ABUSE TRACKER

ESPANA
El Mundo

JOSÉ MANUEL VIDALMadrid
NATALIA PUGASantiago de Compostela

25/04/201

Dos antiguas seguidoras de Feliciano Miguel Rosendo, fundador de la Orden y Mandato de San Miguel Arcángel y que se encuentra en prisión desde diciembre de 2014, han presentado al juzgado que instruye la causa por asociación ilícita, contra la Hacienda Pública y por abuso sexual, sendos «informes de virginidad» para demostrar que esta última acusación es falsa. El obispo de Tui-Vigo suspendió la orden al saltar al escándalo.

Marta Paz, que era la mano derecha de Rosendo en la congregación religiosa, e Ivana L. pretenden así desmontar las acusaciones de otras dos seguidoras de Orden y Mandato, que acusan al ex líder de la organización de abusos sexuales reiterados y otras vejaciones.

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SPAIN
The Local

Two nuns submitted “virginity tests” to a Galician court in an attempt to prove the leader of their religious order was innocent of sexual abuse, recently released court transcripts show.

Marta Paz and Ivana L. presented evidence of their virginity to a court in the Galician town of Tui after their leader, Feliciano Miguel Rosendo, was arrested and held without bail for crimes including sex abuse in December 2014.

Rosendo lead the Mandate and Order of Saint Michael Archangel, whose choir sang for Pope Benedict when he visited Madrid in 2011. Rosendo changed the name of the sect after he was expelled from the Roman Catholic diocese of Tui for “inappropriate behaviour”.

The majority of the sect’s 400 followers left after Rosendo was expelled from Tui, but a core group of supporters claim his innocence to this day.

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CANADA
Niagara Falls Review

By Ray Spiteri, Niagara Falls Review
Sunday, April 24, 2016

A first-of-its-kind appointment has been made by Anglican Diocese of Niagara Bishop Michael Bird in naming Canon Valerie Kerr as an archdeacon for truth, reconciliation and indigenous ministry.

A Mohawk woman of the wolf clan, Kerr has been an ordained Anglican priest for more than 10 years, and is currently the rector of St. John the Evangelist in Niagara Falls.

Kerr will be charged with helping Bird implement the Anglican Church of Canada’s commitment to truth and reconciliation in the Diocese of Niagara.

This ministry will include teaching, building relationships, and fostering healing and reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples.

The appointment comes as the Anglican Church of Canada seeks to live into the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 94 calls to action, and confront the ways in which it has embodied colonial attitudes.

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UNITED KINGDOM
By Hull Daily Mail

Posted: April 24, 2016

VICTIMS of historic sex abuse have held a demonstration at a Beverley church today.

Joined by their lawyer, they handed out leaflets to residents as they visited the Roman Catholic Church of St John of Beverley, in North Bar Without.

It follows numerous convictions following sexual abuse cases at St William’s approved school in Market Weighton, where the victims are yet to receive an apology or compensation.

Both establishments are part of the Diocese of Middlesbrough hence the location of the demonstration.

The leaflets read: “St William’s was opened in about 1960 by the Diocese of Middlesbrough as a community home for young boys aged between 13 to 16 years.

“They were sent there by many local authorities that had trust in them to care for children but that was never the case.

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UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage

William D. Lindsey

Noting that the Vatican has placed convicted rapist Father Joseph Jeyapaul back into a parish, Barbie Latza Nadeau (and Daily Beast) write,

This may be the worst case we’ve ever seen. What does a priest have to do to get kicked out of the Catholic Church?

Nadeau quotes David Clohessy of SNAP, who states,

I say this carefully and only after considerable thought. The Jeyapaul case is the worst case we’ve seen.

As I noted several days ago, Megan Peterson, whom Jeyapaul was convicted of raping in the parish he pastored in Greenbush, Minnesota, when she was fourteen years old, has filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block his reappointment to parish ministry in India. As Nadeau states, Jeyapaul has admitted to raping at least two girls in his Greenbush parish. She writes,

After being charged with the abuse, which included rape and forcing at least one of the girls to perform fellatio on him, he fled home to India, where he was eventually arrested on an Interpol warrant. He was then extradited back to Minnesota, where he admitted his heinous crimes and entered a plea bargain in which, in exchange for a lighter sentence, he copped to molestation of one of the girls.

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UNITED STATES
Charles E. Schumer

U.S. Senator Charles Schumer announced today that a new provision was added to his bill, the Adam Walsh Reauthorization Act of 2016, that would allow children who were victims of crimes such as sex trafficking, sexual abuse, sexual exploitation, and other crimes related to child pornography to sue their abuser for the pain and suffering they caused – for up to 10 years after the child turns 18. Current law only provides a statute of limitations extension for three years after the child turns 18. Schumer, today, said that is not long enough and added that this provision is particularly important for cases of child pornography, where a minor may not find evidence of the exploitation online until later in life.

“The sands of time should not fall in the favor of criminals – especially sexual predators. This provision rightfully extends the chance a child victim of sexual abuse or pornography has to take action against those who caused them harm,” said U.S. Senator Charles Schumer. “I have always supported fully funding the Adam Walsh Act because it protects our kids, but the provision we added today gives it even more teeth by rightfully extending the window in which a civil action can be brought against an abuser. The three years provided under the law right now is just not long enough.”

Schumer is the lead democratic sponsor of The Adam Walsh Reauthorization Act and is vowing to push for passage of this critical legislation which includes important provisions to protect children from sexual exploitation and violent crimes.

Amongst other protections, the legislation provides funding for the U.S. Marshals that help track down and apprehend fugitive sex criminals. Second, the legislation extends the statute of limitations for federal civil claims against abusers. The current statute of limitations for civil suits is only three years after the child turns 18. Schumer says that statute of limitations for civil claims must be extended to 10 years, which is the current standard for criminal cases. Additionally, The Adam Walsh Reauthorization Act includes key provisions of Senator Jeanne Shaheen’s Sexual Assault Survivors’ Rights Act to ensure rape kits are preserved and to establish a bill of rights for sexual assault survivors.

Schumer said that passage of The Adam Walsh Reauthorization Act would allow more time for a victim to sue for pain and suffering, ensure law enforcement is funded to go after fugitive sex offenders and provide rights to sexual assault victims.

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ROME
Crux

By John L. Allen Jr.
Editor April 23, 2016

Pope Francis just keeps on truckin’ as the most compelling moral point of reference in the world today, most recently capping a last-minute trip to the Greek island of Lesbos to make a statement on refugee rights by bringing 12 of those refugees back to Rome with him, thereby offering Europe a pointed lesson about welcome.

Through both word and deed, Francis has a remarkable knack for finding ways to move the ball on the social and political causes he cares about most.

Francis has become so globally visible and consequential, it’s sometimes easy to forget that he wasn’t elected to the papacy in March 2013 primarily to solve Europe’s refugee crisis, or to fight climate change, or to pave the way for Cuba and the U.S. to restore diplomatic relations.

When the cardinals huddled in the conclave three years ago, their diagnosis was instead that internal ecclesiastical governance had been adrift in the Vatican for quite a while, really since the late John Paul II years, and among other qualities they wanted a new pope who would get the system under control, choking off future scandal and making sure Rome set a positive example for the Church rather than offering a case study in what not to do.

Of late, however, there have been reminders that Francis’ success on the global stage is not really matched by comparable breakthroughs as a manager.

Over the past quarter-century, two areas above all have generated persistent scandal and heartache for the Vatican, and were waiting for a new pope to take up: The child sexual abuse scandals, and money.

In terms of the abuse scandals, a recent report by the Associated Press reveals that a new tribunal within the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which was created by Francis to handle “abuse of office” charges against bishops accused of covering up abuse cases, essentially is going nowhere.

The tribunal, billed as a dramatic move by Francis in the direction of accountability, has been mired from the beginning in conflicting jurisdictions and unclear lines of authority, and so far has not taken up a single case.

In a similar vein, the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, the body created by Francis to lead the charge on reform from the abuse scandals, has experienced chronic difficulties in getting things moved through the system in a timely fashion, including authorizations to appoint new members and acquiring the necessary bureaucratic materials for new staff.

All of that, and more, has led some critics of the pope’s response to the abuse scandals to wonder if he’s truly serious about reform.

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DEUTSCHLAND
kath.net

[There’s a 5.5 billion euro shortfall in the pension fund of the German Catholic Church.]

„Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung“: Deckungslücke in der „Kirchlichen Zusatzversorgungskasse“ könnte der katholischen Kirche in Deutschland finanzielle Verwerfungen bis hin zur Zahlungsunfähigkeit ganzer Bistümer bescheren.

Frankfurt (kath.net) Eine Deckungslücke von 5,5 Milliarden Euro sei bei der „Kirchlichen Zusatzversorgungskasse“ (KZVK) im vergangenen Herbst bekannt geworden. Dies berichtete die „Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung“ am Donnerstag. Damit sei eine der größten nichtstaatlichen Versorgungseinrichtungen Deutschlands „ein Sanierungsfall“. Die KZVK gehört zum „Verband der Diözesen Deutschlands“.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Kritisches Netzwerk

Bis zum Jahr 2010 waren der Katholischen Kirche die Abgründe ihrer Schwarzen Pädagogik seit dem Mittelalter keiner Rede wert. Das änderte sich erst, als die Missbrauchs-Skandale vergangener Jahrzehnte durch publizistische Paukenschläge aus dem Berliner Canisius-Kolleg, aus dem nördlich von Garmisch-Partenkirchen gelegenen Kloster Ettal und bald auch aus dem Bistum Regensburg in der breiten Öffentlichkeit ruchbar wurden. Über Jahre wurden dort Internats-Zöglinge schwer misshandelt, mit Rohrstöcken traktiert, sexuell missbraucht und in einem Klima der Angst gefangen gehalten. Generationsweise mussten Kinder dran glauben, dass Gewalt und Vergewaltigung gottgegeben seien.

Seitdem gaben sich einzelne Bistümer einige Mühe, die Straftaten aufzuklären und deren Opfer als solche anzuerkennen. Nicht so in Regensburg: Dort wurde zunächst gemauert und geleugnet. Doch ließ sich die vorgeblich saubere Fassade nicht lange aufrecht erhalten, denn zuviel Schmutz und Schmerz lagen dahinter verborgen. Das Grauen drängte ans Tageslicht. Es roch nach Lüge und Vertuschung. Den Meldungen Betroffener folgten abwimmelnde Serienbriefe, die neben der Bekundung geschäftsmäßig signalisierter allgemeiner Betroffenheit die Glaubwürdigkeit der Beschwerdeführer bezüglich konkreter Tatverhalte generell in Zweifel zogen. Auf manche wirkte die Abweisung wie weitere entwürdigende Demütigung nach all den Jahren der Traumatisierung und Verdrängung.

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Carbonated.TV

by Amna Shoaib

Like UsChurches in South America are buzzing with priests who were transferred there from places like US and UK. But many of these priests have a dark, unknown past.

A lot has changed in US and UK in the past several decades. As society distances itself from the hold of religious institutions, the power of clerical authorities has waned in the developed countries. This has weaved new patterns on or social fabric, but one undeniably positive thing to have come out of this change was that priests and religious figures are no longer immune to the law of the land.

After exhaustive investigations revealed that priests often targeted vulnerable children in the church, the altar boys, governments were swift to take action. The zero tolerance policy came about as the result of the change in societal values discussed above. This policy means that churches no longer welcome priests accused of molestation.

So where do these priests go?

The Catholic Church, if it cannot protect its priests in developed countries, conveniently sends them to places where they will not have to face the consequences of their actions.

A recent report by The Global Post sheds light on this chilling new trend of the Catholic Church of sending accused priests to places like Peru and Brazil.

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OKLAHOMA
The Lawton Constitution

Sun, 04/24/2016

Mike Andrews

“Without excusing or justifying his behavior, I think he can now safely and appropriately return to ministry.”
PAUL S. COAKLEY
ARCHBISHOP OF OKLAHOMA CITY

Named to become pastor at Lawton’s Blessed Sacrament Church in June

A priest who was convicted in California of sexual battery and sentenced to three years probation is now serving as administrator at Saint Ann Church, Elgin and missions to Mother of Sorrows Church, Apache, and Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church, Sterling. He has been named to become pastor of Blessed Sacrament Church in Lawton effective June 28.

According to the website of Blessed Sacrament, JosÈ Alexis D·vila was hired here in December and was appointed as administrator of the Elgin parish March 29.

News reports in San Diego state that Davila pleaded guilty to inappropriately touching a 19-year-old woman in 2012 and served three years of probation.

Diane Clay, a spokeswoman for the archdiocese, said that Davila had been serving in his hometown parish in Venezuela before returning to Oklahoma to serve in Lawton. Before going to Venezuela he had served in churches in Utah and in the same San Diego parish he served in when he was convicted.

A blog post on the Blessed Sacrament Parish website posted in December said that “Father (JosÈ Alexis D·vila) will be with our parish to assist Father Chapman. Reverend JosÈ A. D·vila was ordained in the Diocese of Cabimas, Venezuela on December 15, 1984. He most recently served as Pastor of Cristo Redentor, in Ojeda, Venezuela. However, he has pastoral experience in the United States. Several years ago Father D·vila’s family immigrated to the USA due to political persecution in Venezuela. To avoid any further persecution and to be closer to his family, Father D·vila, with permission of his Bishop in Cabimas, sought to serve in this Archdiocese.”

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CALIFORNIA/OKLAHOMA
NBC San Diego

By Brie Stimson and Matt Rascon

More than four years after being convicted of groping a 20-year-old woman in San Diego, a priest is behind a Catholic pulpit again.

Father Jose Alexis Davila had been at St. Jude’s Shrine of the West in Southcrest only two months when he was arrested in 2012. He was later reinstated at St. Jude’s but left by the end of the year.

“Without excusing or justifying his behavior, I think he can now safely and appropriately return to ministry,” Paul S. Coakley, the Archbishop of Oklahoma City where Davila now works, said.

“Some actions such as the sexual abuse of a child are so grievous that the perpetrator must be permanently removed from ministry. This was not one of those actions.”

Joelle Casteix, with Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP), has followed Davila’s case since the original sexual assault charges against him.

“If he knew about Davila’s background and still allowed him to be a priest, that is reckless endangerment, and it should definitely be held accountable,” Casteix said.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Troubadour – Saint Francis University

Matt Fraley, Contributing writer • April 24, 2016

Where does SFU stand in the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese Sex Abuse Scandal?

Three Franciscan friars have been charged in connection to the child abuse case in the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese.

On March 15, three Third Order Regular (TOR) friars from the Immaculate Conception Province based in Hollidaysburg were charged with criminal conspiracy and endangering the welfare of children. All three were former provincials for the province.

According to a statement released by the Attorney General’s Katherine Kane’s office, Giles Schinelli, Robert D’Aversa and Anthony Criscitelli are accused of providing Stephen Baker, a friar in the Immaculate Conception Province, access to children by allowing him to teach at Bishop McCort Catholic High School. These men oversaw Baker and knew that he posed a safety threat to the children, Kane said.

According to WGAL News, Stephen Baker worked from 1992 to 2010 as a religion teacher at Bishop McCort High School in Johnstown, where he is accused of sexually abusing more than 80 children. In 2013, Baker took his own life.

Schinelli, D’Aversa and Criscitelli could face up to 14 years in prison each, if convicted.
This is just one piece of a growing case involving the whole Altoona-Johnstown diocese. People from around the diocese have been filing reports that priests abused them.

In a New York Times article published on April 4, one woman who attended the Basilica of Saint Michael the Archangel in Loretto claimed that a priest sexually abused her when she was younger.

Were SFU students ever at risk? How has this impacted the university?

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY MICHAEL O’KEEFFE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Saturday, April 23, 2016

Louis Tambini was a legendary figure at Loyola, a history teacher, coach and athletic director who worked at the small Catholic school on the Upper East Side for more than 30 years.

Tambini was also a creep who molested seven girls who attended the school in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Officials at the Jesuit-run school failed to notify authorities, parents or alumni when they learned about the sexual abuse allegations, according to a report commissioned by the current Loyola administration and prepared by the Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft law firm. But despite evidence that Loyola officials covered up the abuse for decades after they learned of the allegations in December 1982, the victims can’t file lawsuits against the school because New York’s statute of limitations expired decades ago.

The statute of limitations in New York, considered one of the strictest in the nation, bars sex abuse survivors from pursuing criminal charges or civil damages after their 23rd birthday.

“This report really does memorialize how an institution can use a strict and draconian loophole in New York State law to keep the matter quashed until the statute of limitations runs out,” said attorney Mike Reck, who represents one of the victims.

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ILLINOIS
Daily Herald

Kerry Lester

A North Aurora pastor who is listed on the Illinois sex offender registry now faces a new charge of child sex abuse from Kane County prosecutors.

Ralphael Robinson, 39, pastor at Kingdom Church on the 100 block of South Lincolnway, is charged with one count of criminal sexual assault and one count of aggravated criminal sexual abuse.

Prosecutors said Saturday in a news release that Robinson, who lives in Aurora, sexually abused a child while at the church last Monday.

Police issued a warrant for Robinson’s arrest on Friday. But officials say he surrendered himself that day at the Aurora Police Department.

Kingdom Church’s website does not include Robinson’s 2004 sex abuse conviction of a minor as part of the pastor’s biography. But on the state database, Robinson is listed as a sexual predator who abused a 16-year-old when he was 25d.

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ILLINOIS
Patch

The 39-year-old North Aurora pastor was previously convicted of aggravated criminal sexual abuse.

Aurora, IL

By SCOTT VIAU (Patch Staff) – April 23, 2016

A North Aurora pastor, who is also a convicted sex offender, has been charged with sexually abusing a child in a church.

Ralphael J. Robinson, 39, of the 1700 block of Felten Road in Aurora and a pastor at Kingdom Church in North Aurora, was charged with one count of criminal sexual assault and one count of aggravated criminal sexual abuse, according to the Kane County State’s Attorney’s Office.

Robinson allegedly sexually abused his victim, whom he knew, April 18 at his church, located in the 100 block of South Lincolnway, according to the state’s attorney’s office.

Robinson was previously convicted of aggravated criminal sexual abuse, according to the Illinois Sex Offender Registry. He was 25 at the time of the offense and his victim was 16.

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WEST VIRGINIA
Bluefield Daily Telegraph

Samantha Perry

Timothy Probert is a bastard. I’ve waited two years, four months, 13 days and roughly 17 hours to write those words.

Under the guise of a Christian face, Probert used a carefully manipulated role of prominent community member and child of God to gain the trust of adults and then sexually molest their children.

What could be worse?

lll

Since late 2013 I have covered this case as an impartial journalist — all the while knowing the evil acts perpetrated within Probert’s home. I have done my best to report the facts — and only the facts — when covering the story.

It’s not been easy.

In our role as journalists we learn things — know things. We hear the off-the-record comments. We read detailed case reports and court documents. We see the victims and their families in the courtroom. We report the facts and testimony, but some information can not be shared. And that knowledge can eat at us from the inside.

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ROME
The Daily Beast

Barbie Latza Nadeau

This may be the worst case we’ve ever seen. What does a priest have to do to get kicked out of the Catholic Church?

ROME—Just what is it that the Vatican does not get about predator priests? Apparently a lot.
Father Joseph Jeyapaul is a priest from India who admitted to raping two adolescent girls in Minnesota when he served the Crookston, Minnesota, diocese from 2004 to 2005.

After being charged with the abuse, which included rape and forcing at least one of the girls to perform fellatio on him, he fled home to India where he was eventually arrested on an Interpol warrant. He was then extradited back to Minnesota where he admitted his heinous crimes and entered a plea bargain in which, in exchange for a lighter sentence, he copped to molestation of one of the girls.

Jeyapaul was suspended from the priesthood and served a year and a day in prison in Minnesota, then was deported back to India after his release last July. The Minnesota diocese where he worked also settled a civil lawsuit with the victims in which one accused him of systematic abuse in the confessional of the Blessed Sacrament Church in Greenbush, Minnesota, where he would then tell the girl it was her fault, that she had made him “impure.”

How much more proof would one need that the man cannot be trusted with minors?

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PENNSYLVANIA
Tribune-Review

BY BRAD BUMSTED | Saturday, April 23, 2016

HARRISBURG — Sitting through Mass with the Rev. Joseph D. Maurizio Jr. presiding was surreal for Elizabeth Williams.

She felt a chill.

“I just wanted to get up and leave. But I felt I could not,” said Williams, a physician’s assistant.

Her anxiety stemmed from knowing she was about to confront Maurizio with allegations that he had molested boys at a shelter for street kids in Honduras.

Maurizio, a former Roman Catholic priest in Somerset County, visited the shelter on mission trips and provided financial support through a nonprofit. After the Mass on Nov. 11, 2009, Williams, the former president of ProNino USA, and Stephen Beer, a board member of the group that helps Latin American street children, met Maurizio in the rectory of Our Lady Queen of Angels in Central City, Somerset County, and told him boys “were reporting inappropriate sexual harassment or abuse.”

The priest was “quiet and calm,” Williams, 46, recalled. Maurizio “denied it happened and expressed concern about his future,” she said.

They met with former Bishop Joseph Adamec and other officials of the Altoona-Johnstown diocese the next day. Williams later returned to Altoona and met with former Vicar General Michael Servinsky and other diocese officials. She brought videos of boys saying they’d been molested and describing the acts.

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OKLAHOMA
KFOR

APRIL 23, 2016, BY LORNE FULTONBERG

LAWTON, Okla. — A priest who pleaded guilty to sexual battery charges in San Diego is the newest chaplain at a Catholic church in Lawton.

Fr. Jose Alexis Davila joined Blessed Sacrament in Lawton in December, despite a criminal misdemeanor for inappropriately touching a 19-year-old woman in 2011. The church introduced him to the congregation, but never mentioned his criminal past — or even his last job, writing only that “he has pastoral experience in the United States.”

“We’re very alarmed by this,” said David Clohessy, executive director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “This is precisely the pattern that’s been in the Catholic Church for decades and it’s amazingly irresponsible.”

Following Davila’s conviction in 2012, San Diego news outlets reported he was quietly reinstated and deemed “fit to minister.” A judge sentenced him to three years probation and 150 hours of community service. He worked briefly at another parish before leaving the area.

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PARAGUAY
Entorno Inteligente

[The Paraguayan Church was aware of the case of the Argentine priest Carlos Ibanez, investigated for alleged sexual abuse of 10 young people in Bell Ville, Córdoba (Argentina), but said no complaints about the priest was presented in our country. The Apostolic Nuncio of the Holy See in Paraguay, Monsignor Eliseo Ariotti, and the Archbishop of Asuncion, Monsignor Edmundo Valenzuela, held an early press conference to speak on the subject. The newspaper La Nacion published yesterday the first installment of what will be a series of publications that aims to show the “system of silence” of the church to cases of sexual abuse involving priests.]

Hoy.com.py / La Iglesia paraguaya estaba al tanto del caso del cura argentino Carlos Ibáñez, investigado por supuesto abuso sexual a 10 jóvenes en Bell Ville, provincia de Córdoba (Argentina), pero asegura ninguna denuncia sobre el sacerdote fue presentada en nuestro país. Ratifica que hay “tolerancia cero” con los padres acusados de violadores.

El nuncio apostólico de la Santa Sede en Paraguaya, Monseñor Eliseo Ariotti, y al arzobispo de Asunción, Monseñor Edmundo Valenzuela, ofrecieron una tempranera conferencia de prensa para referirse al tema. El diario La Nación publicó ayer la primera entrega de lo que será la serie de publicaciones que pretende mostrar el”sistema de silencio? de la Iglesia ante los casos de abusos sexuales que involucran a los propios curas.

Ariotti indicó que las autoridades eclesiales del país estaban al tanto del caso del sacerdote Carlos Ibáñez desde hace un año y activaron el protocolo de referencia. El nuncio sostuvo que se recogieron elementos y se alertó del hecho al obispo de Córdoba, pero aclaró”nunca fue presentada en Paraguay una denuncia contra Ibáñez”.

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ARGENTINA/PARAGUAY
La Capital

[The first warrant of a judge in Bell Ville against the priest Carlos Ibáñez was released on July 7, 1992 and was signed by the then Judge Oscar Roque Bertschi. The charge was called by the magistrate: “Corruption of minors and repeated and persistent transmission of venereal disease.” Local police then went looking for the priest but could not find him.]

La primera orden de detención de un juzgado de instrucción de Bell Ville contra el sacerdote Carlos Ibáñez salió el 7 de julio de 1992 y fue firmada por el entonces juez Oscar Roque Bertschi.

La carátula de la causa fue titulada por el magistrado: “Corrupción de menores reiterada y continuada y transmisión de enfermedad venérea”. La Policía local, entonces, salió a buscar al sacerdote para capturarlo pero no lo halló.

Miguel Angel Viqueira fue el juez de la niñez que en la misma ciudad de Bell Ville recibió las primeras denuncias contra el cura. El equipo periodístico de La Nación de Paraguay llegó en estos días hasta el domicilio del ex juez quien, ya jubilado, se animó a contar lo que recordaba del caso.
“De lo que me tocó participar, puedo confirmar que hubo denuncias concretas contra el padre por parte de unos 10 chicos, por supuestos abusos sexuales”, manifestó el ex magistrado. “Lo que me correspondió, como en ese entonces mandaban las leyes, fue asistir a estos jóvenes para darles un acompañamiento psicológico y emocional junto a sus familias, ya sea para los trámites de estudios clínicos, porque se denunció que varios de ellos fueron afectados por sífilis, o para avanzar en los estrados judiciales. Eso sirvió para que el juez investigador (Oscar Bertschi, que siguió atendiendo el caso) pueda presentar sus alegatos”, expresó Viqueira.

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ARGENTINA/PARAGUAY
Ultima Hora

[The Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Eliseo Ariotti, tried to minimize complaints about journalistic investigations that have to do with the Cordovan priest accused of sexual abuse in their country. He said the church was aware of the case but could not do anything without documents and evidence.]

El Nuncio Apostólico, monseñor Eliseo Ariotti, intentó minimizar las denuncias e investigaciones periodísticas que tienen que ver con el cura cordobés acusado de abuso sexual en su país. Aseguró que la Iglesia tenía conocimiento del caso, pero que no pudo hacer nada sin documentos y pruebas.

“La Iglesia está haciendo todo lo posible para aclarar el hecho hace más de un año. La Conferencia Episcopal presentó al papa Francisco un protocolo de acción para luchar contra estos casos, para aclarar la situación tan penosa en la vida social, no solo en la vida de la Iglesia”, manifestó en conferencia de prensa monseñor Eliseo Ariotti.

Dijo que las autoridades eclesiales tenían conocimiento del caso hace recién un año, y criticó que, si Carlos Ibáñez está viviendo en Paraguay hace 24, nadie hizo llegar antes ninguna denuncia a la Iglesia, informó el periodista Miguel Franco a ULTIMAHORA.COM.

“Recogieron elementos para poner a conocimientos de las autoridades que conocían al cura cordobés”, dijo respecto a las autoridades de la Iglesia Católica en Paraguay.

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PARAGUAY
La Prensa

[The archbishop of Asuncion, Monsignor Edmundo Valenzuela, apologized Saturday to the Catholic faithful for allowing an Argentine priest accused of child molestation in 1992 to exercise priesthood in Paraguay with forged titles. “We apologize because we are very innocent.” He said in Paraguay they trust people too much even when they are foreigners. He said they must learn to be more suspicious.]

Asución, Paraguay.

El arzobispo de Asunción, monseñor Edmundo Valenzuela, pidió perdón este sábado a la feligresía católica por haber permitido que un sacerdote argentino acusado de abuso de menores en 1992 en su país siguiera ejerciendo el sacerdocio en Paraguay con títulos fraguados.

“Pedimos disculpas porque somos muy inocentes. En el Paraguay confiamos demasiado en la gente, más todavía cuando es extranjera. Hay que aprender a ser más suspicaces”, dijo el prelado en declaraciones a periodistas al referirse al sacerdote argentino Carlos Ibáñez Morino, denunciado en su país por abuso sexual de al menos 10 jóvenes en 1992.

Ibáñez Morino fue suspendido en sus funciones por el obispo de Córdoba, al noroeste de Buenos Aires, pero continuó ejerciendo en Paraguay con títulos falsos hasta semanas atrás, cuando fue denunciado por la prensa.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
New York Times

Editorial

The reparations movement, which calls for compensating the descendants of generations of enslaved Americans going back 250 years, has failed to gain traction in this country for a variety of reasons.

Most Americans see slavery as an artifact of the distant past that has no bearing on the nation’s present. And even people who are sympathetic to the reparations idea — and who acknowledge the continued imprint of slavery on society — have often argued that there is no way to distinguish descendants who have provable claims to compensation from those who do not, partly because enslaved people usually went unnamed in the United States census, which rendered them faceless in the historical record.

Bankers, merchants and manufacturers all profited from the slave trade, as did companies that insured slaving ships and their cargo. And more than a dozen universities have acknowledged ties to slavery. Even so, some will find ways to paper over the role that slavery played in their founding and early history.

Such denials are impossible in the harrowing history of slavery at Georgetown University that Rachel Swarns recounted recently in The Times. In 1838, the Jesuits running the college that became Georgetown sold 272 African-American men, women and children into a hellish life on sugar plantations in the South to finance the college’s continued operation. On that fact, there is no dispute.

The sale by the Jesuits stands out for its sheer size and the directness of its relationship to the existence and fortunes of one of the country’s top Catholic universities. The names of the people who were taken from the Jesuit plantations in Maryland and shipped to New Orleans are known. The fact that some of their descendants have already been found makes this a particularly salient case in the emerging effort to confront one of history’s worst crimes against humanity.

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OKLAHOMA
News on 6

LAWTON, Oklahoma – A survivor’s group says a priest who pleaded guilty in California to fondling a teenage girl in 2011 is now an administrator of three parishes in southwest Oklahoma.

KFMB, the CBS affiliate in San Diego, reports Father Jose Alexis DaVila, who admitted to abusing a 19-year-old woman, is working at at three churches in Caddo and Comanche counties.

David Clohessy, executive director for SNAP – Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests – is outraged DaVila vanished and resurfaced in Oklahoma.

A Lawton church’s website stated on March 29, 2016 Father Jose Alexis DaVila had been assigned as an administrator of St. Ann Church in Elgin, the Mother of Sorrows Church in Apache and Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Sterling.

“I think it’s inappropriate, I think it’s insulting. We believe this priest shouldn’t be a priest at all, this priest should be behind bars,” Clohessy told KFMB.

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UNITED STATES
Crux

By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service April 22, 2016

Archbishop Christophe Pierre, the new nuncio to the United States, said he’s ready to learn about the Catholic Church in the country and will try his best to be Pope Francis’ emissary, particularly in promoting a church that is close to those who suffer.

The archbishop, who had a private meeting at the Vatican with Pope Francis April 21, gave interviews the next day to the English and the Italian programs of Vatican Radio.

The 70-year-old French native has been in the Vatican diplomatic corps for almost 40 years and said a nuncio’s job is to help the pope fulfill his ministry of building up the local churches, respecting their diversity, while keeping them united with the universal church.

“The difficulty or the challenge,” he said, is “to listen, to be careful about what’s going on, to understand, to exercise dialogue — I think that’s very important — to discover the beauty, the richness of the culture of the people, the way the people live (and) to help the inculturation of the Gospel in a particular culture.”

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OSTERREICH
OTS

[At least 16,000 victims of clerical abuse have been identified in Austria.]

Treffen mit Betroffenen verweigert, aber Privatjustiz der Kirche noch schnell mit Goldenem Verdienstzeichen legitimiert.

Wien (OTS) – Bundespräsident Fischer hat kurz vor Ende seiner Amtszeit noch schnell ein würdeloses Zeichen gesetzt und unter Beisein von Kardinal Schönborn die „Klasnic-Kommission“ mit dem “Goldenen Verdienstzeichen der Republik“ ausgezeichnet.

www.katholisch.at/aktuelles/2016/04/15/bundespraesident-fischer-ehrt-klasnic-kommission

Die Kommission hat sich aus Sicht der Betroffenen kirchlicher Gewalt vor allem für den Schutz der Täter engagiert: „Die Klasnic-Kommission wurde von der Kirche eingesetzt, um teure Klagen abzuwenden und Opfer auszuhorchen“, moniert Sepp Rothwangl von der Plattform Betroffener kirchlicher Gewalt. „Sie hat den Opfern Almosen ausbezahlt, ihre intimen Daten klammheimlich mit der Bischofskonferenz geteilt und die Täter gedeckt, anstatt ein Justizverfahren gegen selbige zu unterstützen.“ Und sie habe eine Vernetzung Betroffener verhindert und damit eine zivil- und strafrechtliche Verfolgung massiv erschwert.

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FLORIDA
The Huffington Post

Ron Dicker
General Assignment Reporter, The Huffington Post

He wasn’t looking for a religious experience.

A Florida priest was busted for asking a male undercover officer in a public park to give him oral sex, the Polk County Sheriff’s Office says.

A Sheriff’s spokeswoman told The Huffington Post Friday that the clergyman, Stephen Glenn Charest of Holy Spirit Catholic Church, bluntly told the detective, “I want you to suck my c—k.”

Charest was charged with soliciting another for lewdness. According to arrest records, the 66-year-old priest was booked on April 19 and released April 20.

“I can’t believe it, I really can’t,” parishioner Shirley Schultz told ABC Action News. “He is so nice, nice with the kids, everything. My whole family, they are shocked over it. It hurts, it really hurts, it is a shame.”

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ILLINOIS
Chicago Tribune

A North Aurora pastor who is a convicted sex offender listed on the state’s registry has been charged with sexually abusing a child, according to Kane County prosecutors.

Ralphael Robinson, 39, the head pastor at Kingdom Church, faces one count of criminal sexual assault and one count of aggravated criminal sexual abuse. If convicted, he faces up to 15 years in prison.

The alleged abuse took place at the church, which is located on Lincolnway and described in its promotional materials as a “multi-cultural truth assembly.” Prosecutors said Robinson knows the victim and the charges indicate that he had a “position of trust” in her life.

According to a biography posted on the church’s now-defunct website, Robinson runs Kingdom with his wife, Tamika. It also says that he has a master’s degree in Christian education and a doctorate in divinity, but does not provide the names of the schools where he studied.

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ILLINOIS
WLS

NORTH AURORA, Ill. (WLS) — A pastor at a North Aurora church is charged with sexually abusing a child according to the Kane County State’s Attorney’s Office.

Police say Ralphael Robinson, pastor of the Kingdom Church in the 100-block of South Lincolnway, allegedly sexually abused a victim under the age of 18 at the church.

Robinson is charged with one felony count of criminal sexual assault and one felony count of aggravated criminal sexual abuse. His bail was set at $100,000 and if he makes bond he will be prohibited from having contact with the victim or any person under the age of 17, the State’s Attorney’s Office says.

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ILLINOIS
Chicago Sun-Times

Luke Wilusz
@lukewilusz

A North Aurora pastor has been charged with sexually abusing a child at his church.

Ralphael J. Robinson, 39, is charged with criminal sexual assault and criminal sexual abuse, according to the Kane County state’s attorney’s office.

According to the prosecutor’s office, Robinson, a pastor at Kingdom Church, sexually abused someone younger than 18 at the church last Monday.

After a warrant was issued Friday for his arrest, Robinson turned himself in at the Aurora Police Department the same day.

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ILLINOIS
CBS Chicago

(CBS) — A pastor has been charged with sexually abusing a child at his North Aurora church, according to the Kane County state’s attorney’s office.

Ralphael Robinson, 39, of Aurora is a pastor at Kingdom Church and is accused of sexually abusing the victim there last Monday, the state’s attorney’s office said.

A warrant for Robinson’s arrest was issued on Friday and he surrendered to Aurora Police that day. Robinson is charged with one count of criminal sexual assault and one count of aggravated criminal sexual abuse.

Robinson appeared in court on Saturday and his bond was set at $100,000. His next court appearance is set for April 28.

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ARGENTINA/PARAGUAY
La Nacion

[Carlos Ibanez, a priest suspended by the church for allegedly sexually abusing minors, continued as a priest by officiating at masses, baptisms and other functions.]

El sacerdote argentino Carlos Ibáñez, denunciado en su país a principios de los ’90 por supuestamente haber abusado de unos 10 adolescentes, está actualmente suspendido “ad divinis” por el Obispado de Villa María, Córdoba. A pesar de ello, Ibáñez siguió oficiando misas, bautismos y casamientos durante años en varias capillas de nuestro país.

Si bien Ibáñez pudo zafar de las denuncias en su contra en el ámbito penal, ya que no se presentó en Argentina para afrontar los cargos gracias a las dos negativas de la Justicia paraguaya para extraditarlo, como mostramos en nuestra publicación de ayer, su situación con relación a la Iglesia quedó absolutamente definida.

El sacerdote Ibáñez está suspendido por la causa que se le abrió a principios de los ’90 en Bell Ville, provincia de Córdoba, como consecuencia de las 10 denuncias de adolescentes que aseguraron haber recibido pagos por mantener relaciones sexuales con Ibáñez cuando él se desempeñaba como sacerdote de la parroquia Virgen de Fátima. La carátula, contundente, decía: “Corrupción de menores reiterada y continuada y transmisión de enfermedad venérea”.

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ARTENTINA/PARAGUAY
La Nacion

[The Apostolic Nuncio of the Holy See, Archbishop Eliseo Ariotti, said this morning at a press conference that the church authorities were aware of the case of the priest Carlos Ibanez (investigated for allegations of sexual abuse of at least 10 young people in Bell Ville province of Cordoba, Argentina) from a year ago and that the reference protocol was activated. No complaints had been made about the priest in Paraguay, he said.]

El Nuncio Apostólico de la Santa Sede ante nuestro país, monseñor Eliseo Ariotti, dijo esta mañana en conferencia de prensa que las autoridades eclesiales estaban al tanto del caso del sacerdote Carlos Ibáñez (investigado por denuncias de abuso sexual de al menos 10 jóvenes en Bell Ville, provincia de Córdoba, Argentina) desde hace un año y que se activó el protocolo de referencia.

“Este caso estaba en conocimiento desde hace un año y se recogieron elementos para poner a conocimiento de las autoridades. Se alertaron, pero quiero determinar que nunca fue presentada en Paraguay una denuncia (contra Ibáñez)”, dijo inicialmente Ariotti.

Añadió que las autoridades eclesiales “está haciendo todo lo posible para aclarar, para luchar contra estos casos y aclarar la situación tan penosa de este problema moral.”

“No debemos instaurar un momento de vamos a buscar ahora a los culpables. Debemos intentar colaborar con la madurez de la vida eclesial, encontrar los problemas, mejorar la situación”, agregó el representante de la Santa Sede.

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ARGENTINA/PARAGUAY
La Nacion

[Pope Francis and Clergy Sexual Abuse in Argentina – BishopAccountability.org]

[Carlos Richard Ibanez Morino, a priest in Bell Ville, Argentina, was investigated for allegations of sexual abuse of at least ten young people in the early ’90s. The Diocese of Villa María suspended him and he went to Paraguay, where continued to serve as a priest.]

Carlos Richard Ibáñez Morino, sacerdote de Bell Ville, acumuló diez denuncias en su contra de jóvenes; la justicia intentó la extradición pero nunca la consiguió.

Gabriela Origlia LA NACIONSÁBADO 23 DE ABRIL DE 2016 •

CÓRDOBA.- Carlos Richard Ibáñez Morino era sacerdote en Bell Ville, estaba investigado por denuncias de abuso sexual de al menos diez jóvenes a comienzos de los ’90. El Obispado de Villa María lo suspendió en su cargo y él se fue a Paraguay, donde igual siguió ejerciendo como cura.

Llegó en 1992 y, hasta hace unas semanas, continuó oficiando misas y trabajando con jóvenes. La historia la revela el diario paraguayo La Nación. No era el único, según el medio, habría al menos cinco sacerdotes argentinos denunciados por abuso sexual que estuvieron escondidos y amparados por la Iglesia paraguaya.

La primera orden de detención contra Ibáñez data de julio de 1992; la causa era “corrupción de menores reiterada y continuada y transmisión de enfermedad venérea”. Buscado por policía, nunca lo encontraron.

El entonces juez de Menores, Miguel Viqueira, fue quien recibió las primeras denuncias. Al diario paraguayo le dijo: “Puedo confirmar que hubo denuncias concretas contra el padre por parte de unos 10 chicos, por supuestos abusos sexuales”.

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CALIFORNIA/OKLAHOMA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, April 22, 2016

Statement by Joelle Casteix of Orange County, SNAP volunteer western regional director, 949 322 7434, jcasteix@gmail.com)

A San Diego priest who vanished after pleading guilty to committing “sexual battery” against and “unlawful sexual touching” of a teenager has just been put in charge of three Oklahoma churches apparently with no warning to parishioners.

This is a stunningly irresponsible and hurtful move by both Oklahoma City Archbishop Paul Coakley and by San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy.

In 2012, Fr. Jose Alexis Davila was sentenced to three years’ probation and ordered to stay away from a 19-year-old he victimized in the San Diego Diocese. Catholic officials there were harshly criticized for putting him back in a parish after he admitted his guilt.

[BishopAccountability.org]

Later that year, Fr. Alexis Davila was gone.

[BishopAccountability.org]

But late last month, Coakley said he was putting Fr. Alexis Davila at three Oklahoma parishes. Since December 2015, Fr. Alexis Davila has apparently worked at Blessed Sacrament Parish in Lawton, OK.

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CALIFORNIA/OKLAHOMA
CBS 8

[with video]

By Abbie Alford, Reporter

SAN DIEGO (CBS 8) – A convicted San Diego priest who pleaded guilty to fondling a teenage girl in 2011 is now serving in parishes in Oklahoma City.

Father Jose Alexis DaVila admitted to abusing a 19-year-old woman and now he is involved with three churches. It’s a move that is being called both stunning and hurtful.

Blessed Sacrament’s website in Lawton Oklahoma says as of March 29, Father Jose Alexis DaVila left to serve the following parishes in Oklahoma: Saint Ann Church, Elgin and Missions, Mother of Sorrows Church in Apache, and Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Sterling.

When the church welcomed DaVila in December, it made no mention the priest served in San Diego. DaVila was an associate pastor from Saint Jude’s Shrine of the West in Southcrest.

David Clohessy, executive director for SNAP – Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests – is outraged DaVila vanished and resurfaced on another pulpit in the Sooner State.

“I think it’s inappropriate, I think it’s insulting. We believe this priest shouldn’t be a priest at all, this priest should be behind bars,” said Clohessy.

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INDIA
Hindustan Times

The Ooty diocese on Friday denied that it had reinstated controversial Indian priest Joseph Jeyapaul, who served a sentence in the US for abusing minor girls.

Father Sebastian Selvarajan, secretary of Bishop House, Ooty and spokesperson for the Diocese, told Hindustan Times that Jeyapaul was not given any job or assignment or reinstated as was being alleged. He has been simply given a residence, a permit to stay, that is all, he said.

The diocese came under fire after a 26-year-old Minnesota woman sued it , alleging that Jeyapaul, who had sexually abused her and another girl while working at their local church, was reinstated to ministry after consultations with the Vatican.

Selvarajan said the diocese would legally tackle the federal lawsuit filed in Minnesota.

Asked if Jeyapaul would cooperate with investigations and subsequent action by authorities, Selvarajan said, “he has cooperated with the authorities in the past and why are you asking this question at all?”

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RHODE ISLAND
Fox News

Published April 23, 2016 Associated Press

MIDDLETOWN, R.I. – An elite New England boarding school where dozens of alumni have reported sexual abuse is canceling a gathering it billed as a “healing” event to address sexual abuse after many victims objected.

St. George’s School headmaster Eric Peterson this week announced the event would be held during the school’s reunion weekend in May on its campus in Middletown, Rhode Island.

But many victims said it was inappropriate because of an ongoing investigation into abuse and cover-ups at St. George’s.

The president of the board of trustees announced Friday the event was canceled. She says officials are planning other ways to acknowledge the abuse during reunion weekend.

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GUAM
Guam Daily Post

A group of Catholics held a peaceful demonstration Thursday night at the Guam airport, protesting the arrival of Giuseppe Gennarini, who is said to be the highest official of the Neocatechumenal Way in the United States.

Gennarini, along with his wife Claudia, arrived aboard United Airlines Flight 197 which landed on Guam at about 10:30 p.m. Thursday from Japan.

The protesters were from the Concerned Catholics of Guam (CCOG) and the Laity Forward Movement (LFM) who staged their “reception” event at the arrival area at the airport.

According to the members of the groups, they want to let Gennarini know “in no uncertain words and through protest signs that we Catholics in Guam do not appreciate nor welcome the presence, influence and indoctrination that the NCW is making in Guam – havoc, dissension, division within our Catholic faith.” According to the groups, further protest events will be announced and held during Gennarini’s stay on Guam.

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RHODE ISLAND
Boston Globe

By Bella English GLOBE STAFF APRIL 23, 2016

After threats of boycotts and other protests from angry victims of sexual abuse, St. George’s School is altering its plans to hold a “Hope for Healing” session on its Rhode Island campus during an alumni reunion weekend next month.

On Wednesday, headmaster Eric Peterson wrote to alumni about a gathering to “address this deeply troubling and painful chapter in our school’s history.” The session was to be held in the chapel of the Episcopal prep school, during Alumni Weekend, scheduled for May 6-8.

But late Friday afternoon, board chairwoman Leslie Heaney sent out a second letter to alumni, stating that the initial letter about the proposed “Hope for Healing” session had “upset many survivors.”

“With the investigation into sexual abuse at St. George’s still ongoing, survivors and Day One have expressed their feelings that it is premature to talk about healing,” Heaney wrote.

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

GLORIA GALLOWAY
OTTAWA — The Globe and Mail
Published Friday, Apr. 22, 2016

The National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations says he will urge the Pope to press Catholic groups that ran Canada’s Indian residential schools to renew their efforts to raise money for healing programs that he says could provide real help to those who were abused.

Perry Bellegarde has been trying for some time to arrange a meeting with the Pope to ask for an apology for the church’s role in what happened at the schools, and also for a repudiation of the church’s 1493 papal bull and its “doctrine of discovery,” which gave Christian explorers the right to claim any lands they found that weren’t inhabited by Christians.

“So this is a third reason, because there’s a moral obligation on behalf of the church to do what’s right,” Mr. Bellegarde said this week of the failed fundraising bid. “I am going to be writing to Pope Francis and asking him to rectify this matter.”

The more than 50 Catholic orders that ran many of the schools were allowed to walk away from their commitment, written into the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, to try to raise $25-million for healing programs – a pledge crafted to demonstrate the church’s interest in reconciliation.

Pierre Baribeau, their lawyer, says they did their best – that a professional fundraising firm was engaged to run a national campaign to collect money, mostly from corporations but also from Catholic organizations. It was, in his words, “a fiasco.”

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SCOTLAND
The Times

The trial of five former staff members at a school run by a Catholic religious order who are accused of abusing dozens of boys over three decades has begun hearing evidence.

John Farrell, 73, Paul Kelly, 63, Edward Egan, 78, Michael Murphy, 76, and William Don, 61, are charged with 121 counts of physical and sexual abuse against pupils at St Ninian’s School, in Falkland, Fife, between 1967 and 1983.

They deny all the charges against them.

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PERU
Angelus

April 21, 2016 – Catholic News Agency

On Saturday an ethics commission created to investigate and offer proposals surrounding accusations of abuse against the founder of the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae released its report, which detailed an internal culture of extreme “discipline and obedience to the founder.”

This culture was “forged on the basis of extreme physical demands, as well as physical punishments, constituting abuses which violated the fundamental rights of persons,” the commission wrote in its April 16 report.

The Ethics Commission for Justice and Reconciliation was formed in November 2015 at the request of the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae. It is formed of two lawyers, a bishop, a psychiatrist, and a journalist.

The Sodalitium Christianae Vitae is a society of apostolic life which was founded in 1971 in Peru, and granted pontifical recognition in 1997. Alejandro Bermúdez, executive director of CNA, is a member of the community.

An apostolic visitor from the Vatican is currently investigating allegations of sexual abuse, mistreatment, and abuse of power against Luis Fernando Figari, founder of the community.

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HAWAII
Honolulu Civil Beat

Most of the claims target the Roman Catholic Church in Hawaii and its religious affiliates. The deadline for such cases expires Sunday.

APRIL 22, 2016 · By Chad Blair

With a legal window scheduled to close Sunday, an estimated 25 lawsuits were expected to be filed at 1st Circuit Court in Honolulu by closing time Friday — the last business day to register the complaints.

Most of the cases list the Roman Catholic Church in Hawaii or its affiliates, and concern allegations of sexual assault.

The plaintiffs are anonymous adults who say they were abused by priests when they were children.

As Civil Beat reported earlier this month, more than 60 people had already filed such lawsuits, and about half of those have been settled.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

A Queens Assemblywoman has announced plans for two days of lobbying in Albany to push for a bill that would make it easier for sexually abused children to bring lawsuits as adults.

The proposed Child Victims Act would eliminate the civil and criminal statutes of limitations in New York for child sex abuse. And it would create a one-year window for victims who have been time-barred in the past to file criminal charges or civil claims.

On May 3, Assemblywoman Margaret Markey (D-Queens) and other proponents of the bill will hold a roundtable discussion on child sexual abuse in sports, families, schools and youth groups.

The next day, a roundtable will focus on abuse in the Catholic Church.

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MINNESOTA
DL-Online

By Becky Jacobs

BAGLEY, Minn. – A Clearwater County District Court jury found a former pastor in northwestern Minnesota guilty Wednesday of having sexual contact with children.

The Rev. Scott Morey, Shevlin, Minn., was charged in 2014 with eight first-degree, three second-degree and three fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct charges.

All of the convictions are related to incidents with two minor children, according to a news release from the Clearwater County Attorney’s Office. The 43-year-old was acquitted of one count of first-degree criminal sexual conduct.

After receiving the verdict, Judge Eric Schieferdecker revoked Morey’s bail and remanded him into custody of the Clearwater County Sheriff.

Morey had been a pastor at Calvary Lutheran Church in Winger, Minn., Immanuel Lutheran Church in Bejou, Minn., and Our Savior’s Lutheran Church in McIntosh, Minn. He resigned as pastor at the churches on Dec. 12, 2014, according to the Rev. Lawrence Wohlrabe, bishop with Northwestern Minnesota Synod ELCA in Moorhead.

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WISCONSIN
WTMJ

[with video]

Rebecca Klopf

A new group in Milwaukee has started to combat sexual assaults of minors. The community coalition is from the Office of Violence Prevention.

Just this week a dean, a teacher, and a pastor, all charged with having inappropriate relationships with underage children.

Alice Belcher says something needs to be done.

That’s why she has teamed with other sexual assault groups in Milwaukee to create a new community coalition.

“The problem has been a lot of people don’t know that we are here and have been doing this work,” says Alice Belcher, Christian Woman Prospective Ministries founder. “So we decided instead of doing things disjointedly we would together as a new coordinated community response team.”

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WEST VIRGINIA
Bluefield Daily Telegraph

By SAMANTHA PERRY Bluefield Daily Telegraph

PRINCETON — An emotional outburst by a victim and his mother followed the ruling of a judge Friday to allow an admitted child sex abuser to remain free on bond.

Fayette County Judge Charles Vickers declined to revoke the bond of Timothy Probert, 57, of Princeton, who pleaded guilty in Mercer County Circuit Court Monday to 37 charges related to child sexual abuse.

“What about the kids who live beside him?” the victim yelled to the judge following the adjournment of the hearing.

“You didn’t even hear about his trustworthiness!” the victim’s mother screamed, as she began crying hysterically.

Vickers was assigned to the case in 2015 after Mercer County Circuit Court judges Omar Aboulhosn, Derek Swope and William “Bill” Sadler recused themselves citing conflicts of interest. …

Probert, who was arrested in 2013, is a former youth volunteer at Westminster Presbyterian Church and mentor for the Working to Eliminate Child Abuse and Neglect (WE CAN) program.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY CHAUNCEY ALCORN, RICH SCHAPIRO NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Friday, April 22, 2016

A Connecticut screenwriter who says he was preyed upon by a notorious Jesuit priest brought his campaign for justice to the Upper East Side Friday.

Neil Gumpel called for an end to the statute of limitations in child sex abuse cases in a one-man demonstration outside the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola on Park Ave.

“It just sickens me they’re allowed to flaunt this statute of limitations stuff,” said Gumpel, 58, who is seeking an official apology from the Jesuits.

“The night that happened to me, I as a person was pretty much murdered.”

Gumpel says he was beaten, strangled and raped by the Rev. Roy Drake during a college tour at the Maine Maritime Academy in 1974.

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INDIA
The News Minute

Geetika Mantri| Saturday, April 23, 2016

On Tuesday, Megan Peterson, a US citizen and a victim of sexual assault at the hands of church priest Joseph Jeyapaul, filed a lawsuit against him at the Minnesota federal court. Jeyapaul was accused of rape and sexual assault, pleaded guilty and was sentenced for a jail term spanning a year and a day. He was then deported to India in July 2015. However, barely six months later, he was reinstated as the head of the diocese of the commission for education in Ootacamund with the Vatican’s approval.

Megan Peterson, her attorney Jeff Anderson and the organisation SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) have since been trying to draw attention to the case. “I felt abused and degraded and victimsed all over again. it felt like a slap in the face to myself and to the other survivors of clergy sex abuse across the globe,” she had said in a statement earlier, speaking about Jeyapaul being reinstated to the ministry.

In an exclusive and detailed interview to The News Minute, Megan tells us why this case needs more attention and asks that Jeyapaul not be reinstated.

Q: You have fought a long and hard legal and personal battle against Jeyapaul. What do you have to say about him being reinstated as a priest and head of the diocese of commission for education in India?

Megan: Reinstating Jeyapaul back into priesthood is a disservice and a danger to children in India. Children are put at risk by putting a convicted, admitted sex offender back into the ministry and at a position of authority. I don’t want another child to go through what I have been through.

Q: What is your message to Bishop Amalraj, who reinstated Jeyapaul to the ministry?

Megan: Reverse your decision, disclose who in the Vatican approved such a reckless move, put Fr. Jeyapaul in a remote, secure treatment center for sex offenders where he’ll be very closely monitored. Aggressively seek out others he has hurt and prod them to call police.

Q: Do you think there should be more dialogue in India about this case so as to set a precedent for the Indian Church as well?

Megan: Absolutely! Open dialogue, transparency and accountability of officials and offenders are key in moving forward and protecting others. By having these discussions, survivors in India may also feel safer, supported and therefore encouraged to come forward.

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UNITED STATES
San Diego Union-Tribune

April is Sex Abuse Awareness Month. In light of this fact, it’s time we re-examine our state laws — particularly those that pertain to sexual abuse. More specifically, we need to take a hard look at the laws that can limit or bar a sex abuse victim’s ability to bring a civil lawsuit against the perpetrator and/or the institutions that failed to protect him/her. These laws are referred to as statutes of limitations. Though in place for a reason, statutes of limitations on childhood sex abuse cases frequently act to protect predators and harm victims.

Children who have been sexually abused face a lifetime of psychological issues. The trauma inflicted on them in their youth reverberates into adulthood. Often it takes years for victims of childhood sex abuse to come to terms with what happened to them. Their struggle is real: a childhood sex abuse victim is more likely to turn to drugs or alcohol to help him/her deal with their emotional pain and low self-esteem. They may have difficulty forming meaningful relationships with coworkers and may find themselves in and out of romantic relationships due to trust issues.

In addition to the human cost of childhood sex abuse, there is a real cost to society. A 1996 Department of Justice study of child molestation victims determined that childhood sex abuse costs society an average of $23 billion annually.

There is one clear way that we can lessen the toll that childhood sex abuse takes on our society: increase and/or eliminate statutes of limitations on childhood sex abuse cases.

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FRANCE
France Inter

[Pedophilia in the church: The Conspiracy of Silence]

[avec video]

La stratégie de l’étouffement qui était à l’oeuvre depuis des décennies au sein de la hiérarchie catholique n’est plus tenable. A la lumière des récentes affaires de pédophilie impliquant des prêtres en France, l’enquête de Laetitia Saavedra en démonte le fonctionnement, en révèle la mécanique.

Depuis cette déclaration du pape en septembre dernier, l’église de France est confrontée à plusieurs scandales. L’affaire la plus emblématique est celle du cardinal Barbarin, qui est visé par une enquête pour non dénonciation d’agressions sexuelles sur des mineurs. Cette enquête de Laeticia Saavedra va démêler les fils de ce scandale, elle a rencontré l’homme à l’origine des premières révélations.

Une affaire lyonnaise

Il s’appelle Alexandre Dussot, il a 42 ans, et il est issu de la bourgeoisie catholique de Sainte-Foy-lès-Lyon. Entre 9 et 12 ans, il a été agressé sexuellement par le père Preynat, prêtre de cette paroisse et fondateur du groupe de Scouts Saint Luc. Avec deux autres anciens scouts, il a créé une association de victimes La Parole libérée. Les faits sont prescrits mais Alexandre s’en souvient comme si c’était hier.

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MASSACHUSETTS
Wicked Local Needham

Posted Apr. 22, 2016

NEEDHAM

The Archdiocese of Boston recently announced that it has dismissed Thomas H. Maguire from the clerical state. According to his assignment history Maguire served at 10 Massachusetts parishes, including Saint Joseph Parish in Needham.

A March 31 press release from the Archdiocese of Boston stated that Maguire’s dismissal followed “allegations of inappropriate sexual conduct in the presence of minors.”

In 1998, Maguire served as a Temporary Parochial Vicar at Saint Joseph Parish for a brief period between Feb. 1 and March 30.

The initial allegation came in 2012 while Maguire was serving as Pastor at Saint Helen Mother of the Emperor Constantine in Norwell. The inappropriate conduct was alleged to have occurred around that time.

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MISSOURI
Columbia Tribune

By THE TRIBUNE’S STAFF
Friday, April 22, 2016

A former Mid-Missouri pastor on Tuesday pleaded guilty to several sex crimes for having sex with at least three underage girls and was sentenced to four years in prison.

Travis R. Smith, 45, of California, Mo., pleaded guilty to two counts each of second-degree statutory rape and second-degree statutory sodomy and one count of sexual abuse. He appeared in Laclede County Circuit Court, where his case was transferred on a change of venue in 2015.

While he was a pastor and youth minister at First Baptist Church in Stover, Smith admitted to forcing himself on at least one teenage girl and having sex with two others. In one case he was accused of pinning down a 16-year-old girl and raping her in 1998. Smith also admitted to having sex with her again in early 1999 in the back of a friend’s truck.

The other cases happened in 2005.

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CALIFORNIA/OKLAHOMA
The Worthy Adversary

April 22, 2016 Joelle Casteix

So we can assume that OK City Archbishop Paul S. Coakley doesn’t bother with that whole “background check” thing.

Why?

A former San Diego priest who vanished after he pled guilty to misdemeanor sexual battery and “engaging in unlawful sexual touching” in 2012 has resurfaced in parishes in Oklahoma.

Fr. Jose Alexis Davila was sentenced to three years’ probation in 2012 and ordered to stay away from the 19-year-old victim. The Diocese of San Diego was harshly criticized for allowing the priest back in a parish.

By October of that year, Davila was gone.

Thanks to a tip from a reader, I learned that Davila was assigned to Blessed Sacrament Parish in Lawton, OK in December 2015—in the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City.

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IRELAND
Limerick Leader

Anne Sheridan
21 Apr 2016

FOUR sets of civil proceedings in relation to at least two priests and Bishop Eamon Casey have been entered in the High Court. They relate to a number of claims involving different parties in the Limerick Diocese, span-ning several decades.

The series of proceedings were initiated last November, with the latter two proceedings entered this February.

One of the cases is being taken by a Limerick woman against Bishop Eamon Casey, who was based in Limerick from 1955 to 1960, when he served at St John’s Cathedral as curate.

Bishop Casey, 88, was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Limerick on June 17, 1951, and he is believed to have suffered a number of health setbacks in recent years.

Well known Limerick solicitor Tommy Dalton, when contacted by the Limerick Leader, confirmed that he had issued a summons on behalf of the woman.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

A Limerick woman has initiated civil proceedings in the High Court against Bishop Eamon Casey, among four cases regarding various members of the clergy in the Limerick diocese over several decades.

The proceedings against Bishop Casey, now 88, and living in a nursing home in Co Clare, are listed among four sets of civil proceedings in relation to at least two priests, regarding a number of claims in the Limerick diocese.

A summons has been issued on both Bishop Casey, and the Bishop of Limerick, Dr Brendan Leahy – in his representative capacity as the current head of the diocese.

One of the cases is being taken by a Limerick woman against Bishop Casey, who was based in Limerick from 1955 to 1960, when he served at St John’s Cathedral as curate.

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ARGENTINA
Associated Press

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Prosecutors in Argentina are accusing a Roman Catholic priest of sexually abusing 3-year-old girl.

The Public Ministry in Santa Fe province said Wednesday that local prosecutors are asking for Nestor Monzon to be formally investigated. Under Argentine law, the request by prosecutors is the precursor to charges that must be decided on by a judge.

Monzon was detained late Tuesday after the parents of the child reported him to authorities. The priest led a parish in the provincial capital some 500 miles (800 kilometers) northeast of Buenos Aires.

Local TV footage showed images of the priest being arrested by police officers while a neighbor shouted insults and accused him of the abuse. Prosecutors are also probing whether Monzon abused the girl’s 5-year-old cousin.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Main Post

[The Würzburg public prosecutor completed the investigation of suspected abuse of a 17-year-old girl by a high church officials. The case is time-barred.]

Zu spät hat die Staatsanwaltschaft Würzburg offenbar vom Verdacht des Missbrauch einer 17-Jährigen durch einen hochrangigen Vertreter des Bistums erfahren, um sie noch verfolgen zu können. Dies bestätigte Thorsten Seebach, Sprecher der Behörde. Nach einer Prüfung des falles wurde die Akte geschlossen. Der Fall von 1988 ist verjährt.

Die heute 44-jährige Alexandra Wolf beschuldigt den früheren Missbrauchsbeauftragten des Bistums, sie zum Oralverkehr gezwungen zu haben. Der Beschuldigte bestreitet das.

Mutmaßliches Opfer: „Ich fühle mich wie erneut missbraucht“ (30. März 2016)
Der Fall kam erst durch Medienberichte an die Öffentlichkeit. Zuvor war das Bistum intern zu der Ansicht gekommen, „die behauptete Straftat“ sei „nahezu auszuschließen“. Die Behandlung des Falles trug dem Bistum den Vorwurf der Vertuschung ein, den man zurückwies. Doch der heutige Missbrauchsbeauftragte, der Kriminologe Klaus Laubenthal, hält die Vorwürfe für plausibel.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Main Post

[Abuse officer of the church as the perpetrator? If the recent allegations ever turn out to be true, one dimension would be achieved and that would leave people just stunned and in disbelief. The new case in the diocese Würzburg seems, however, to nourish an old prejudice: The church covered up rather than work up the allegations disclosed.]

Christine Jeske

Ein Missbrauchsbeauftragter der Kirche als Täter? Wenn sich die jüngsten Vorwürfe jemals als wahr herausstellen sollten, wäre eine Dimension erreicht, die einen nur noch fassungslos und ungläubig werden ließe. Der neue Fall im Bistum Würzburg scheint indes ein altes Vorurteil zu nähren: Die Kirche vertuscht, anstatt die Vorwürfe offen aufzuarbeiten.

Dabei hatte die katholische Kirche doch vor sechs Jahren so sehr Transparenz gelobt: Ende Januar 2010 wurde auch in Deutschland der Umfang des sexuellen Missbrauchs bei Kindern und Jugendlichen in kirchlichen Einrichtungen in der Öffentlichkeit bekannt. Die deutschen Bischöfe mussten reagieren. Sie hatten keine Wahl und reformierten ihre Leitlinien. „Sexueller Missbrauch vor allem an Kindern und Jugendlichen ist eine verabscheuungswürdige Tat.

Dies gilt besonders, wenn Kleriker oder Ordensangehörige sie begehen“, heißt seit 2010 ein neuer Passus der 2002 eingeführten Richtlinien. Und: „Die Täter fügen der Glaubwürdigkeit der Kirche und ihrer Sendung schweren Schaden zu. Es ist ihre Pflicht, sich ihrer Verantwortung zu stellen.“

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DEUTSCHLAND
POW

[After desecration of the a crypt in the church dedicated to St. Kilian, Bishop Dr. Friedhelm Hofmann held a penitential right at the tomb in Neumünster. The tomb had recently been vandalized.]

Nach Schändung der Kilianskrypta: Bischof Dr. Friedhelm Hofmann eröffnet mit Bußritus Gruft im Neumünster – Gebet um Heilung und Tauferneuerung – Frage des Bischofs: „Steht eine solche Entgleisung nicht doch in einem weiteren Zusammenhang mit öffentlichen Kampagnen gegen die Kirche?“

Würzburg (POW) Bischof Dr. Friedhelm Hofmann hat die Kilianskrypta in der Neumünsterkirche nach der Beseitigung der Schmierereien am Donnerstagabend, 21. April, wieder eröffnet. Mit einem Pontifikalgottesdienst und einem Bußritus gab er das „Herzstück unseres Frankenlandes“ wieder frei für die Öffentlichkeit. „Heile die Verletzungen, die uns die Schändung der Grabstätte der Frankenapostel zugefügt hat. Heile die Verletzungen, die Menschen einander zufügen, und lass sie ihren Hass überwinden“, betete der Bischof beim Bußritus in der Kiliansgruft. Beim Taufgedächtnis besprengte er die geschändete Kiliansgruft mit Weihwasser, deckte anschließend den Altar neu ein und entzündete die Altarkerzen.

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FLORIDA
The Weekly Challenger

An unholy war over claims of pedophilia and graft in the nation’s fifth largest Christian church has taken a vicious new turn with the main accuser publicly naming a man who, he claims, was molested by the church’s top bishop.

The new allegation from Florida Pastor Earl Carter was angrily denied by the alleged victim himself as well as his parents and the hierarchy of the 6-million-strong Church of God in Christ, including its top man Bishop Charles Blake.

‘It hurts,’ Sidney Lassiter III — who admits he was molested as a child, but not by Blake — told Daily Mail Online in an exclusive interview.

‘I have been trying to put the horrible thing that happened behind me for years. I repressed my memories for a long time and now it has all been made public.

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MISSOURI
Springfield News-Leader

Darryl Gates, Springfield April 12, 2016

A NICE BIG THORN:To the Knights of Columbus Missouri-wide. They just awarded a youth scholarship to whom I assume is a fine young man out in Bolivar. The only problem is that it is the Cardinal Bernard Law Scholarship. Certainly at this point in time and infamy, one would think that the Knights would be able to come up with a better name for a “youth scholarship.”

Perhaps Keith Milson, State Deputy up in St. Louis, might want to comment since this is a state function?

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MISSOURI
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Thursday, April 21, 2016

For more information: David Clohessy (314-566-9790 cell, davidgclohessy@gmail.com), Barbara Dorris (314-503-0003 cell, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org), Barbara Blaine (312-399-4747, bblaine@snapnetwork.org)

Victims blast big Catholic group
It honors “disgraced” church official
Scholarship is named after Boston’s Cardinal Law
He was forced to resign due to “horrific” abuse cover ups
Years ago, he headed diocese of Springfield-Cape Girardeau
SNAP: “Such callousness encourages secrecy and hurts victims”
Group asks St. Louis archbishop to force K of C to apologize & stop

A large statewide Catholic group that meets this weekend just gave a scholarship named after a disgraced Catholic official who was forced to resign because of widespread abuse cover ups and a victims’ group is crying foul.

The Missouri Knights of Columbus donated money to a student for his education as the “Cardinal Bernard Law Youth Scholarship.” http://www.mokofc.org/programs/youth-activities/scholarships-grants

[News-Leader]

In 2002, Law became the first US bishop to resign for quietly moving predator priests. He’s been called “the poster child” for the church’s abuse scandal.

[Washington Post]

[WBUR]

St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson is the Knights’ honorary state chaplain. They have an office in Maplewood (7318 Manchester Rd, 314 647 5529) and Jefferson City (573 584 3200). They are the “world’s largest Catholic fraternal organization” with 1.8 million members. http://www.kofc.org/un/en/news/releases/1point8_20100505.html

Leaders of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests says honoring those who conceal abuse encourages others to conceal abuse.

“Archbishop Robert Carlson is Missouri’s highest ranking Catholic official,” said David Clohessy, SNAP’s director. “He should denounce this callousness and insist that the group apologize and rename the scholarship.”

“Ignoring wrongdoing encourages more wrongdoing,” said Barbara Dorris, SNAP’s outreach director. “And honoring a prelate who knowingly endangered hundreds of kids for decades makes victims who haven’t reported their abuse less likely to do so. It deepens the already deep feelings of hopelessness that so many of us already feel.”

“Keith Milson of St. Louis is the statewide head of the Knights. He is an engineer for MSD, so he’s not dumb. And he’s been involved with the Missouri State High School Activities Association, so he should care about kids,” said Clohessy. “So how can he and Archbishop Carlson and thousands of Catholics across Missouri turn a blind eye to the widely-understood and clearly-documented harm that Cardinal Law did to so many families?”

In 2003, the national Knights of Columbus loaned $38 million to Law and the Boston archdiocese to settle child sex abuse and cover up lawsuits.

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INDIANA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, April 21, 2016

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 566 9790, 314 645 5915 home, davidgclohessy@gmail.com)

Indianapolis Presbyterian officials are “blaming the messenger” and being deceptive in an abuse case. We’re very sad that he and his staff are doing damage control instead of pastoral outreach.

[Fox 59]

Pastor Robert E. Hock of Southport Presbyterian Church (317-534-2900) is being deceptive and hurtful by describing child sexual abuse as being “between two teenagers.” That’s minimizing a horrific crime. That’s like calling a bank robbery a financial transaction between two adults.

If a 19 year old forces himself on a 13 year old, is Pastor Hock implying that this is OK? He and his lawyers and his public relations team knows that the power difference, not the age range, is what matters in sexual violence.

If a 42 year old rapes a 22 year old, will Pastor Hock call it “between two adults?” If a CEO sexually harasses a custodian, would Pastor Hock call this “between two adults?”

The word “between” implies consent. But there can be no consent when an older, more sophisticated person sexually exploits a younger, more vulnerable person.

And the word “teenagers” implies equality. In this case, there is not equality. The accused predator has far more power than his victim.

Pastor Hock says no abuse happened on church property, or at a church-sponsored event and no church employee was the offender. That’s his lawyer and his PR person talking.

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MISSOURI
Kansas City Star

BY TONY RIZZO
trizzo@kcstar.com

A south Kansas City man has been charged with sexually molesting a child younger than 14.

Jackson County prosecutors charged 48-year-old James M. Burton with sexual molestation of a child, sexual misconduct and two counts of statutory sodomy. A judge set his bond at $100,000.

The incident reportedly occurred earlier this month in the garage of Burton’s home, according to court documents.

It was reported to police April 8 after the girl told her mother that Burton “touched my privates,” according to the allegations outlined in court documents.

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MISSOURI
Fox 4

Click here to read the complete letter from St. Peter’s Parish.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A man who worked as a maintenance supervisor at St. Peter’s Parish, 6415 Holmes Rd., has been charged with statuatory sodomy, sexual molestation and child molestation in Jackson County. The victim in the case is a girl, less than 14-years-old, who told her mother that ‘Mr. Buzz touched my privates.’

Mr. Buzz is a nickname James Burton, 48, is called by those who know him around his south Kansas City neighborhood. The girl says the abuse happened in Burton’s garage and that Burton touched her, asked her to touch him and sodomized her. From the girl’s description of what happened, technicians took swabs of spots in the garage that will be tested for semen. Burton denied ejaculating in the garage, as the girl seemed to describe.

The parish sent out a letter Thursday morning to inform parishioners that Burton had been charged with these offenses. Parish leaders said the alleged abuse did not take place on parish or school grounds. Burton is also not a member of the church.

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MISSOURI
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, April 22, 2016

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 503 0003 cell, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org)

Another KC Catholic worker is accused of child sex crimes. Bishop James Johnston should visit the affected parish this weekend and beg victims, witnesses and whistleblowers to call police so the predator can be convicted and kept away from kids for a long time.

[KSHB]

James Burton, a custodian at St. Peter’s parish, is charged with molesting a child.

It’s ironic that just hours after another church “healing service,” more child sex crimes by a Catholic employee are disclosed. Bishop James Johnston is desperately trying to “turn the page” and “move forward” and imply that the diocese’s abuse and cover up is largely over. It’s not. And it’s disingenuous to pretend it is.

Church officials claim they this quiet at the request of law enforcement. We hope but doubt that’s true. But what matters now is whether they help police and prosecutors build a strong case. We beg them to use church bulletins, parish websites, pulpit announcements and other ways to aggressively seek out anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes by Burton or cover ups by colleagues.

We fear Bishop Johnston will act just like Bishop Finn, and sit passively back, letting the burden of keeping this predator away from kids fall on his victims and the police. That’s wrong. It’s tempting, but it’s irresponsible.

Here’s Bishop Johnston’s chance to chart a new course. We hope he will. But we’re not optimistic.

No matter what lawmakers or church officials do or don’t do, we urge every single person who saw, suspected or suffered child sex crimes and cover ups in Catholic churches or institutions to protect kids by calling police, get help by calling therapists, expose wrongdoers by calling law enforcement, get justice by calling attorneys, and be comforted by calling support groups like ours. This is how kids will be safer, adults will recover, criminals will be prosecuted, cover ups will be deterred and the truth will surface.

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SCOTLAND
The Courier

A teacher who worked at a Christian Brothers school where pupils were allegedly sexually and physically assaulted told a court she never saw any sign of abuse.

Margaret Nicol, 67, who taught part-time at St Ninian’s School at Falkland in Fife, from 1976 to 1981, told the High Court in Glasgow that she never saw anything untoward.

She was asked by prosecutor Kath Harper: “What would you have done if you had seen any evidence of the pupils being physically or sexually abused?” and replied: “I would have gone to their social workers, but at no stage did I see anything that caused me concern. “

The jury was told that St Ninian’s was a List G boarding school which took boys from Glasgow, Renfrewshire, Lanarkshire, Dundee and Edinburgh.

The court was told that the school was run by the Christian Brothers and there were a number of lay people including teachers and domestic staff.

Mrs Nicol was asked by Ms Harper: “Who looked after the boys at night,” and replied: “I know the Brothers were there at night, but none of the other staff were.”

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ARGENTINA
La Nacion

[The Catholic Church admits that priest Carlos Ibanez “escaped” from Argentina to Paraguay. Oscar Gonzalez, vicar general of the Asuncio archdiocese in Paraguay, said institutional weakness was the main cause in ignorance of clergy history. He said Ibanez did not have a direct relationship with the church but was devoted to teaching.]

Tras la investigación sobre el blindaje a sacerdotes argentinos acusados de abuso sexual y el silencio de la iglesia paraguaya frente a este suceso, salió al paso de las declaraciones, Oscar Gonzalez, vicario general de la Arquidiócesis de Asunción, reconociendo la “debilidad institucional” como causal principal en el desconocimiento del historial de los clérigos.

En conversación con la emisora radial 970 AM, la Arquidiócesis de Asunción sentó postura. Ante la consulta del periodista de la radioemisora -¿Como pudo actuar impunemente el Sr. Ibañez en el país por 20 años?, Gonzalez, manifestó que el cura investigado – Carlos Ibañez – hizo algunas celebraciones en algunas capillas del país pero, “nunca tuvo relación directa con la iglesia. Él se dedicaba mas bien a la docencia”

“La costumbre que tenemos es de encontrarnos en celebraciones masivas pero no nos conocemos entre todos, la confianza hace que entremos en las celebraciones sin conocer a todos”, se excusó.

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ARGENTINA
Clarin

[Pope Francis and Clergy Sexual Abuse in Argentina – BishopAccountability.org]

[La Nacion has revealed that Argentine priests accused of child abuse have hid for years in Paraguay.]

Al menos cinco sacerdotes argentinos denunciados por abuso sexual estuvieron escondidos en territorio paraguayo, amparados por la Iglesia de ese país. Así lo denuncia el diario La Nación de Paraguay.

En un informe del que hasta ahora se publicó solo una primera parte (de cinco previstas), el diario hace foco en el caso del sacerdote argentino Carlos Richard Ibáñez Morino, investigado por denuncias de abuso sexual de al menos diez jóvenes en Bell Ville, provincia de Córdoba, a principios de los 90.

Mirá también: La Iglesia reabrió la causa diocesana contra un cura acusado de abuso

Según La Nación de Paraguay, Ibáñez llegó a Paraguay en 1992 y aún cuando pesaba sobre él una suspensión de parte del obispado cordobés, igual ejerció sus funciones como sacerdote, oficiando misas, trabajando con jóvenes y “paseándose por varias comunidades religiosas” hasta hace apenas unas semanas.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Joe R. San Agustin April 23, 2016

Archbishop Anthony Apuron claims that his deed of restriction, filed secretly with the Department of Land Management, in November 2011, did not transfer ownership and control of the seminary property in Yona. Not true. In my analysis, the advancement of the NeoCatechumenal Way’s agenda and the enthronement of its cultic religion on the Catholics of Guam is at the center of all this hoopla.

The Way, in the mid- to late-1990s, convinced Apuron that a seminary in Guam will enhance his leadership of the Church in the Pacific region. Thus, the establishment of a Redemptoris Mater Seminary … in Guam in December 1999 became a necessary prelude.

Serendipitously, the former Accion Hotel was put up for sale at a very low price of $2 million. Its value today, however, has been pegged at between $40 million and $75 million. The Archdiocese of Agana took out a bank loan to buy that property, which was shortly thereafter paid in full by a donor.

The archdiocese now has a seminary fully paid for, with The Way operating it. The title to the seminary property, however, was not in the name of the Redemptoris Mater Seminary corporation, something The Way wanted done to ensure perpetual ownership of the property.

In September 2011, the Archdiocesan Finance Council was asked by Apuron to agree to the transfer, since the council’s consent was required, as well as Vatican concurrence. The council voted against the transfer; Vatican approval/concurrence was not obtained. Even the archdiocese’s own legal counsel at that time advised against the transfer.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

[with video]

April 22, 2016

Beau Donelly

Melbourne’s most secretive Jewish sect, the ultra-Orthodox Adass Israel community, has opened its doors to the public for the first time.

Made up of about 200 families who live over a square kilometre block in Ripponlea, the conservative religious group honours ancient rituals dating back to biblical times and follows the strictest interpretation of the commandments in the Torah.

The men wear mink fur hats and black silk coats. Women cover their hair in public. Boys and girls are segregated from kindergarten. Arranged marriages are common. Children in some families number in the teens. During the Sabbath, they refrain from using electricity – no phones, cars, lights. They don’t own televisions. Most shun the internet. …

The documentary briefly touches on the child sex-abuse scandal that has in recent years plagued the ultra-orthodox community’s reputation.

A court last year ordered the Adass Israel Girls School in Elsternwick to pay more than $1 million to a woman abused by former principal Malka Leifer, who fled overseas with the help of school authorities after allegations against her first surfaced.

In the film, retired importer and Adass elder Shlomo Abeles defends the community’s handling of the Leifer case, saying she was removed “the second we found out about it”.

“Whatever way we got rid of her, it’s correct or not so correct, but we got her away from the kids,” he said. “We didn’t want her in the community trying to abuse any more kids.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier

Melissa Cunningham

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse will hold a directions hearing next week to make further orders regarding the response of Catholic Church clergy to complaints of child sexual abuse in Ballarat.

The hearing to be held in Sydney on Wednesday and comes after former Ballarat Bishop Ronald Mulkearns died at the age of 85 earlier this month following a long battle with colon cancer.

Bishop Mulkearns headed the Ballarat diocese between 1971 and 1997, when Catholic clergy, including teachers, abused hundreds of children.

Many clergy sex abuse survivors believe he could have stopped much of the horrific abuse that occurred in the region. He was bishop of the Ballarat diocese for almost 30 years.

The inquiry has previously heard the bishop moved priests, including notorious paedophile Gerald Ridsdale around the diocese despite being told they had abused children, and also destroyed documents in Ridsdale’s file.

The inquiry announced on Friday no participants of the commission raised any submissions in relation to his part-heard evidence which will now be taken into account by the commission as it stands.

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INDIA
India Today

Posted by Nivedita Dash
New Delhi, April 22, 2016

An Indian priest, who pleaded guilty last year of molesting a minor in the United States, has been rehabilitated by the Vatican in a church in Tamil Nadu.

The case came to light when the complainant, an American woman named Megan Peterson, who was allegedly raped by Father Jeyapaul when she was just 14, sued the Indian Church and claimed damages.

Megan Peterson, in her complaint, said she feels “abused, degraded and re-victimized all over again.”

While the Ootacamund (Ooty) Diocese in Tamil Nadu has remained silent so far, Megan Peterson herself has spoke exclusively to India Today putting forth her terrifying tale.

“It’s a well known fact that perpetrators or sexual molesters generally don’t stop at one victim. Infact there are multiple incidents involving him during his short stay in Minnesota. So, without a doubt children are at risk of being wounded by Father Joseph Jeyapaul,” Peterson told India Today.

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ARGENTINA/PARAGUAY
La Nacion

[Pope Francis and Clergy Sexual Abuse in Argentina – BishopAccountability.org]

[At least five Argentine priests accused of sexual abuse were hidden in Paraguayan territory covered by the local Catholic Church while being sought by Argentina Justice.]

Al menos cinco sacerdotes argentinos denunciados por abuso sexual estuvieron escondidos en territorio paraguayo, amparados por la Iglesia local y con una llamativa actitud del Poder Judicial, mientras eran buscados por la Justicia argentina. Hasta hace poco, uno de ellos seguía ejerciendo y otro continúa normalmente con cargos eclesiásticos.

El equipo de La Nación Investiga presenta desde hoy una serie de publicaciones que mostrarán el “sistema del silencio” de la Iglesia frente a los abusos sexuales cometidos por clérigos.

CAPITULO I: LA HISTORIA DE CARLOS IBÁÑEZ

Desde 1992, Paraguay cobijó al sacerdote argentino Carlos Ibáñez, investigado por denuncias de abuso sexual de al menos 10 jóvenes en Bell Ville, provincia de Córdoba, Argentina, a principios de los ’90. Estando suspendido por el obispado cordobés, Ibáñez igual ejerció sus funciones como sacerdote, oficiando misas, trabajando con jóvenes y paseándose por varias comunidades religiosas en nuestro país, hasta hace apenas unas semanas. Con la carta eclesial como respaldo, Ibáñez se metió de lleno al mundo académico, donde logró un status importante, pero que esconde otra trama: gran parte de los títulos que presenta son falsos.

LA HISTORIA DE CARLOS IBÁÑEZ

Corrían los años 1991 y 1992 cuando las vidas de al menos diez adolescentes argentinos cambiaron para siempre. Todos ellos eran pobladores de la tranquila ciudad de Bell Ville, un sitio anclado en la provincia de Córdoba. Por ese entonces, conocieron al sacerdote Carlos Richard Ibáñez Morino, un diocesano que llegó a la ciudad poco antes para ocuparse de la iglesia Virgen de Fátima.

Según la denuncia oficial a la que tuvo acceso el equipo de La Nación Investiga, una tarde del mes de diciembre de 1991, Tomás y Carlitos (utilizamos nombres ficticios para resguardar la identidad de los denunciantes reales) conversaban en las inmediaciones del predio del ferrocarril de Bell Ville, cuando se acercó a ellos el padre Carlos y los invitó a acompañarlo a un dispensario.

Entonces subieron al Fiat 147, color blanco –que el padre Carlos usaba para movilizarse en la ciudad– hasta llegar al lugar de destino: un consultorio llamado “Juan XXIII”, ubicado sobre la calle Echeverría Nº 102. Allí, en las habitaciones del local, ambos adolescentes tuvieron un encuentro sexual con el sacerdote. La paga para ambos fue de 550.000 australes, moneda que en ese entonces se utilizaba en Argentina.

Este relato forma parte de la denuncia presentada ante el Juzgado de Bell Ville. Si bien fue el principio, no tardarían en aparecer otros casos similares, engrosando la carpeta de denuncias en contra del sacerdote, y en la medida que transcurría el tiempo, la bomba seguiría creciendo. Para mediados de 1992, resultó imposible detener el escándalo y estalló ante la conservadora sociedad de esta ciudad cordobesa, con un total de 10 denunciantes, todos por abuso sexual contra el cura Ibáñez. Cuando la Justicia local intervino, ya era tarde. Gracias a algunas ayudas extras que habrían surgido desde el seno de la Iglesia, Carlos Ibáñez pudo huir de Bell Ville y se refugió en otro país: Paraguay. Aquí llegó a oficiar misas, casamientos, bautismos y se hizo docente de varias universidades.

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NEW YORK
Road to Recovery

JESUITS OF THE NORTHEAST PROVINCE ARE RE-VICTIMIZING A CLERGY SEXUAL ABUSE VICTIM

Jesuits of the Northeast Province are insensitive and re-victimizing Neal E. Gumpel, a childhood clergy sexual abuse victim of Fr. Roy Alan Drake, SJ, a deceased, serial, pedophile Jesuit priest

Jesuits admit to having credible information from approximately five (5) persons (besides the victim) about Neal E. Gumpel’s childhood sexual abuse by Fr. Roy Alan Drake, SJ and still refuse to settle Neal E. Gumpel’s claim reasonably

Jesuits have refused to reasonably settle the childhood sexual abuse claim of Neal E. Gumpel

What
A demonstration and leafleting alerting the media, parishioners of a Jesuit-sponsored parish, and the general public that the Northeast Province of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits), has insulted and re-victimized a childhood sexual abuse victim of a Jesuit priest by refusing to settle his claim reasonably. The Jesuits have already settled at least one public claim against Fr. Roy Alan Drake, SJ.

When
Friday, April 22, 2016 from 11:00 am until 1:00 pm

Where
On the public sidewalk outside the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola, 980 Park Avenue (between East 83rd and East 84th Streets), New York, NY 10028 – 212-288-3588

Who
Members of Road to Recovery, Inc., a non-profit charity based in New Jersey that assists victims of sexual abuse and their families, including its Co-founder and President, Robert M. Hoatson, Ph.D.

Why
The Northeast Province of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) knows that Fr. Roy Alan Drake, SJ, was a serial molester of minor boys. The Province settled at least one public claim against Fr. Roy Alan Drake, SJ, in the past. Neal E. Gumpel’s credible factual account of having been sexually abused as a minor child by Fr. Roy Alan Drake, SJ, at Maine Maritime Academy in Castine, Maine, when Fr. Roy Alan Drake was a professor and Jesuit priest at Maine Maritime Academy, was credibly supported by approximately five (5) individuals, in addition to Neal E. Gumpel. Now, the Northeast Province of the Jesuits, which has found that Neal E. Gumpel’s claim is credible, has insulted and re-victimized Neal E. Gumpel by refusing to reasonably settle his claim. Demonstrators will ask parishioners and the general public to voice their outrage to the Jesuits of their parish and the Northeast Province (whose headquarters are around the corner on East 83rd Street) and demand of the Northeast Jesuit leadership that they treat Neal E. Gumpel with compassion, fairness, and justice.

Contacts
Robert M. Hoatson, Ph.D., Road to Recovery, Inc. – 862-368-2800
Attorney Mitchell Garabedian, Boston, MA – 617-523-6250

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CAMBODIA
Cambodia Daily

BY BEN SOKHEAN AND ALEX WILLEMYNS | APRIL 22, 2016 | អានជាភាសាខ្មែរ

The chief monk of Kompong Speu province last month became the latest senior clergy member to be faced with a sex abuse case in his jurisdiction, with one of his monks jailed for attempting to rape a 9-year-old girl.

Coming little more than a year after an ex-monk shot dead his former pagoda chief just a few kilometers away from the pagoda now at the center of the sex abuse allegations, it was a sign that a severe moral sickness was going untreated among the clergymen provincial chief monk Dou Vandoeun had been tasked with managing.

The monk chief took no responsibility for the case, dismissing the attempted rape as an aberration, a crime committed by a “bad” monk, and he was neither disciplined nor told by his superiors to bring his monks in line.

Yet the same kid-glove treatment was not afforded to Dou Vandoeun on Thursday, with religious authorities deciding to strip him of his position for singing on stage at a post-Khmer New Year concert at his pagoda on Sunday night.

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UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage

William D. Lindsey

Recommended: New York Times reporter Laurie Goodstein’s “Times Insider” report today on why the sex abuse story in the Catholic church remains a story. Be sure to listen to the podcast discussion between Goodstein and Susan Lehman about Goodstein’s report.

As Goodstein explains both in the podcast and in her written report, one of the most significant revelations from the Pennsylvania grand jury report regarding the horrific, long-covered-up abuse in the diocese of Altoona-Johnstown is that blatant, prevalent abuse of minors by clerics in this diocese was covered up for such a very long time because “there is a web of corruption that goes well beyond the church.” The grand jury has found that there was longstanding collusion between public officials, police, district attorneys, and church officials to cover up abuse of minors by Catholic clerics. As Goodstein notes, this is a new wrinkle in the story of the abuse crisis in American Catholicism.

As she also notes, the Pennsylvania findings suggest that the story of sexual abuse of minors by clerics in the Catholic church in the U.S. remains a story because these findings have “elevated the story once again.” As with any revelations of abuse by pastoral officials, these have encouraged more people who had remained silent to come forth. In her podcast discussion with Lehman, Goodstein says that anytime she writes a story about abuse in the Catholic church in the U.S., she receives a spate of communications from abuse survivors who are encouraged by the report to speak out.

She writes,

Pennsylvania shows how the sexual abuse story in the Catholic Church has evolved. The reporting now is often about accountability: Are bishops abiding by the reforms they agreed to in 2002, in response to the eruption of cases set off by the scandal in Boston? The American bishops agreed to report allegations to the authorities and to remove all credibly accused priests from ministry. They agreed to establish prevention programs in parishes and schools, teach children and adults about warning signs, and conduct background checks on employees.
Have they? The biggest church abuse-related stories in the United States in very recent years have been about bishops in Kansas City, Missouri and Minnesota who failed and eventually lost their positions.

And speaking of Minnesota: the story of Father Joseph Jeyapaul, who was convicted last year of sexually molesting a teenaged girl in the diocese of Crookston, Minnesota, is back in the news. I’ve commented on this story previously — here, here, here, and here. As I’ve noted, my husband Steve and I have followed this story with concern because he grew up in the Crookston diocese and has close family ties to the parish in which Jeyapaul raped Megan Peterson when she was 14 years old. As Jean Hopfensperger notes for the Minneapolis Star Tribune, another girl identified as Jane Doe 121 also filed a criminal complaint against the diocese in 2008, alleging that Jeyapaul raped her when she was 16.

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MINNESOTA/INDIA
Wall Street Journal

By KENAN MACHADO
Apr 22, 2016

A Roman Catholic diocese in southern India said Thursday it consulted with the Vatican before reinstating a priest who pleaded guilty last year to the sexual abuse of a minor in the U.S.

The suspension of the priest, Father Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul, 61 years old, was lifted by Bishop Amalraj Arulappan from the Diocese of Ootacamund in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, earlier this year, Father Sebastian Selvanathan, a spokesman for the diocese said.

Father Jeyapaul was deputed to serve in the Diocese of Crookston in Minnesota in the U.S. in 2004. He returned to India in September 2005 and two years later, criminal charges were filed against him in the U.S. accusing him of sexually abusing a girl between 2004 and 2005. Father Jeyapaul was suspended from the Indian diocese in 2010.

He was arrested in India in March 2012 and extradited to the U.S. where he was held jail in Roseau, MN. In May 2015, he pleaded guilty to criminal sexual conduct, according to court documents.

He was released from jail, after having been jailed for three years and four months, and was deported from the U.S. in July 2015.

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

GLORIA GALLOWAY AND SEAN FINE
OTTAWA and TORONTO — The Globe and Mail
Published Thursday, Apr. 21, 2016

The Canadian government released Catholic groups from an obligation to try to raise $25-million for aboriginal healing so that it could hold the groups to other promises they made in the historic 2007 residential schools agreement, a draft of their agreement reveals.

In return for paying $1.2-million for healing programs, the 50 Catholic entities wanted to be released from any and all of their obligations under the residential schools settlement agreement, government officials told The Globe and Mail. Those include being required to disclose documents to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that investigated what went on at the schools, participating in compensation hearings and taking part in planned reconciliation events, said the officials, who spoke under condition of anonymity.

Under the final deal struck in October, however, the Catholic groups agreed to continue with all but the financial obligations, the officials said.

Although the Liberals refuse to disclose the final agreement, a draft copy was given to The Globe by Archbishop Gérard Pettipas of Grouard-McLennan in Grande Prairie, Alta. The draft was undated and unsigned.

The government confirmed the document sent by Archbishop Pettipas was a draft of a final agreement signed on Oct. 30, but refuses to say how close it is to what was eventually signed.

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NEW JERSEY
Jewish Standard

BY JOANNE PALMER April 21, 2016

Rabbi Steven Pruzansky of Congregation Bnai Yeshurun in Teaneck is no stranger to controversy.

A lawyer and the rabbi of the biggest, oldest, and arguably the most prominent Orthodox synagogue in town, Rabbi Pruzansky has strong views, which he often lays out strongly and at some length in his blog, rabbipruzansky.com.

Over the years, Rabbi Pruzansky has angered many people — and made many friends — with harshly worded attacks on Yitzhak Rabin, soon before he was murdered; on President Obama’s re-election, which he blamed on stupid greedy people wanting “free stuff”; on the Jewish Week, which he compared to the Nazi propaganda rag Der Sturmer (although later he said the comparison of course was purposely ludicrous), and on Israeli Arabs, for whom he advocated severe mass punishment, possibly including deportation. Earlier this year, dismissing Hillary Clinton as a “liar, a crook, an active participant in the largest pay-for-play scheme in the history of mankind…,” he also called her “an awful speaker, shrill when she tries to be passionate…” Instead, he endorsed Donald Trump.

In that endorsement, on March 17, he touched on a theme that has resurfaced in the last few weeks — the theme of victimhood, which he sees as an occasionally improperly assumed mantle. “People have had enough of the moral posturing of the faux victim, which has resulted in nothing less than in the increase of the numbers of faux victims and even the possible causes of victimhood,” he wrote in that March post. “People are tired of having to whisper the truth because murderers, evildoers, or sinners will have their feelings hurt by it, even unintentionally.”

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ISRAEL
Al-Monitor

Rape and sexual harassment have preoccupied the Israeli public over the last year. A post by a female journalist who had been working with Knesset member Yinon Magal accusing him of sexual harassment eventually led to his resignation from the Knesset. Former Minister and Knesset member Silvan Shalom also resigned following sexual harassment allegations by a series of women. Actor Moshe Ivgy has also been paying dearly career-wise in recent months for alleged sexual harassment.

For quite some time now, complaining to the legal authorities has seemed to no longer be a necessary step in the public investigation of such matters. The complaints traditionally filed with the police are now often replaced by social media posts. One apt example is the Facebook page One Out of One, to which testimonies by women who have been sexually harassed are posted.

For the past 13 years, the Takana Forum has been operating quite discreetly in the national-religious community. “Takana” means both a rule and a remedy, and the forum addresses complaints against authority figures wielding power in the religious sector — spiritual leaders, influential officials or educators.

The forum typically appoints three or four of its members to handle reported harassment complaints. In each case, a panel of forum members hears the accused’s side as well as the accuser’s, and decides if and what sanctions to impose.

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PENNSYLVANIA
GoErie

The state House of Representatives — spurred by the litany of horrors contained in the state grand jury report on child sex abuse in the Catholic Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown — with overwhelming support advanced legislation that would allow victims of such abuse to reach deep into the past to seek civil damages for harm they suffered.

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FLORIDA
Daily Mail (UK)

By MARTIN GOULD FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

An unholy war over claims of pedophilia and graft in the nation’s fifth largest Christian church has taken a vicious new turn with the main accuser publicly naming a man who, he claims, was molested by the church’s top bishop.

The new allegation from Florida Pastor Earl Carter was angrily denied by the alleged victim himself as well as his parents and the hierarchy of the 6-million-strong Church of God in Christ, including its top man Bishop Charles Blake.

‘It hurts,’ Sidney Lassiter III — who admits he was molested as a child, but not by Blake — told Daily Mail Online in an exclusive interview.

‘I have been trying to put the horrible thing that happened behind me for years. I repressed my memories for a long time and now it has all been made public.

‘All I want is to heal and for my family to heal and now this comes up. It’s like picking at a scab.’
Lassiter, 32, a church minister in Richmond, Virginia, told Daily Mail Online a now-dead worker in the Church of God in Christ — known by the acronym COGIC — molested him when he was 12 or 13. He has been through therapy for years to cope with the incident.

His father, Sidney Lassiter Sr., a COGIC elder from Suffolk, Virginia, mentioned in passing that a member of his family had been molested as a child during a conversation with a friend, Denise Hall. She allegedly reported that to Carter, who then claimed online that Bishop Blake was the molester.

‘Earl Carter needs to get his facts straight,’ Lassiter told Daily Mail Online. ‘I hate to say this because I was always taught to respect my elders, but this man is just ignorant.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

BY JAMIE MCKINNELLAAPAPRIL 22, 2016

The bishop of Rockhampton has restated an apology to the victims of abuse at a notorious Queensland orphanage after a royal commission found inadequate training of staff contributed to their pain.

A report by the sex abuse royal commission was released on Thursday after last year examining the St Joseph’s Orphanage Neerkol, near Rockhampton, which was operated by the Sisters of Mercy between 1940 and 1975.

The commissioners found punishments administered by nuns and other staff were “cruel and excessive” and contravened regulations.

The state government had also failed to supervise and protect the children because it didn’t properly train inspectors or provide adequate scrutiny of the orphanage.

The commission accepted Sister Berneice Loch, who became the Congregational Leader of the Sisters of Mercy in 1991, and retired Rockhampton Bishop Brian Heenan, didn’t receive training in how to detect and respond to complaints.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Written by Janela Carrera

Protesters were chanting and yelling, “Gennarini Go Home!”

Guam – An angry mob of protesters hounding the leader of the neocatechumenal way in the us, Guiseppe Gennarini last night at the AB Won Pat International Airport.

The protesters, yelling in Gennarini’s face, say they’ve had enough and they won’t back down to someone they believe is trying to overthrow their beliefs.

It was a riotous scene of angry mobsters made up of mostly Catholic man’ amko last night. At first just a few dozen showed up with signs. Just outside the arrival gate at the airport, the protesters were chanting and singing.

But as soon as Gennarini and his followers walked out the double doors, it turned into violent screams. Some were even yelling words like, “Satan go home! You’re satan!”

But not a word from the rattled and unwelcomed visitors. Gennarini, who’s responsible for spreading the neocatechumenal way in the United States and now Guam, is being blamed for causing the division within the Catholic Church on Guam.

Many Catholics accuse him of manipulating Archbishop Anthony Apuron into giving away the disputed Redemptoris Mater Seminary to the Gennarinis for the purpose of perpetuating their teachings—teachings that go against the traditions of the local church.

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FRANCE
La Croix

[Alain Christnacht has been asked to advise French bishops on sexual abuse. He will chair the national commission of independent experts in assessing situations where priest have committed sexual abuse.]

Nicolas Senèze (avec Gauthier Vaillant)

Ce haut fonctionnaire a été nommé pour présider la commission nationale d’expertise indépendante pour conseiller les évêques dans l’évaluation des situations de prêtres ayant commis des abus sexuels.

Son passage au cabinet de Christiane Taubira gêne une partie des catholiques.

Avec Alain Christnacht, c’est à un habitué des missions difficiles que les évêques de France viennent de confier la commission nationale d’expertise indépendante annoncée la semaine dernière pour les conseiller dans l’évaluation des situations de prêtres ayant commis des abus sexuels.

Et des missions délicates, ce grand serviteur de l’État en a mené de nombreuses. En Nouvelle-Calédonie notamment, où il été un des artisans des accords de Matignon (1988) mettant un terme aux affrontements sur le territoire où il est nommé haut-commissaire en 1991.

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MINNESOTA
Pioneer Press

By FORUM NEWS SERVICE
April 21, 2016

BAGLEY, Minn. — A Clearwater County pastor was found guilty by a jury Wednesday of 13 counts of criminal sexual conduct involving two male juveniles.

Scott Morey, 43, of Shevlin was arrested in January 2015 and charged with multiple counts of felony criminal sexual conduct for acts that allegedly occurred between 2009 and 2014.

Morey was a pastor at Calvary Lutheran Church in Winger, Immanuel Lutheran Church in Bejou and Our Savior’s Lutheran Church in McIntosh. Morey resigned as a pastor at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America churches in December 2014 during the investigation.

Morey was convicted on seven counts of criminal sexual conduct in the first degree, three counts of criminal sexual conduct in the second degree and three counts of criminal sexual conduct in the fourth degree, according to a release from the Clearwater County attorney’s office. Morey was acquitted on one count of criminal sexual conduct in the first degree.

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INDIANA
Fox 59

APRIL 22, 2016, BY KYLE HICKS – DIGITAL PRODUCER

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. (April 21, 2016) – Leaders of an Indianapolis church have responded to claims that they failed to report a sexual abuse.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests or SNAP, claims leaders of the Southport Presbyterian Church knew about an incident involving two of its members and did not take appropriate action.

Church leaders say they were not involved in the incident, other than trying to provide help and ensure the victim and families involved were supported.

The church says the incident occurred between two teenagers at a mutual friend’s house in a private gathering that included several youth. And the only connection to the church is that both individuals go there.

Church officials say they were informed of the incident several days afterward by an individual who heard about it from someone other than the victim.

Church officials say they talked to the individuals involved and offered support.

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CANADA
Sherwood Park News

By Ben Proulx, Sherwood Park News
Thursday, April 21, 2016

A priest withdrawn from duty and sent back to India — after an RCMP investigation that netted no charges — was being investigated for allegations of undisclosed abuse, the Archdiocese of Edmonton has confirmed.

Parishioners at Our Lady of the Angels Catholic Church in Fort Saskatchewan, just north of Strathcona County, were told on March 19 that Father Ashok Mascarenhas — who had been with the church since 2013 — has been withdrawn from service at the church, after complaints spurred an RCMP investigation.

“The Archdiocese of Edmonton was informed this week by the Fort Saskatchewan RCMP that their investigation into complaints made against Fr. Ashok Mascarenhas has concluded, and that no criminal charges will be laid,” reads the letter to parishioners, sent by Lorraine Turchansky, director of communications and public relations of the Catholic Archdiocese of Edmonton.

“Nevertheless, the Archbishop has determined that there was not full adherence to the code of ministerial conduct expected of all ministers of the Gospel.

“For this reason, the decision to remove Fr. Ashok from priestly ministry in the Archdiocese of Edmonton remains in effect. He has returned to his native India, where he is under the care of his religious community.”

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MISSOURI
KSHB

[with video]

41 Action News Staff , Cynthia Newsome
Apr 21, 2016

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – A Kansas City man who was employed at an area church has been charged with child sexual abuse.

James Burton was charged with two counts of statutory sodomy, one count of child molestation and attempted sexual misconduct, according to court documents.

The Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph said in a statement the alleged abuse did not occur on any diocesan property and the victim is not a student at any diocesan school.

Burton is employed as a maintenance supervisor at St. Peter Parish in Kansas City. On Friday, April 8, the diocese was alerted to an allegation of abuse against Burton. It was confirmed that there were ongoing investigations pending with the Missouri Children’s Division and law enforcement. The diocese said Burton was immediately placed on administrative leave from St. Peter Parish. The diocese said to maintain the integrity of the ongoing police investigation, neither Burton nor the parish community was made aware of the reason for his leave at that time.

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AUSTRALIA
Eureka Street

Frank Brennan | 21 April 2016

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has now published its Case Study 26 on the Neerkol Orphanage in Rockhampton.

The Commission finds that the response by the bishop and by the Sisters of Mercy to victims making complaints prior to 1996 was often inadequate and lacking in compassion. It also makes a damning finding that the bishop was dishonest in a letter he sent to the diocese.

I still have a problem with this commission making findings on issues like the want of compassion. When it reported on the Ellis Case, I said the royal commission (being appointed by the state rather than the church) had no business finding that Cardinal Pell ‘did not act fairly from a Christian point of view’. I thought they should simply have found that the Cardinal did not act fairly. Similarly I wonder about the competence, utility and power of a royal commission to make findings on compassion. Sure, the Christian churches espouse compassion as a Christian virtue, but I don’t see that it is something usefully to be assessed or mandated by a royal commission. To find how compelling the commissioners’ findings on compassion were, I would first want to know how compassionate each of them is, and that’s basically none of my business. They are royal commissioners performing a legal task for the state. Would the commission make findings that other institutions (like Swimming Australia or the State Department of Child Welfare) did not act compassionately?

The word ‘compassion’ or ‘compassionate’ appears 21 times in this case study report. I have no problem with church people or other individuals adversely judging church leaders for a lack of compassion. There may even be a case for politicians doing it, and then arguing the toss on whether they are more compassionate than the people they are criticising. But I don’t think it’s the job of a royal commission. If it is the job of the royal commission, why do they stop at compassion? Why not also offer judgments about whether the responses are loving, merciful and self-sacrificing? I think by over-reaching itself in this way, the commission actually blunts its findings about the adequacy of responses, including compliance with protocols and sensitivity to the needs of victims. The issue is not whether church leaders measured up to the ideals of the Christian virtue of compassion but whether they measured up to the standards properly expected by the Australian community, regardless of people’s religious commitments and views. You would hope that church leaders would do more to assist victims than merely to comply with community standards. To date, the commission has unearthed countless instances where the church leaders have not even complied with those community standards. But I am uneasy about a royal commission making assessments about virtue which go beyond the laws and protocols which might be set down for all institutions and for all individuals.

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WEST VIRGINIA
Clinton Herald

PRINCETON, W. Va. — As rows of victims and their family members watched in stoic silence, a former church volunteer quietly uttered the word “guilty” when asked how he was pleading to a myriad of child sexual abuse charges.

Timothy Probert, 57, of Princeton, pleaded guilty Monday morning to 37 charges related to the sexual abuse of teen boys while he served as an elder and youth volunteer at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Bluefield, West Virginia and as a mentor for a program working to eliminate child abuse.

Probert’s plea brought an end to a more than two-year legal struggle that roiled a small city near the Virginia border and saw three judges recuse themselves from the case due to conflicts of interest.

Probert entered the plea before retired Fayette County Judge Charles Vickers, who was assigned to the case in 2015 after Mercer County Circuit Court judges Omar Aboulhosn, Derek Swope and William “Bill” Sadler recused themselves. According to the Bluefield, West Virginia Daily Telegraph, all three judges signed a letter to the West Virginia Supreme Court citing conflicts of interest. Steve Canterbury, administrative director for the high court, told the Daily Telegraph there were no additional details as to the specific conflicts of interest.

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UNITED STATES
Religion Dispatches

BY PATRICIA MILLER APRIL 21, 2016

If anyone needed more evidence of just how cynical the U.S. Catholic bishops’ manipulation of the principle of “religious freedom” is, look no further than last week’s dismissal of Tony Spence, the editor in chief of Catholic News Service, for tweeting his opposition to bills that would codify LGBT discrimination.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops built its “religious liberty” campaign, which was largely responsible for creating the broad, corrupted definition of religious liberty that has resulted in a wave of anti-LGBT bills across the country, around the idea that religious liberty is the “first, most cherished liberty”—and that to deny it is a violation of core American values:

Freedom is not only for Americans, but we think of it as something of our special inheritance, fought for at a great price, and a heritage to be guarded now. We are stewards of this gift, not only for ourselves but for all nations and peoples who yearn to be free. Catholics in America have discharged this duty of guarding freedom admirably for many generations.

Even as the Catholic hierarchy bewails the lack of respect for “religious freedom,” they demanded that Spence resign for daring to publicly oppose anti-LGBT legislation that the bishops back under the “religious freedom” rubric.

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INDIA
Bangalore Mirror

By Deepthi Sanjiv, Bangalore Mirror Bureau | Apr 22, 2016

On the complaint of a 10-year-old boy’s parents, the Vittal police of Dakshina Kannada district booked a priest for beating the child during a catechism class.

Speaking of the incident to Bangalore Mirror, Childline (Padi) director Renny D’Souza said the priest identified as Andrew D’Costa attached to the Lady of Fathima Church in Peruvai is accused of beating up the child. “The incident reportedly took place on April 15, and it was brought to our notice on April 18,” he said.

Before their first Holy Communion, a child is made to learn a lot of prayers. This child was reportedly slow in learning the prayers, which infuriated the priest, resulting in him beating the boy. The parents brought the issue to Childline.

A team from Childline visited the boy’s house, examined his bruises and recorded statements of the boy as well as his parents. The team also tried to meet the priest, but could not as he was not available. Childline will submit a report of the incident to the district child protection officer on Friday, it said.

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INDIA
The Times of India

Mangaluru: A Catholic church priest was charged with assaulting a boy after he failed to answer questions on the Bible, during his first communion catechism class in Our Lady of Fatima Church, Mangaluru. Police said the priest is absconding.

The incident occurred on April 12 and the case registered on April 18. The parents of the 12-year-old boy said parish priest Andrew D’Costa got furious with the victim during the first communion catechism as he failed to answer some Bible-related questions. Later, he beat him black and blue with a stick.

After the boy narrated the incident to his parents, who are from a poor economic background, they filed a case against the priest. Police said the priest was booked under the Juvenile Justice Act and IPC 324.

Rev Fr William Menezes, public relations officer, Mangaluru Diocese, told TOI the accused priest confessed he had reprimanded the boy, but denied manhandling him.

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NEW YORK
Syracuse.com

By John O’Brien | jobrien@syracuse.com

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Federal investigators have discovered 10 photos of a naked student at a local elementary school on the cell phone of an accused child pornographer, according to two sources familiar with the investigation.

The photos show the child sitting on the toilet and standing naked in a bathroom at All Saints Elementary School in Syracuse, the sources said.

FBI agents have not found photos of any other All Saints students, the sources said.

The pictures were found on the phone of Emily Oberst, an aide at the school and daycare center, the sources said. Oberst was one of two people charged last month with sexually exploiting three children for the purpose of producing child pornography.

The photos of the All Saints student were among the pictures Oberst sent to Jason Kopp, the sources said.

Oberst and Kopp were indicted on charges of sexually exploiting three children to make child pornography. The All Saints student was one of those three victims, the sources said.

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