ABUSE TRACKER

MICHIGAN
Death Notices

GRANDPRE REV. LOUIS E. Age 81, a beloved priest, pastor and educator, died on Saturday, February 20, 2016, at Angela Hospice in Livonia, after a long illness. Fr. Grandpre, who resided in Detroit, was remembered as a genuinely pastoral man with a kind heart, an enthusiastic smile, and a scholarly mind. Fr. Lou is the beloved brother of Don and the late Kay Kuntz. Also survived by several nieces, nephews, and many loving friends. Family will receive friends Friday 3-8 p.m. with prayers 7 p.m. at A.J. Desmond & Sons (Vasu, Rodgers & Connell Chapel), 32515 Woodward (between 13-14 Mile), 248-549-0500. Mass of the Resurrection Saturday 11 a.m. at SS. Peter & Paul Jesuit Catholic Church, 629 E. Jefferson Ave., Detroit, MI 48226. Visitation at the church begins at 10 a.m. Memorial tributes to SS. Peter & Paul Church Warming Center (Pope Francis Center), Angela Hospice, or the charity of donor’s choice.

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

UNITED STATES
Washington Post

By Martin Baron

February 24

Most years I try to stay attentive, or at least awake, through the Academy Awards. Most years I fail.

On Sunday, however, fatigue has an overwhelming counterweight — obvious self-interest. Plus, I will be sitting inside the Dolby Theatre.

“Spotlight” brought to the big screen the first six months of a Boston Globe investigation that in 2002 revealed a decades-long cover-up of serial sexual abuse by priests within the Boston Archdiocese.

Liev Schreiber portrays me as the newly arrived top editor who launched that investigation, and his depiction has me as a stoic, humorless, somewhat dour character that many professional colleagues instantly recognize (“He nailed you”) and that my closest friends find not entirely familiar.

The scandal disclosed by the Globe’s Spotlight investigative team ultimately took on worldwide dimensions. Fourteen years later, the Catholic Church continues to answer for how it concealed grave wrongdoing on a massive scale and for the adequacy of its reforms, as it should.

The movie has been nominated for six Oscars, including best picture. And, journalistic objectivity be damned, I’m hoping it wins the entire lot. I feel indebted to everyone who made a film that captures, with uncanny authenticity, how journalism is practiced and, with understated force, why it’s needed.

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

MASSACHUSETTS
Boston.com

By Eric Levenson @ejleven
Boston.com Staff | 02.24.16

Former Boston Globe editor Marty Baron emphatically approves of the Oscar-nominated film Spotlight, in which he is portrayed by Liev Schreiber.

But there’s one scene Baron wishes had been in the movie.

Reflecting in The Washington Post ahead of Spotlight’s turn at the Academy Awards, Baron writes that a particular real-life speech railing against the Globe’s investigation into the Catholic Church sexual abuse scandal has stuck with him almost 15 years later.

“Occasionally I have been asked what I would have liked to see in the movie that was not portrayed,” he writes. “One answer, I confess, is a product of my own anger that the years have yet to extinguish.”

He continues:

I’m referring to a Nov. 4, 2002, speech given by Mary Ann Glendon, a Harvard law professor who would later become U.S. ambassador to the Vatican. “All I can say,” she declared before a conference of Catholics, “is that if fairness and accuracy have anything to do with it, awarding the Pulitzer Prize to the Boston Globe would be like giving the Nobel Peace Prize to Osama bin Laden.”

Glendon’s infamous analogy came amid a lengthy criticism of the Globe. Glendon also said that the Globe had created a “climate of hysteria the likes of which has not been seen in Boston since the Ursuline convent was burnt down.”

As Baron tells it, that speech was emblematic of larger issues.

“A brief glimpse of the speech might have said volumes about the culture of denial and defiance that afflicted the Church before, and for long after, our investigation,” he writes.

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

UNITED STATES
Washington Post

Michael Cavna February 23

I LIVE for composition. Whether staring at a still-life or gazing at the glow of a projected image in motion, there is something beguiling about the balance of objects created in space and manipulated to trip the wires of our minds. To decode composition is to understand what the artist is saying without words; you are invited to join in this telepathic dance.

This year, five wonderful cinematographers are nominated for Oscars, including two favorite legends, Roger Deakins (“Sicario”) and Emmanuel Lubezki (“The Revenant”): Both are virtuosic in their ability to elevate storytelling through visual craft. And both are painters in space who can dazzle you with their panache.

Then there is a film like “Spotlight,” which is up for six Oscars this weekend, including best picture. Truthful films that function as procedurals of journalism and the law often dwell in the cinematic realm of nuance. The camera must inform but not distract, and the visual tone necessarily must match the gravitas of the tale told.

Among the films that “Spotlight” director Tom McCarthy has said he drew influence from are “All the President’s Men” and “The Verdict,” and it’s worth noting that neither of those much-lauded movies received Oscar nominations for cinematography. (The former film won four Academy Awards, and was up for best picture; the latter film was nominated for five.) Visual subtlety isn’t particularly magnetic near awards hardware, yet it’s an art of informational restraint unto itself. If you look closely, you can be dazzled by the discipline.

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

ILLINOIS/WISCONSIN
Chicago Tribune

John Kass

If you stole $100,000 from a church, a reasonable person would expect that you’d get some jail time for your crimes.

If a poor kid was charged with stealing a fraction of that much cash from a sandwich shop, chances are that jail would be waiting.

But a Wisconsin priest stealing from a church trust, a priest with a fondness for luxury goods and fine restaurants, a priest with a powerful ally in the Chicago Greek Orthodox church hierarchy?

Well, that’s a different story, because that’s no poor kid. That’s a holy man with the robes to prove it.

And in this one, the priest walks and doesn’t serve a day in jail.

It is the case of the Rev. James Dokos, the Greek Orthodox priest who pleaded guilty this week in Milwaukee County Circuit Court to a felony for embezzling more than $100,000 from the Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church in Milwaukee.

He paid the money back as restitution, and if he behaves himself and spends 40 hours doing community service, it’ll all be dropped down to a misdemeanor, authorities said.

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

MEXICO
La Jornada Oriente

[Perhaps the Archbishop of Puebla, Víctor Sánchez Espinosa, knows the whereabouts of the priest Nicolas Aguilar, a pederast who raped dozens of children in the region of Tehuacan and the United States and may be ministering with impunity, according to Alberto Athie, defender of victims of sexual abuse by clergy. He said this impunity can spread as a bad example to other priests who commit statutory rape.]

Publicado por Martín Hernández Alcántara

Es posible que el arzobispo de Puebla, Víctor Sánchez Espinosa, sepa el paradero del cura pederasta Nicolás Aguilar, quien violó a decenas de niños en la región de Tehuacán y Estados Unidos y que incluso el sacerdote siga ejerciendo su ministerio con impunidad, advirtió Alberto Athié, defensor de las víctimas de abuso sexual por clérigos.

Athié consideró que la impunidad que goza Nicolás Aguilar puede cundir como ejemplo para otros sacerdotes que incurren en la violación de menores, por lo que re necesario que desde la comunidad católica se presione a la jerarquía para que se castigue al cura, tal y como ha sucedido en Estados Unidos en casos similares.

Los comentarios de Athié se dieron en el marco de una jornada de análisis y reflexión titulada “¿Qué deja la visita de Francisco a México?”, celebrada ayer en la Universidad Iberoamericana Puebla y en el que participaron especialistas y activistas expertos en el tema.

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

ROMA
Hoy Los Angeles

Una escena extraordinaria tendrá lugar en un hotel en Roma el domingo por la noche, cuando uno de los asesores más cercanos al papa Francisco enfrente la primera de cuatro noches de declaraciones –que serán transmitidas en vivo-acerca de su rol en un supuesto encubrimiento de abuso sexual en Australia.

El cardenal George Pell, ministro de finanzas del Vaticano y alto clérigo católico de Australia, se someterá a un interrogatorio entre las 10 p.m. del domingo y las 2 a.m. del lunes, durante al menos tres –posiblemente cuatro- noches. La indagatoria será realizada por jueces de diferentes países, que se conectarán con Sídney (donde será de mañana) por videoconferencia, desde las distintas partes del mundo.

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

ROMA
il Giornale

[Peter Saunder, former members of the papal child abuse commission, said the pope has done nothing against pedophilia in the church.]

Lucio Di Marzo – Mar, 23/02/2016

L’accusa è delle più gravi e arriva da un’intervista alla Bbc, in cui Peter Saunders, che Papa Bergoglio aveva voluto nella commissione vaticana contro i preti pedofili si scaglia contro la Santa sede, accusando Francesco di non fare abbastanza per arginare il fenomeno.

“La Chiesa cattolica non ha fatto nulla per eliminare gli abusi sui minori da parte del clero”, spiega Saunders, riferendosi al periodo successivo all’elezione al Soglio pontificio del Papa argentino. Vittima di molestie da parte di un sacerdote, Saunders sostiene di essere “una spina nel fianco del Vaticano” e di esserlo stato fin dal momento in cui è entrato nella Commissione, da cui è stato sospeso a febbraio.

Pensai che il nostro lavoro sarebbe stato quello di prendere delle decisioni contro i singoli sacerdoti abusatori e invece l’obiettivo è creare politiche e linee guida per stabilire quali sono le migliori pratiche per evitare gli abusi”, accusa Saunders, secondo cui la Commissione è solo una “questione di pubbliche relazioni”.

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

BELGIQUE
La Libre

[Abus sexuels dans l’Eglise]

[Victims of abuse in the Belgian Catholic Church are urging other victims to file complaints with the church.]

OPINIONS

Nous lançons cet appel à tous les Belges qui ont été agressés ou abusés dans leur enfance ou adolescence, par le clergé de l’Eglise catholique en Belgique, et qui n’ont jamais porté plainte contre ces agressions.

Quelque 950 personnes ont déjà fait appel à notre association Droits des hommes dans l’Eglise catholique. Nous invitons ces personnes à porter plainte contre les coupables de l’époque, vivants ou décédés, et également contre la hiérarchie ecclésiastique qui avait autorité sur les coupables en ces moments, si l’on peut soupçonner que certains de ces supérieurs étaient au courant de ce qui se passait et n’ont rien fait pour arrêter cela.

La façon dont la hiérarchie ecclésiastique belge se défend chez le juge est si pénible pour les victimes que nous nous sentons obligés d’exprimer cette douleur (pour preuve, écoutez l’exposé de leur avocat Me Keuleneer, fin janvier dans la class action à Gand (2) concernant la plainte de 39 victimes pour omission coupable des supérieurs ecclésiastiques à l’époque des abus).

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

BELGIE
De Standaard

[Werkgroep Mensenrechten in de Kerk – Wegen tot herstel]

[Fifty victims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church have come forward publicly and want to help others, still hidden, to complain about their abuse.]

door Yves Delepeleire

Vijftig slachtoffers van seksueel misbruik in de Kerk komen vandaag voor het eerst met naam naar buiten. Ze hopen andere slachtoffers ervan te overtuigen om alsnog een klacht in te dienen.

Meer dan vijftig slachtoffers van seksueel misbruik komen (bijna allemaal) voor het eerst met hun naam en voornaam naar buiten: alleen al daarom is hun oproep in De Standaard uniek. De vijftig richten zich tot alle slachtoffers van seksueel misbruik in de Kerk die hun verhaal tot nu toe voor zich hebben gehouden, uit schaamte of angst. Ze roepen hen op om er alsnog mee naar buiten te komen door bij de politie een klacht in te dienen tegen de dader of zijn hiërarchische overste, als er sprake zou zijn van schuldig verzuim. Óf ze kunnen naar een opvangpunt van de bisdommen en congregaties stappen.

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

DEUTSCHLAND
epd

[A reporting center for those abused at Korntaler homes has been set up.]

Eine “Unabhängige telefonische Meldestelle Aufarbeitungsprojekt Korntal” startet am 1. März. Personen, die sexuelle Gewalt und anderes Unrecht in Heimen der Evangelischen Brüdergemeinde Korntal erlebt haben oder davon wissen, können dort vertraulich und auf Wunsch anonym anrufen, teilte Mechthild Wolff von der Hochschule Landshut am Dienstag mit. Wolff und drei weitere Expertinnen wurden von der Brüdergemeinde mit dem wissenschaftliche Forschungsprojekt “Historische Aufarbeitung der Heimerziehung der Evangelischen Brüdergemeinde seit den 50er Jahren” beauftragt. Dafür sammelt die Meldestelle Informationen.

Die Meldestelle solle dazu beitragen, “Ausmaß und Art von Unrechtsfällen zu erfassen”, teilte Wolff mit. Ziel des Projekts sei die Aufklärung von Gewalttaten und der individuellen und institutionellen Verantwortlichkeiten. Anlass waren Berichte von ehemaligen Heimkindern aus drei Kinderheimen der Evangelischen Brüdergemeinde Korntal über sexualisierte, physische und psychische Gewalt. Die Täter waren teils Erziehungs-, Bildungs- und Leitungspersonal, aber auch Personen im technischen Bereich oder aus dem heimnahen Umfeld.

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

ROM
religion@orf

Der Finanzchef des Vatikans, der australische Kardinal Kardinal George wird per Videoschaltung als Zeuge im australischen Ballarat bei Melbourne aussagen. Zehn Missbrauchsopfer wollen persönlich an der Befragung von Pell in Rom teilnehmen.

Der Finanzchef des Vatikans, der australische Kardinal Kardinal George Pell, wird per Videoschaltung zu Vorwürfen des Missbrauchs durch Priester in der Stadt Ballarat bei Melbourne als Zeuge aussagen. Der Kardinal wird am kommenden Sonntag in dem Konferenzsaal mit dem Gerichtssaal in Ballarat verbunden sein, berichteten italienische Medien.

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

UNITED KINGDOM
Christian Today

Ruth Gledhill CHRISTIAN TODAY CONTRIBUTING EDITOR
24 February 2016

The Archbishop of Canterbury has appointed a woman who is an expert on government and safeguarding to head his independent inquiry into whether there was any kind of cover-up in the Church of England over sex abuse bishop Peter Ball.

Justin Welby, who last year disclosed the inquiry was to take place, has announced that Dame Moira Gibb is to chair the investigation into “the way the Church of England responded” to complaints about the disgraced former Bishop of Gloucester, jailed last year for a string of sex offences.

Dame Moira, former chief executive of Camden Council until 2011 and who chaired the serious case review into safeguarding at Southbank International School in the wake of the crimes committed by William Vahey, is expected to report before the end of this year.

The separate Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, chaired by Justice Goddard, will also be looking at the Peter Ball case.

Dame Moira’s chairmanship was announced as The Times reported that a Church of England priest who was a former police officer held talks with police in an attempt to cover up the scale of offending by Ball. The priest had set out to establish that Ball was innocent but according to a 1993 document seen by The Times, and written up for the attention of the then-Archbishop Lord Carey of Clifton, the priest found that Ball had abused “very many young men who passed through his care”.

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

UNITED KINGDOM
Church of England

24 February 2016

The Archbishop of Canterbury has announced the appointment of Dame Moira Gibb to be chair of the independent review into the way the Church of England responded to the case of Peter Ball, the former Bishop of Gloucester, who was jailed last year for sex offences.

Dame Moira has worked at a senior level in the statutory sector – she was Chief Executive of Camden Council until 2011 – and holds a range of non-executive roles. Most recently she was the chair of the Serious Case Review (published January 2016) into safeguarding at Southbank International School in the wake of the crimes committed by William Vahey.

She will be assisted in the review by Kevin Harrington JP, safeguarding consultant and lead reviewer on a range of Serious Case Reviews; James Reilly, former Chief Executive of Central London Community Healthcare NHS Trust (until Feb 2016); Heather Schroeder MBE, currently vice chair of Action for Children and formerly held senior positions in social services and children’s services in a number of local authorities.

The review will be published once Dame Moira and her team have completed their work which is expected to be within a year. The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) chaired by Justice Goddard will also be looking at the Peter Ball case but have made it clear that institutions should continue with their previous commitments on safeguarding and the Church is in ongoing touch with IICSA on this.

The aim of the review will be to consider: What information was available to the Church of England, who had this information and when and to provide a detailed timeline and transparent account of the response; whether the response was in accordance with recognised good practice, and compliant with CofE policy and legislation as well as statutory policy and legislation; lessons about any necessary changes and developments needed within the CofE to ensure that safeguarding work is of the highest possible standard; how complaints and disciplinary processes are managed and any other specific areas of Church behaviour and practice identified by the review.

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

UNITED KINGDOM
National Secular Society

Posted: Wed, 24 Feb 2016

The National Secular Society has warned that the Church’s inquiry into their handling of the Bishop Peter Ball sex abuse case could leave significant questions unanswered.

Bishop Ball was jailed last year for sexual offences, after escaping justice twenty years previously. A letter-writing campaign at the time saw support for the bishop come from senior establishment figures, including a member of the royal family.

The Church of England has now announced that an inquiry will look at the case to establish how much senior figures in the Church of England knew about Ball’s crimes.

However, the NSS has criticised the terms of reference of the Church of England’s review and warned that they do not go to the heart of the failures which contributed to Ball escaping justice for twenty years. In this period one victim committed suicide.

The review will establish “what information was available to the Church of England … concerning Peter Ball’s abuse of individuals; who had this information and when. To provide a detailed timeline and transparent account of the response within the Church of England. To consider whether the response was in accordance with recognised good practice, and compliant with Church of England policy and legislation as well as statutory policy and legislation.”

But the review into the case will be carried out behind closed doors. Keith Porteous Wood, executive director of the National Secular Society, warned that “while this may encourage greater frankness of those giving evidence, it will be regarded as lacking openness and transparency, qualities already shown to be sorely lacking in the Church over such matters even today.”

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

UNITED KINGDOM
Telegraph

A bishop who sexually abused young men escaped justice thanks to a “deeply sinister, co-ordinated” cover-up, one of his victims has said.

Former Bishop of Lewes Peter Ball was jailed for 32 months in October 2015 after pleading guilty to historical sex offences, but he had been originally investigated and cautioned by police in 1993.
Documents seen by the BBC suggest that his defence team in the first investigation sought a deal with the police to avoid scandal as the bishop was “friendly with Prince Charles”.

The Rev Graham Sawyer, one of the men abused by Ball, told the BBC: “It looks like there was a deeply sinister, co-ordinated, but probably in the end rather inept attempt at a cover-up.”

After Ball was sentenced, Lord Carey, who was the head of the Church of England when it emerged that the bishop had misused his power over teenagers and young men, apologised for dealing with his victims “inadequately” but denied presiding over a cover-up.

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

UNITED STATES
United Church of Christ

February 02, 2016
Written by Barb Powell

Download the “Spotlight” discussion guide.

Sexual abuse of children, teens and adults by church leaders is a serious problem brought back into focus recently by the heralded film, “Spotlight.” To aid thoughtful dialogue about issues highlighted in the movie, the United Church of Christ has released a film discussion guide for use by churches interested in addressing ways to ensure members of our faith communities are not vulnerable to abuse.studyguidecover.jpg

The story of how the Boston Globe uncovered the massive scandal of child molestation and cover-up in the local Catholic Archdiocese, “Spotlight” is a top contender for the Best Picture Oscar and recently took home the best ensemble cast award from the Screen Actors Guild awards.

“‘Spotlight’ is indeed a cautionary tale for us all. While non-Catholics might be tempted to walk away from the theater with just a tinge of self-righteousness, assuming that this is a Catholic problem, don’t give into that temptation,” said the Rev. Marie M. Fortune, a UCC minister who heads the Seattle-based FaithTrust Institute, which is working to end sexual and domestic abuse. “The fact is that sexual abuse of children, teens, and adults by those designated as faith leaders is a serious and disturbing reality in every faith community. No exceptions.”

The discussion guide, developed by the UCC’s Local Church Ministries as part of the denomination’s 2016 multimedia campaigns tied to its core mission, encourages UCC members and leaders to see the film and then reflect on its implications for their local churches and the denomination as a whole.

“‘Spotlight’ is a wonderfully engaging, yet haunting, film,” said the Rev. J. Bennett Guess, executive minister of Local Church Ministries. “It is the perfect movie for church audiences to see together and then discuss how our churches are taking the necessary steps to protect children and other vulnerable people who are in our care.”

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

TEXAS/ARIZONA
Arizona Republic

Christopher Silavong, The Republic | azcentral.com

February 24, 2016

An extradition hearing will be held Wednesday for an 83-year-old Scottsdale man accused of murdering a Texas beauty queen when he was a young priest in 1960.

Prosecutors want John Feit to be returned to Hidalgo County, Texas, to be tried for the first-degree murder of Irene Garza, a 25-year-old school teacher. She went to Feit’s parish on April 16, 1960, and never returned home.

Since nearly a lifetime ago, Feit had been the sole occupant on detectives’ list of suspects in the murder, although he never had been arrested or charged.

His name is absent from the earliest police records generated in the missing-person-turned-murder case. The Republic obtained copies of those records with help from the McAllen Monitor.

The following is an account of the very first days of the case, from when Irene Garza’s father reported her missing to the McAllen Police Department through the forensic examination of her body that would occur five days later.

The beginning

Irene Garza hadn’t called her mother, something she did whenever she was going to be late.

She left home at about 6:30 p.m. for Sacred Heart Catholic Church. It was the night before Easter 1960.

The missing person report gives no indication about when her family expected her home, just that eight hours had passed without word.

Her parents, Josefina and Nicolas Garza, were worried something happened. Nicolas went driving and found her car parked just south of the church. His next stop was the McAllen Police Department to report Irene missing, a report taken at 3:10 a.m. April 17.

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

CANADA/UNITED STATES
Toronto Star

By: Peter Goffin Staff Reporter, Published on Mon Feb 22 2016

A man who resigned as director of a Toronto private school in 2008 over graphic poems on his website is now facing child-pornography charges in California.

On Monday, the district attorney of Contra Costa County in the San Francisco Bay area charged David Prashker, 60, with possession of child pornography and attempting to destroy evidence.

County investigators went to search Prashker’s home in Lafayette, Calif. on Feb. 18. When they arrived, Prashker allegedly ran to the back of the house and threw a laptop out a second-storey window into the backyard.

The district attorney’s office said that forensic examiners later found evidence of child pornography on the laptop.

Prashker had recently worked as a substitute teacher at two private schools in Contra Costa, the district attorney said. He has also worked at schools in London and Miami.

From 2004 to 2008, Prashker was director of Leo Baeck Jewish Day School, a kindergarten-to-Grade-8 private school with campuses in Thornhill and just west of Forest Hill.

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

NEW JERSEY
Obits for Life

Date of Birth:
Saturday, January 6th, 1934
Date of Death:
Saturday, August 15th, 2015
Funeral Home:
Farmer Funeral Home
farmerfuneralhome.com
45 Roseland Avenue
ROSELAND, New Jersey, UNITED STATES
07068

Obituary:

Rev. Gerald P. Ruane, 81, of Brick, New Jersey, passed away on August 15, 2015, the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin. Rev. Ruane was ordained a Priest of the Archdiocese of Newark in 1960. He was a Priest at Our Lady of Lourdes, West Orange, N.J., Pastor of Holy Trinity Church, Westfield, N.J., Professor and Chaplain at Caldwell College, Caldwell, N.J., and Director and Founder of the Sacred Heart Institute in Caldwell, N.J., until his retirement in 2004.

Gerald was much more than a priest. He lived a dynamic life. He was a gifted speaker and author of many books. With a love for travel, he often led spiritual retreats to Rome, the Holy Land, and Medjugorie. His abundant love for family and friends was evident through frequent visits and gatherings for meals, prayers, masses and intriguing conversation. He was well known and loved for his various inspirational Community and Fellowship work – most recently with Alcoholics Anonymous. He generously shared his spirit, time, witty sense of humor, and counsel, all of which will never to be forgotten.

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

ISRAEL
The Jewish Week

Tue, 02/23/2016

Nathan Jeffay
Contributing Editor

Will the Jewish women who claim sexual abuse by their headmistress get to see her go to trial? Or will Malka Leifer become the next Avrohom Mondrowitz — another alleged abuser who won’t be extradited from Israel to stand trial.

Mondrowitz, an American Orthodox rabbi, fled the U.S. in 1985 before an arrest warrant could be executed on an indictment handed down against him for child abuse. In the case of Leifer, she fled to Israel from Melbourne, Australia, in 2008, when allegations surfaced that she had abused girls in her care at the Adass Israel School.

She is living in the predominantly Orthodox city of Bnei Brak, and attempts to extradite her are proving fruitless, despite her house arrest. In fact, it’s thought to be one of the most complicated extradition cases in Israeli history.

Leifer claims that she cannot attend extradition proceedings because when court dates loom, the stress brings on psychotic episodes — and these claims have delayed proceedings for a year-and-a-half. The Israeli state prosecutor pushing for extradition told the Jerusalem District Court on Sunday that it’s time to have a state psychiatrist examine whether there may be “elements of fabrication” in this claim.

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

AUSTRALIA
7 News

Outspoken Liberal senator Bill Heffernan has renewed his call for a national investigation of the judiciary, alleging cover-ups of pedophilic judges.

Senator Heffernan has told parliament on Wednesday the child abuse royal commission should be extended to investigate sex abuse in judiciary ranks, producing an alleged list of pedophiles he says includes senior judges and lawyers, as well as a former prime minister.

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

AUSTRALIA
The Islander

By MELISSA CUNNINGHAM
Feb. 24, 2016

A RELIGIOUS superior has admitted to a woefully inadequate culture of protecting children and told an inquiry the Christian Brothers could have not comprehended the enormity of the trauma caused by their brutality and sexual abuse.

Superior of the Christian Brother’s Ballarat community and former headmaster of St Patrick’s College Brother Paul Nangle said the psychosexual formation of brothers was “defective” and while the rape of children could never be justified, he believed society was more relaxed about matters of sexuality during the sexual revolution in the 1970s.

“In my regret I profoundly wish I had of been better informed and had better knowledge of what was occurring,” Br Nangle said.

“I’m appalled at what happened and I’m deeply sorry for pain people have suffered as a result of that.”

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

AUSTRALIA
news.com.au

Megan NeilAAP

A religious superior threatened to “get” a teacher who complained about a pedophile Christian Brother, an inquiry has heard.

A lay teacher was shocked when another pedophile Brother, Br Edward Dowlan, joined Geelong’s St Mary’s College, soon after another had left, the child abuse royal commission heard.

“Dowlan’s inappropriate behaviour with the students was worse than (redacted) and I couldn’t believe what was happening,” Robert Thompson told police.

“Within a short period of time I was beginning to receive complaints from students about Br Dowlan and that he was sexually interfering with them.”

Mr Thompson said he was “frozen out” at the college after approaching the Christian Brothers community leader Br John O’Halloran in 1987 or 1988.

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

AUSTRALIA
Courier

[with video]

Federal member for Ballarat Catherine King has made an emotional plea for Cardinal George Pell not to let the Ballarat community down again.

In a prepared speech in parliament on Tuesday, Ms King said the Cardinal’s failure to appear at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse in Ballarat were “not the actions of a man of courage”.

Labelling the Cardinal “Ballarat to the core”, a clearly emotional Ms King had this to say: “As you prepare to give testimony on the 29th, I want to say to you: please do not let them down again.”

Her speech followed that of Wendouree MP Sharon Knight, who made a similar speech on February 10.

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

AUSTRALIA
ABC – PM

MARK COLVIN: Meanwhile, a lot of people in Ballarat are on edge to hear the testimony of the city’s former bishop Ronald Mulkearns at the Royal Commission tomorrow.

Some victims have waited decades for the bishop to respond to allegations that he ignored complaints that his priests were abusing children.

He’s also been accused of moving paedophile priests from parish to parish during his term between the years of 1971 and 1997.

Bishop Mulkearns is expected to give his evidence by video link from his Ballarat nursing home tomorrow.

Today, some of the victims of the ergion’s most infamous paedophile priest, Gerald Ridsdale, took their complaints to the door of that home.

Charlotte King reports from Ballarat.

CHARLOTTE KING: They call themselves ‘Nazzie girls’: children who ended up in the care of the Sisters of Nazareth girls’ home in Ballarat in the 1950s and ‘60s.

GABRIELLE SHORT: Ninety-five per cent hell. Yeah torture, abuse, fear, terror.

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

UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

By TOM KELLY FOR THE DAILY MAIL

The scandal of a predatory Bishop who escaped prosecution for child abuse for two decades deepened last night as it was claimed that the Church of England knew he was a serial abuser of ‘young men’.

Peter Ball – who was eventually jailed after admitting the abuse last year – benefited from a ‘deeply sinister cover-up’.

Secret documents claimed that he had been let off 23 years ago to ‘prevent a scandal in the press’ – despite the Church of England being told he was a serial abuser. Ball resigned as Bishop of Gloucester in 1993, but returned to work within two years.

The report was compiled at the time by a private detective working for Ball’s legal team. It warned senior figures that Ball had been ‘abusing not only his office but many young men’ and had confessed to his behaviour.

Its existence was reported by the BBC and it was described as being for the information solely of the Bishop of Chichester, the late Eric Kemp, and the then Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey.

The documents also indicate the private investigator frequently got to his victims before police did. They also made it clear that Ball had confessed to abusing boys.

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

BELGIUM
The Brussels Times

Between 2012 and 2015, 418 victims of sexual abuse commited by men of the cloth have come forward say centres established by the Catholic Church, and also a further 628, the Arbitration Centre opened at the request of the Commission Spéciale du Parlement pour le Traitement des Plaintes pour Abus Sexuels (Special Parliamentary Commission for Sexual Abuse Complaints-handling) states.

During this period, the ecclesiastical authorities have given 3.9 million euros to such victims, it emerges from a new report written by Manu Keirse, Professor Emeritus of the KULeuven (University of Leuven) and President of the Commission Interdiocésaine pour la Protection des Enfants et des Jeunes (Inter-diocesan Commission for the Protection of Children and Youths) which will be presented this Monday (today) in Brussels.

To deal with victims’ complaints, the Church has itself put in place reception centres, which are spread across Belgian dioceses and religious congregations, as well as a central information point where those wishing to make a complaint are assisted to do so.

Victims of crimes which are statute-barred, who cannot take legal action have also been encouraged to come forward through public appeals. “Just because the legal time-limits for these crimes have passed, does not mean that these crimes are a thing of the past for victims,” Manu Keirse asserts.

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

KENTUCKY
Lexington Herald-Leader

BY MICHAEL MCKAY
mmckay@herald-leader.com

The church worker charged with rape of a 16-year-old met his alleged victim when she was 10 and warned her she would be banned from mission trips if she told anyone about their activities, a Lexington detective testified Tuesday.

Tony Sasnett, 39, was the home Bible study director for Greater Faith Apostolic Church on Clay’s Mill Road in Lexington. As a result of Sasnett’s church role, police and the prosecution argued he was in a position of “special trust” with the victim, but his attorney, Dan Carman, disputed that contention at Tuesday’s preliminary hearing with Fayette District Judge Kim Wilkie.

Sasnett is charged with four counts of third-degree rape, one count of sexual abuse and one count of using a phone to solicit nude photos of a minor. He was originally charged with five counts of rape, but one charge was dismissed at Tuesday’s hearing because the alleged event happened in neighboring Jessamine County.

In testimony, detective Tyler Smith with the Crimes Against Children Unit described how the father of three school-aged children escalated the relationship with the victim from a joke about a massage to sex in parked cars and in Sasnett’s home.

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

OHIO
WOWK

[with video]

By Randy Yohe

A community expressed relief after police arrest a man they are calling a sexually violent predator. Police arrested a Southern Ohio country church pastor Monday, and said he preyed on children and the disabled.

A Jackson County, Ohio Grand Jury charged 67-year-old Dennis Wright with 15 felony charges. Charges that included seven counts of rape, two counts of sexual battery, two counts of unlawful sexual conduct with a minor, and several other sexually related charges …

Reports said two of the victims belonged to the church where Wright worked as a Minster. 13 news has more on how police are now looking for more victims.

“Everybody in the neighborhood knew what was going on,” Elliott Perry said.

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

BELGIUM
WEST – Welfare Society Territory

by Ivano Abbadessa – 2016.02.23

In Belgium, more than 1,000 people have reported sexual abuse committed by priests between 2012 and 2015. It’s just one of the striking findings of a report presented in Brussels by an inter-diocese Commission for sexual abuse in the Church. The victims were mainly children with 89 per cent still classed as juveniles at the time. Almost one-quarter (23 per cent) were under 10 and 71 per cent were male. They were abused by dozens of paedophile priests. Although 80 per cent of cases took place more than 30 years ago, the horror suffered by the victims leaves an indelible mark that often drives them to alcohol, drugs and, in extreme cases, even suicide. This European scandal is a close-to-home reminder of the American abuse cases, uncovered as part of the ‘Spotlight Investigation’. Now an Oscar-nominated film just out in Italian cinemas, Spotlight tells the story of the Boston Globe reporters who, in 2002, revealed the abuse perpetrated in the US Church, which for years hid the most serious acts of paedophilia by clergy.

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

AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Jessica Longbottom
Posted February 24, 2016

A senior Christian Brother authorised spending on a private investigator to track down victims of notorious paedophile Brother Edward Dowlan, the royal commission into child sexual abuse has heard.

Brother Brian Brandon was a provincial council member of St Patrick’s province of the Christian Brothers, which covered Victoria and Tasmania, between 1984 and 1996.

Since 1993, he has dealt with sex abuse claims brought against the Christian Brothers as part of his role with the order’s Professional Standards Board.

Testifying before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Ballarat, he revealed the tactics engaged by the Christian Brothers to bully people who took sex abuse claims to police.

In 1995, he authorised spending on a private investigator who was targeting victims of Brother Edward Dowlan, who is now in jail for molesting dozens of boys.

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

SOUTH AFRICA
Daily Maverick

KINGSLEY KIPURY interviews Richard Sipe, sociologist and ex-priest who authored the ground-breaking research on sexual abuse in the clergy. He explains how this has gone on for centuries, how celibacy could be the problem, and what the church needs to do if it has any chance of reform

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

UNITED STATES
The Stylus

By Charlotte Luft
On February 23, 2016

The Catholic Church has been a powerful institution since its inception; even during a time when people who were found to be Catholic were killed, the church had great power and sway.

The key element behind the church’s power was the idea that Catholicism was for the common man.

The idea of Catholicism has evolved since it was created as it has switched from the common man’s religion to a religion of the rich and powerful.

The introduction of money into the church system has lead to corruption on multiple levels, but perhaps the most atrocious institution that has evolved into the church system is the sexual abuse of children.

According to the columbia.com article, “Catholic clergy scandal: Possibly just 5 out of 77 sexual abusers convicted” by The Associated Press, there is a list of 77 Catholic priests and clergy members who were listed as allegedly sexually abusing children, of those accused on the list only about five were convicted of the crime.

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

WASHINGTON
Seattle Weekly

By Sara Bernard Tue., Feb 23 2016

Last month, the Seattle Catholic Archdiocese published a list of 77 names of priests and other clergy credibly accused of child sexual abuse while working or living in western Washington. (It was updated a week later and now contains 78 names.) As a step toward healing and transparency, it made a significant splash, but perhaps not quite the one the church had hoped. Releasing a list of names is “not a worthless gesture,” says David Clohessy, executive director of the St. Louis-based Survivors’ Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP), but the information is, to him, infuriatingly incomplete.

“There have been tons of exposes, and harsh editorials, and criminal prosecutions, and lawsuits, and settlements, and apologies, and promises” involving the Catholic church, argues Clohessy, who was molested for years, along with his two brothers, by a priest in Missouri’s Jefferson City Diocese. He says Seattle is the latest in a list of dioceses across the country to “parcel out tiny bits of information” without revealing larger, systemic truths. “The one untried remedy here is punishing—or even exposing—the enablers. I challenge Catholics to name one church employee anywhere, from custodian to cardinal, who’s lost one day’s pay for ignoring or concealing horrific crimes against kids.”

Clohessy, like many survivors and advocates, including former King County Superior Court judge Terry Carroll, former U.S. attorney Mike McKay, Seattle attorney Michael Pfau, SNAP Northwest director Mary Dispenza, and the Seattle Times editorial board, is urging the Seattle Archdiocese to release the full files on its predator priests—a trove of still-secret documents that private consultants used to put the original list together.

That would paint a much fuller picture, Clohessy and others say, of the system that allowed this abuse to happen.

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

AUSTRALIA
The Age

February 24, 2016

Chris Johnston

The former headmaster of St Kevins College in Toorak, Brother Brian Brandon – a senior Victorian Catholic administrator – admitted today it was “questionable” to give paedophile priest Ted Dowlan a job at an orphanage housing young victims of clerical sexual abuse.

Brother Brandon – a former head of legal affairs and provincial council member of the Christian Brothers for Victoria and Tasmania – said there were “suspicions” but not “knowledge” of Brother Dowlan’s sexual interest in boys at the time of the appointment.

Brother Brandon has also held a role with the church’s professional standards team.

Brother Dowlan started working at the St Vincents Boys Orphanage in South Melbourne in 1989.
He was jailed in 1996 for sexually interfering with boys in Ballarat, both at St Patrick’s College, and his previous school, St Alipius primary.

At the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Ballarat, under questioning by Justice Peter McClellan, Brother Brandon said despite “suspicions” about Dowlan, a serial paedophile since the early 1970s, he was not made a teacher at the orphanage, but a co-ordinator.

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

AUSTRALIA
The Age

February 24, 2016

Amber Wilson

A GROUP of women claiming to have been abused by the Ballarat clergy in the 1950s and 1960s have started a protest outside Nazareth House, the Ballarat nursing home where Bishop Ronald Mulkearns now lives.

Bishop Mulkearns, now retired, is due to give evidence to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse on Thursday via video link from the Mill Street nursing home.

Gabby Short and Wendy Eldridge were among the group of women who demanded answers from the staff at the site, which was formerly also a girls’ orphanage. They are demanding to know why the home is now “giving sanctuary” to the priest, whose testimony has regularly been delayed by Bishop Mulkearns’ ill health.

At one point the women tried to enter the building but were asked to leave by staff.
Police said they were happy for the women to protest from the street, but asked them not to enter the premises.

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

MALTA
Times of Malta

Wednesday, February 24, 2016

by Martin Scicluna

I have just seen the film Spotlight. It tells the story in a calm and low key manner of the Boston Globe’s team of reporters and that newspaper’s tenacious and scrupulous exposure in 2002 of the most harrowing litany of child sex abuse crimes dating back 50 years in the Roman Catholic diocese of Boston.

The diocese had covered up the decades-long abuse at the highest levels in Boston’s religious, legal and state establishments, sparking off a wave of revelations around the world, leading the Vatican to consider similar allegations against some 3000 priests between 2001 and 2010.

The Diocese of Boston subsequently paid $85 million in compensation for the mental anguish and, in many cases, criminal violence inflicted on about 550 victims. The Archbishop of Boston, Cardinal Law, was subsequently forced to resign.

When asked to comment on the film, Archbishop Charles Scicluna, who served for eight years in the Vatican as the prosecutor of sexual abuse of minors by priests from 2002 (the same year as the Boston revelations), said that: “Disclosure of abuse is the best service that one can render the Church.”

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

CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Sun-Times

A former Chicago priest who pleaded guilty to multiple child sex abuse charges in 2007 is due in court on more abuse allegations involving a boy while he was still a priest.

Daniel McCormack was arrested in 2014 in the 2005 case involving a 10-year-old alleged victim at a West Side parish.

Attorneys also will be in court Wednesday for a status hearing on his custody at a state mental health facility. McCormack remains committed under the Sexually Violent Persons Commitment Act.

McCormack was removed from the priesthood and pleaded guilty in 2007 to abusing five children. He was sentenced to five years in prison.

Earlier this month a judge ruled that a man who was an alleged victim of McCormack’s 16 years ago can seek punitive damages.

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

AUSTRALIA
The Age

February 24, 2016

Chris Johnston

The Christian Brothers hired a private investigator in 1995 to “dig up dirt” on victims of a notorious paedophile priest in Ballarat.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse was told today the private investigator, Glynis McNeight, of Ballarat, visited two victims of Brother Ted Dowlan at home just before Dowlan was charged by police for historical sex crimes against boys.

The object of the exercise, the commission heard, was for the Christian Brothers’ legal team – from a small firm in Ocean Grove – to find out what kind of witnesses the victims would be in court and whether, according to counsel assisting the commission Stephen Free, they would be “easily torn apart in the witness box”.

One victim Ms McNeight visited ended up crying and agitated and she reported to the law firm – which was being paid by the Christian Brothers – that the victim was “nervous” and “excitable” and was prone to tears and bad language. He would have “no credibility” as a witness, she wrote.

The investigator, who called herself an “inquiry agent”, asked Victoria Police for details of the victims but police refused. A policeman involved in the investigation warned her that she could pervert the course of justice.

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

AUSTRALIA
The Advetiser

Sean Fewster and Nigel Hunt
The Advertiser

FATHER John Fleming engaged in criminal, predatory, deceitful and morally reprehensible sexual behaviour with a minor while working as an Anglican priest, the Supreme Court has ruled.

On Wednesday, the court dismissed the now-Catholic priest’s defamation lawsuit, ruling The Advertiser and Sunday Mail’s reports about his illegal sexual misconduct were true.

Auxiliary Justice Malcolm Gray ruled the newspapers had made out their defence to Fr Fleming’s claims they had defamed him and caused him to lose a lucrative job with a Catholic college.

He said the newspapers’ imputations that Fr Fleming — one of Australia’s most prominent priests — “engaged in criminal sexual behaviour” during his time with the Anglican Church were substantially true.

He also said the articles truthfully conveyed imputations that Fr Fleming was engaged in “sexual misconduct, predatory sexual behaviour, morally reprehensible and deceitful conduct, an immoral, adulterous, homosexual affair, hypocrisy, abuse of trust, moral cowardice and false denial of sexual involvement.”

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

NEW JERSEY
Observer-Tribune

By PHIL GARBER Managing Editor

MENDHAM – It was just too painful to see it alone, so Bill Crane asked his wife, Jane, to go with him to see the film, “Spotlight.”

Monsignor Kenneth Lasch said he knew seeing the film would trigger many difficult memories so he also needed someone to help him get through it.

And Richard Sipe said he cried at the point in the movie when the Boston Globe‘s editor, Marty Baron, tells his staff that he wants to expose the system, and not just individuals, that allowed priests to go unpunished while they sexually abused young boys.

“Spotlight” is the story of the Boston Globe’s Pulitzer Prize winning investigation into cases of widespread and systemic child sex abuse in the Boston area by numerous Roman Catholic priests. The Globe investigation sparked similar probes around the nation and the world. It touched locally when a former priest at St. Joseph Church in Mendham, James Hanley, was defrocked for having abused multiple young boys.

In addition to the priests who have been defrocked and prosecuted, the National Catholic Reporter found that clergy abuse has cost the Catholic Church in America $4 billion since 1950 in settlements, therapy for victims, and other costs.

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

NEW YORK
Buffalo News

By Jay Rey | News Staff Reporter
on February 23, 2016

Video footage from a Buffalo school bus refutes a young boy’s claims that he was sexually assaulted in December while on the bus home from a Catholic school, according to a source familiar with the investigation.

Investigators have retrieved the surveillance footage from the day of the alleged bus incident and found nothing on the video to substantiate that the 6-year-old accuser was sexually molested by an older student.

“The videotape does not support the allegations of abuse,” the source said.

The Catholic Diocese of Buffalo echoed that stance Tuesday.

“Our investigation of the allegation of abuse, including a review of the videotape, does not support the claim of abuse,” the diocese said in a statement.

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

MASSACHUSETTS
CommonWealth

ANTONIO F.D. CABRAL
Feb 23, 2016

SPOTLIGHT, BOSTON’S OWN OSCAR NOMINEE FOR BEST PICTURE, highlighted the courageous work of Boston Globe reporters and editors that exposed the Catholic Church’s handling of clergy sexual abuse. The Globe’s reporting forced the issue of clergy sexual abuse onto the Commonwealth’s agenda, both culturally and politically.

Since the movie focused elsewhere, few of the movie’s fans know the political impact of the Globe’s work. I had a front row seat to Beacon Hill’s reaction to the Globe’s reporting as I’d been appointed the House chairman of the legislative committee that handled child abuse legislation just a few months earlier. While the story may not be Oscar worthy, the speed with which Massachusetts state government responded to the scandal, after years of inaction prior to the Globe’s reports, is a reminder that the legislative process, designed to be deliberative, can move quickly at times even in the face of long-standing opposition.

As Spotlight portrays, the issue of clergy sexual abuse was not unknown when the Globe published the first of its many stories on the church’s coverup on Jan. 6, 2002. For at least a decade, legislators had been filing bills in Massachusetts to include clergy in the Commonwealth’s mandated reporter law, section 51A of Chapter 119 of the Massachusetts General Laws. This law, enacted in the 1970s, requires those who hold certain jobs, generally the jobs which require interaction with children and their families, to immediately report the abuse of a child to law enforcement. Until 2002, religious officials, including priests, rabbis, etc., as well as their superiors, were exempt from this law.

A handful of victims of abuse by priests, like Phil Saviano who appears in the film, had been lobbying for these bills for years, testifying before the Legislature, trying unsuccessfully to get attention for the issue. At the time of the law’s passage in the 1970s and through the following decades leading up to the Globe’s reporting, the Catholic Church had a full-time lobbyist on Beacon Hill and these bills that would have added clergy to the list of mandated reporters never made it out of committee.

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

UNITED STATES
Slant

An Interview with Neal Huff

BY GERARD RAYMOND ON FEBRUARY 23, 2016

It was Phil Saviano’s persistence to bring his story of sexual abuse to the attention of the Boston Globe’s Spotlight team that led to a full-scale investigation into the allegations and reports of sexual misconduct by priests of the Archdiocese of Boston and its cover-up by officials in the Catholic Church. This investigation would eventually win the paper’s reporters the Pulitzer Prize, and more than 10 years later become the focus of Tom McCarthy’s critically acclaimed Spotlight. Neal Huff, who plays Saviano in the film, worked with McCarthy on HBO’s The Wire, on which the former played a political aide and the latter a morally challenged reporter. While their working relationship may have allowed Huff to get his foot in the door, it was the physical and emotional intensity of his audition that sealed the deal. The New York stage, film, and television actor’s incredibly deep connection to Saviano is very much evident on the screen, and during our recent chat, he discussed the making of Spotlight and his relationship with Saviano, as well as his urgent desire to play his character in a way that was at once truthful and necessarily representative.

What was it like meeting the real Phil Saviano?

When I read the script I didn’t even know if the character was an actual person. So the first thing I did was ask if they had any info on him beyond the scene itself. It turned out that [co-screenwriter] Josh Singer had done a really extensive interview with Phil in 2012 and he shared that with me. I immediately asked if I could get in touch with Phil, add within days I was in Phil’s house, spending time with him. That began what has become a really significant friendship in my life. He’s a real original, from the way he thinks to expresses himself. He was so generous. I immediately knew that it was going to be a collaboration between us. But I also knew that the character had to serve a certain function in the story. There are a few survivors in the film, and they all serve different functions—even as notes for the audience. And so I spent a lot of time talking with Tom [McCarthy] about what he really needed. We knew there was Phil, but there was also the Phil Saviano character, which was what they needed for the purposes of the scene. Phil knew this wasn’t exactly about him—that he was representing a lot of people.

How did you gain his confidence?

He said he could tell my heart was in the right place and that he knew I had a very personal stake. I had friends who’d been abused from childhood and high school, so I was very curious. And the thing with Phil is his remarkable generosity. I have never met anybody like him in that regard. He’s very open about what happened to him and he never repressed any of it. He just thought he was the only one, which is why he never talked about it.

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

MINNESOTA
Crookston Times

By Jess Bengtson

Posted Feb. 23, 2016

The Roman Catholic Church in southern India recently made a decision to lift the suspension of a former Crookston priest accused of sexual abuse.

Father Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul, 61, was originally suspended in 2010 after being charged with assaulting two girls who were both 14 at the time of the alleged abuse. Jeyapaul fled the United States, but was arrested in India by Interpol in 2012 and extradited to the U.S. He plead guilty and was convicted of fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct involving a Greenbush, Minnesota teenage girl, and was sentenced to one year in jail.

Jeyapaul is now back in his native country of India and could be allowed to work in the church again following the lifted suspension.

Former Clay County prosecutor Heidi Davies told a local news station that she was “shocked” that the Catholic Church had not even contacted law enforcement to learn anything about him or his case. Minneapolis attorney and child victim advocate mentioned that the promise made by Pope Francis to tackle the problem of sexual abuse by priests seems to have been violated.

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

MISSOURI
Religion Dispatches

BY PATRICIA MILLER FEBRUARY 23, 2016

In the latest example of a high-ranking Catholic prelate who hasn’t gotten the memo from Pope Francis that the culture wars are over, St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson is urging parishes in his diocese to cut ties with the Girl Scouts because the organization is “increasingly incompatible with Catholic values.”

And what could members of the 100-year-old girls service organization be doing that has so alarmed Carlson? Are Brownies dissing Jesus by making Christmas trees out of old Reader’s Digests? Is someone taking that Campfire badge a little too seriously (I swear it was an accident—and my sister’s eyebrows did grow back)?

No, what has Carlson concerned isn’t anything specific Girl Scouts or Girl Scout troops in St. Louis are doing. His concerns include a rehash of charges against the national Girl Scouts organization ginned up by conservatives associated with the Ethics and Public Policy Center and given credence by an “investigation” by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. These charges boil down to the organization’s membership in the World Association of Girl Guides and Girls Scouts (WAGGGS), which, according to the bishops, advocates for “so-called ‘sexual and reproductive health/rights’.”

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

UNITED KINGDOM
The Times

Sean O’Neill Chief Reporter

A Church of England priest held secret talks with police in an attempt to cover up the scale of sex offending by a senior bishop who was a friend of the royal family, according to documents seen by The Times.

The priest, a former police officer, set out to disprove the police case against Peter Ball but concluded in a confidential report in 1993 that the cleric had abused “very many young men who passed through his care.”

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

AUSTRALIA
Leader

Nicholas Payne
Mordialloc Chelsea Leader

ANGRY parents at two Catholic schools have hired a prominent sexual and institutional abuse lawyer as they demand the resignation of the parish priest.

Parents from St Patrick’s Parish Primary in Mentone and St John Vianney’s in Parkdale want Father John Walshe to quit his post.

Their lawyer, Angela Sdrinis, told the Leader the school community “has lost confidence” in the priest and that his position “is untenable”.

Ms Sdrinis said the concerned parents believe they “strongly represent the vast majority of the parents in the school community”, and have requested an “urgent response” from the Melbourne Archdiocese.

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

UNITED KINGDOM
YouTube – via BBC Panorama

Panorama –
The Secret Letters of Pope John Paul II

Pope John Paul II ruled the Catholic Church for 27 years until 2005. He was one of the most influential figures of the twentieth century, revered by millions and made a saint in record time. Now reporter Edward Stourton can offer a new perspective on the emotional life of this very public figure.

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

ILLINOIS
WJBD

2/23/2016

BELLEVILLE, Ill. (AP) – Questions remain about the removal of a priest recruited from the Philippines by the Catholic Diocese of Belleville to replace a cleric arrested for theft.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that parishioners in two small towns near southern Illinois’ Rend Lake weren’t told why the Rev. Peter Balili was removed in 2014.

U.S. Conference of Bishops’ notice that Balili was dismissed over “inappropriate conduct regarding certain of his parishioners” doesn’t appear to have been released by the Belleville diocese to its members. The notice did not specify the nature of that conduct or the age of the parishioners.

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

UNITED KINGDOM
Telegraph

Dame Moira Gibb to oversee behind-closed-doors review in case handling of Peter Ball case in Carey era

By John Bingham, Religious Affairs Editor 23 Feb 2016

A new inquiry is to investigate how much senior figures in the Church of England including the former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey knew about the activities of the sex abuser bishop Peter Ball.

It follows claims the Church covered up the full extent of its knowledge of the abuse for two decades.

Dame Moira Gibb, a former council chief executive, is to chair an independent review, ordered last year by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev Justin Welby, into how the Church of England responded to the case of Ball, who resigned in disgrace as Bishop of Gloucester in 1993.

Ball, now 83, was jailed last year after pleading guilty to abusing 18 young men, including teenagers, in Litlington, East Sussex, in the 1970s and 1980s during his time as Bishop of Lewes.

Ball accepted a police caution for gross indecency and resigned from his position as Bishop of Gloucester after one victim went to police in the early 1990s.

But it meant he avoided more serious charges until the case was finally reopened 20 years later.

The Rev Vickery House, Ball’s deputy helping run a Church gap-year scheme for young men testing out a possible “call” to ordination was also jailed for sexual offences in a separate case. …

Keith Porteous Wood, executive director of the National Secular Society, which has campaigned on the issue of clerical abuse, said the inquiry must also investigate allegations that whistleblowers were effectively silenced.

“The inquiry is woefully incomplete unless the terms of reference make specific reference to establishing the extent of historic and current bullying by senior figures in the Church of alleged victims and whistleblowers,” he claimed.

“This bullying has led to a suicide and considerable psychological harm beyond the abuse itself.

“They must also specifically establish the extent to which church officials sought – or encouraged others – to intervene with the CPS, the police and dissuading complainants from reporting to the police.

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

ROME/AUSTRALIA
Los Angeles Times

[note: Testimony will begin in the U.S. at 4 p.m. (eastern time zone) on Sunday and will be live- streamed from the Royal Commission web site.]

Tom Kington

An extraordinary scene will unfold in a hotel in Rome late Sunday night when one of Pope Francis’ most trusted advisors sits down for the first of up to four nights of live-streamed testimony about his role in an alleged cover-up of sexual abuse in Australia.

Cardinal George Pell, the Vatican finance minister and Australia’s senior Roman Catholic cleric, will be subjected to questioning from 10 p.m. until 2 a.m. nightly for at least three and possibly four nights by judges linked via video from halfway around the world in Sydney, where it will be morning.

Pell, 74, has not been allowed to have a lawyer travel from his home country to be at his side, but he will not be alone: He is being joined during the hearings by a group of victims of priestly abuse who are traveling from Australia to be in the room with him.

In December, Pell was summoned to give evidence about abuse near Melbourne, Australia, but his lawyers argued his heart condition made it dangerous to fly, and suggested he speak by videolink from Rome.

Australia’s Royal Commission on child abuse wants to quiz the cardinal about his alleged role in moving a pedophile priest, Gerald Ridsdale, from one parish to another in Australia in the 1970s and 1980s — a common pattern in Catholic dioceses around the world at the time.

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

UNITED KINGDOM
Western Gazette

A BISHOP from the Langport area convicted of sex offences attempted to make a deal with police to avoid a scandal, it has been claimed.

Bishop Peter Ball, formerly of Aller, was sentenced to 32 months’ imprisonment in October, after he pleaded guilty to two counts of indecent assault and one count of misconduct in a public office between 1977 and 1992.

Now documents have come to light which suggest that Ball’s defence team, which included a priest, sought to broker a deal with the police to avoid the “scandal of a trial”.

The documents in question, which were seen by the BBC, were intended only for the eyes of the late Eric Kemp, former bishop of Chichester, and Lord George Carey, then-Archbishop of Canterbury.

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

MEXICO
Sin Embargo

[10 Keys | The “princes” of the Catholic Church and its excesses: travel, luxury, homes, parties …]

Durante su visita a México, el Papa Francisco I fue crítico con los políticos mexicanos, pero también, de manera enfática, con la cúpula de la Iglesia católica, vista por los fieles muy cercana a los poderes político y económico, y cada vez más lejos de su grey, especialmente de los más pobres y desamparados. Obispos y Arzobispos, sin embargo, están permanentemente rodeados de gobernantes y empresarios influyentes, y presumen, sin rubor, un estilo de vida suntuoso.

Ciudad de México, 20 de febrero (SinEmbargo).– El llamado del Papa Francisco a los obispos mexicanos durante su visita al país fue claro y contundente: deben acercarse a la “periferia humana”, “involucrarse en las comunidades parroquiales y las escuelas”, dejarse de personalismos y no actuar como “príncipes”.

México es un país donde la jerarquía eclesiástica en general mantiene un estrecho vínculo con la clase política y económica, vive fuera del precepto de austeridad y tiene posiciones muy conservadoras y distantes de lo que opina el país en temas como el matrimonio homosexual o el aborto.

Los casos son varios. Por ejemplo, al Arzobispo primado de México, el Cardenal Norberto Rivera Carrera, se le pudo ver junto al magnate Carlos Slim Helú y otros grandes empresarios del país en Galicia, España, en agosto de 2013, donde ofició una misa y pasó unos días de vacaciones.

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

NEW YORK
WIVB

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) — A spokeswoman for Sen. Tim Kennedy says the State Education Department is investigating two alleged cases of abuse on Buffalo school buses.

In a letter to State Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia, Kennedy says a 6-year-old boy was allegedly abused by a 12-year-old on the bus in December.

School officials with the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo are also investigating that incident.

The letter also mentioned a situation where a mother said her 9-year-old South Buffalo son was physically and sexually abused on a school bus.

Kennedy says he wants to see if bus aides are needed to prevent issues of abuse.

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

INDIA
Times of India

PAL: A six year old girl was raped by the priest of a temple in Anuppur district of Madhya Pradesh.
The accused priest Ramkrishna Kewat, was arrested and presented before court on Tuesday.

The incident took place at Badra village under Bhalumada police station of the district on February 21.

The survivor’s parents went to market in Kotma town leaving the girl at home, it was then that the accused took the girl to the temple and raped her, said police.

When the parents of the girl returned they found that the girl is not well, she was taken to the local doctor but the girl could not tell what has happened, it was only after her condition deteriorated next day, she told her mother about the incident on February 22, police said.

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

UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Harriet Sherwood Religion correspondent
@harrietsherwood
Tuesday 23 February 2016

The Church of England has appointed an independent panel to review its handling of the case of Peter Ball, the former bishop of Lewes and Gloucester who was jailed for sex abuse offences, and to help it “learn from its errors”.

The review, which will report to the archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, within a year, is to examine what information was in the church’s possession concerning Ball, and when; and whether the church’s response was appropriate and complied with the law.

Ball, 83, was sentenced last October to 32 months in prison for the grooming, sexual exploitation and abuse of 18 vulnerable young men between 1977 and 1992.

His trial at the Old Bailey heard that a string of senior establishment figures, including an unidentified member of the royal family, wrote letters in support of Ball while the police were investigating allegations of abuse. Following a caution for gross indecency in 1993, Paul resigned as bishop of Gloucester and lived in a rented cottage on the Prince of Wales’s Duchy of Cornwall estate. He was not prosecuted for more than 20 years.

On New Year’s Eve, the church released a cache of letters following a Freedom of Information request. One from the former archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, to the chief constable of Gloucester spoke of Ball’s “excruciating pain and spiritual torment” over the abuse allegations.

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

UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

By Colin Campbell
BBC South East home affairs correspondent

A victim of sexual abuse at the hands of a bishop has claimed a “deeply sinister, co-ordinated cover up” allowed him to escape justice.

Bishop Peter Ball, who was jailed last year for abusing young men between the 1970s and 1980s, was investigated by police in 1993 and given a caution.

He admitted to his defence team, which included a priest, that he had committed sexual offences.

Gloucestershire Police said a thorough investigation took place.

Documents seen by the BBC suggest Ball’s defence team sought to do a deal with the police to avoid the “scandal of a trial”.

Ball, who was previously Bishop of Lewes, promised to resign as Bishop of Gloucester and “immediately leave the country”, but instead continued to officiate as a priest in the Church of England until 2010.

Rev Graham Sawyer, one of the men abused by Ball said: “It looks like there was a deeply sinister, coordinated, but probably in the end rather inept attempt at a cover-up.”

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

DEUTSCHLAND
Sexueller Missbrauch durch Angehörige der katholischen Kirche im Bistum Trier

[Is the Munster diocese made all right? No!]

Liebes Bistum Münster,
sehr geehrter Herr Dr. Kronenburg,

leider erhielt ich bisher noch keine Antwort auf die email, in der ich darum bat, mir mitzuteilen, wie Sie, Herr Kronenburg, die Begrifflichkeit “sexuell intendierte Handlung” definieren. Optimal wäre natürlich eine Quellenangabe, aus welcher hervorginge, dass dieser Begriff einheitlich definiert wird und nicht von einem bischöflichen Pressesprecher aus den weiten Feldern der Psychologie, Psychiatrie, Strafgerichtsbarkeit, Forensik etc. etc. bewusst irreführend und verharmlosend als Begründung für die Beurlaubung eines Priesters offiziell abgegeben wird.

Immerhin geht die Brisanz hinsichtlich der geäußerten Vorwürfe daraus hervor, dass zum einen sowohl die kirchenrechtliche Untersuchung innerhalb kürzester Zeit abgeschlossen wurde (fast schon rekordverdächtig!) als auch der Beschuldigte umgehend “beurlaubt” (!) und in ein Kloster gesandt wurde. Mit dem absurden Hinweis: “wo er niemandem schaden könne”. Ich erinnere Sie an dieser Stelle selbstverständlich gerne an die “causa Ver.”. Auch ihn sandte das Bistum Trier damals in ein Kloster. Leider. Ich erinnere Sie auch an die Flötenspielenden kleinen Mädchen, mit denen er im Kloster die Adventsfeier gestaltete. Ich hoffe, Sie erinnern sich auch und an die Schlagzeilen, die sich daraus ergaben. Soviel zu Ihrer Behauptung: “Niemanden schaden können”!

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

BELGIEN
Flandern Info

[New oversight board against abuse in the Church]

Die katholische Kirche in Belgien wird einen Sonderausschuss einrichten. Dieser soll begutachten, ob jemand noch seine Priesterarbeit ausführen kann, wenn er des sexuellen Missbrauchs beschuldigt wird oder worden ist. Damit will die Kirche neuen Missbrauch verhindern.

1.000 Missbrauchsopfer haben sich in den vergangenen Jahren bei der Kirche oder bei einer anderen Stelle gemeldet. Häufig haben sie vor allem Anerkennung ihres Leids gesucht, sagt Manu Keirse. Er ist innerhalb der Kirche für die Aufnahme verantwortlich.

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

MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation

[with document]

02/22/2016

Mid-February, the attached email was sent to parish representatives by the attorney representing the parish group. I received it via a circuitous route which I will not outline here. My reason for posting it is because it provides the clearest demonstration of the attitude with which the recently announced settlement has been received, as well as an important heads up regarding what to expect as the civil window opened by the Minnesota Child Victims Act expires. See the highlighted text below.

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

ITALIA
IL Giorno

[Priest Mauro Inzoli is charged with abusing five boys.]

di PIERGIORGIO RUGGERI

Crema, 23 febbraio 2016 – Il giorno del giudizio, per don Mauro Inzoli, sarà il 9 marzo prossimo, quando la sua causa verrà discussa davanti a Letizia Platè, giudice delle udienze preliminari. E si parlerà di abusi sessuali su minori che il prete in Mercedes, come veniva chiamato, vista l’auto che utilizzava e che aveva ottenuto in regalo, avrebbe commesso dal 2004 al 2008. In totale, otto casi, ma un’altra quindicina è già andata in prescrizione. Secondo i bene informati gli avvocati di don Mauro, i fratelli Giarda, avrebbero chiesto informazioni sul patteggiamento, ripiegando poi sul rito abbreviato. Questo significa che in caso di condanna don Mauro può contare su uno sconto di pena di un terzo e, soprattutto, si potrà fare appello. Il che allunga i tempi processuali pericolosamente verso una prescrizione di tutti gli eventuali reati.

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

AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

February 23, 2016

SHANNON DEERY
Herald Sun

A SENIOR Christian Brother saw nothing wrong with one of his colleagues kissing every boy in his class before they left school for the day.

Br Paul Nangle also told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse today that child abuse may not always be a sin.

The commission heard Gerald Leo Fitzgerald, known as Br Leo to his grade three class at Ballarat’s St Alipius’s Primary School, had long been considered a danger.

As early as the 1950s he had been censured “as strongly as possible” after it was discovered he had kissed a boy and was routinely entering boys’ bedrooms.

But when the policeman father of one of the students complained of the group kissing practice Christian Brothers superior Br Nangle In 1975, he thought nothing of it.

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

AUSTRALIA
news.com.au

AAP

Victoria’s corruption watchdog is the right body to investigate into how details of allegations against Cardinal George Pell became public, the state’s attorney-general says.

Victoria Police’s Taskforce Sano has spent a year investigating allegations Cardinal Pell sexually abused five to 10 victims while he was a priest in Victoria, the Herald Sun reported on Saturday.

The Catholic Church has described the allegations as being “without foundation and utterly false”.

It believes they were leaked at a time “clearly designed to do maximum damage to the Cardinal and the Catholic Church”.

Cardinal Pell is due to give videolink evidence from Rome to the child sex abuse royal commission in Sydney about unrelated matters.

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

AUSTRALIA/ROME
The Age

February 23, 2016

Suzanne Carbone
Journalist

The ornate four-star Rome hotel where Cardinal George Pell will give evidence in the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is steeped in drama because the property is connected to an opera house where human tragedy has been played out since 1880.

The imperial-style Hotel Quirinale​ was built in 1865 and is where Cardinal Pell and 15 clerical-abuse victims and supporters from Ballarat will gather for the public hearings.

At the request of Cardinal Pell, the hearing will start at 10pm on Sunday in Rome, which is 8am Monday in Australia. The evidence will be transmitted to the commission’s hearing in Sydney.
His evidence will be streamed on the Royal Commission’s website. A room at the Ballarat Town Hall has been set up for people to watch the webcast.

In the eternal city, Hotel Quirinale is linked to the Teatro dell’Opera​ via its courtyard and is located on the popular Via Nazionale shopping strip that leads to Piazza della Repubblica​.

From the hotel, it is a 10-minute walk to the Colosseum. The Trevi Fountain and Spanish Steps are a 15-minute stroll, and the Vatican is 10 minutes by car.

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

AUSTRALIA
The Age

February 23, 2016

Frank O’Shea

Isn’t it time someone spoke up for George Pell? I have never met him and have no ambition to do so. He seems to lack what you might call warmth; he comes across as remote, patrician, above the ordinary herd. But you could say the same about many academics or judges or public figures and it is hardly a reason to excuse the poor press that he gets.

In fact, the strident common tone of the media treatment of Pell should be a signal to people to wonder whether we are being manipulated. When all public commentary seems to agree on something, it is a duty of those who do not take their opinions from the media or from shock jocks to raise a small squeal of protest.

Modern Australia has long forgotten the widespread sectarianism of a former era, but perhaps there are buried shoots, ready to sprout at the least provocation. And the clerical abuse crisis is just the kind of stimulant to get these weeds growing again.

You may still hear comments from those times in surprising places – your local golf club, the butcher shop where you pick up doggy scraps, a restaurant meal – comments which pass over your head because you are among friends. Offence was not intended and in your case, not taken, but you may subsequently wonder where the remark came from, what caused someone you know well to make a statement more appropriate to the Mannix days of the 1920s.

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

AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

Melissa Davey
@MelissaLDavey

Victoria police have referred the alleged leak of an investigation into Cardinal George Pell to the state’s anti-corruption commission.

The police said they were concerned details had been made public about the investigation into allegations of historical child sexual abuse.

The allegations, which Pell has vehemently denied and described as “outrageous”, were first reported on Friday night, allegedly as the result of police leaks to News Corp.

As a result, Victoria police said it had referred the matter to the Independent Broad-Based Anti-Corruption Commission. The commission will now review the case to see if it requires an investigation.

When the abuse allegations came to light, Pell called for an investigation into Victoria police to identify the source of the leaks. He also wrote to the Victorian police minister requesting the investigation.

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

AUSTRALIA
ABC – RN Breakfast

Monday 22 February 2016 Gregg Borschmann

Ballarat sexual abuse survivor Tony Wardley had previously chosen to remain anonymous. Now, thanks to the efforts of a crowd-funded campaign, he’s off to Rome to see Cardinal George Pell give evidence in person. Gregg Borschmann reports.

Tony Wardley can’t quite believe it.

He’s packing his bags for Rome, one of a group of 15 victim/survivors of child sexual abuse from Ballarat.

More than $203,000 has been raised in the past week to send the group to Rome to hear Cardinal George Pell give evidence to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Commissioner Justice Peter McClellan said today that the desire of the group to attend the hearings in Rome was a ‘reasonable request’. The venue is likely to be a hotel room, which will be tested later today for the quality of the video link it can provide.

‘That’s unreal. I wasn’t expecting it. You can’t see my face, but I’m smiling,’ Wardley, who was abused from the age of six at three different schools in Ballarat in the late 1960s and early 1970s, told RN Breakfast.

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

AUSTRALIA
Sky News

The ‘sexual revolution’ of the 1970s may have contributed to Christian Brothers sexually abusing children in a Victorian community, a religious superior says.

Brother Paul Nangle suggested the cultural change made it possible for things to occur that would not be accepted by society today, when asked to explain how so many Brothers could have abused children under his watch.

Br Nangle said the abuse and rape of children could never be justified but society became more relaxed about sexuality in the 1970s.

‘I wouldn’t say that it caused it,’ he said.

‘I’d be inclined to say that it might have contributed to creating a climate in which such things may have become possible.’

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

AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

[with video]

February 23 2016

John McMillan

Recent media coverage of Cardinal George Pell’s recall to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has ignited public debate on whether churches are willing to face up to child sexual abuse. Tim Minchin’s “musical attack” on Cardinal Pell has been a lightning rod for debate on social media.

Against a background of negative commentary, it is easy to lose sight of positive changes that are taking place across churches and the broader community.

On the same day last week that support for an “anti-Pell campaign” was building, the NSW Ombudsman’s office tabled a report in Parliament that told a different story – a story of church openness, not a “cover-up”.

The report, Strengthening the oversight of workplace child abuse allegations, comes after all of NSW’s Catholic and Anglican archbishops and bishops jointly called on the NSW Parliament at the end of last year to enact legislation that would open their churches’ work with children to further external scrutiny. These church leaders are asking Parliament to put measures in place to ensure that all allegations of sexual or other abuse of children made against their clergy, employees and volunteers must be reported to and oversighted by the Ombudsman.

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

FRANCE
Catholic Herald (UK)

by Catholic News Service posted Tuesday, 23 Feb 2016

French Cardinal Philippe Barbarin of Lyon is facing questions about how he dealt with a priest who faces abuse and rape charges.

Proceedings opened on January 27 against Fr Bernard Preynat, charged with “sexual aggression and rape of minors” between 1986 and 1991 at Lyon’s Saint-Luc parish, where he ran a large Catholic Scout group over two decades.

French newspapers said the priest had been moved to a new parish in Neulise after his alleged crimes were reported to Lyon Cardinal Albert Decourtray, who died in 1994. Fr Preynat was removed from parish work last August.

In a statement, La Parole Liberee, an organisation supporting abuse survivors, said 45 alleged victims of the priest had now come forward, adding that the group had filed charges against Cardinal Barbarin for failing to report abuse. Under France’s penal code, failure to report abuse carries a three-year jail term and a nearly €45,000 (£35,000) fine.

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

AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

Elise Elliott
Herald Sun

I WAS brought up a strict Catholic. I attended a Catholic convent school for 13 years and was taught by nuns.

My family went to mass every Sunday. As a little girl I cherished it: those massive doors, the cool serenity of church, the shafts of sunlight piercing through the stained-glass windows, the sombre magnificence of it all.

By the age of five I knew all the prayers by heart. Most memorable was the Penitential Rite: “I have sinned through my own fault, in my thoughts and in my words, in what I have done and in what I have failed to do.”

In my 20s I no longer attended mass regularly, but I would sometimes stop in to a church after going for a run, just to rekindle that sense of reverence and reflection.

But now, as a woman, I can no longer go inside a Catholic Church. The reports of abuse and cover-up have made the religion hollow to me.

I know at least six people who have been abused by priests. Some are friends, some family friends, others are relatives. Their harrowing stories are depressingly similar: they were singled out and preyed upon by someone they trusted and revered. They were too scared to confess for fear of going to hell.

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

CALIFORNIA
Los Angeles Times

By Amy Kaufman

Frank and Virginia Zamora were among the last to file out of the movie theater. The couple had seen “Spotlight” before, but still it was a jolt. Especially watching one particular actor with green eyes. He looked a lot like their son, Dominic, who died last year following a battle with alcoholism, an addiction his parents believe began after he was molested at age 8 by a priest in the Los Angeles Archdiocese.

“One day, when he was about 12, he told us he didn’t want to be an altar boy anymore,” recalled Virginia. “He and his dad got into an argument. Frank said, ‘It’s an honor to be an altar boy.'”

“I was an altar boy,” Frank interjected. “I always had respect for the priests. They were second to God.”

“Spotlight,” about the Boston Globe investigation that uncovered rampant child sex abuse within the Catholic Church, brings all these memories to the surface for the Zamoras. Which would seem to be a reason to stay away from the film and its Oscar campaign as it competes for six Academy Awards, including best picture.

Instead, the couple went out of their way to make the Culver City screening, which had all the trappings of an awards season gathering: a logo-patterned backdrop for photos, chicken skewers, a Q&A with movie talent.

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

AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Jessica Longbottom

The former headmaster of a Ballarat school where a notorious paedophile operated says he cannot remember any sexual abuse complaints ever being made against the teacher, a royal commission has heard.

Brother Paul Nangle, who was headmaster of St Patrick’s College from 1974 to 1979, has given evidence to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

He was questioned about his knowledge of Brother Edward Dowlan who worked at the school at the time, and was later convicted of molesting dozens of boys.

In a frustrating day of evidence for survivors, Brother Nangle answered many questions with “I can’t recall”, or “I can’t remember”, despite previous evidence at least four complaints were made to him about Brother Dowlan.

The now 84-year-old said he only remembered one accusation of corporal punishment levelled against Brother Dowlan, and never anything of a sexual nature.

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

AUSTRALIA
Daily Mail

By BELINDA GRANT GEARY FOR DAILY MAIL AUSTRALIA

A senior brother in the Catholic Church did not consider a teacher kissing his students to be sinister and thought it simply an ‘expression of an eccentric old man’ as it is revealed he hugged an accused child paedophile right after he admitted to physically abusing a year five student.

Paul Nangle, who was headmaster for St Patrick’s College in Ballarat during the 1970s, presented evidence the Royal Commission into Institutionalised Responses to Child Sexual Abuse on Tuesday.

The hearing is focused on the Catholic order’s handling of child sex abuse allegations involving six Christian Brothers, all of whom spent time working at schools in the Diocese of Ballarat.
Four have been convicted of child sex offences while another died in 1986.

The 89-year-old brother said he regrets the horrific child sex abuse committed by Christian Brothers under his watch, but insists he only knew about two complaints and had taken appropriate action.

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

AUSTRALIA/ROME
BBC News

Catholic Cardinal George Pell will face an audience of child abuse survivors when he testifies to an Australian inquiry from a Rome hotel.

Cardinal Pell was excused from returning to Australia to testify at the royal commission into child sex abuse due to ill health.

Abuse survivors and their supporters have raised enough money to attend Cardinal Pell’s testimony in Rome.

A room at the Hotel Quirinale will be the venue for next week’s hearing.

The cardinal’s testimony begins on Monday morning Australian time and is expected to run for three to four days.

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

UNITED STATES
The Daily Beach

Jason Berry

Pope Francis portrays himself as a man who leads by example, but his protection of bishops who protected child-abusing priests continues.

Pope Francis, speaking to reporters on the flight from Mexico City to Rome last week, gave his strongest comment yet on the clergy sex abuse crisis.

Francis called such acts “a monstrosity,” according to the Associated Press. In the Holy See’s transcript, the pope went beyond current Vatican policy in stating: “A bishop who moves a priest to a different parish if he detects a case of paedophilia is without conscience and the best thing for him to do would be to resign.”

But the official church policy on such bishops remains unclear, and the Vatican reform on this issue, charitably put, is a lurching work in progress.

By using the present tense—“a bishop who moves”— Francis may be signaling a going-forward stance when new cases surface. But what is the policy on bishops with past transgressions?

The pope echoed a Vatican Radio statement earlier in the week by one of his key advisors, Boston Cardinal Seán O’Malley, who chairs the Pontifical Commission on the Protection of Minors: “The crimes and sins of the sexual abuse of children must not be kept secret for any longer.”

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

UNITED STATES
USA Today

William F. Baker February 23, 2016

It is just a single line of dialogue from Spotlight, up for Best Picture and five other Academy Awards this Sunday, but it could be a movie in itself. It’s an allusion to an entire unknown chapter in the history of the Catholic Church sex abuse scandals: the role of the National Catholic Reporter (NCR) in first uncovering the clerical conspiracy to shield abusing priests.

“Have you read Jason Berry’s book? He wrote about the Gauthe case,” an abuse survivor asks the team of investigative reporters featured in the film.

The survivor, Phil Saviano as portrayed by Neal Huff, holds up a copy of Berry’s 1992 book, Lead Us Not Into Temptation: Catholic Priests and the Sexual Abuse of Children, which expanded on Berry’s reporting for the Times of Acadiana in partnership with the NCR.

The June 7, 1985, edition of the NCR was earth-shattering. Berry — whose child had recently been baptized Catholic — published a lengthy piece on Father Gilbert Gauthe’s sexual crimes and their concealment by the highest clerical authorities in Gauthe’s diocese in Lafayette, La. In the same issue, reporter Arthur Jones detailed the concealment of pedophile priests throughout America, and NCR wrote an editorial accusing American Catholic bishops of systemic inaction and silence.

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

AUSTRALIA
Noise 11

by PAUL CASHMERE on FEBRUARY 23, 2016

South Melbourne priest Father Bob Maguire added further to his comments about George Pell and Tim Minchin earlier this week clarifying his feeling for the Catholic Cardinal saying he is “not the greatest admirer (in Church matters) of Cardinal Pell”.

Father Maguire says Tim Minchin has done sexual abuse victims a favour releasing the song. “Its the kind of thing that victims of clerical abuse needed to hear in the public forum,” Father Bob said. “Tim Minchin’s done them a favour”.

Tim Minchin released his damning ‘Come Home (Cardinal Pell)’ about the Australian cardinal George Pell, the third highest ranking Catholic in the world. Pell has angered abuse victims by calling in sick for the Royal Commission into sexual abuse next week and instead choosing to stay in exile in The Vatican and give evidence via a video link from halfway around the world instead.

When Minchin released the song last week it shot to number one on Australia’s iTunes chart generating a response from Melbourne’s Archbishop Denis Hart who took the side of Pell and not the victims over the song’s content.

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

AUSTRALIA/ROME
ABC News

Cardinal George Pell will give evidence to the child abuse royal commission via video link from the Hotel Quirinale in Rome from next Monday.

The four-star hotel is located in the heart of the Italian capital, near the Piazza Della Repubblica.

A group of survivors will fly to Italy to hear Cardinal Pell’s evidence in person after a GoFundMe campaign raised funds for their trip.

The royal commission has called for people to register their interest to witness Cardinal Pell’s evidence given in Rome, which will be video streamed to a public hearing in Sydney.

Australia’s most high profile Catholic has hit back at criticism over his inability to return to Australia to appear in person before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

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

MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

By Jean Hopfensperger Star Tribune FEBRUARY 22, 2016

Twin Cities archdiocese leaders met with parishioners at St. William’s Church in Fridley Sunday, following last week’s announcement that their priest is under investigation for possible possession of child pornography.

The priest was temporarily removed from ministry Thursday after Edina police searched his home. He is not identified by the Star Tribune because he has not been arrested or charged. According to a search warrant affidavit, he admitted to police he had viewed pornography on his computer.

Auxiliary bishop Andrew Cozzens and Tim O’Malley, the archdiocese’s head of child safety standards, answered questions about future operations of the church and why the archdiocese didn’t tell parishioners sooner about the investigation. The Edina police met with officials of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Feb. 6; parishioners were notified Friday.

“I explained the situation that … as requested by Edina Police Department, we did not take action that could have interfered with that investigation,” O’Malley said. O’Malley, a former chief of the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, said the archdiocese followed its new child safety protocols.

An Edina police spokesperson confirmed the request.

With no parish priest, St. William’s parishioners found Cozzens celebrating two Sunday masses and participating in an informational meeting in the sanctuary Sunday afternoon.

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

IRELAND
Derry Journal

Brendan McDaid
Brendan.McDaid@jpress.co.uk

Sinn Féin Foyle MLA Maeve McLaughlin has welcomed a new working group to look into a possible inquiry around Magdalene Laundries and mother and baby homes.

The Magdalene Laundries in Ireland were institutions run by the Catholic Church for decades with the knowledge of the State.

Thousands of women were incarcerated in such facilities and made to work in laundries run by the Church.

Many of these women were taken there because they were deemed to be ‘fallen women’ for reasons that could include that they had become pregnant out of wedlock or even for flirtatious behaviour.

Many suffered horrific abuse, many were forced to sign over their own babies for adoption, and the women were also forced to endure separation from their families and the outside world.

Many died without ever getting their lives back.

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

MISSOURI
Berger’s Beat

…A PRIEST WHO WORKED IN MANCHESTER AND GLENCOE with fellow clerics Gerard Welsch, Robert Schwaig, Larry Damato and Edmund Griesedieck has passed away. He’s Fr. Carl F. Peltz who was sued for allegedly forcing a 12 year-old boy to drink whiskey and raping him on a Navy base in Iceland. The case was settled for $25k and the priest kept working until 2009. Peltz also spent time at a treatment center for sexually troubled clerics called the Vianney Renewal Center in Dittmer.

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

GUAM
Pacific New Center

[with video]

Written by Janela Carrera

The Concerned Catholics of Guam and other members of the catholic church reiterated their concerns regarding Archbishop Anthony Apuron’s actions in recent years.

Guam – Another silent protest was held yesterday by some members of the Catholic community to coincide with Archdiocese of Agana’s Sweethearts Ball that was held at the Outrigger Guam resort.

Dozens of Catholics showed up, holding signs opposing Archbishop Anthony Apuron, some even calling on his resignation. Some of those we interviewed reiterated their stance regarding the controversial Redemptoris Mater Seminary that the Archbishop allegedly gave away to the neocatechumenal sect.

Others also called upon Archbishop Apuron to restore two beloved priests who were removed from their duties.

“To give a huge multimillion dollar property to an entity that does not belong to our archdiocese just doesn’t make sense, and as my sign says here, the church property is not his to give away,” says MaryLou Diaz Martinez. “I don’t have any personal grudges with any individual members of the neo, and everybody should be able to worship the way that they prefer, but if you don’t follow the catholic church– and I would think the archbishop would be the first one to point out those differences in our teachings in our beliefs–if you don’t follow, then don’t claim to be catholic. And that’s what we’re opposing also.”

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

SPAIN
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

for immediate release: Tuesday, Feb. 23, 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)

A priest who spent at least three years in Spain has been ousted from ministry in two US dioceses for having “inappropriate images of students” in one and having “inappropriate conduct with parishioners” in the other. Now, his whereabouts are unknown. We fear he may have hurt parishioners in all or some of the six places he worked or studied. And we fear he’s still on the job in a parish somewhere.

[St. Louis Post-Dispatch]

An on-line biography of Fr. Peter Balili says that he “earned a Doctorate in Theology at the University of Navarra, Spain, under the auspices of the Opus Dei Fathers. He stayed in Navarra for three years where he developed a fluency in Spanish.

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

AUSTRALIA
The Courier

Feb. 22, 2016

Arrangements are underway to allow Ballarat clergy child sexual abuse survivors to fly to Rome to witness Cardinal George Pell give evidence next week. The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse chair Justice Peter McClellan said the requests of survivors to attend the Cardinal’s evidence in person on February 29 were “not unreasonable”.

The third round of hearings into sexual abuse that occurred within the Diocese of Ballarat began on Monday morning. Justice McClellan announced in the opening address Cardinal Pell looked set to give evidence via video link from a room inside a hotel in central Rome. He said the room was yet to be tested to ensure it would provide an effective signal back to Australia. Justice McClellan said the room would be tested late Monday and he would confirm on Tuesday whether it was suitable.

The inquiry is yet to confirm if the room would be open to the public. Earlier this month, the commission accepted a medical report which said Cardinal Pell, 74, was at risk of heart failure if he flew back to Australia to give evidence.

Clergy abuse survivor David Ridsdale said the group of survivors and representatives from Ballarat planned to fly out of Australia on Friday evening. He said Cardinal Pell was the highest ranking Catholic in Australia and had intricate knowledge of the movements of paedophile priests who were shifted from parish to parish.

Another survivor Paul Levey has already booked his flights.

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

AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

[live stream]

Stage 3: February 2016
The Royal Commission will hold the third part of the public hearing regarding the Catholic Diocese of Ballarat commencing on 22 February 2016 at the Ballarat Magistrates Court.

Read Witness List (PDF 217 KB)

Read Witness List (DOC 226KB)

Read Opening Address (PDF 333KB)

Read Opening Address (DOC 248KB)

Read Statement by the Chair regarding arrangements for Cardinal Pell’s evidence (PDF 220KB)

Read Statement by the Chair regarding arrangements for Cardinal Pell’s evidence (DOC 363KB)

Cardinal George Pell will give evidence from 29 February 2016 by video link from Rome concerning Case Study 28: Catholic Church authorities in Ballarat and Case Study 35: Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne. The Royal Commission will sit in Sydney and, in accordance with a request from Cardinal Pell, the hearing will commence at 08:00am AEDT.

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

AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

How to attend the hearing in Sydney

Date: Monday 29 February 2016 to Thursday 3 March 2016 (estimated)
Time: The Royal Commission hearing room will open to the public from 7:00am
Hearing hours: 08:00am – 12:00noon AEDT
Venue: Royal Commission, Level 17, Governor Macquarie Tower, 1 Farrer Place, Sydney

How to attend the screening in Ballarat

Date: Monday 29 February 2016 to Thursday 3 March 2016 (estimated)
Time: The Ballarat Town Hall will open to the public from 7:30am
Hearing hours: 08:00am – 12:00noon AEDT
Venue: Trench Room, Ballarat Town Hall, Sturt St, Ballarat

How to attend the venue in Rome

Date: Central European Time Sunday 28 February 2016 to Wednesday 2 March 2016 (estimated)
Hearing hours: 10:00pm – 02:00am CET
Venue: Hotel Quirinale, Rome, Italy

Anyone wishing to attend in person in Rome should register their interest with the Royal Commission by emailing contact@childabuseroyalcommission.gov.au or calling 1800 099 340.

Media wishing to attend must register interest by emailing media@childabuseroyalcommission.gov.au

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

AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Instituional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

23 February, 2016

The Royal Commission will hear evidence from Cardinal George Pell from 29 February 2016 at the Hotel Quirinale in Rome as part of its public hearings into Catholic Church authorities in Ballarat and the Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne.

The public hearing will be held at the Royal Commission’s hearing rooms in Sydney. Cardinal Pell will give evidence via videolink from the conference room at the Hotel Quirinale in Rome. His evidence will be live streamed on the Royal Commission’s website and a dedicated room at the Ballarat Town Hall will be available for the public to watch the webcast.

In accordance with a request from Cardinal Pell, the hearing will commence at 8:00am AEDT (Australian Eastern Daylight Time) on Monday 29 February 2016, which is 10:00pm CET (Central European Time) on Sunday 28 February 2016. The hearing is expected to run for four hours per day, including a half-hour adjournment, for three to four days.

The Royal Commission requests that anyone wishing to attend in person in Rome register their interest with the Royal Commission by emailing contact@childabuseroyalcommission.gov.au or calling 1800 099 340. Media wishing to attend must register interest by emailing media@childabuseroyalcommission.gov.au

Anyone wishing to attend the public hearing in Sydney or watch from the Ballarat Town Hall does not need to register their interest.

Please note that as this hearing is taking place in Sydney, legal representatives will not be granted leave to appear in Rome.

Information for the public on how to attend the hearing can be found here.

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

FRANCE
National Catholic Reporter

Catholic News Service | Feb. 22, 2016

LYON, FRANCE
French Cardinal Philippe Barbarin of Lyon is facing questions about how he dealt with a priest who faces abuse and rape charges.

On Jan. 27, proceedings opened against Fr. Bernard Preynat, charged with “sexual aggression and rape of minors” between 1986 and 1991 at Lyon’s Saint-Luc parish, where he ran a large Catholic Scout group over two decades.

French newspapers said the priest had been moved to a new parish in Neulise after his crimes were reported to Lyon Cardinal Albert Decourtray, who died in1994. Preynat was removed from parish work last August.

In a Feb. 14 statement, La Parole Liberee, an association set up to aid victims at Saint-Luc, said 45 victims of the priest had now come forward, adding that the group had filed charges against Barbarin for failing to report abuse. Under France’s penal code, failure to report abuse carries a three-year jail term and a nearly $50,000 fine.

The group said it was also suing Cardinal Gerhard Muller and Archbishop Luis Ladaria Ferrer, respectively prefect and secretary of the Vatican’s Congregation for Doctrine of the Faith, for failing to act.

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

WISCONSIN
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

By Bruce Vielmetti of the Journal Sentinel Feb. 22, 2016

A Greek Orthodox priest pleaded guilty Monday to embezzling more than $100,000 from his former parish in Wauwatosa, but under a deferred prosecution deal he will get only a misdemeanor conviction if he stays out of trouble for a year.

Neither the Rev. James Dokos nor his attorneys, Patrick Knight and Franklyn Gimbel, made any comment after a hearing before Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Jeffrey Conen.

Dokos, 63, of Chicago, was charged in 2014 with using about $100,000 intended for Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church for lavish dinners, jewelry for his wife, and everyday expenses. He had been the pastor at the church about 20 years.

By the time he was charged, Dokos had already been transferred to Sts. Peter and Paul in Glenview, Ill., one of the largest and most affluent Greek Orthodox churches in the Chicago area.

Theft in a business setting of more than $10,000 — which is a felony — carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison, plus five years of supervised release and a $25,000 fine. But Conen agreed to withhold entry of judgment, and if Dokos meets various reporting and community service requirements, in a year he will instead enter judgment for misdemeanor theft. As part of the agreement, Assistant District Attorney David Robles said he will recommend an unspecified fine at that time.

Robles also told Conen that he met earlier in the month with members of Annunciation to explain the agreement and take questions. He said Dokos has already paid restitution of more than $10,000, and that the plea settles all known criminal and civil actions arising from Dokos’ conduct.

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

UNITED STATES
Crux

By John L. Allen Jr.
Associate editor February 22, 2016

By virtually any standard, Pope Francis’ recent trip to Mexico, which began with a brief stop in Cuba to meet the Russian Orthodox Patriarch, was a triumph. Large crowds showed up everywhere he went, and the visit drew saturation coverage, especially with the pontiff’s dust-up at the end with Donald Trump.

Certainly if you were an undocumented immigrant on the US side of the border, or a prisoner or worker or victim of drug violence or an indigenous person inside Mexico, you have special reason to feel good about the pope’s presence, since he made a point of reaching out to these groups.

On the other hand, any papal trip is by definition an exercise in choice, and there are always others on the outside looking in – groups which, for one reason or another, feel neglected, or unheard, or disappointed in whatever the pope said or did. …

Abuse survivors

During the Pope Benedict XVI years, it became a standard feature of papal travel that when the pope visited a country that had been hard-hit by clerical abuse scandals, he would meet with victims. That was seen not only as an important gesture of sensitivity, but also a way of encouraging local bishops to do likewise.

On that score, Mexico certainly qualifies. It’s the birthplace of the Legion of Christ, a religious order launched in 1959 whose founder, the late Marcial Maciel Degollado, was found guilty by the Vatican in 2006 of various forms of sexual abuse and misconduct and sentenced to a life of “prayer and penance.”

In late December, a Mexican archbishop said that a meeting with victims and their families was in the works, but in the end, it never happened.

Such a meeting would have come at a good time for Francis. In recent weeks, the Vatican has faced controversy over its response to the abuse scandals on three different fronts:

* A survivor on the pope’s own anti-abuse commission was given a leave of absence after he was publicly critical of Francis for appointing a bishop in Chile known as an ally of that country’s most notorious abuser priest.

* A Vatican training session for new bishops came under fire for inviting a French monsignor who told the bishops they have no obligation to report abuse charges to police and failing to mention the Church’s extensive efforts in various parts of the world to develop cutting-edge abuse prevention programs.

* The pope’s top financial official, Cardinal George Pell, is facing a new round of allegations in Australia related to an ongoing probe by a Royal Commission into the Church’s handling of abuse cases.

Whatever Francis’ reasons for not meeting survivors in Mexico, it will add to the questions already being raised about where the Vatican, and the pope himself, presently stand in terms of the commitment to turning over a new leaf.

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

NEW JERSEY
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Monday, Feb. 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)

Apparently, a New Jersey priest is accused of beating a 70 year old man and putting him in a coma. We hope Camden Bishop Dennis Sullivan will shed some light on this troubling accusation.

[Daily Post]

The accused is Father Mike Steve Ezeatu. He reportedly attacked a 70 year old man after mass and beat him to coma.

Fr. Ezeatu is apparently with Project Educate Africa, Inc. (445 White Horse Pike West Collingswood, NJ 08107, info@projecteducateafrica.org) His email is mezeatu@yahoo.com

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

ILLINOIS
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Monday, Feb. 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)

Once again, a priest who was ousted elsewhere for having ­­“inappropriate images of students” was quietly sent to our area to work with no warning to parishioners. And once again, a priest who engaged in “inappropriate conduct” here has been quietly sent away, with no notice to parishioners, and is probably working now among unsuspecting colleagues and congregants in Philadelphia, Phoenix or Portland.

[St. Louis Post-Dispatch]

And Catholic officials try to convince us they’re changing and being more “transparent.” Hardly.

Two dioceses – San Francisco and Belleville – have kicked the cleric out. Neither told the public or parishioners that they had done so or the reasons behind their decisions.

The troubled cleric is Fr. Peter Balili, a native of the Phillipines. He worked at St. Mary Parish in Sesser and St. Andrew Parish in Christopher. (He also worked in parishes in two California dioceses – San Bernardino and San Francisco – and studied in Orange, California for six years in the 1990s. He studied at Notre Dame University, is a native of the Phillipines and was once with a religious order called Opus Dei Fathers.

[Belleville diocese]

He was also affiliated with a group called “Shrines of Europe Pilgrimage.”

No Catholic official in any of the five places where Fr. Balili spent time has bothered to alert Catholics or citizens about him and or detail the accusations against him. “The Belleville Diocese dismissed him because of instances of what it viewed as ‘inappropriate conduct regarding certain of his parishioners.’ The notice did not specify the nature of that conduct or the age of the parishioners,” according to the Post-Dispatch.

We’ve seen this kind of language time and time again used by Catholic officials. It usually refers to sexual misdeeds or crimes. But bishops owe their flocks more honesty than this.

Belleville Bishop Edward Braxton is among the most secretive bishops in the US.

We beg anyone who saw, suspected or suffered clergy sex crimes or misdeeds by Fr. Balili, to show courage, call police, protect others and start healing.

(Fr. Balili also worked in parishes in two California dioceses – San Bernardino and San Francisco – and studied in Orange, California for six years in the 1990s. He studied at Notre Dame University, is a native of the Phillipines and was once with a religious order called Opus Dei Fathers.)

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

TENNESSEE
WGNS

A change in the statue of limitations for child sexual abuse victims to file a civil suit against a suspect in a Tennessee courtroom is on the horizon. State Representative Dr. Bryan Terry of Murfreesboro commented….

The bill as proposed by Representative Daren Jernigan, extends the statue of limitations for civil actions against the accused child rapist or person who committed sexual crimes against a child.

In civil litigation, the victim of a child sexual attack can file suit against the suspect for illnesses or injuries related to the abuse, even though the abuse occurred when the victim was a child and did not come forward with the allegations until adulthood. The bill will extend the statute of limitations by three years from the date of discovery.

Currently, victims of child sexual abuse only have one year to file a civil claim after the discovery of the reported crime. One in ten children are victims of sexual abuse by the time they turn 18 in Tennessee, according to the Child Advocacy Center of Rutherford and Cannon Counties.

The Civil Justice Committee will review the proposed bill on Tuesday (2/23/2016).

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

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

THE AUSTRALIAN
FEBRUARY 23, 2016

Tessa Akerman

Victoria Police are investigating senior Catholic Church figures, with the idea of charging them with child neglect or ­endangerment.

The Australian can reveal that Task Force Sano detectives have been examining charging church figures with failing to protect children when they were facing potential danger.

Former Victorian crown prosecutor and chief magistrate Nick Papas QC said he would prosecute a case against church officials for endangering a child provided the legal threshold was met.

Several senior clergy in Vic­toria knew that pedophile priests were operating, but failed to report the crimes to police, the sex abuse royal commission has been told, with many victims, perpetrators and church officials now dead.

Details of the investigation emerged as George Pell ­announced he had written to the Victoria’s Acting Police Minister formally requesting an inquiry into the “maliciously timed” leaking of details of a police investigation into allegations against him.

Mr Papas, one of Australia’s most experienced prosecutors, said people needed to face the courts if police uncovered a proper basis for taking action. “As a private barrister who both defends and prosecutes, my personal opinion is if the evidence is there and there’s no other factors that prevent the matter being prosecuted properly and fairly, then you should prosecute them,” he said.

Neil Wileman, 55, was abused by former Christian Brother Ted Dowlan at St Patrick’s College in Ballarat more than 40 years ago.

He told the royal commission he reported the physical abuse to the college in 1973 but was punished for complaining and the abuse continued, both physical and sexual. “They had a duty of care for those underage children,’’ he said. “They did nothing and they allowed them to be raped.”

The child sex abuse royal commission has heard evidence that officials in the Ballarat diocese knew of pedophile priests but ­failed to report the offenders to the police. At the time, failing to report knowledge of child sexual crimes was not an offence, however misprision of a felony — or concealment of a felony by someone other than a participant — was a common law offence until 1981 and conduct endangering people ­became an offence in 1985.

Detectives have been reviewing evidence of when victims of abuse made complaints to church officials.

The royal commission has received evidence former bishop of Ballarat Ronald Mulkearns moved one of Australia’s worst pedophile priests, Gerald Ridsdale, between parishes when complaints were made. Ridsdale, who had possibly hundreds of victims, was moved to the western Victorian parish of Horsham to serve as assistant priest in 1986.

The royal commission also heard evidence Ridsdale committed further offences in Horsham.

Cardinal George Pell served as auxiliary bishop in the Melbourne archdiocese from 1987 until 1996, when he was appointed archbishop. Pedophile priest Peter Searson served in the archdiocese and many complaints were made about his conduct, which included holding a knife to a schoolgirl’s chest. Searson is dead.

Archbishop Denis Hart told the royal commission there was a failure in the handling of complaints and he would have expected Cardinal Pell to have an “adequate ­degree of knowledge” about the situation. “Whether he knew all these awful things, which make me feel ashamed, I’m not sure,” he said.

Mr Papas said there was an ­imperative to ensure the truth was told. “Sexual abuse in the context of breach of trust, especially in the environment such as priest and parishioner and child, can’t simply be swept under the carpet,” he said.“If there’s a proper basis to bring criminal proceedings, no matter when they occurred, they need to be brought. Ultimately, the prosecution of all serious sexual offences is in the interest of the community, but always subject to competing factors.”

He said the factors included the length of time since the matters occurred, ability to obtain evidence and fairness to all parties.

Cardinal Pell yesterday announced he had written to the Victorian Acting Police Minister formally requesting an inquiry into the “maliciously timed” leaking of details of a police investigation into allegations against him.

Victoria Police confirmed that Cardinal Pell’s complaint had been referred to the state’s peak anti-corruption body for investigation. “Victoria Police takes this allegation seriously and accordingly we have referred the matter to IBAC,’’ a spokeswoman said.

Additional reporting: Chip Le Grand

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

AUSTRALIA/ISRAEL
The Australian

The Australian – February 23, 2016

Jamie Walker – Middle East Correspondent

Fugitive Jewish school principal Malka Leifer will be called to account for apparent discrepancies in her psychiatric record used to justify controversial absences from extradition proceedings in Israel.

The psychiatric re-evaluation ordered by the Jerusalem District Court on Sunday shapes as make or break — both for state prosecutors, who are trying to get Ms Leifer on a plane back to Australia to face child sex abuse charges, and for her defence fighting hard to keep her in Israel.

The former headmistress of Melbourne’s Adass Israel School, a strictly religious Jewish college for ultra-orthodox children, failed to attend the hearing on Sunday, citing stress-induced psychosis that allegedly incapacitates her before court dates.

The pattern has been entrenched since Ms Leifer was arrested 18 months ago by Israeli police on an extradition request from Australia on 74 counts of child sexual abuse alleged to have been committed while she was at Adass between 2000 and 2008.

In Melbourne, families of her alleged victims have accused Ms Leifer of exploiting loopholes in Israeli law to avoid being extradited. Her Israeli lawyers have produced medical reports from a battery of psychiatrists to show her panic attacks and psychosis are genuine, induced by the stress of having to face court.

They are pressing for the proceedings to be stayed or abandoned.

However, judge Amnon Cohen’s latest ruling has tasked a senior state psychiatrist to focus on two aspects of her behaviour when she was checked in to hospital on January 3, two days before she was to report for her second-to-last court appearance.

Her letter of referral to the hospital had recommended she go in on December 30, and the judge said it was unclear why the admission was delayed. She checked herself out soon after the court date passed.

Judge Cohen asked for the admission delay to be explained.

He also noted a “discrepancy” between Ms Leifer’s behaviour on the ward in groups and in phone conversations with her family, compared to how she responded during formal sessions with psychiatric staff.

The judge noted a prosecution submission, made on Sunday, that Ms Leifer had “no interest” in recuperating when the status quo stopped her being extradited.

In his written decision, Judge Cohen said Ms Leifer’s lawyers had opposed the prosecution’s application for the re-evaluation, saying the medical material was copious and should be relied upon.

The judge said he had full confidence in the District Psychiatrist, a state doctor who had evaluated Ms Leifer and who would carry out the court-ordered review. If necessary, Ms Leifer would be committed to state care for this.

But he said he made the order “not without reservation”, and the examination should take place as soon as possible so a report could be presented on March 20.

“I think it’s a minor victory,” said Manny Wax, a 39-year-old survivor of sexual abuse at another Melbourne Jewish orthodox school who was in the court on Sunday.

“The judge could have decided to have dismissed the case … the tension builds as the final decision is in the hands of the psychiatrist’s report.”

Ms Leifer remains in home detention in the orthodox enclave of Bnei Brak in central Israel.

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

ISRAEL
Jerusalem Post

Malka Leifer, a dual Israeli-Australian national, fled to Israel in 2008 after she was accused of engaging in sexual behavior with eight students at an Australian school where she was principle.

A Jerusalem judge on Sunday ordered that a haredi woman at the center of an Australian sexual abuse scandal must undergo psychiatric evaluation to determine if she is fit to be extradited, ABC News Australia reported.

Malka Leifer, a dual Israeli-Australian national, fled to Israel in 2008 after she was accused of engaging in sexual behavior with eight students at the Adass Israel School in Elsternwick, where she was principal. She was arrested in 2014 and sentenced to house arrest pending extradition but has managed to fend off any further action, exhibiting panic attacks prior to multiple hearings and claiming that she is “mentally unfit” to take part in the judicial proceedings.

Late last year Australian media reported that Adass Israel may face a criminal investigation due to the role that its board members played in spiriting Leifer out of the country. In September, a local court found the school liable in a civil suit, ordering it to pay more than a million dollars to one of the victims.

In his ruling on Sunday, Judge Amnon Cohen called for the accused to undergo further mental examinations.

“This seems to be a big game. A strategy on her behalf. We don’t need to be Einsteins to work out what is happening here,” former Australian ultra-orthodox sexual abuse victim and survivors’ advocate Manny Waks told ABC outside the court on Sunday.

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

VATICAN CITY
Catholic News Service

By Carol Glatz Catholic News Service
2.22.2016

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi will retire as head of Vatican Radio Feb. 29, as the Secretariat for Communications takes on the general administration of the radio.

Giacomo Ghisani, an Italian layman and vice general director of the secretariat, will be the “ad interim” administrative director and legal representative of Vatican Radio starting March 1. Ghisani had been director of international relations and legal affairs at Vatican Radio for many years.

Father Lombardi, 73, will still head the Vatican press office for the time being and continue serving as Vatican spokesman.

The personnel changes were announced by the Vatican Feb. 22.

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