s.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse found one student’s father told Mr Howell in mid-1981 that Lynch had sexually abused his son, despite Mr Howell’s denial before his death in 2011.

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SWITZERLAND
The Local

The Catholic church in Switzerland has set up a new commission charged with awarding compensation to victims of historic sex abuse by Swiss priests.

Last December the Swiss Bishops Conference (SBK) announced it had created a 500,000 franc reparations fund to pay compensation to sex abuse victims who no longer have the right to seek redress in court since the statute of limitations has passed.

In 2010 the Catholic church finally acknowledged responsibility for numerous cases of sexual molestation by priests that had earlier come to light.

Between 2010 and 2015, 223 victims informed the church authorities of cases of abuse that took place between 1950 and 1990.

Of those, 49 were children aged under 12 at the time of the abuse.

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MALTA/AUSTRALIA
Malta Today

Matthew Vella 15 February 2017

In 1928, Perth-based Maltese priest Fr Raphael Pace urged the Congregation of the Christian Brothers to include Maltese children in its emerging migration scheme. The Irish order was especially dedicated to the evangelisation and education of youth. Negotiations between the Maltese and Western Australian governments continued through the 1930s but the first Maltese child migrants did not arrive in Australia until after World War II. Between 1950 and 1965, 259 boys and 51 girls were sent to Catholic institutions in Western Australia and South Australia.

Most parents believed their children would receive a better education in Australia. Instead many were put to work on the Christian Brothers’ building projects, some were forced to stop using their Maltese language and never learned to read or write English. They were also brutally sexually abused and physically punished.

Last week, a report by the Australian Royal Commission into child sexual abuse released damning statistics on the scale of the crisis within the Catholic Church, which shows that seven per cent of Australia’s Catholic priests were accused of abusing children in the six decades since 1950.

By far the worst was the order of the St John of God Brothers, where a staggering 40% of religious brothers are believed to have abused children; 22% of Christian Brothers and 20% of Marist Brothers, both orders that run schools, were alleged perpetrators.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio , heugenio@guampdn.com Feb. 15, 2017 | Updated 2 hours ago

Vatican representatives on Thursday morning are scheduled to receive testimony from a former altar boy allegedly sexually assaulted by Archbishop Anthony Apuron in the 1970s. Groups of Catholics plan to be there to show their support for Roland Sondia and other clergy sex abuse survivors.

Sondia is currently an employee of the Pacific Daily News.

“We are seeking justice for Mr. Sondia, other clergy abuse victims and the whole of Guam. We would like to show the Vatican our mistrust of Apuron, and we hope the Vatican will speed up the trial and defrock Apuron,” David Sablan, president of Concerned Catholics of Guam, said Wednesday.

Apuron is undergoing a canonical trial, a process which started after former altar boys, including Sondia, came forward last spring to accuse Apuron of raping or sexually abusing them when he was parish priest in Agat.

Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, in a one-page Feb. 3 decree, requested Sondia’s presence at 10 a.m., Feb. 16, at the Archdiocesan Chancery “for the purpose of giving said testimony.”

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JAMAICA
Jamaica Observer

Raulston Nembhard

Wednesday, February 15, 2017

In recent weeks the Church has come under withering criticisms because of untoward and even criminal behaviour alleged to have been committed by members of the Church. The Centre for the Investigation of Sexual Offences and Child Abuse, in a recent damning commentary, indicated that pastors and members of the police force are among the leading high-profile cases of criminal sexual abuse of minors in the society. This is a worrying trend, and the society has been understandably incensed at what is happening to our children.

Criticism of the Church in this regard is necessary and should not be easily brushed aside. Such behaviour cannot be excused among those who should be seen as the greatest upholders of integrity in the land. The Church often gets unnerved by such criticisms, but people have a right to expect the best standards of behaviour from those who claim to be different because of their assumed proximity to the creator.

In criticising the Church, however, one must be careful not to throw the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. One can understand that people become more outraged at egregious behaviour demonstrated by those from whom you would least expect it, especially from leaders of the Church. But there is a tendency to use a broad brush to paint the Church and to bring everyone under the judgement that should be best reserved for the few.

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GUAM
Guam Daily Post

Confidential documents: Vatican opened case against Apuron in 2008

Mindy Aguon | For the Post

A tribunal from the Vatican, which will be led by a cardinal, is scheduled to hold a secret hearing on Guam this week to speak to at least one of the victims accusing Archbishop Anthony Apuron of sexual abuse.

Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, a canon lawyer and former head of the Vatican’s supreme court, signed a decree on Feb. 3, 2017, requesting that one of Apuron’s accusers, Roland Sondia, appear personally before Burke later this week on Guam.

The cardinal wrote the decree “in fulfilling the office of judge.”

Sondia was being summoned “for the purpose of giving testimony” in the Apuron case, according to the decree.

A Vatican equivalent of prosecutor and an advocate for the accused will also hear the accuser’s testimony, according to the decree.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

February 15, 2017

TESSA AKERMAN
ReporterMelbourne
@TessaAkerman

The royal commission into child sex abuse has rejected evidence by the former head of Geelong Grammar, John Lewis, that he was not told a teacher at the school tried to have sex with a ­student.

In its report into Geelong Grammar handed down yesterday, the commission found students BKM and BIA told Mr Lewis that Jonathan Harvey, a maths teacher/housemaster, “tried to have sex” with BKM in 1982. Counsel for Mr Lewis had submitted BKM and BIA’s evidence was compromised because they were giving evidence of historical events.

The commission rejected Mr Lewis’s submissions and made no finding as to whether the sexual abuse occurred.

Mr Lewis gave evidence that he didn’t speak to other teachers about the allegations because he would not have considered it appropriate.

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AUSTRALIA
Byron Shire News

Andrew Backhouse | 15th Feb 2017

A TOOWOOMBA man who suffered harrowing sexual abuse as a child is calling for an overhaul of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

The man, who is giving evidence for the criminal trial of his alleged abuser, gave evidence to the commission in Toowoomba last year.

He said he was raped as a primary school student in a Victorian school, which taught him to avoid notorious sexual predators at a Christian Brothers college.

With the focus of the commission on the Catholic church, and senior figures being named and shamed, the Toowoomba man said not enough focus was being put on public school victims.

“There is a lot of desperation, frustration and animosity out there among many victims of childhood sexual abuse perpetrated within the state system with many victims feeling snubbed and left with no confidence in either the proceedings, or that they will benefit from any future redress scheme,” he said.

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SWITZERLAND
swissinfo

After creating a victims’ fund one year ago, the Swiss Catholic Church has set up a reparations commission to formally examine abuse victims’ complaints.

The Swiss Catholic Church has set up a reparations commission which is ready to receive compensation requests from victims of paedophile priests, Joseph Bonnemain, from the Conference of Swiss Bishops, told the Swiss News Agency ATS on Tuesday.

The formal creation of the six-person commission in January to examine claims follows the establishment of a CHF500,000 ($498,000) compensation fund for victims of abuse by member of the church.

A victim who wishes to file a compensation claim must address it to their diocese or, in French-speaking Switzerland, to the independent sexual abuse commission CECAR. After being considered, the requests will be sent to the reparations commission.

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AUSTRALIA
The Advertiser

THE opportunity afforded by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has been unprecedented.

Thousands of survivors of child sexual abuse, violated in many mainstream institutions, have spoken of the chilling crimes which, over decades, progressively devastated their lives.

Those stories have driven a public discourse about abusive power, compounded betrayal, systemic failure and the appalling human cost of institutional inhumanity.

The commission has heard this evidence, and Australians and the world have listened aghast. We are now looking to our governments and institutions for the transformational change needed to secure perpetrator and institutional accountability, true justice, fair and equitable redress and optimal victim support.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

AAP

Outside scrutiny could help restore the trust that has been lost in Catholic Church leaders, a member of the Vatican’s child protection body has told an Australian child abuse inquiry.

Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors member Baroness Sheila Hollins said there was a lack of consistency among bishops in their ongoing professional supervision of priests, but oversight into a priest’s personal life would be inappropriate.

The child abuse royal commission will on Wednesday focus on the support and supervision of working priests and religious as it investigates what led to and allowed the continuation of widespread child sex abuse in the Catholic Church in Australia.

Baroness Hollins said the ongoing formation and continuing professional development of ordained people had not yet been accepted as a norm like it had with professions such as medicine and teaching.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Mail

By Belinda Cleary For Daily Mail Australia

A man who suffered at the hands of a Catholic paedophile as a teenager in the 1970s is calling for Cardinal George Pell to face child abuse allegations and resign so victims of abuse by member’s of the church can ‘finally’ have closure.

Robert Zammit left school aged 16 to escape the clutches of a paedophile teacher – he told Daily Mail Australia he couldn’t speak out about his abuse at the time or for decades afterward because ‘it wasn’t talked about’.

Dr Zammit wants Cardinal Pell to return to Australia and answer to allegations the country’s most senior Catholic ignored abuse claims.

The senior Catholic has refused to fly from Rome to Australia on medical grounds to answer calls from the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Sydney.

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AUSTRALIA
Huffington Post

Eoin Blackwell Senior Associate Editor, HuffPost Australia

The writer of television comedies Black Books, The IT Crowd and Father Ted has started a crowdfunding campaign to bring Cardinal George Pell to Australia from Rome via chartered ambulance so he can “clear his name” over allegations of wrongdoing.

Writer and director Graham Linehan has started a crowd funder campaign to raise $460,000 to bring Pell from Rome to Australia, with medical staff, as Victoria Police investigate allegations of historic sexual abuse made against Pell.

In December 2015, Pell’s lawyers told the sex abuse Royal Commission he was unable to travel from Rome to give testimony about how the Church responded to child sex abuse allegations because the Cardinal suffered from hypertension.

He appeared by video link in February 2016, where he gave evidence on his response to allegations of abuse made against colleagues in Victoria when he was a rising church official.

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PENNSYLVANIA
PennLive

By Steve Marroni | smarroni@pennlive.com

PHILADELPHIA – A settlement agreement has been reached, but neither the victim nor the church she said failed to report her sexual abuse to the authorities can talk about it.

On the fifth day of trial Monday in Philadelphia County Court, Stephanie Fessler, of Lancaster, settled the suit she filed against the Jehovah’s Witness Church in Spring Grove.

“The matter with the Jehovah’s Witnesses has been resolved,” her attorney, Jeffrey Fritz, said Monday.

And that was all he could say due to the confidential settlement agreement, which bars all parties from talking about the case or disclosing the amount of the settlement.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

14 February, 2017

The Royal Commission’s report into Case Study 32 – the response of Geelong Grammar School to allegations of child sexual abuse of former students at the school – was released today.

The report follows a public hearing in September and October 2015 which inquired into the response of Geelong Grammar’s school council, principals and other members of staff to concerns raised about inappropriate conduct, or complaints about child sexual abuse, by teaching and non-teaching staff at the school.

The Royal Commission heard evidence from 13 former students at the school who told the public hearing they were sexually abused by staff at the school between 1956 and 1989. The mothers of two former students also gave evidence.

The Royal Commission heard that two survivor witnesses and their mothers reported the abuse to the school at the time it was occurring. These witnesses gave evidence that no action was taken by Geelong Grammar School and the perpetrators remained at the school.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

Joanne McCarthy
14 Feb 2017

FORMER Hamilton Marist Brothers school principal, Brother Christopher Wade, has been charged with making false statements to police and perverting the course of justice.

Strike Force Georgiana detectives Sergeant Kristi Faber, and Senior Constable Simon Grob, charged Brother Wade with four offences on Tuesday relating to statements he made to police in 2014 during Georgiana investigations into Marist Brothers Francis Cable (Brother Romuald) and Darcy O’Sullivan (Brother Dominic).

He was charged in Sydney.

Brother Christopher, 78, whose real name is William Henry Wade, was charged after investigations following his statement to Strike Force Georgiana in 2014 that he did “not remember ever having to consult the Provincial regarding any complaint or grievances of the Brothers of Hamilton during my time”.

In a separate statement to Georgiana detectives that was tendered at a Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse public hearing in Newcastle in September, Brother Christopher recalled a complaint by “a student or a parent or something” about Brother Romuald.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Mittelbayerische

[Former Domspatzen choir member describes abuse. Alexander Probst made the abuse public with his book and he will now give courage to other victims.]

By Christine Straßer , MZ

REGENSBURG.Als Elfjähriger wurde Alexander Probst bei den Regensburger Domspatzen sexuell missbraucht. Er war nicht der einzige Schüler in den Reihen des weltberühmten Chors, der geprügelt, gedemütigt und missbraucht wurde. Probst ist aber einer derjenigen, denen es zu verdanken ist, dass die Schicksale der Opfer bekannt wurden und der Skandal jetzt aufgearbeitet wird. 2010 hatte er als erster sein Martyrium öffentlich gemacht. Nun erzählt er in seinem Buch „Von der Kirche missbraucht“ seine ganze Leidensgeschichte. Einerseits sagt Probst, habe er sich das von der Seele schreiben müssen, um Frieden zu finden. Von 1968 bis 1971 besuchte Probst die Vorschule Etterzhausen und später das Internat der Regensburger Domspatzen. Für ihn eine dunkle Zeit. Andererseits hoffe er darauf, mit seinem Buch anderen Opfern Mut zu machen. Denn Probst wurde zwar nach seinem Schritt an die Öffentlichkeit vielfach verunglimpft, letztlich kämpfte er aber erfolgreich für die Anerkennung der Opfer und die Aufarbeitung des Skandals.

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FRANKREICH
Katholisches

[“I was not a pedophile priest, but a pedophile who was ordained a priest” France 3 broadcast the interview with a former priest who was laureate for the sexual abuse of children by the church. His statements are frightening. It is remarkable, however, that he was not a pedophile priest, but a pedophile who was ordained a priest. ]

(Paris) France 3 strahlte das Interview mit einem ehemaligen Priester aus, der wegen sexuellen Mißbrauchs von Kindern von der Kirche laisiert wurde. Seine Aussagen sind erschreckend. Bemerkenswert ist jedoch seine Aussage, daß er nicht ein pädophiler Priester war, sondern ein Pädophiler, der zum Priester geweiht wurde.

„Ich war kein pädophiler Priester, sondern ein Pädophiler, der zum Priester geweiht wurde“, so die ebenso klare wie erschreckende Aussage eines Mannes, der Priester war und wegen Pädophilie verurteilt wurde.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

Rebekah Ison – AAP on February 14, 2017

The Vatican has directed Catholic seminaries to assess aspiring priests and brothers for homosexuality but not for an attraction to children, a royal commission has heard.

Sister Lydia Allen, who conducts assessments at a Homebush seminary in Sydney, said she didn’t think there needed to be a direction to test those who wanted to enter the priesthood or a religious order for sexual tendencies towards children because it was just “obvious” it should be done.

“They do not have, as far as I’m aware, anything that says, you must assess that,” the nun, who also has a Phd in psychology, told the Royal Commission Into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Sydney on Tuesday.

“I would think it’s an unspoken rule. I don’t think it needs to be stated explicitly, because it’s so obvious.”

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NORTH DAKOTA
Bismark Tribune

Katie Fairbanks Forum News Service

JAMESTOWN — Two Jamestown legislators are sponsoring a bill that would create a task force on preventing sexual abuse of children and reporting recommendations for legislation.

Senate Bill 2342 was introduced by Sen. John Grabinger, D-Jamestown, and had a hearing in the Human Services Committee on Jan. 30. No vote or other action has been taken since. The other sponsor is Rep. Bernie Satrom, R-Jamestown.

The task force would gather information concerning child sexual abuse throughout the state, receive testimony and reports from individuals, state and local agencies and organizations, and create goals for state policy that would prevent child sexual abuse during the 2017-2018 interim period. The task force would submit a final report with recommendations to the governor and legislative management, which is a group of legislators who determine interim studies and committee memberships.

Satrom said the idea for the bill came from the Rev. Shawn Bowman, senior pastor at Victory Lutheran Church in Jamestown, who called Satrom after seeing a news show about child abuse and said something should be done.

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NEW YORK/PENNSYLVANIA
Daily News

By SCOTT DESMIT
SDESMIT@BATAVIANEWS.COM
PUBLISHED: TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2017

A former pastor of a Lyndonville church serving a 15-year prison term for molesting girls was sentenced for similar charges in a Pennsylvania court last week.

Roy Harriger, 73, was sentenced to two-to-five years in prison for molesting a young girl in Mercer County.

The assaults took place while Harriger was serving as pastor of Mercer Community Church from 1991-97.

Harriger had been charged with rape, statutory sexual assault, deviate sexual intercourse, aggravated indecent assault and indecent assault.

Unlike in New York, where Harriger vehemently denied molesting two granddaughters and took the case to trial, he admitted guilt before trial.

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AUSTRALIA
Riverine Herald

REVELATIONS the Sandhurst Diocese had one of the worst child sex offence records in Australia was a ‘‘tragedy’’ and a ‘‘wake-up call’’ for the church, according to Rochester district priests.

The diocese — which includes Rochester, Elmore and Lockington — had the second highest rate of priests accused of child sexual abuse out of Australia’s 17 Catholic dioceses over a period of 60 years.

Figures identified in a Royal Commission report showed almost 15 per cent of priests who ministered in the diocese between 1950 and 2010 were accused of child sexual offences.

Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Elmore Father Alex Lim said he was relieved it was out in the open.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Written by Janela Carrera

Melvin Duenas says he was repeatedly raped by the now-retired bishop in the early 1970s.

Guam – The Diocese of Chalan Kanoa in Saipan issued a statement this afternoon following allegations of sexual abuse against Saipan’s Bishop Emeritus Tomas Camacho.

Bishop Ryan Jimenez said in a release that his diocese is cooperating with civil authorities and that they are working hard to maintain a safe church environment.

“It is with deep sadness and great bearing to learn of the sexual abuse allegations in a civil claim against then-priest and now Bishop Emeritus Tomas A. Camacho by Guam resident Melvin Duenas,” said Jimenez. He also says that his diocese is in contact with the Archdiocese of Agana.

Camacho is the latest church official to be named in a sexual abuse lawsuit filed against the Archdiocese of Agana. The alleged victim, 55-year-old Melvin Duenas, accused Camacho of locking him in a room when he was 10 years old and sexually assaulting him. Duenas said this happened at the rectory of the St. Joseph’s church in Inarajan when he was an altar server.

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AUSTRALIA
Hawkesbury Gazette

Justine Doherty
14 Feb 2017

THE findings of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse have reached deep into the hearts of Catholics, revealing horrors that are difficult to face. The Gazette asks Hawkesbury’s Catholic institutions for their responses to the crisis.

Last week the commission hearings revealed that between 1980 and 2015, 4444 people alleged they were abused as children in more than 1000 Catholic institutions, with 1880 perpetrators identified.

It was also revealed that 40 per cent of St John of God Brothers have been implicated in abuse claims. With two St John of God-branded hospitals in our district and several Catholic schools as well, the Gazette asked St John of God Healthcare and the Diocese of Parramatta to respond to the commission’s revelations.

A St John of God Health Care spokesperson told the Gazette “St John of God Health Care was established by the Sisters of St John of God who came to Australia from Ireland in 1895”.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Richard Baines

Tasmanian survivors of clergy abuse want police to investigate whether a former Anglican Bishop should face criminal charges for allowing a paedophile to remain in the church.

A day after the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse released damning findings, survivors said they planned to launch legal action.

The commission held hearings in Hobart last year to examine responses to allegations within the Church of England Boy’s Society (CEBS) and Anglican Diocese, including in Tasmania.

The report found evidence that former Tasmanian Bishop Philip Newell was made aware in 1987 that now-convicted paedophile Louis Daniels had sexually abused three boys.

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DELAWARE
Sussex Living

A former U.S. Navy lieutenant commander and ordained Catholic priest was recently sentenced to 30 years in prison for charges involving the sexual exploitation of children, announced U.S. Attorney Charles M. Oberly III of the District of Delaware.

John Thomas Matthew Lee, 51, of Millsboro, was sentenced Feb. 8 by U.S. District Court Judge Leonard P. Stark of the District of Delaware, who also ordered Lee to serve a lifetime term of supervised release. On Nov. 16, 2015, Lee pleaded guilty to one count of production of child pornography and one count of distribution of child pornography. He became a registered sex offender following his 2007 conviction in a general court martial of sexually assaulting another Naval officer while serving as a chaplain at the U.S. Naval Academy. Lee has been in custody since his arrest Nov. 3, 2014.

According to admissions made in connection with the plea agreement, following a series of CyberTipline reports from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations special agents connected Lee with accounts that were being used to upload images of child pornography to several social networking sites. In executing a search warrant at Lee’s Millsboro residence, agents found child-pornography images on Lee’s electronic devices, including his phone. Using online messenger applications and text messages from his cell phone, Lee also induced juveniles to send him pornographic images of themselves. Lee uploaded at least one of these images to a publicly-accessible social media site. He also traded other images of child pornography online with other adults.

The Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Edmond Falgowski of the District of Delaware prosecuted the case.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio , heugenio@guampdn.com Feb. 14, 2017

Former Guam priest Tomas A. Camacho, who now is a retired bishop on Saipan, still can be investigated by the Vatican and face a canonical trial over allegations he sexually abused an altar boy in the 1970s, a lawyer with expertise on Catholic Church law said.

“Yes, he can still be investigated and punished, even if he is retired,” said Minnesota-based canon lawyer Jennifer Haselberger, who established Canonical Consultation and Services LLC in 2013.

Haselberger said “a retired bishop remains a priest and can still exercise ministry — say Mass, baptize, confirm.”

“If someone is defrocked, it means he loses the ability to act as a priest/bishop and do those things,” added Haselberger, who previously served as chancellor for canonical affairs at the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, but resigned in April 2013 in protest of the archdiocese’s handling of accusations of clergy sexual abuse.

Vatican policy dictates that only the Vatican can investigate bishops and archbishops who are accused of sexual abuse.

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INDIA
The Ladies Finger!

February 14, 2017
By Maya Palit

A 37-year-old adivasi woman from Kanapur, a village in Madhya Pradesh, was raped by a priest (reports do not indicate which clergy or church he belonged to) named Hanop Alexander on the church premises. According to news reports, the incident took place around midnight, when she left her house (also on the church premises) and was abducted by the priest and taken to his room. The priest fled on his motorcycle after the incident and has been absconding since, but the police managed to book him for rape, and are on the look-out.

The rampant abuse of women carried out by members of the clergy, at least in the Catholic Church, is hardly a new issue, and a new incident surfaces practically every couple of months. In November last year, for instance, a woman in Kozhikode was forced to file a police complaint after internal complaints to her bishop about a sexually abusive priest was ignored for months. A month later, another priest from the Kottappauram Catholic diocese was given a double life term under the POCSO Act for raping a minor girl, while a government doctor was accused of colluding with him and failing to report the abuse.

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GUAM
Guam Daily Post

Neil Pang | Post News Staff Feb 14, 2017

Bishop Ryan Jimenez of the Diocese of Chalan Kanoa in Saipan said that while the church will give their full cooperation with civil authorities in any investigation into the allegations of child sexual abuse made against Bishop Emeritus Tomas Camacho, they can offer no further comment as the matter is in litigation.

“It is with deep sadness and great bearing to learn of the sexual abuse allegations in a civil claim against then-priest and now Bishop Emeritus Tomas A. Camacho by a Guam resident Melvin Duenas,” Jimenez said in a letter released to the media. “I request for your prayers for everyone affected by this news – those who have sought and continue to seek redress from abuses, the accused and their journey to realize due process, the families on each side that are struck with a heavy weight of pain that comes with each sharing and everyone within our midst who are affected one way or another.”

Camacho was named, along with former Guam priest Louis Brouillard and the Archdiocese of Agana, in the latest in a series of child sexual abuse allegations by former altar boys stretching back decades.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Oliver Jacques

One of Australia’s most senior child protection bureaucrats has expressed concern with the way governments monitor incidents of child abuse within religious institutions.

NSW Deputy Ombudsman Steve Kinmond runs a watchdog scheme in his state that checks how schools, churches, childcare and foster care agencies handle complaints of child abuse.

He said there was a “hodgepodge” arrangement in place where some religious institutions were covered by his watchdog functions and others were not.

“We have a curious situation, and somewhat unhelpful situation where some religious organisations come under our jurisdiction and some don’t,” Mr Kinmond said.

“The issue that the churches have raised is that they are required to have working with children checks, but we have a hodgepodge arrangement as to whether the church or part of the church is under our jurisdiction.

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AUSTRALIA
The Advocate

Melissa Cunningham
@MeljCunningham

14 Feb 2017.

A lack of understanding and compassion may have caused Catholic priests to hear the confessions of clergy committing child sex crimes and allow them to continue to abuse, an inquiry heard.

David Leary, an academic and Franciscan friar told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse on Tuesday, the Catholic Church still failed to fully comprehend how its systems allowed a culture of child sexual abuse to flourish.

He said assessment for clergy candidates was fundamentally flawed because it tested homosexual tendencies ahead of whether or not the applicant was a compassionate person.

Dr Leary also said the Catholic Church still did not fully understand how civil society works.

“I don’t think we understand the psychology that underpins our modern understanding of child sexual abuse. As a result, we fluff around the edges and we try to negotiate,” he said.

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VATICAN CITY
Premier

Tue 14 Feb 2017
By Premier Journalist

Pope Francis has written an introduction to a book by a survivor of clerical sex abuse in which he asks survivors of clerical sexual abuse to forgive the Church.

The Pope added that he was particularly distressed by the fact that some victims of abuse had resorted to suicide.

He wrote: “These deaths weigh on my heart, on my conscience, and on that of the whole Church. To their families I offer my sentiments of love and of sorrow, and I humbly ask forgiveness.”

Since his election in 2013, Pope Francis said he would take a “zero tolerance” approach against cleric abuse.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Police Professional

Britain’s biggest child sex abuse inquiry has been hit by another high-level departure.

Media chief Bron Madson has left the troubled Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) amid reports of tensions over a consultancy firm that has been paid nearly £300,000.

Ms Madson quit her role as head of communications as the IICSA revealed that it has paid the consultancy firm Crest Advisory £294,232 since 2015 for “strategic communications advice”.

She stepped down from the inquiry – beset by a flurry of departures in recent months– after an enhanced role was afforded to Crest.

She and her team are said to have been frustrated by the reluctance of senior officials and members of the panel to “engage with the media” at a time when the future running of the inquiry was in doubt.

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TEXAS
The Monitor

LORENZO ZAZUETA-CASTRO | STAFF WRITER

EDINBURG — A judge set a tentative trial date for a former priest accused of killing a McAllen woman more than 50 years ago.

After a brief hearing Monday morning both sides in the capital murder case of John Bernard Feit agreed to a late April trial date.

92nd state District Court Judge Luis Singleterry set a pretrial date for April 20, and a subsequent trial date of April 24 after Hidalgo County Assistant District Attorney Michael Garza asked the court to set a date as most evidence has been turned over to the defense.

The 83-year-old man is accused of killing Irene Garza, a McAllen schoolteacher and beauty queen back in the 60s when he worked as a priest in the Valley.

The 25-year-old woman was last seen April 16, 1960 going to confession at the Sacred Heart church in McAllen; authorities found her lifeless body 5 days later in a canal.

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TEXAS
KRGV

[with video]

EDINBURG – A former McAllen priest accused in a decades-old murder made a court appearance Monday morning.

John Feit was arrested for the murder of Irene Garza last year in Phoenix, Arizona.

Feit walked into court Monday using his walker and shook hands with people on his way to his seat. When his counsel asked him how he was feeling, Feit replied that he felt great.

The 92nd District judge, Luis Singleterry, set Feit’s trial date for April 24.

In April 1960, Garza was going to confession at Sacred Heart Church the night before Easter Sunday. Feit heard her confession, but what happened after that was unknown.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Mary Carolan

An elderly man with cancer has taken High Court action urgently seeking information about the fate of the infant sister he has “never known” after she went into a mother and baby home in Tuam, Co Galway.

Peter Mulryan claims Tusla, the Child and Family Agency has a duty to forensically examine what it describes as an “enormous” quantity of documents in its possession related to the home, but has not done that.

Mr Justice Richard Humphreys has directed Tusla to write to the Bon Secours order, which operated the home, asking if it kept burial records for hundreds of children recorded as having died there. If burial records were maintained but destroyed, the order is asked to confirm when they were destroyed and at whose direction.

Mr Mulryan went with his mother to the home in July 1944 four days after his birth. He wants, in his “lifetime”, to get whatever knowledge exists concerning the life or death and resting place of his infant sister, Marian Bridget Mulryan.

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GUAM/SAIPAN
Saipan Tribune

By Jon Perez | Posted on Feb 14 2017

A Guam resident filed a sexual abuse lawsuit against bishop emeritus Tomas A. Camacho yesterday regarding allegations that date back several decades ago, making Camacho the first clergy member from the CNMI to be embroiled in a controversy that has hounded the Roman Catholic Church.

Last year, Guam’s Catholic community was rocked by several allegations of similar sexual abuse by then archbishop Anthony S. Apuron. Guam and the CNMI are both predominantly Catholic and tight-knit communities.

Most Rev. Archbishop Savio Hon Tai Fai, then serving as the Archdiocese of Agana’s apostolic administrator, urged Pope Francis to remove Apuron from his post because of the allegations.

Most. Rev. Archbishop Michael J. Byrnes was appointed Coadjutor Archbishop of the archdiocese on Oct. 31, 2016.

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UNITED STATES
BishopAccountability.org

Summary of Case: Charles Stephney was a priest of the Society of the Precious Blood, ordained in 1980, or possibly earlier. He was assigned to St. Mark’s parish and to a jail chaplaincy Cincinnati, OH. In late 1981 Stephney was investigated after teenage boys complained that the priest had made sexual advances toward them. Jail officials asked him to leave, and Stephney’s Order sent him to Brooklyn, NY, for treatment. While in Brooklyn Stephney was assigned to Our Lady of the Presentation parish. Against the Society of the Precious Blood’s orders, Stephney left Brooklyn and was later hired to assist accused priest, Rev. George Stallings, at St. Teresa’s in Washington, DC. Stallings knew of Stephney’s history, but told parishioners the priest had left his Order to care for his mother. Archbishop Hickey discovered the situation and twice told Stallings to fire Stephney. Stallings refused. In 1990 Stephney was known to be assisting Stallings at Imani Temple in DC, which Stallings established after breaking away from the Roman Catholic Church.

Ordained: 1980?

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic Philly

By Carol Glatz • Catholic News Service • Posted February 13, 2017

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — The sexual abuse of children by those who have vowed to serve Christ and the church is a horrendous monstrosity that represents “a diabolical sacrifice” of innocent, defenseless lives, Pope Francis said.

The church, which must protect the weakest, has a duty “to act with extreme severity with priests who betray their mission and with the hierarchy — bishops and cardinals — who protect them,” the pope wrote in the preface to a new book written by a man raped as a child by a Capuchin priest.

The book, “My Father, I Forgive You” (“Mon Pere, Je Vous Pardonne”), was written by Daniel Pittet, 57, in an effort to describe how he fell victim to a predator abuser when he was 8 years old growing up in Fribourg, Switzerland, and the challenges he faced when came forward two decades later with the accusations. The book, currently published only in French, was to be released Feb. 16. News outlets released the text of the pope’s preface Feb. 13.

Pittet — who had been a monk, but later married and had six children — had met the pope at the Vatican during the Year of Consecrated Life in 2015.

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MINNESOTA
The Journal

NEW ULM — The Diocese of New Ulm announced over the weekend that one of its priests, Fr. Sam Wagner, has been placed on leave from ministry during an investigation of “allegations of inappropriate personal conduct.”

The statement from Monsignor Douglas Grams, Vicar General of the Diocese of New Ulm and the Bishop’s Delegate for Matters Pertaining to Sexual Misconduct, was read at parish masses on Saturday and Sunday. The statement did not disclose what the nature of the alleged misconduct was.

The suspension follows a recent report to the New Ulm Police Department about the allegations, which relate to the time period Fr. Wagner was assigned to the Cathedral parish in New Ulm, the statement said.

Fr. Wagner was assigned to the Cathedral parish from June 23, 2014 to June 29, 2016.

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GEORGIA
Foreign Policy

BY EMILY TAMKIN
FEBRUARY 13, 2017

A Georgian priest was arrested Monday for allegedly scheming to poison a high-ranking cleric, prosecutors said.

Speaking at a news conference, Georgia’s chief prosecutor, Irakli Shotadze, described a plot that could have been pulled from a Dan Brown novel or an episode of an Orthodox version of Young Pope: A private citizen informed the office that Georgian Archpriest Giorgi Mamaladze had allegedly asked him to help obtain cyanide in order to poison the cleric, who wasn’t named.

Mamaladze allegedly told the person that he would pay with both money and “unlawful benefits,” but that he allegedly wanted the cyanide in hand before leaving for Germany to visit 84-year-old Patriarch Ilia II, the head of the Georgian Orthodox Church. Ilia II was in Berlin ahead of a gallbladder operation on Monday. The priest allegedly wanted to carry the poison with him on the plane. And, indeed, when arrested for preparation of murder at Tbilisi International Airport on Friday, Mamaladze had cyanide in his luggage. (Some good news for the patriarch: the operation was apparently successful, and Georgian Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili has sent Anzor Chubinidze, the head of the Special State Protection Service, to Berlin for his protection.)

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MINNESOTA
Mankato Free Press

By Brian Arola barola@mankatofreepress.com

NEW ULM — The New Ulm Police Department is investigating allegations of sexual misconduct by an area priest.

The allegations stem from when the Rev. Sam Wagner worked in New Ulm between 2014 and 2016, said Jeff Hohensee, senior investigator with the New Ulm Police Department. Wagner, who Hohensee said was placed on leave by the Diocese of New Ulm, is listed online as a parochial vicar at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Sleepy Eye.

Hohensee said the investigation remains ongoing and no charges have been filed at this time.

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MINNESOTA
KEYC

[with video]

Feb 13, 2017

By Kelsey Barchenger

A Diocese of New Ulm priest has been placed on leave and an investigation is underway in response to allegations of inappropriate conduct.

The investigation surrounds Father Sam Wagner, who was assigned to the Cathedral parish from June 2014 to June 2016.

In July, Wagner served as parochial vicar in the Divine Mercy Area Faith Community, St. Mary’s, in Sleepy Eye, Japanese Martyrs in Leavenworth, St. Michael in Morgan, and St. Paul in Comfrey.

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AUSTRALIA/SCOTLAND
BBC News

A former Catholic monk accused of child abuse at a Scottish school has appeared in court in Australia facing extradition.

Father Denis “Chrysostom” Alexander was one of several monks accused of abusing boys at the former Fort Augustus Abbey boarding school in the Highlands.

He has always denied the allegations.

He appeared via a video link at the hearing in Sydney and was refused bail. The full extradition case is set to be heard in May.

In 2013, Father Alexander was confronted by BBC Scotland in Australia as part of a documentary into alleged abuse by monks at the school, which prompted a major police investigation.

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ROME
The Daily Beast

In his strongest words yet, the pontiff condemns clerics involved in child sex abuse in the preface to a shocking new book by one of their accusers.

Barbie Latza Nadeau

ROME—Pope Francis has been criticized in the past for not taking a harder stance against pedophile priests. His Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors has been slow to start, condemned for missteps surrounding the forced leave of absence for Peter Saunders, one of two commission members who is a victim of clerical abuse. And the group faced accusations last year that it was out of touch and irrelevant because it wasn’t even involved in training new bishops about how to handle clerical-abuse accusations.

But writing in the preface of a hard-hitting new book, I Forgive You, Father by Swiss clerical sex-abuse survivor Daniel Pittet, Pope Francis makes it abundantly clear where he stands on this issue. In doing so, he asks the uncomfortable questions for which everyone familiar with the sordid history of clerical sex abuse have long wanted answers.

“How can a priest at the service of Christ and his church cause so much harm?” writes Pope Francis. “How can someone who devoted their life to lead children to God, end up instead to devour them in what I call a ‘diabolical sacrifice’ that destroys both the victim and the life of the church? Some of the victims have been driven to suicide. These deaths weigh on my heart, on my conscience and that of the whole church.”

Two years ago, Francis met Pittet, who was systematically raped for four years starting when he was just 8 years old by his parish priest in Switzerland. He supported Pittet’s desire to meet his abuser, who was never punished by secular or church authorities, but instead moved from Switzerland to France, where Pittet says he abused “hundreds of boys.”

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GUAM
Guam Daily Post

Mindy Aguon | For the Post

The latest sex abuse case filed in the District Court of Guam alleges that a former Guam Catholic priest, who later became bishop of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, repeatedly molested and raped an altar boy decades ago.

Melvin Duenas is the 17th victim to come forward and file a lawsuit in the District Court against the Archdiocese of Agana, retired Bishop Tomas Aguon Camacho of the CNMI, and Louis Brouillard, a former priest who worked at parishes and schools on Guam. Camacho, 83, is accused of sexually abusing Duenas for at least three years before the former altar boy ran away.

The complaint, which seeks a minimum of $5 million in damages, alleges Duenas was repeatedly sexually molested and raped by Camacho when he became the priest for the Saint Joseph Catholic Church in Inarajan in the 1970s. The lawsuit accuses the Archdiocese of Agana of knowing about the sexual abuse and assisting Camacho and Brouillard with keeping the misconduct “hidden or secret.” It also accuses the archdiocese of failing to adequately investigate, discharge or discipline Camacho and Brouillard, and other priests known to have sexually abused children.

Calls to Camacho went unreturned as of press time.

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AUSTRALIA
NT News

Nicholas Payne, Geelong Advertiser
February 13, 2017

SURVIVOR of abuse at Geelong Grammar School has slammed its trademark positive education program as “crap”, as the royal commission’s findings on the elite Corio school are set to be tabled in Parliament.

Libby O’Brien attended Geelong Grammar in the 1980s and said she hoped the commission’s report did not “get swept under the carpet”.

“There are so many more perpetrators out there,” she said, despite the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse having been in progress since 2013.

“The cover-ups were really frightening,” she said. “I just want to make sure (the royal commission finding) doesn’t go under the radar.”

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