Peru – BishopAccountability.org

77 Accused in This Country

P. Marco Agüero Vidal

Status: Accused

Padre Marco Agüero Vidal was arrested March 3, 2026 at his parish, Nuestra Señora de la Alegría church in San Borja, Lima, after police received complaints that he had sexually abused penitents during the sacrament of confession and following an unruly protest by parishioners defending him. Agüero was detained for seven days; he was released on March 12.

According to a Diario Correo report, five females filed complaints of inappropriate touching during confession. Two were adults, and the three others were minors represented by their parents. One mother told Radio Exitosa that the priest had grabbed her daughter’s leg during confession on more than two occasions.

Months earlier, in early December 2025, some of the complainants and other parishioners had sent a long letter to Lima archbishop Cardinal Carlos Castillo requesting an investigation into the priest and his removal. The letter cited “confusing” changes to the liturgy, and also said that several young women, including at least one minor, had been subject to “non-consensual touching” by Agüero. During confession, the priest had placed his hands on some of the alleged victims' shoulders “and, in other cases, on their knees,” according to a page from the letter that was published by Infovaticana. The letter appended statements by three of the complainants, including a minor. The parishioners did not receive a response.

In response to the publicity around the Agüero’s arrest in March, the archdiocese removed him from public ministry. It also issued a public statement acknowledging that it had received the parishioners’ letter in December and that the archdiocese’s “Listening Commission” had assessed it and forwarded to Cardinal Castillo on December 26, 2025. The archdiocese said that Castillo had ordered a preliminary investigation and then subjected Agüero to unspecified “precautionary measures” and that the investigation was still ongoing.

On March 13, 2026, the local prosecutor requested that the priest be subject to nine months’ preventive detention for alleged "inappropriate touching, acts of a sexual nature, or lewd acts against three minors and two adult women" (“tocamientos indebidos, actos de connotación sexual o actos libidinosos en agravio detres menores de edad y dos adultas.”) On April 18, 2026, Peru 21 reported that the Superior Court of Lima had lifted the travel ban on the priest. The article included an image of a March 9, 2026 letter from the Lima archdiocese to law enforcement, stating that the archdiocese had recorded no complaints against Agüero - an apparent contradiction of Cardinal Castillo's public statement on March 6 that he had received the letter the alleged victims had sent in December 2025.

Sources:

Cura denunciado por presuntos tocamientos indebidos continúa dando misa en parroquia de San Borja, Radio Exitosa, 03.04.2026
Detienen a sacerdote denunciado por abuso sexual en confesionario: fieles protestan en parroquia de San Borja, Infobae, 03.04.2026
Tres denunciantes acusan al sacerdote Marco Agüero Vidal de abuso sexual en San Borja, un caso por el que sería suspendido, Infobae, 03.05.2026
Comunicado, Arquidiocesis de Lima, 03.06.2026
Escándalo en Lima: denuncian tocamientos a menores y abusos litúrgicos de un sacerdote protegido por el cardenal Castillo, Infovaticana, 03.06.2026
Arzobispado de Lima impone medida penal y suspende a sacerdote denunciado por abuso sexual en parroquia de San Borja, Infobae, 03.08.2026
Párroco detenido por denuncia de tocamientos: tres de las denunciantes son menores de edad, Diario Correo, 03.09.2026
Fiscalía solicita prisión preventiva para sacerdote por presuntos tocamientos indebidos, LP Derecho, 03.13.2026
Agüero Case: victims denounce lack of support and contradictions from the Archdiocese of Lima, Infovaticana, 04.08.2026
Caso Marco Agüero: Poder Judicial deja sin efecto el impedimento de salida del país en su contra, Perú 21, 04.18.2026

P. Cristián Alejandría Agreda

Ordained: 1990
Status: Convicted

Diocese: Diocese of Peru, Military

Assigned after ordination in 1990 to the church in Yuracyacu (Rioja), then in March 1993 to Sagrado Corazón de Jesús parish in Lluyllucucha-Moyobamba. In 1994 Alejandría headed rural pastoral care in Yuracyacu. He became Chaplain in 1998 of the Third Special Forces Brigade of the Peruvian Army, in the Morales district of San Martin. In September 2017 Alejandría was accused of sexually assaulting a 13-year-old girl. He was placed in pretrial detention in the Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo prison in Tarapoto, San Martín. Per Radio Tropical, Alejandríato was convicted in January 2019 and sentenced to 30 years in prison.

Sources:

Dictan prisión preventiva a capellán del Ejército Peruano, Via Television, 01.31.2018
San Martín: Dictan Prisión Preventiva para Sacerdote Acusado de Violación, Panamericana, 02.02.2018
Perú: dictan prisión preventiva a sacerdote acusado de violación, Peru.com, 02.03.2018
Sala penal confirma cinco meses de prisión preventiva a capellán del Ejército, Diario Correo, 02.05.2018
Sacerdote considera injusta prisión contra capellán militar, Radio Tropical, 08.16.2019

Fr. Joseph Angeli

Donate Photo

Ordained: 1942
Status: Sued

Died: 5/5/1993
Diocese: Archdiocese of Boston MA

From Italy. Assigned in Boston MA in 1959 after 27 years in South America, in the Diocese of Tacna, Peru. Transferred to the San Antonio archdiocese in 1960, was in the Diocese of El Paso by 1965, then the Las Cruces diocese when it was created in 1982. Died 5/4/1993. Included on a list of accused priests and religious posted by the Law Offices of Mitchell Garabedian 01/19/2011. Per Garabedian, at least one claim settled with the Boston Archdiocese. Omitted from the 2011 Boston AD database because he was a "visiting priest." In 12/2015 a woman stated publicly that she was abused as a minor in the early 1960s in Hondo, TX by Angeli; she called on the San Antonio archdiocese to verify her allegations and settle her claim. On the San Antonio archdiocese's list 1/31/2019. On Las Cruces diocese's list 6/24/2019. Accused in a lawsuit filed in 7/2024 of sexually abusing an altar boy, age 10, multiple times around 1980. The boy was from Tortugas.

Assignments:

BA.org Assignment Record

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P. José Antúnez de Mayolo, S.D.B.

Order: SDB
Status: Accused

Died: 4/9/2022
Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

On May 7, 2017, the program Punto Final featured interviews of two men who said that Padre Antúnez de Mayolo sexually abused them as children. Musician Américo Legua Díaz was nine years old in 1980, performing altar boy duties at Sagrado Corazón de Jesús parish in Magdalena del Mar, Lima, when Antúnez de Mayolo allegedly began sexually violating him. The incidents occurred over two or three years, until Legua was 11 or 12, and ranged from inappropriate touches to anal rape. In 2015, Legua formally reported his abuse to the Salesian congregation, then headed by Provincial Santo Dal Ben. In February 2017, the Salesians informed him that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith had reviewed the case and decided to dismiss it. No explanation was given.

The Punto Final segment also featured the testimony of “Luis,” who said he was age 15, attending the Salesian school in Arequipa, when Padre Antúnez de Mayolo asked to meet with him privately to discuss the boy’s alleged homosexual leanings. Antúnez de Mayolo allegedly told the boy to take off his pants and the priest fondled his genitals. Luis said that he did not report to the Salesians but that he knew other victims who had.

In a public response to the Punto Final program, the Salesians stated that the Vatican had closed Legua’s case “due to a lack of sufficient evidence.” They said they were unaware of any additional victims and suggested that those testimonies could be presented to the Salesians’ Commission for the Protection of Minors.

According to Martin Scheuch in a post on his blog, Las Lineas Torcidas, reports there is no record that any of the victims or witnesses filed a complaint against Antúnez de Mayolo with the civil courts. Scheuch also reveals that the case against the priest had been re-opened after Américo Legua wrote a letter to Pope Francis in April 2017. Nonetheless, church officials dismissed the case without ever asking Legua to testify:

“And while in the case of Américo Legua there was a canonical process, since his complaint was sent by the Salesians to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the latter decided in 2016 to close it due to a ‘lack of credibility.’ The case was reopened after the Peruvian musician wrote a letter to Pope Francis, dated April 4, 2017. Even so, in December 2017, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith decided to definitively close the complaint against Father Antúnez de Mayolo, due to ‘an absolute absence of evidence to support the claims contained in the complaint.’ At no time was the victim contacted or summoned to testify, nor was he ever officially notified of how the process was going, what its outcome was, much less what the arguments were for its dismissal.”

Antúnez de Mayolo appears to have remained a Salesian in good standing until his death at age 95 on April 9, 2022. An obituary that appeared in a Salesian publication made no mention of the allegations against him. It praised him as a “man of God” with “a serene disposition and the big heart of a shepherd.”

Sources:

Latina Noticias, Punto Final, 07 de mayo de 2017
Salesianos en Perú responden a acusaciones contra sacerdote sobre presuntos abusos, ACI Prensa, 09 de mayo 2017
Nueva denuncia de pedofilia contra sacerdote peruano José Antúnez de Mayolo, exmiembro de la CVR, Lamula.pe, 09 de mayo 2017
#Popemode: 10 Allegations of Sexual Abuse in the Peruvian Catholic Church that You Won’t See Anywhere Else, Útero.Pe, 18 de enero de 2018
Boletin Salesiano, Marzo-Abril 2022
Los Salesianos Pederastas, Las Lineas Torcidas, 21 de enero de 2023

P. Gerardo Araujo Sarabia

Donate Photo

Order: OFM
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

Peruvian. One of the first clerics investigated criminally for child sexual abuse in Chile. In February 2001 a parishioner in the southern town of Carahue [Cautín Province, Araucanía Region] accused Araujo of sexually abusing her young son (whose age was reported variously as 12 years old and younger than 12). A prosecutor investigated. He escaped without criminal charges: judicial proceedings were suspended provided the priest leave the country for at least three years. Araujo reportedly relocated to Lima but a journalist who sought to interview him there was unable to determine his whereabouts. According to one news report, Araujo also worked in the Chilean town of Cañete [Arauco Province, Biobío Region]. Included in the Chilean bishops' original list of 18 guilty clerics, released November 2011.

Sources:

Sacerdote Abandona el País, El Mercurio, 04.15.2001
Chile/Pederastia: Procesan a Sacerdote, by Gilberto Villarroel, BBCMundo.com, 10.18.2002
Abogada Magina Zegpi Pons: “La Iglesia ya entendió que no puede ocultar a pedófilos”, by Sonnia Mendoza, revistanos.cl, 03.2011
Iglesia reveló listado de sacerdotes condenados por abusos contra menores en Chile, cooperativa.cl, 11.11.2011

P. Jaime Baertl Gómez

Order: SVC
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

Ordained in 1981, Baertl was the Sodalicio's first priest and for decades served as its Assistant for Spirituality on the Superior Council. The press calls him the architect of the group’s finances, a characterization that Baertl denies.

A former member, Martin Scheuch, alleges that in 1979, when he was 15 or 16 and Baertl was his spiritual director, Baertl ordered him to undress and simulate intercourse with a chair. In April 2019, Scheuch testified to the Congressional commission. The commission’s report noted that in 2016, the Sodalicio had deemed the allegation not credible and refused to recognize Scheuch as a victim. It later apologized and reportedly paid reparation to Scheuch in December 2024.

Prosecutors declined to charge Baertl in 2017, and a money-laundering inquiry was archived in May 2026.

On October 23, 2024, Pope Francis expelled Baertl and fellow SCV member Juan Carlos Len from the Sodalicio. The communique from the nunciature cited their participation in “irregular and illicit” financial activities within the group’s companies and organizations, as well as one allegation of sexual abuse, without saying which of the two men was accused. The pair sent a notarized letter to the papal nuncio calling the charges “false and defamatory” and the allegation of sexual abuse “absolutely false.” In a Crux article that appeared on October 28, 2024, Scheuch reiterated his allegation of abuse by Baertl. The priest continues to deny the allegation, saying that he has not been found guilty under either church or civil law.

Sources:

Jaime Baertl: El sacerdote que está detrás de los negocios del Sodalicio. Los abusos del Sodalicio (parte VII), La voz a ti debida, La Mula, 05 de junio de 2016
Piura: arzobispo sorprendido por estar en denuncia contra Sodalicio, Comas, 10 de octubre de 2016
Informes sobre Abusos y Respuesta en el Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana, Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, 10 de febrero de 2017
9.2 – Caso Emblemático “Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana,” Comisión Investigadora de Abusos Sexuales contra Menores de Edad en Organizaciones, Congreso de la República del Perú, 23 de julio de 2019
A espaldas del Vaticano, el Sodalicio saca su dinero de Perú para no reparar a los sobrevivientes, La República, 01 de diciembre de 2021
Sodalicio: El Informe De Belaunde, Sudaca.ped, 26 de noviembre de 2022
Caso Sodalicio: expulsan a dos miembros tras denuncias por abuso, El Comercio, 23 de octubre de 2024
Peruvian priest ousted from order accused of sex abuse, coverup, Crux, 28 de octubre de 2024
Carta de Baertl a Gualtieri, Crux, 24 de octubre de 2024
El exsodálite Jaime Baertl niega haber cometido abusos en carta notarial al exobispo Reinaldo Nann, Religion Digital, 24 de septiembre de 2026

P. Luis Alejandro Bazalar García

Status: Acquitted

Diocese: Archdiocese of Ayacucho o Huamanga, Peru

In 2013, Luis Alejandro Bazalar García was accused of sexually abusing a 17-year-old seminarian who served as an altar boy at the Ayacucho cathedral, where Bazalar was a priest. In January 2016, Bazalar was convicted and sentenced to eight years in prison. In August 2016, Peru’s Supreme Court overturned the conviction.

According to the prosecution’s charges as summarized in the Supreme Court’s eventual acquittal ruling, Bazalar met the boy in July 2012 and, with his superior's consent, became his spiritual guide. Prosecutors said he isolated the boy from his family and from friends his own age, taught him to drink large amounts of wine, and promised to pay for theology studies and take him travelling in Europe. Prosecutors charged that he had anal intercourse with the boy in late October 2013. In the early hours of October 30, 2013, Bazalar came to the boy's home and left with him. In the confrontation that followed, an aunt suffered a broken arm and the boy cut his wrist; prosecutors alleged that Bazalar had told him to kill himself ("mátate"). A second former seminarian alleged that in 2011, while Bazalar was a formator at the seminary, he had touched his genitals and threatened him with expulsion if he told anyone; this young man later withdrew his account.

Archbishop Salvador Piñeiro said he learned of the complaint from the Public Ministry on October 31, 2013. In a press release, he said that he had suspended Bazalar from ministry until the civil and church proceedings ended, opened a penal disciplinary process in the archdiocesan curia, and pledged full cooperation with the Huamanga prosecutor.

On July 10, 2015, according to Piñeiro, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a decree finding "sufficient moral certainty" of Bazalar’s guilt under canon law and dismissing Bazalar from the clerical state.

On January 22, 2016, an Ayacucho court convicted Bazalar of seduction of the 17-year-old and of seriously injuring the aunt. It sentenced him to eight years in prison and S/10,000 in civil reparations. It acquitted him of attempted kidnapping, breaking and entering, and the charge of indecently touching the other seminarian in 2011.

On August 16, 2016, the Supreme Court overturned both convictions and acquitted him of all charges, ruling that there was not sufficient evidence 'to annul the presumption of innocence.' It found the boy's statements contradictory, held that Bazalar had acted as a spiritual guide seeking only to support him, and found that he had pushed the aunt in self-defense. It ordered his immediate release and the expunging of his criminal record.

Bazalar disputed the Vatican’s decision to dismiss him from the priesthood. He said the ruling was retaliation for exposing wrongdoing at Cáritas del Perú and in the archdiocese, and he has repeatedly sought to appeal it. In recent years, he has gained visibility in Peruvian politics.

Sources:

Acusan a Sacerdote De Violacion Sexual Contra Un Menor En Ayacucho, La Republica, 01 de noviembre de 2013
Ayacucho: sacerdote acusado de violar a seminarista fue suspendido, El Comercio, 5 de noviembre de 2013
Ayacucho: Sacerdote acusado de violación guardó silencio ante Fiscalía, RPP, actualizado el 14 de noviembre de 2013
Denuncian Penalmente a Sacerdote Por Abuso Sexual Contra Ex Seminarista, La Republica, 07 de deciembre de 2013
Sentencia absolutoria, Corte Suprema de Justicia de la República, 16 de agosto de 2016
Ayacucho: Sacerdote acusado de violación postulará a la presidencia del Perú, NoticiasTrujillo, 23 de noviembre de 2023
Assolto dalla Corte Suprema, espulso dal Vaticano: chi è Luis Bazalar, il «confessore» di un candidato presidenziale peruviano, Infovaticana, 20 de mayo de 2026
Comunicado del Arzobispado de Ayacucho sobre caso de exsacerdote, Conferencia Episcopal Peruana, 27 de mayo de 2026

Fr. Alfred J. Bietighofer

Ordained: 1965
Status: Settled

Died: 5/16/2002
Diocese: Diocese of Bridgeport CT

Ordained in 1965 for the Diocese of Bridgeport, CT. Worked in Chiclayo, Peru in 1974 and 1986. At least four men alleged in 2002 that Bietighofer abused them late 1970s and early 1980s at Blessed Sacrament Parish in Bridgeport. Sent to St. Luke Institute for treatment in 5/2002; hung himself while there in his room. A diocesan official knew of a complaint against Bietighofer in 1996. Claims against Bietighofer were settled by the Diocese as part of massive settlement in 10/2003; the Diocese paid $21M to 40 people claiming abuse by 16 priests. Another allegation was received in 12/2009. Per a report commissioned by the diocese in 2019, there were 17 victims, ages 12-15, of abuse occurring 1959-1989.

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P. Santiago Caballero

Donate Photo

Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

In August 2025, The Pillar quoted an unnamed source saying that Caballero "has had at least 10 allegations against him for abuse of minors." The priest reportedly had been suspended from ministry in 2014 by Lima archbishop Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani. According to another unnamed Pillar source, when Cardinal Carlos Castillo succeeded Cipriani in January 2019, he fully reinstated Caballero to ministry, after which there were additional allegations against Caballero of sexual abuse. The Pillar reported that according to "senior archdiocesan sources in Peru," the Vatican had commissioned an investigation into allegations of financial misconduct and cover-up by Castillo.

Sources:

Vatican-ordered investigation underway in Lima, The Pillar, 08.12.2025

Fr. Carmelo Ignatius Camenzuli

Ordained: 1966
Status: Sued

Diocese: Diocese of Baton Rouge LA

Ordained for the Archdiocese of Arequipa, Peru. Worked as an extern priest in Baton Rouge, LA. On 5/18/2000 the Diocese of Baton Rouge received an allegation against Camenzuli of sexual abuse occurring in the early 1980s, while he was assigned to St. Joseph Cathedral in Baton Rouge. Camenzuli left the diocese in 1985 and died in 1998. He was included on the Baton Rouge diocese's list in 2019. Accused in a lawsuit(s) filed sometime between 6/2024 and 1/2026 sexual abuse occurring at St. Joseph the Worker in Pierre Part, LA.

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P. José Carranza Chavesta

Status: Acquitted

Diocese: Archdiocese of Arequipa, Peru

Investigated by the Public Prosecutor's Office and the Church after an allegation that he inappropriately touched a 12-year-old boy in November 2016. Carranza was the boy's religion student at the Gran Unidad Escolar Mariano Melgar School in Arequipa. The boy told his father, who filed a formal complaint. Carranza admitted only to having tapped the boy on his shoulders several times. Archbishop Javier Del Río (Arequipa archbishop 2006 to present) suspended him from ministry and teaching. In February 2017 he was ordered to nine months of preventive detention pending the outcome of the case, and an arrest warrant was issued. Carranza went into hiding; in May 2018 he turned himself in. During the investigation, it came to light that in 2002 and 2003, Carranza had allegedly similarly molested five boys at the school while disciplining them. Carranza was said to have locked the boys in a restroom and proceeded to touch their genitals. Then-archbishop Luis Sánchez-Moreno (Arequipa archbishop from 1996 to November 2003) was given a formal document detailing the allegations, which had been drafted by another teacher at the school. Carranza was temporarily suspended. During the 2017 investigation, the complaint to the archdiocese about the alleged 2002-2003 crimes was found to have disappeared; the school reported having lost their records too. The 2016 case went to trial in August 2018. Carranza was acquitted in October 2018, the Court citing contradictions in the alleged victim's statements.

Sources:

Arequipa: Investigan a sacerdote por tocamientos indebidos a escolar, La República, 02.07.2017
Arequipa: Sala ordena prisión de sacerdote acusado de manosear a un escolar, La República, 02.08.2017
Arequipa: Sacerdote fue acusado de manosear a cinco menores hace 14 años, La República, 02.09.2017
Santa Sede verá caso de cura acusado de tocamientos a niño en Arequipa, La República, 02.12.2017
Inició juicio contra sacerdote acusado de hacer tocamientos a un escolar, Diario Correo, 08.22.2018
Liberan a cura acusado de actos contra el pudor, Diario Correo, 10.12.2018
Arequipa: Sacerdote está en la lista de los más buscados por la Policía, Perú 21, 08.23.2019

P. Emeterio Castañeda Muñoz

Status: Accused

Diocese: Prelature of Huamachuco, Peru

Emeterio Marcial Castañeda Muñoz, a diocesan priest of the prelature of Huamachuco in northern Peru, is accused of taking part in parties in Trujillo in the late 1990s at which priests had sex with teenage boys for money. Allegations against him were reported to the congressional commission as well as to the media outlet Connectas, which in July 2020 published a blockbuster investigative piece on abuse and cover-up in the prelature of Huamachuco and the archdiocese of Trujillo.

A man who spoke to Connectas as "Andrés" said that between 1996 and 1998, when he was 16, Castañeda and four other priests organized or attended weekend night parties in Trujillo parishes and in a private house where they had sex with minors for money. The congressional commission on sexual abuse, as summarized by the website Sudaca, named a complainant, J.M.B.R., whose account matches that of "Andrés:" it said that Castañeda and three other priests invited him at age 15 to parties of alcohol, cigarettes and sex, held from 1996 to 1998 at the parish of El Buen Pastor in El Porvenir, at other places near Trujillo and at the private house, where priests met boys aged 15 to 17.

Fr Á.C.M. told ACI Prensa that Castañeda and Tulio Montenegro were the most frequent visitors to a house Bishop Sebastián Ramis Torrens bought in Trujillo for travelling clergy, where, he said, many atrocities were committed. According to Connectas, Castañeda's alleged victims had already told their story to La República's magazine Domingo in 2000. In a letter of March 18, 2019 to the journalist Melissa Goytizolo, Huamachuco priests who had formed a commission to listen to victims named Castañeda among the priests they said were implicated in sexual crimes.

On January 2, 2016, a group of Huamachuco priests had written to Bishop Ramis objecting to what they said was the favorable treatment he gave to Castañeda and four other priests against whom there were already accusations of sexual crimes. Ramis, a Franciscan of the Third Order Regular, had been the prelate since 1991. After a television report on abuse in the prelature in February 2016, Ramis set up a commission of inquiry; the prelature later said it suspended the priests involved on March 1, 2016 and sent its findings to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which directed that administrative penal processes be opened.

ACI Prensa reported in August 2020 that both church and civil authorities had acquitted Castañeda and three other accused diocesan priests for lack of evidence. Sudaca, drawing on the congressional report, says the cases of the five victims it examined, J.M.B.R.'s among them, were closed by prosecutors as time-barred or for lack of evidence. In August 2020, Castañeda reportedly was still serving as a priest in the prelature of Huamachuco. His current status is not publicly known.

Sources:

Escándalo: Denuncian a dos sacerdotes por abuso sexual, El Popular, 23 de febrero de 2016
Pederastía en el Perú: batalla al interior de la Iglesia, La República en alianza con CONNECTAS, 12 de julio de 2020
Denuncias de abusos en Perú: Mons. Cabrejos envía carta a episcopados latinoamericanos, EWTN News, 16 de julio de 2020
Abusos sexuales en Trujillo y Huamachuco: Una herida abierta en la Iglesia Católica en Perú, ACI Prensa, 27 de agosto de 2020
Las víctimas de abuso sexual en la prelatura de Huamachuco, Sudaca.Pe, 15 de abril de 2023

Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne

Order: Opus Dei
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne, a priest of Opus Dei, was only 44 years old in 1988 when Pope John Paul II elevated him to the bishopric, assigning him to be an auxiliary bishop of the Ayachuco o Huamanga archdiocese. Cipriani was promoted to archbishop of Ayachucho in 1995 and served just four years before JP II tapped him to become archbishop of Lima. He was elevated to cardinal in 2001, and continued to head the Lima archdiocese until January 2019, when Pope Francis accepted his resignation soon after the cardinal's 75th birthday.

On January 24, 2025, El País reported that Pope Francis had compelled Cipriani to step down as Lima archbishop soon after the cardinal’s 75th birthday because of Cipriani’s alleged abuse of a minor. In 2018, a man had written a letter to the Pope saying that in 1983, when he was ages 16 and 17, he had been groped, caressed and kissed by then-Father Cipriani. According to the victim, Cipriani was his confessor, and the abuses took place during confession. In response to the El País report, the Vatican spokesman Matteo Brunei confirmed the sanctions against the cardinal. Bruni said that following the cardinal’s 2019 resignation, he had received “a penal injunction with specific disciplinary measures related to public activity, place of residence and the use of insignia.” The cardinal “signed and accepted” the measure, Bruni said, adding that the restrictions remained in place.

Sources:

El primer cardenal del Opus Dei, arzobispo de Lima, fue apartado por el Papa en 2019 tras acusaciones de pederastia, El País, 24 de enero de 2025
Vatican confirms disciplinary measures against Cardinal Cipriani, Vatican News, 27 de enero de 2025

Br. John L. Malachy Cosgrove

Donate Photo

Order: OP
Status: Accused

Died: 2/25/2011
Diocese: Archdiocese of New Orleans LA

Religious brother. Professed solemn vows 1959. Named publicly by the Dominicans St Joseph Province on its list in late 2018, which notes that an allegation was established in 2018, but not where or when the abuse was said to have occurred. Cosgrove became a part of the Province of St. Martin de Porres when it was formed in 1979. (We're placing him in the New Orleans archdiocese, where the Province is based.) Per his obituary, Cosgrove worked in Somerset OH, Philadelphia,PA, Chimbote Peru, New Haven CT, New York NY, St. Dominic Priory New Orleans (1980), Dallas TX, Houston,TX, Humble TX and Providence RI. He died 2/25/2011 in New Orleans, where he had lived since 2000.

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P. William Costa Serrano

Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Trujillo, Peru

William José Costa Serrano, a priest of the Archdiocese of Trujillo in the La Libertad region of northern Peru, was accused, with another Trujillo priest, Segundo Fernández Haro, of paying a teenage boy for sex at parties in the late 1990s.

On April 16, 2016, a man identified in the major Connectas exposé as "Andrés" filed a complaint with prosecutors, saying he had been prostituted by the two priests. He said that between 1996 and 1998, when he was age 16, Costa, Fernández Haro, and three other priests organized weekend night parties in Trujillo parishes and in a private house where they had sex with minors for money. He said he met Costa and Fernández Haro at one of these parties and that the priests paid him 20 or 30 soles (6–10 U.S. dollars) for sex. He said they told him that nothing bad had happened, and that what happened there stayed there. The sex parties continued for two years.

According to the website Sudaca, the Congressional commission on sexual abuse identified a victim, J.M.B.R., whose account matches that of "Andrés:" that account says Costa, Fernández Haro and two Huamachuco priests invited him at age 15 to parties of alcohol, cigarettes and sex, held from 1996 to 1998 at the parish of El Buen Pastor in El Porvenir, at other places near Trujillo and at the private house, where priests met youths aged 15 to 17.

The archdiocese says it learned of the criminal complaint on April 22, 2016, suspended both priests that day, and the next day set up one commission to investigate the victims' allegations and another commission to cooperate with the civil authorities.

When "Andrés" testified to the archdiocese's commission on May 14, 2016, he found that Fr. Ricardo Angulo Bazauri, whom he and another victim said they had seen at the parties, was among those handling his case; the two refused to testify before Angulo, and a Huamachuco priest, José Ignacio Gómez, took their statements instead.

At the end of May 2016, leaflets reproducing the criminal complaint against Costa and Fernández Haro were handed out at the Corpus Christi celebrations in Trujillo, which led to arrests and to a criminal complaint by Angulo against the complainants.

In July 2020, the archdiocese said in a public statement that it had been told by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in June 2017 that it had closed the case of both priests. The archdiocese said the alleged abuse had taken place in the 1990s under a previous archbishop, Manuel Prado Pérez-Rosas, SJ, that there was no record of it, and that the archdiocese had received no concrete complaint since Archbishop Miguel Cabrejos Vidarte became archbishop of Trujillo in 1999. It also said that the precautionary suspension of both priests from all ministerial duties remained in force.

On July 16, 2020, Archbishop Cabrejos, who at that time also headed the Peruvian bishops' conference and the Latin American bishops' council (CELAM), told Latin American bishops' conferences that both the Vatican and the local prosecutor had closed the cases in 2017, and that La República/Connectas had withdrawn its major article; but ACI Prensa found the article still online, and its author said no one had told her of any withdrawal.

The Congressional commission chaired by Alberto de Belaunde asked the archdiocese what Cabrejos had done about the case. De Belaunde said Cabrejos never answered.

The Sánchez Carrión prosecutor's office closed the complaint by "Andrés" as time-barred, according to La República; Costa said the Huamachuco prosecutor closed the investigation for lack of conclusive evidence and because more than 20 years had passed.

Sudaca, drawing on the congressional report, says the cases of the five victims it examined, J.M.B.R.'s among them, were closed as time-barred or for lack of evidence.

Costa denies the accusation: he told Connectas that "Andrés" accused him in order to get money and that he had demanded a large sum to keep the case out of the media ("No le puedo decir la cantidad, pero era demasiado").

In July 2020 ACI Prensa tried without success to question Cabrejos about the two suspended priests. As last reported in 2020, Costa was still suspended from ministry.

Jeffery Daniels Valderrama

Donate Photo

Order: SVC
Status: Case Dismissed

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

American. Consecrated layman of the Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana from 1985 to 2001. Daniels led Marian Groups of boys, aged 12 to 16, at San Borja, taking them on mission trips, and teaching religion at Colegio San Pedro.

The 2017 report commissioned by the Sodalicio described Daniels as the group’s most egregious abuser. Between 1985 and 1997, he allegedly abused twelve boys and young men between 1985 and 1997. The abuses ranged from fondling to repeated anal penetration of boys aged 10 to 17. A victim, A.U., said Daniels abused him for about two years from age 14, and two other witnesses describe touching on mission trips in Arequipa.

Daniels had been reported to his superiors at the SCV in 1997, and he admitted abusing three young men. Luis Figari and Germán Doig neither expelled him nor reported him to law enforcement. Instead, he was isolated for three years at the San Bartolo formation house, while other members were told he was on retreat. Doig reportedly said he would deal with the victims' families himself.

After Doig's death in 2001, the Sodalicio’s Superior Council authorized Daniels' departure from the group. He moved to the United States that year.

In February 2017, the Sodalicio's Superior General delivered the group's own commissioned report to Lima's public prosecutor. It documented alleged sexual abuses perpetrated by Daniels, Luis Fernando Figari, Germán Doig, and Virgilio Levaggi against 19 minors and 10 adults.

In December 2017, Peruvian prosecutors formally charged Jeffery Daniels (by then living in the United States) with multiple counts of abuse. The charges, documented in court filings and reported by the Chicago Tribune, included sexual, physical, and psychological abuse and conspiracy to cover up these crimes. Peru intended to seek Daniels’ extradition, but once the case was closed by Peruvian authorities (in 2019, without indictments), extradition efforts stopped.

Peru closed its criminal cases against Daniels and the others in 2024.

As of 2017-2018, Daniels reportedly was living in Antioch, Illinois with his wife and children. Sodalicio said that in 2016, it had reported his whereabouts to Illinois child-welfare authorities and to the archdiocese of Chicago.

Sources:

JEFFERY DANIELS, SODÁLITE, Las Lineas Torcidas, 28 de octubre de 2015
Informes sobre Abusos y Respuesta en el Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana, Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, 10 de febrero de 2017
Residente de los suburbios acusado de abusar sexualmente de niños en Perú, Chicago Tribune, 15 de diciembre de 2017
El apóstol de niños implicado en el caso más grave de abuso sexual en Perú, ElNacional.cat, 04 de abril de 2018Sodalicio en Perú: quién es Jeffery Daniels, el “apóstol de los niños”, implicado en “el caso más grave de abuso sexual” contra menores en ese país, BBC, 04 de abril de 2018
Álvaro Urbina y los abusos del Sodalicio: Habla el hombre que inspiró la obra “San Bartolo,” RPP, actualizado el 9 de julio de 2018
9.2 – Caso Emblemático “Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana,” Comisión Investigadora de Abusos Sexuales
contra Menores de Edad en Organizaciones, Congreso de la República del Perú, 23 de julio de 2019
Álvaro Urbina: “¿Cuántos curas siguen encubiertos por la Iglesia?”, Perú 21, 25 de agosto de 2019
Papa Francisco expulsa a otros tres miembros del Sodalicio y exige que enfrenten a la justicia “sin más dilación”, Infobae, 10 de octubre de 2024

P. Luis Hernán del Carpio Costa

Status: Convicted

Diocese: Diocese of Chimbote, Peru

Accused in July 2014 of sexually abusing a 13-year-old girl, who was an altar server at Our Lady of Guadalupe parish, in the Nicolas Galatea neighborhood of the Nuevo Chimbote district. Del Carpio was a priest of the parish. His victim testified that he lured her into a room at the parish, then forcibly kissed her and touched her private parts. Del Carpio was convicted and received a ten-year suspended sentence in October 2017, and removed from the clerical state by the Vatican. Del Carpio fled. Chimbote's Bishop Simon Piorno stated that del Carpio should turn himself in. In October 2020, after a two-year search, he was captured by law enforcement in the El Porvenir neighborhood of Chimbote, then transferred to the Cambio Puente prison to serve his sentence. In March 2025 an appeal of del Carpio’s conviction was denied by Peru’s Constitutional Court.

Sources:

Sacerdote es condenado a diez años pero pena no se hará efectiva, RPP, 11 de octubre de 2017
SENTENCIAN A 10 AÑOS DE PRISIÓN A EXSACERDOTE DE NUEVO CHIMBOTE POR TOCAMIENTOS A MENOR, Poder Judicial del Peru, 11 de octubre de 2017
Dictan 10 años de prisión a ex cura por tocamientos indebidos, El Comercio, 12 de octubre de 2017
Obispo considera que exsacerdote condenado a 10 años de cárcel debería entregarse a la justicia, Chimbote en Línea, 13 de abril de 2018
Exsacerdote sentenciado por tocamientos indebidos es capturado en Chimbote, Diario Correo, 26 de octubre de 2020
Capturan a sacerdote condenado a 10 años de cárcel por tocamientos indebidos a una niña, Wayka.pe, 27 de octubre de 2020
AUTO DEL TRIBUNAL CONSTITUCIONAL, Peru, 04 de febrero de 2021
SENTENCIA DEL TRIBUNAL CONSTITUCIONAL, Peru, 10 de marzo de 2025

Germán Doig Klinge

Order: SVC
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

Consecrated layman. Doig joined the Sodalicio in the 1970s. Ten years younger than Figari, he quickly became one of Figari’s favorites, eventually becoming his vicar general, i.e., second in command. Between 1983 and 2000, according to a 2017 investigative report commissioned by the Sodalicio, Doig allegedly abused five boys and one female teen, all of whom were minors. He also allegedly abused three adult male members and “sexually manipulated” three other adult men.

Doig died of cardiac arrest at age 44 in 2001. Shortly thereafter, the Sodalicio began the process to get him beatified. Dr. Rocio Figueroa, who had been sexually abused by Doig when she was 15, was named to the team charged with gathering information for Doig's beatification case. During the process, Figueroa found evidence that Doig had victimized others. Figari fought to silence her, but after he resigned as Superior General in late 2010, Figueroa’s case against Doig moved forward. In 2011, the new Superior General, Eduardo Regal, informed the community that Doig had committed acts “contrary to his vow of celibacy.” He did not mention that the victims included minors. The shocking news soon became public: in 2011, the now-defunct newspaper Diario16 ran testimonies from three victims, and the news outlet Caretas soon followed.

Sources:

Resumen del caso y artículos de prensa sobre el Germán Doig, Informe Guillén, 2012
Reporte para SNAP de los Casos Publicados en la Prensa Sobre Abusos Sexuales Relígíosos en Peru, Años 2000 Al 2012, by Héctor Guillén Tamayo, presented at SNAP’s 2012 Annual Conference, Chicago IL, U.S
Informes sobre Abusos y Respuesta en el Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana, Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, 10 de febrero de 2017
9.2 – Caso Emblemático “Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana,” Comisión Investigadora de Abusos Sexuales contra Menores de Edad en Organizaciones, Congreso de la República del Perú, 23 de julio de 2019

Fr. Michael J. Donofrio

Ordained: 1976
Status: Sued

Diocese: Archdiocese of Philadelphia PA

Ordained in 1976 for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, PA. Assigned to Parroquia San Pedro in Andanuaylas, Apurimac, Peru in the early 1990s. In 2003 Donofrio was accused in a lawsuit of sexually abusing a 12-year-old boy in PA 1982-1983. The Archdiocese of Philadelphia was notified in 2002. Donofrio was was removed from his Peru assignment in 2003 and placed on restricted leave. He submitted a petition to the Vatican for voluntary laicization. He was laicized in 7/2007.

Assignments:

Philadelphia Archdiocesan Priest Data Profile

Sources:

Fr. Milton Eggerling

Ordained: 1954
Status: Sued

Died: 2/29/2008
Diocese: Diocese of Austin TX

Ordained for the Sioux Falls SD diocese. Worked in a number of archdioceses and dioceses: St. Paul-Minneapolis, Bismarck ND, Oakland CA, Austin TX, San Jose CA, Boston MA, and Lima Peru via the Boston-based Society of St. John the Apostle. Accused in a 3/2016 lawsuit of sexually abusing a boy over five years, beginning when the boy was an 11-year-old student and altar server at St. Louis parish in Austin in the 1970s. Eggerling was assigned to Austin 1973-1979. He reportedly plied the boy with alcohol and took him on trips. He died 2/29/2008, per the 2009 Official Catholic Directory. Included on the Sioux Falls diocese's list 3/21/2019 (it erroneously notes his death dated as 3/7/2008). On the Austin diocese's list 1/31/2019.

Assignments:

Sources:

Fr. Frank E. Fairbairn

Donate Photo

Ordained: 1969
Status: Sued

Died: 9/13/2000
Diocese: Archdiocese of Boston MA

Left position as chaplain at Northeastern University in Boston, MA, to minister in Lima, Peru, 1994-1999. Died in 9/2000. Reportedly in 1/2003, Fairbairn was accused for the first time in a recent lawsuit of abusing a 14-year-old boy in 1970. Per the Boston archdiocese's list in 8/2011, there was no formal determination of guilt either because Fairbairn died prior to a canonical investigation or it was not complete at his death.

Assignments:

BA.org Assignment Record

Sources:

Fr. Leonard (Jeffrey) Fairfield

Donate Photo

Order: OCarm
Ordained: 1946
Status: Accused

Died: 11/28/2005
Diocese: Diocese of Joliet IL

Worked and/or lived in Ontario Canada, in the United States in PA, WDC, MA, TX, IL, FL, NY, CA, VA. Assigned 1952-1962 to Nuestra Senora del Carmen in Miraflores, Lima, Peru. Died in 2005. Named publicly as accused of child sexual abuse by the Carmelite order on its list 11/22/2020. (Location of abuse not noted - placing Fairfield for now in the Diocese of Joliet, where the Province is located.)

Assignments:

Carmelites Assignment Record

Sources:

P. Segundo Fernández Haro

Status: Case Dismissed

Diocese: Archdiocese of Trujillo, Peru

Segundo Asunción Fernández Haro, a priest of the Archdiocese of Trujillo in the La Libertad region of northern Peru, is accused, with another Trujillo priest, William Costa Serrano, of paying a teenage boy for sex at parties in the late 1990s. On April 16, 2016 a man who spoke to Connectas as "Andrés" filed a complaint with prosecutors saying he had been prostituted by the two priests. He said that between 1996 and 1998, when he was 16, Fernández Haro, Costa and three other priests organized or attended weekend night parties in Trujillo parishes and in a private house where they had sex with minors for money. He said he met Fernández Haro and Costa at one of these parties, that the priests paid him 20 or 30 soles (6–10 U. S. dollars) for sex, and that it occurred for two years. After the rapes and assaults, the victim, the priests would tell him nothing bad had happened.

The congressional commission on sexual abuse, as summarized by the website Sudaca, named a complainant, J.M.B.R., whose account matches that of "Andrés": it says Fernández Haro, Costa and two Huamachuco priests invited him at age 15 to parties of alcohol, cigarettes and sex, held from 1996 to 1998 at the parish of El Buen Pastor in El Porvenir, at other places near Trujillo and at the private house, where priests met boys aged 15 to 17.

The Archdiocese of Trujillo suspended both priests on April 22, 2016 and set up a commission. The victims refused to testify before one commission member, Fr. Ricardo Angulo, whom they said they had seen at the parties where they were prostituted. In July 2020, in response to the publication of the Connectas piece, the archdiocese said that the Vatican had closed the case in June 2017 for lack of evidence, but that the priests were still suspended from ministry. The criminal cases were dismissed because of statutes of limitation.

Sources:

Escándalo: Denuncian a dos sacerdotes por abuso sexual, El Popular, 23 de febrero de 2016
Pederastía en el Perú: batalla al interior de la Iglesia, La República en alianza con CONNECTAS, 12 de julio de 2020
Denuncias de abusos en Perú: Mons. Cabrejos envía carta a episcopados latinoamericanos, EWTN News, 16 de julio de 2020
Abusos sexuales en Trujillo y Huamachuco: Una herida abierta en la Iglesia Católica en Perú, ACI Prensa, 27 de agosto de 2020
Las víctimas de abuso sexual en la prelatura de Huamachuco, Sudaca.Pe, 15 de abril de 2023

Luis Fernando Figari

Order: SVC
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

Consecrated layman. Figari founded the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae (SCV) in Lima in 1971 as a Catholic lay community of consecrated laymen and priests. Officially approved by Pope John Paul II as a society of apostolic life in 1997, the reputedly ultraconservative group eventually spread to 25 countries and claimed to have 20,000 members.

In 2000, ex-member José Enrique Escardó Steck became the first person to reveal abuses within the Sodalicio, as it is called, when he published a six-part series in Gente magazine detailing the psychological and physical suffering he endured as a teenager in the group.

In 2007, Sodalicio member Daniel Beltran Murguía was caught by Lima police in a hotel room, preparing to photograph an 11-year-old boy in the nude.

In 2008, Sodalicio leaders were notified of abuses perpetrated by Germán Doig, Figari’s second-in-command until his death in 2001.

Figari continued leading the group until he resigned abruptly on December 31, 2010, citing health problems. An inquiry later commissioned by the Peruvian Congress revealed that he faced pressure to resign because of allegations of abuse. His sexual, psychological, and physical abuse of minors and young men have since been extensively documented.

In 2011, the first public victims’ testimonies accusing Figari of sexual abuse appeared in the now-defunct newspaper Diario16.

In 2015, two journalists, ex-Sodalicio member Pedro Salinas and investigative reporter Paola Ugaz, published more than 30 accounts by victims of Sodalicio leaders. Their book, Mitad monjes, mitad soldados, detailed cult-like control, humiliation, and severe abuse within the organization. It proved to be a watershed in the history of the Sodalicio, galvanizing responses by prosecutors, the Peruvian Congress, the Vatican, and the disgraced sect itself. It also marked the beginning of a reckoning, however slow and sputtering, of the Peruvian church for its inadequate response to clergy sex abuse.

In early 2017, the Vatican’s Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life finally took action against Figari, banning him from contact with any Sodalicio members and from returning to Peru.

On February 13, 2017,the Sodalicio published its own report of an investigation by outside experts that named five lay leaders of the Sodalicio as sexual abusers of minors, including Figari, who it cited as a sexual abuser of one minor and six young adults.

In late 2017, a Lima prosecutor, armed with new victims’ testimonies, re-opened the criminal case against Figari that had been dismissed by another prosecutor months before. She sought nine months’ pre-trial detention for Figari and three other Sodalicio leaders – Virgilio Levaggi, Jeffery Daniels, and Daniel Beltran Murguía. Rather than sexual abuse, she charged them with criminal conspiracy and causing serious psychological harm – charges that had not yet prescribed.

In the meantime, victims of Figari and other Sodalicio leaders testified to the Congress’s investigating commission. One victim said that Figari had sodomized him repeatedly, justifying it as a spiritual technique. Another said that Figari had shown him pornography. Yet another said Figari had forced him to undress and re-enact a sexual act.

The commission concluded that Figari was both a perpetrator and an enabler: he had committed sexual, physical and psychological abuse, and he had been complicit in similar abuses perpetrated by Virgilio Levaggi, Jeffery Daniels, and Germán Doig.

Figari consistently denied everything, calling himself innocent and refusing to appear before the congressional inquiry.

In January 2018, Pope Francis ordered the Vatican to take control of the Sodalicio’s governance. In July 2023, Francis dispatched Archbishop Charles Scicluna and Msgr. Jordi Bertomeu to investigate abuses within the group. The two gathered testimonies from victims, current and former Sodalicio leaders, and journalists who had exposed the group’s wrongdoing. Their report, issued in late 2023, spurred further action by the Vatican.

In August 2024, the Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life expelled Figari from the Sodalicio. The Peruvian bishops’ conference stated that the Vatican had found Figari guilty of abuses. In September 2024, the Vatican expelled 10 other prominent Sodalits from the group, including Archbishop José Eguren, two priests, and seven laymen.

In January 2025, the Vatican announced that Pope Francis had decided to permanently dissolve the organization. His decree was officially enacted on April 14, 2025, days before his death.

The Church’s forceful action was long overdue. Former Peru bishop Reinaldo Nann notes in his book, ¿Cueva de abusadores o iglesia segura?: Los abusos sexuales contra menores en la iglesia peruana y su futura prevención" that victims’ complaints had been presented to the ecclesiastical tribunal of Lima since the early 2000s. Victims say that they never received information about the disposition of their cases and that no action was taken against their abusers.

In March 2026, investigative reporter Paola Ugaz obtained a face-to-face interview with Figari, aged 78, at a church-run nursing home in San Giovanni Rotondo, Italy. She reported that he was living in comfort.

“Figari lives peacefully in his gilded exile because the justice system in Peru stopped pursuing the case in which he was being investigated as the leader of an abusive and sectarian organization,” she said.

In May 2026, Msgr. Jordi Bertomeu and his team overseeing the Sodalitium’s dissolution process returned to Lima to hear victims’ accounts. In their first five days of work, they received more than 100 reports of abuse, including sexual abuse. Bertomeu said he had heard from victims "who do not know where to begin to explain all the trauma that belonging" to the Sodalitium has generated for them. In an interview later that month, he said that in their final ten days of gathering testimonies, an additional 142 victims had come forward.

Sources:

Mitad monjes mitad soldados, por Pedro Salinas con la colaboración de Paola Ugaz, 2015
Abuse Allegations Follow Leader of Peruvian Catholic Sect to Rome, The Guardian, 16 de junio de 2016
Informes sobre Abusos y Respuesta en el Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana, Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, 10 de febrero de 2017
9.2 – Caso Emblemático “Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana,” Comisión Investigadora de Abusos Sexuales
contra Menores de Edad en Organizaciones, Congreso de la República del Perú, 23 de julio de 2019
Vaticano expulsó a Figari acusado de abuso infantil, El Diario, 15 de agusto de 2024
Figari, the Sodalitium and sexual abuse: much ado about nothing, Los Ángeles Press, 19 de agosto de 2024
Quién es Luis Fernando Figari, el fundador del Sodalicio peruano al que la Iglesia expulsó tras múltiples denuncias de abusos sexuales, BBC, 20 de agosto de 2024
Vatican to compensate victims of abusive Peru Catholic group,
Agence France Presse, 2 de abril de 2026

Fr. Miguel Flores

Ordained: 1994
Status: Sued

Diocese: Diocese of Fresno CA

From Guadalajara, Mexico. Ordained in Bolivia. Ministered and taught in Chile. Studied in Argentina and Australia. Taught at a seminary in in Lima, Peru. Studied in Colombia. Arrived in the Fresno CA diocese from Mexico in 1999. Accused by a 16-year-old girl in 2002 of sexual assault 1/2002-2/2002. She was his office assistant at parishes in Tranquility and Hanford. Acquitted by jury in 8/2002 on three counts of forcible rape, three counts of sex with a minor and charge of making threats and intimidating a witness. Returned to active ministry. Case reopened in 2019 after new information was deemed credible. Placed on leave in 2/2019. Flores' alleged victim filed suit against the diocese in 2/2020 under the CA Child Victims Act. The case was dismissed by the plaintiff in 4/2024.

Documents:

Superior Court of California 04.26.24

Sources:

P. Roosvelt Flores Flores

Status: Accused

Diocese: Diocese of Huancavélica, Peru

Flores was principal of a San Juan María Vianney minor seminary in Huancavelica when he was accused of raping a 16-year-old boy on February 16, 2021. The boy was a San Juan María Vianney student. Flores was criminally investigated. A physician who examined the boy concluded that there were “signs of recent unnatural sexual intercourse.” Flores’ whereabouts were unknown for a time after the allegation. It was later discovered that he had gone to Izcuchaca, Huancavelica, where he was allowed active ministry. Flores had been represented by six lawyers and the case was dismissed. The boy's mother said, "I hope the Church is not involved or providing support... ."

In April 2024 Flores was arrested in Huancayo for the alleged recent indecent touching of a 17-year-old girl during a social gathering. At the party Flores allegedly asked the girl to come closer and talk and, after a while, began to rub her leg, then began to play with her hands. The girl said, “I felt very tense, very uncomfortable, and very nervous...he separated my legs, pressed hard, which is why I have a bruise on my thigh, and he also started touching my private parts.” She was examined by a forensic physician who concluded that she had been injured. Flores was placed in pre-trial detention in April 2024. On April 24, 2024, Huancavelica bishop Carlos Salcedo Ojeda, O.M.I stated that Flores would be prohibited from ministry during the criminal proceedings, providing further confirmation that Flores had been reinstated to active ministry after the substantive rape allegation in 2021.

On April 4, 2025 the Specialized Criminal Court for Violence Against Women and Family Members ordered the release of Flores, after having determined that there was insufficient evident to establish criminality.

Sources:

Escolares huancavelicanos desarrollan pan que reduce índices de anemia en 45 días, La Republica, 11.04.2019
Requerimiento de detención preliminar de Roosvelt Flores Flores, 02.17.2021
Huancavelica: Sacerdote denunciado por violación a adolescente está no habido, Wayka, 02.22.2021
Piden prisión preventiva contra sacerdote de Huancavelica por tocamientos a menor de 17 años, Huana York-Times, 04.21.2021
Huancayo: Detienen a sacerdote acusado de abuso sexual contra dos menores de edad, Infobae, 04.20.2024
Caso sacerdote: Poder Judicial ordena 9 meses de prisión a Roosvelt Flores por tocamientos a menor, Huana York-Times, 04.22.2024
Huancayo: sacerdote acusado de tocamientos indebidos cumplirá nueve meses de prisión preventiva, RPP, 04.23.2024
Comunicado del Obispo Carlos Alberto Salcedo Ojeda, O.M.I, para Flores, 04.24.2024
Sala declara inadmisible casación interpuesto por sacerdote Roosvelt Flores contra prisión preventiva, Huana York-Times, 05.29.2024
Vuelve a las calles sacerdote investigado por tocamientos indebidos a menor y violación sexual, Info Andes, 04.07.2025

Seminarian Juan Carlos González Herrera

Status: Convicted

Diocese: Diocese of Tacna y Moquegua, Peru

Colombian. On May 4, 2002 Frecuencia Latina reported that in 1997, González raped a 9-year-old boy at San Martin de Porres School in Tacna. González worked at the school. The boy told his parents, and González was arrested. He was released after the court decided that there was insufficient evidence. Six months later González was again arrested, this time for the rape of a 13-year-old boy at an abandoned property that belonged to the Diocese. The boy and another had been picked up off of the street by the seminarian, who offered them gifts, took them to where he was sleeping and told them both to take off their clothes. González was convicted, and sentenced in January 1999 to 5 years in prison and ordered to pay 6,000 soles to his victims. His sentence was soon changed to partial liberty and González fled the country. He also had paid his victims only 10 soles. The boys' attorney reportedly stated that the seminarian's sentence was lenient due to pressure from the Church, in particular by Bishop José Hugo Garaycoa Hawkins, who allegedly said that the attorney "would be excommunicated and barred from entering any Catholic church in Tacna" if he continued with the prosecution.

Sources:

Seminarista Colombiano violó a dos niños y huyó del país con ayuda de la iglesia Católica de Tacna, Frecuencia Latina, 05.04.2002
Reporte para SNAP de los Casos Publicados en la Prensa Sobre Abusos Sexuales Relígíosos en Peru, Años 2000 Al 2012, by Héctor Guillén Tamayo, presented at SNAP’s 2012 Annual Conference, Chicago IL, U.S
Resumen del caso y artículos de prensa sobre el seminarista González Herrera, Informe Guillén, 2012

Fr. Patrick Henry

Ordained: 1981
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Omaha NE

Henry was placed on leave in 6/2007 after a complaint that he sexually abused a boy, age 14-15, at Boys Town in 1972, prior to ordination. Henry worked at Boys Town in the late 1960s-into the 1970s. The archdiocesan review board deemed the allegation credible. The case was forwarded to the Vatican. Henry also worked in the Omaha Diocese 1981-1984, in Bolivia 1984-1989, again in Omaha 1990-1992, and then in Peru, where he worked with Aymara Indians near Lake Titicaca. He transferred to the Diocese of Cleveland in 1994, where he was incardinated in 1997. Included on the Omaha archdiocese's list 11/30/1018. It notes a report to Cleveland in 2008 of abuse 1970s-1980s. Laicized, per the Cleveland diocese's list in 6/2019. Per the NE A.G.'s report in 11/2021, there are six known victims, all boys, ages 12-16.

Assignments:

BA.org Assignment Record

Sources:

Fr. Frederick J. Hopwood

Ordained: 1951
Status: Guilty plea

Died: 4/30/2017
Diocese: Diocese of Charleston SC

Ordained in 1951 at Maryknoll Seminary for the Foreign Missions; sent to Peru to teach. By 1952 Hopwood was in the Diocese of Charleston, SC, assigned as assistant chancellor. He also taught at Bishop England High School and was chaplain for the Citadel. He eventually became rector of the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist and was elevated to monsignor. In 1984 he was assigned as pastor of a Greenville parish about the time the Diocese reportedly learned of an allegation. Hopwood resigned in 12/1993 after allegations became public. At least 10 men alleged sexual abuse by Hopwood. Criminal charges were filed in 1994. Hopwood leaded guilty 3/21/1994 to a lewd act on a minor for abuse of a St. John the Baptist Cathedral altar boy in 1970. He was sentenced to three years probation, treatment and 250 hours of public service. He died 4/30/2017. Included on the Diocese's 3/29/2019 list of credibly accused. A lawsuit filed in 1/2021 claims sexual abuse of a boy for two years in the mid-1970s, beginning when the boy was age 13 and a St. John's Church and Cathedral School student.

Sources:

P. Marco Antonio Huaripata Medina

Status: Accused

Diocese: Diocese of Chimbote, Peru

Assigned to Our Lady of Guadalupe parish in the Nuevo Chimbote district when arrested in March 2019, accused of sexually assaulting a 16-year-old girl on multiple occasions for a month, beginning in October 2018. The girl was a catechism assistant and choir member at the parish. Chimbote Bishop Angel Francisco Simon Piorno announced that he had suspended Huaripata and ordered the initiation of a canonical trial. Per the bishop, Huaripata admitted only to kissing the girl.

Sources:

Áncash: denuncian a sacerdote por presunto abuso sexual en agravio de una menor, El Comercio, 03.22.2019
Áncash: suspenden de sus funciones a sacerdote acusado de abuso sexual, El Comercio, 03.22.2019
Padre denuncia que sacerdote abusó sexualmente de su hija de 16 años en Áncash, Perú 21, 08.25.2019

Fr. C. James Jeffrey

Ordained: 1959
Status: Accused

Died: 5/28/2017
Diocese: Diocese of Brownsville TX

Ordained in 1959 for the Diocese of Fargo, ND. Joined the Missionary Society of St. James in 1964. Assigned to parishes in Peru until 1986, in Miraflores, Lima; Chimbote; Piura. On loan to the Diocese of Brownsville 1986 until 1988, when his faculties were removed. Returned to Fargo where he pastored parishes until 1999. Retired and moved to Belleville, IL. Became involved with the Diocese of Belleville's Hispanic Ministry. Died 5/28/2017. Named publicly as credibly accused by the Brownsville diocese on its list 1/31/2019. Included on the Fargo diocese's list 1/2/2020. Allegations substantiated.

Sources:

Fr. Edgardo Arrunataegui Jimenez

Ordained: 1983
Status: Accused

Diocese: Diocese of Orange CA

Ordained in Peru. Worked in Honduras for a time, arrived in the Diocese of Orange CA in 1987. Left to perform missionary work in Peru in the early 1990s. Worked in the Diocese of Fresno 1997-2004. First public identification as accused was in 1/2004. The Diocese of Orange dealt with the allegations "years ago" but didn't tell police until 2004. As of 2009 Jimenez was found to be working as a priest in Madrid but was still listed as part of the Diocese of Chimbote in Peru. Found in 2017 by a news team, working as a hospital chaplain for the diocese in Chimbote. Since leaving Orange in the early 1990s, Jimenez had "bounced around the world" using different versions of his name (e.g. Horacio Jimenez, Edgardo Arrunategui, etc.) Chimbote's bishop Simon Piorno said the 2017 news story was false, and that the Orange diocese's list was irrelevant.

Assignments:

OC Weekly 3.04.05

Sources:

Fr. Edward M. Keohan

Ordained: 1959
Status: Settled

Died: 9/12/2015
Diocese: Archdiocese of Boston MA

Ordained for the Archdiocese of Boston in 1959. Worked as a Society of St. James the Apostle missionary 1961-1966, in Apurimac, Peru. One of 16 priests named for the first time in lawsuits filed in 1/2003 by 70 plaintiffs. Accused of fondling a teenage boy at St. Rose of Lima in Chelsea MA. The Archdiocese did not place him on leave until 8/2003 because it said the lawsuit did not contain enough information to justify removal. Accuser received a six-figure settlement; Keohan was exonerated by the Review Board and returned to active status in 3/2005. Per the 8/2011 Boston archdiocese's list, Keohan was retired with no restrictions. He died 9/12/2015.

Assignments:

BA.org Assignment Record

Sources:

Fr. Ronald LaBarrera Villarreal

Ordained: 1986
Status: Accused

Diocese: Diocese of Fresno CA

Ordained for the Diocese of Trujillo, Peru. Worked as an extern priest in the Fresno CA diocese for a month in the summer of 2004 and in 2007 at weekend retreats. Named as credibly accused by the Diocese of Fresno on its list in 8/2021. Appointed in 2021 by Pope Francis to the International Theological Commission for the 2021-2026 term. Was working when appointed at the Biblical, Theological, and Pastoral Center for Latin America and the Caribbean. In 2026 remains in active ministry as pastor of a Guadalupe, Peru parish.

Sources:

Virgilio Levaggi Vega

Order: SVC
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

Consecrated layman and a member of the Sodalicio's founding generation. By the mid-1980s, Levaggi was in charge of Instruction and described as the organization's number three.

According to the inquiry later commissioned by the Sodalicio, Levaggi sexually abused at least one minor and two young adult men between 1977 and 1987 and sexually manipulated three adult men. After abuse complaints were reported to his superior, Figari, Levaggi left the Sodalicio of his own accord in 1987. In 2016, then-SCV Superior General Alessandro Moroni reportedly admitted that two accusations had been concealed.

In February 2017, Moroni delivered the commission's investigative report to Lima's public prosecutor. It documented alleged sexual abuses perpetrated by Luis Fernando Figari, Germán Doig, Virgilio Levaggi and Jeffrey Daniels against 19 minors and 10 adults, including an allegation that Levaggi had sexually abused a 17-year-old boy in 1977. In March 2017, a prosecutor closed the case, citing statute of limitations. In late 2017, another prosecutor, pursuing other charges, called for nine months' pre-trial detention for Figari, Levaggi, Daniels and Daniel Murguí. According to the Sodalicio, the detention request was annulled in 2019 and the criminal cases against Levaggi and the others were definitively closed in 2024.

Levaggi called the allegations in Sodalicio's 2017 baseless and denied committing any abuse. As of 2018, he reportedly was living in Madrid.

Sources:

Ex miembro del Sodalicio rechaza cargos de abusos en su contra, El Comercio, 07 de octubre de 2016
SODALICIO: EL OCASO DEL INNOMBRABLE, Las líneas torcidas, 8 de octubre de 2016
Piura: arzobispo sorprendido por estar en denuncia contra Sodalicio, RPP, 10 de octubre de 2016
Informes sobre Abusos y Respuesta en el Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana, Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, 10 de febrero de 2017
Caso Sodalicio: OIT tomó conocimiento de abusos de Virgilio Levaggi, Lamula.pe, 02 de febrero 2017
El Sodalicio publicó informe sobre abusos sexuales de Luis Figari, RPP, 14 de febrero de 2017
Sodalicio: los dolorosos testimonios de las víctimas de abusos, El Comercio, 10 de enero de 2018
Virgilio Levaggi y el Sodalicio (parte final), La Mula,16 de abril de 2018
9.2 – Caso Emblemático “Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana,” Comisión Investigadora de Abusos Sexuales
contra Menores de Edad en Organizaciones, Congreso de la República del Perú, 23 de julio de 2019
Papa Francisco expulsa a otros tres miembros del Sodalicio y exige que enfrenten a la justicia “sin más dilación”, Infobae, 21 de octubre de 2024

Fr. Paul Madden

Ordained: 1970
Status: Settled

Diocese: Diocese of Jackson MS

From Ireland. Ordained for the Diocese of Jackson, MS. Accused in 1993 of abuse, including rape, of 13-year-old boy on a trip to Ireland in 1973. Plaintiff settled for $50K. In a separate 2002 lawsuit plaintiff alleged church lied, telling him there was no previous knowledge of abuse by priests. Attached to the petition was a letter signed by a Paul Madden who said he "feels remorse and guilt for the molestation." Judge ruled in favor of the defense in in 9/2003 and the case was dismissed. Faculties in Jackson were suspended in 7/2002. Madden was 'on duty outside the diocese' in the Diocese of Saltillo, Mexico 1977-1979. Worked as a missionary of the Society of St. James the Apostle in Peru 1991-1993 and 1994-2002. Incardinated into the Chimbote diocese in Peru in 2003, despite warnings to the diocese by Diocese of Jackson officials. Still active there in 8/2015. Retired and living in Peru in 3/2019. Included on the Jackson diocese's list of credibly accused 3/19/2019.

Assignments:

BA.org Assignment Record

Sources:

P. Marco Francesco Mambretti

Status: Acquitted

Diocese: Vicariate Apostolic of Pucallpa, Peru

From Italy. Ordained in 2013. Accused of raping a 13-year-old boy, who had a mental age of 10, in 2017 at Santo Domingo Savio parish in Yarinacocha. Mambretti was the vice-rector of the nearby San Pedro Seminary. According to the accuser, "The rapes occurred on several occasions, both in the office of the priest's seminary and in his bedroom." In July 2023 Mambretti was sentenced to 25 years in prison and required to pay 20,000 soles to the victim. In March 2025, the Superior Court of Justice of Ucayali, through its Permanent Criminal Court, issued a unanimous decision to exonerate Mambretti of the charges, sparking controversy and debate. Three other adolescent boys were also accused of sexually abusing the boy. In February 2026 Mambretti was in active ministry in the Diocese of Milan.

Sources:

Ucayali: sentencian a 25 años a sacerdote por violación sexual contra menor, expreso.com.pe, 18 de julio de 2023
Perú: Condenan en primera instancia a sacerdote acusado de abuso y que se declara inocente, ACI Prensa, 19 de julio de 2023
Corte Superior de Justicia de Ucayali: Anulan sentencia de sacerdote encontrado culpable de violación, Corte Superior de Justicia de Ucayali, 01 de enero de 2024
Sentencia, Corte Superior de Justicia Ucayali, 27 de marzo de 2025
Transcripción, Permanent Criminal Court Acquits Father Marco of Rape, UTV Noticias, YouTube, 29 de marzo de 2025

Fr. Daniel J. Mangen/Mangan

Order: CPPS
Ordained: 1980
Status: Sued

Diocese: Diocese of Cleveland OH

American. Missionary in South America. Accused of sexually abusing and raping a girl for three years beginning when she was 16 years old at a Catholic high school in Cleveland OH (U.S.) in the early 1980s. Mangen denied the allegations but acknowledged having been "sexually active" with minors and adults. In 1984, he was transferred to Chile. He became a parish priest in the rural town of Tralcao, located in the southern municipality of Mariquina [Valdiva Province, Los Rios Region]. In 2002, a Cleveland TV reporter found Mangen ministering at St. Sebastian church in the Chilean town of Purranque [Osorno Province]. In 2005, according to the Official Catholic Directory, he was working as a priest at San Francisco de Borja in Lima, Peru. Not included on Chilean bishops' public list of guilty clerics. Believed to be in Valdivia, Chile as of 11/2010 (not as a priest).

Assignments:

BA.org Assignment Record

Sources:

Seminarian Roberto Marcelo Pilco

Status: Arrested

Diocese: Diocese of Callao, Peru

In October 2008 Marcelo Pilco was arrested on Callao after two boys reported that they had been sexually assaulted by the seminarian. Police found large quantities of pornography in Marcelo Pilco's home, including USB drives containing over 1,000 photographs of children engaging in sex acts. Three boys were found with him. Marcelo Pilco had created a youth association for boys, ages 11-13, who lived in low-income neighborhoods. He reportedly would lure boys to his home, give them a strange drink, and offer them 20 soles to undress. He then took photos of the boys posing suggestively, telling them he would submit the photos to modeling agencies. Marcelo Pilco worked as a security guard and threatened his victims with guns. He admitted his behavior and tried to justify it by saying that he, too, had been raped as a child.

Sources:

Resumen del caso y artículos de prensa sobre el seminarista Roberto Marcelo Pilco, Informe Guillén, 2012
Reporte para SNAP de los Casos Publicados en la Prensa Sobre Abusos Sexuales Relígíosos en Peru, Años 2000 Al 2012, by Héctor Guillén Tamayo, presented at SNAP’s 2012 Annual Conference, Chicago IL, U.S

P. Santiago Martínez Valentín-Gamazo

Status: Acquitted

Diocese: Prelature of Moyobamba, Peru

From Toledo, Spain. Arrived in Peru in 2007. Assigned in 2013 as teacher and, in 2015, spiritual director of Juan Pablo II Minor Seminary in Moyobamba. In March 2017 the seminary’s rector reported to law enforcement allegations that Martinez had groped four students between 2014 and 2017. Martinez allegedly would sexually assault the boys after entering their rooms when they were asleep or feeling ill. Parents of the boys alerted the rector. Martinez was suspended from ministry and sent to live at Moyobamba Cathedral. The prosecutor’s office investigated. Martinez was placed in pre-trial detention in August 2017. He was acquitted and released in January 2019.

Sources:

San Martín: investigan a sacerdote por presuntos tocamientos indebidos, El Comercio, 05.21.2017
Por Inasistencia del Abogado del Sacerdote Santiago Martínez Valentín Gamazo Juez Tuvo Que Reprogramar Audiencia de Prisión Preventiva,Noticias, Poder Judicial del Peru, 07.11.2017
Moyobamba: sacerdote acusado de tocamientos a niños pasará proceso en libertad, Diario Correo, 07.13.2017
Ministerio Público apela resolución que dejó libre a sacerdote acusado de tacamientos indebidos, Voces, 07.14.2017
Siete meses de prisión preventiva a un sacerdote español por abuso sexual en Perú, UDGTV, 08.19.2017
Sacerdote español acusado de tocamientos indebidos a cuatro menores de edad, Ultimasnotas.com, 08.20.2017
Absuelven a sacerdote español acusado de tocamientos indebidos en seminario de Moyobamba, Perú 21, 08.25.2019

P. Eugenio Bernardo Masías Abadía

Donate Photo

Order: SDB
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

According to a Sudeca. pe essay by writer and former Sodalico member Martín Scheuch, a man provided testimony to the Congressional Investigative Commission on Sexual Abuse of Minors within Organizations (2018-2019) that Masías Abadía sexually abused him during the 1970s, when he was ages 8-12 and a student at the Colegio Parroquial Salesiano in Breña, Lima. Masías Abadía was the school's principal. Per the alleged victim, Masías Abadía would take him to a dark room in the school to review lessons, then physically punish and sexually touch him. The abuse included beatings on the boy's buttocks, forced undressing and bathing, then anal penetration. The abuse ended when a teacher noticed that the boy would return from the review sessions in tears and wet. The teacher confronted Masías Abadía and threatened to report him. The boy was transferred to a different school the following year.

Sources:

Los Salesianos Pederastas, Las Lineas Torcidas, 21 de enero de 2023

Seminarian Marco Masías León

Status: Charged

Diocese: Archdiocese of Cusco, Peru

Former seminarian and choir teacher, referred to as "Brother Marco." Masías León was a volunteer religion teacher at several Cusco schools when he was accused in March 2007 of sexually abusing a ten-year-old-boy. He allegedly was dressed as a priest when the assault took place. The Archdiocese stated that Masías León had no connection with the local church. After medical examinations, it was determined that sexual assault had taken place, and Masías León was ordered detained. Officers found a large amount of child pornography in Masías León's home and was suspected of being involved with pedophile networks in Chile and Spain. He was reportedly criminally charged with the sexual abuse of two children.

Assignments:

Capturan en Cusco a presunto pedófilo que integraría red internacional, Panamericana, 30 de marzo de 2007
Arzobispado de Cusco descarta vínculo de presunto violador con la Iglesia, EWTN News, 3 de abril de 2007
Resumen del caso y artículos de prensa sobre el Marco Masias Leon, Informe Guillén, 2012
Reporte para SNAP de los Casos Publicados en la Prensa Sobre Abusos Sexuales Relígíosos en Peru, Años 2000 Al 2012, by Héctor Guillén Tamayo, presented at SNAP’s 2012 Annual Conference, Chicago IL, U.S

P. Manuel Mendoza Ruiz

Status: Accused

Diocese: Prelature of Huamachuco, Peru

Manuel Mendoza Ruiz, a priest of the Prelature of Huamachuco in northern Peru, was the prelature's chancery secretary when he was accused of sexually touching a 15-year-old boy in 2015. According to the account given by the victim to the media outlet Connectas, Mendoza, a friend of his family, went with him to a weekend retreat in Chimbote in May 2015. On the bus back to Huamachuco, the boy said, he woke to find the priest's hand inside his trousers; Mendoza apologized, and then tried again.

Two seminarians had reportedly accused him earlier of seeking sex.

Bishop Ramis was told of the accusation in January 2016 and heard the boy in person. According to the mother, the boy's statement was torn up and she was called a liar; Ramis says he tore it up because she wanted no action.

In 2016, following publicity about alleged abuses in Huamachuco, Ramis suspended Mendoza. In August 2018, Bishop Cisneros, who headed the prelature as apostolic administrator after Ramis' retirement, provisionally lifted the suspension. In April 2019, Cisneros barred Mendoza from presenting himself as a priest pending psychological therapy, but the bishop accused the boy of having contradictory accounts.

In May 2017, the mother filed a criminal complaint for acts against modesty. The church authorities called it ongoing in mid-2020, and a 2023 column says it was closed.

Mendoza denied the accusation and says the Church never found him guilty. In August 2020, he was living with his family in Huamachuco, not exercising ministry. The Prelature of Caravelí had agreed to take him.

Sources:

Escándalo: Denuncian a dos sacerdotes por abuso sexual, El Popular, 23 de febrero de 2016
Pederastía en el Perú: batalla al interior de la Iglesia, La República en alianza con CONNECTAS, 12 de julio de 2020
Denuncias de abusos en Perú: Mons. Cabrejos envía carta a episcopados latinoamericanos, EWTN News, 16 de julio de 2020
Abusos sexuales en Trujillo y Huamachuco: Una herida abierta en la Iglesia Católica en Perú, ACI Prensa, 27 de agosto de 2020
Las víctimas de abuso sexual en la prelatura de Huamachuco, Sudaca.Pe, 15 de abril de 2023

Obispo Gabino Miranda Melgarejo

Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Ayacucho o Huamanga, Peru

A member of Opus Dei, Miranda was made a bishop in 2004 by Pope John Paul II. He served as auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese of Ayachucho o Huamanga from 2004 to May 2013, when he was forced to step down at age 53 after being accused of molesting children he is said to have targeted during confession. Pope Francis laicized him in July 2013.

Sources:

Obispo Auxiliar Gabino Miranda Critica Su Expulsion, La Republica, 23 de septiembre de 2013
Peru: Ex-Bishop Accused of Sex Abuse Admitted Acting ” Imprudently”, This Week in Peru, 23 de septiembre de 2013
Cipriani Por Exobispos: ” Se Esta Haciendo Un Circo Politico Y Mediatico”, Peru 21, 12 d octubre de 2013

P. Tulio Montenegro Infante

Status: Case Dismissed

Diocese: Prelature of Huamachuco, Peru

Tulio Armando Montenegro Infante was a priest of the Prelature of Huamachuco in northern Peru in 2016 when he was accused by at least four men of sexually abusing them as boys or young men between 1988 and 2001, in parishes of the prelature and in the archdiocese of Trujillo.

One victim was a secondary-school pupil and altar boy when Montenegro sexually assaulted him in 1988. Another was a seminarian of 18. A third victim was a young man who lived in the priest’s parish and says he was repeatedly raped from 1995 to 2001. The fourth victim was a teenager in 1996-1998 attending parties in Trujillo where priests paid minors for sex.

One victim says he reported Montenegro to Bishop Sebastián Ramis in 1991. (Ramis ran the prelature of Huamachuco from 1990 to 2018.) Another says Ramis told him not to report and offered to send him to study in Spain. A group of whistleblower priests confronted Ramis in January 2016 about Montenegro and other abusive clerics. Ramis set up a commission of inquiry, but only after a TV program aired the accusations in February 2016.

Ramis says he suspended the accused priests in March 2016. His successor, apostolic administrator Bishop Cisneros, provisionally lifted Montenegro's suspension in August 2018, then in April 2019 barred him permanently from public ministry, while telling two accusers that their statements were contradictory and exaggerated. The penalty was under appeal at the Vatican in 2020.

The criminal complaints were time-barred or closed for lack of evidence, according to ACI Prensa and the congressional commission.

Montenegro denied the allegations. Banned from public ministry, he was head of a state-run high school in Pataz as of August 2020.

Sources:

Escándalo: Denuncian a dos sacerdotes por abuso sexual, El Popular, 23 de febrero de 2016
Pederastía en el Perú: batalla al interior de la Iglesia, La República en alianza con CONNECTAS, 12 de julio de 2020
Abusos sexuales en Trujillo y Huamachuco: Una herida abierta en la Iglesia Católica en Perú, ACI Prensa, 27 de agosto de 2020
Las víctimas de abuso sexual en la prelatura de Huamachuco, Sudaca.Pe, 15 de abril de 2023

P. Ismael Montero Casas

Status: Convicted

Diocese: Prelature of Yauyos, Peru

In 2011, Montero Casas sexually assaulted and attempted to rape a 15-year-old boy after luring him into a room at a parish in the Chilca district of Lima’s Canete province. The priest threatened to also sexually abuse the boy's sister if he reported the incident. After the assault became known, the priest fled to his home, where he was later arrested. He was immediately suspended from ministry. Chilca police moved him to the district of Mala after area residents attempted vigilante justice. A medical examination of the boy showed injuries consistent with sexual assault. Reportedly, there were similar complaints about Montero Casas in 2004 - one in Yauyos and two in Chilca. He was sentenced in May 2012 to seven years in prison and ordered to pay 10,000 soles for reparations.

Sources:

Cañete: Pretenden golpear a sacerdote acusado de intento de violación, RPP, 07.29.2011
Suspenden a sacerdote acusado de abusar de un menor en Perú, ACI Prensa, 08.01.2011
Los Pecados del Padre Montero, Parte 1, Panamericana Television S.A., 08.07.2011
Los pecados del padre Montero parte 2, Panamericana Television S.A., 08.07.2011
EN CAÑETE SENTENCIAN A SACERDOTE POR ABUSO SEXUAL, Actualidad Canetana, 05.11.2012

P. Marco Antonio Monzón Luna, S.D.B.

Order: SDB
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Huancayo, Peru

Arrived in Huancayo in 1973. Taught at the Santa Rosa Salesian school in Huancayo. In 1995 Monzón Luna was accused by several former students of sexually abusing them during the 1990s. One alleged victim, José del Carmen Oregón Tapia, wrote in March 2015 that he was 10 or 11 years old when the abuses began: "Marco Monzón Luna, chaplain and director of the Salesian Catholic school in Huancayo, sexually abused his students, adolescents, inappropriately touching their private parts and genitals. He carried out these criminal acts during the various ordinary and pastoral activities that he personally directed in the city. Monzón included his student victims in charity activities, spiritual retreats, and outings that he held in the Mantaro Valley, where he abused them. He had his students help him in the principal's office, touching them while they performed minor tasks such as placing stamps and organizing office papers." Other anonymous accusations surfaced after José shared his story. When the allegations came to light in 1995, Monzón Luna was reportedly moved by the Salesian order to its houses across Peru and the world. In June 2020 the Cusco Criminal Investigation Department issued an alert that Monzón Luna was missing. He was last known to have been living in the Zaguán del Cielo area of Cusco as of March 15. He was age 70.

Sources:

EL DISCÍPULO IMPERFECTO (Testimonio), Por José del Carmen Oregón Tapia, 05 de mar de 2015
Nota de Alerta, Policia Nacional del Peru, 06.01.2020
Los Salesianos Pederastas, Las Lineas Torcidas, por Martin Scheuch, 21 de enero de 2023

Daniel Murguía Ward

Order: SVC
Status: Acquitted

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

Murguía Ward was a consecrated Sodalit layman who reached the level of perpetual profession. He reportedly was close to Figari and worked as his cook, as nurse to Figari's parents, and as his personal secretary.

On October 27, 2007, Lima police found him in a hotel room near Plaza San Martín with an 11-year-old boy whose trousers were down. Murguía was holding a digital camera. The boy told police Murguía had tricked him into undressing and had performed oral sex on him. According to the 2019 report issued by the Congressional commission, the camera also held photographs of two other minors. Murguía denied the boy's account.

The Sodalicio expelled Murguía two days after his arrest. The Congressional commission’s later probe of the case included allegations that the Sodalicio had destroyed evidence that would further incriminate Murguía. The commission also found that the Sodalicio had provided no help to the child and had deliberately withheld files from law enforcement.

A Lima higher court acquitted Murguía of rape of a minor on January 7, 2009. The Supreme Court upheld the acquittal on June 30, 2011. The court relied on the child's changed statement that he had only been photographed. The Congressional commission criticized the ruling and said a child-pornography charge should have been possible. Prosecutors named Murguía again in 2017-2018 among those accused with Figari. The criminal case against Murguía and the other criminally accused Sodalicio leaders was permanently dismissed in 2024.

In 2019, Murguía refused to appear before the Congressional commission, and a court order to force him to do so was not carried out.

Sources:

Informes sobre Abusos y Respuesta en el Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana, Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, 10 de febrero de 2017
9.2 – Caso Emblemático “Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana,” Comisión Investigadora de Abusos Sexuales contra Menores de Edad en Organizaciones, Congreso de la República del Perú, 23 de julio de 2019
Parliamentary inquest in Peru revives accusations of abuse cover-up against lay group, Crux, 31 de julio de 2023
Encubrimiento Sodalicio: juez liberó en tres años a pederasta capturado in fraganti cuando abusaba de menor, Infobae, 03 de agosto de 2023
El Sodalicio publicó informe sobre abusos sexuales de Luis Figari, RPP, 14 de febrero de 2017
Justice delayed is justice denied: Peruvian whistleblower reported abuse 14 years ago, Crux, 20 de agosto de 2024
Peruvian priest ousted from order accused of sex abuse, coverup, Crux, 28 de octubre de 2024
El papa Francisco disuelve el Sodalicio, la organización religiosa peruana acusada de décadas de abusos, BBC, 20 de enero de 2025

Br. Felipe Navarrette Diaz

Donate Photo

Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Chicago IL

Named publicly as credibly accused by the Carmelite Order on its list 11/22/2020. Assigned in Tlalpan Mexico, Lima Peru, Middletown NY, Coahula Mexico, and 2014-2015 in Washington DC. Separated from the Order in 2015. Included in the 5/23/2023 IL Attorney General's Report. (No information as to when or where abuse occurred. Placing him in Chicago, where the Province is based.)

Assignments:

Carmelites Assignment Record

Sources:

Fr. John D. O’Connell

Ordained: 1959
Status: Sued

Died: 7/11/2002
Diocese: Diocese of Springfield IL

Parish priest, pastor, hospital chaplain. On leave as a missionary in Peru 1976-1979. Died in 2002. Accused in a lawsuit filed in 7/2026 of sexually abusing a boy multiple times 1991-1994, at St. Mary's in Taylorsville. The boy was an altar server and parish school student.

Sources:

P. Alfonso Raúl Obando Manayay

Status: Accused

Diocese: Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru

Prohibited from ministry at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Parish in Pátapo, Diocese of Chiclayo in March 2019. Chiclayo's bishop was Robert Prevost, O.S.A. (2019-2023). Despite the prohibition, The New York Times discovered via Facebook that Obando continued in active ministry, including with children. In one post on a church Facebook page, Obando asked children to send him their photos on WhatsApp. In June 2025 the Diocese of Chiclayo announced that Obando had been laicized by the Vatican. The Times reported that Obando nonetheless was continuing to work in Chiclayo.

Sources:

Perú: Sacerdote pierde estado clerical y diócesis alerta sobre sacramentos inválidos, ACI Prensa, 10 de junio de 2025
Two Contrasting Cases Raise Questions of Pope Leo’s Actions on Sex Abuse, The New York Times, 28 de junio de 2025

P. Estanislao Olivares

Status: Charged

Diocese: Diocese of Tarma, Peru

Mexican. Member of the Comboni Missionaries. Previously worked in parishes in Ecuador and in Cerro de Pasco, Perú. Per an article on the Camboni Missionaries' website in 2026, Olivares worked in Peru until he became depressed after his mother died and had to be reassigned, to mission work in Chile. Per the Camboni's, Oliveras reportedly left Chile to seek treatment in Mexico, where he worked when he could; further, in 2019 he became physically ill and went to live at the Camboni's Oasis community for the sick and elderly in Guadalajara. Olivares was accused in June 2004 of sexually abusing a 10-year-old altar boy while parish priest of San Jerónimo, in Alhué Chile [Melipilla Province, Santiago Metropolitan Region], where he had been working for 5 years. The abuse was reported by the boy's mother, after her son arrived home in tears and told his parents that Father Lao had touched the boy's genitals in the parish's sacristy. She immediately filed a criminal complaint with local law enforcement but Olivares had already left the country and was in Mexico on vacation for 2.5 months, approved by the Diocese of Melipilla, headed by Bishop Enrique Troncoso (2000-2014). In July 2004, Bishop Troncoso opened an investigation into "a complaint of alleged inadequate conduct against a minor that concerns Fr. Estanislao Olivares." The victim's family asked Troncoso to order Olivares to return to Chile. Troncoso said that Olivares had maintained his innocence and that "there hasn't been any bad intention. They were touches...like a game." Olivares claims that he had requested in advance the 2.5 months' time off. According to media outlets, he left for Mexico one day after the criminal complaint was filed. He returned to Chile in September 2004 and appeared before a judge of Melipilla. The Diocese of Melipilla said it would cooperate with secular authorities to help clarify the "alleged inappropriate conduct attributed to Olivares," and that a record of events related to the case had been sent to the Vatican for it to decide whether or not to proceed with a canonical trial. On October 1, 2004, a judge charged Olivares with sexual abuse. According to the judgment, on two separate occasions Olivares sat the boy on his lap, caressed the boy's stomach beneath his clothes, and inserted his hand beneath the boy's pants, touching his genitals. On both occasions, an altar boy entered the sacristy and witnessed the incident. The first time it happened, the boy remained silent. When it happened a second time, he revealed both incidents to his parents. The Diocese of Melipilla wrote in a statement that Olivares had been "charged by a court of law after the family of a minor of his [Olivares's] community accused him of inappropriate behavior," adding that Olivares "declares himself innocent." He reportedly remained in custody in a local jail awaiting sentencing. We could not determine the outcome of the prosecution. Not included as of August 2016 on Chilean bishops' public list of guilty clerics.

Sources:

Comunicado, Obispado de Melipilla, Iglesia.cl, 07.07.2004
Sacerdote acusado de abusos deshonestos viajó de vacaciones a México, cooperativa.cl, 07.07.2004
Sacerdote de Alhué acusado de abuso sexual contra acólito, El Mercurio, 07.09.2004
Obispado de Melipilla informa situación de P. Estanislao Olivares, Iglesia.cl, 09.28.2004
Declaración, by Obispado de Melipilla, 10.01.2004
Párroco de Alhué procesado por abusos sexuales, emol.com, 10.01.2004
Párroco de Alhué fue sometido a proceso por abuso sexual infantil, cooperativa.cl, 10.01.2004
Cura de Alhué seguirá preso, El Mercurio, 10.02.2004
Al Vaticano abusos del cura de Alhué, lacuarta.com, 09.29.2005
Testigos privilegiados de la misión, misioneroscombonianos.com.mx 2026

P. Félix Pariona Huacre

Status: Charged

Diocese: Archdiocese of Ayacucho o Huamanga, Peru

Accused in May 2017 of inappropriately touching and raping a girl when she was ages 15-17, at San Cristóbal de Huamanga Seminary in Ayacucho. Pariona was the seminary's formation director. The alleged abuse was reported to the prosecutor’s office. Pariona was allowed to continue active ministry. The case was closed in July 2017, reopened, then again closed in November 2017. Archbishop Salvador Piñeiro García Calderón issued a statement defending the priest. In May 2018 a former seminarian stated that he had lied to the prosecutor's office to cover for Pariona, after Pariona offered him a better paying job and housing for his cooperation. The former seminarian said he knew about the sexual assault of the girl by Pariona, and that Pariona sexually harassed him after his testimony. In April 2018 he filed a complaint against Pariona with the National Superintendency of Labor Inspection. Pariona was acquitted in 2019 in the case of the abuse of the girl. In November 2020, the Ayacucho Superior Court annulled Pariona's acquittal and ordered a new trial to be conducted by a different panel of judges ("ordenó un nuevo juicio oral a cargo de otro colegiado"). Eighteen months later, it appears that the new trial still hadn't started; in a May 2022 article, Diario Correa reported that Pariona's acquittal had been overturned due to serious irregularities ("serias irregularidades") in the first trial and that he would be tried again. The victim's lawyer said that judges in both the first and second instances had refused to consider the testimony by the victim in the Gesell chamber. In August 2026 the Archdiocese posted a birthday greeting to Pariona on Facebook, stating "today, August 17th, we greet our brother and ask the Lord to grant him health, wisdom, and much joy to continue guiding his community with love. May he remain a priest according to his heart's desire."

Sources:

Ayacucho: Archdiocese rejects rape accusation against priest, El Comercio, 11.08.2017
Ayacucho: They seek to include Monsignor Piñeiro as a witness in rape case , Wayka.pe, 01.18.2018
Ayacucho: Former seminarian lied to cover for priest accused of rape, Wayka.pe, 05.28.2018
Ayacucho: New trial ordered for priest who allegedly sexually abused a minor , americatv.com.pe, 11.05.2020
New trial announced for priest investigated for rape , Diario Jornada, 04.27.2022
Ayacucho: Legal proceedings against priest accused of sexual assault will resume , Diario Correo, February 5, 2022
Happy Birthday Father Felix Pariona Huacre , Archdiocese of Ayacucho via Facebook, 08.15.2026

P. Alfonso Pedrajas, S.J.

Order: SJ
Status: Accused

Died: 9/5/2009
Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

"Padre Pica." Spanish. Taught as a seminarian 1961-1971 at schools in Bolivia, at Colegio Colombia in Lima, Peru, and in Ecuador. He settled into ministry in 1971 at a boarding school in Bolivia. Pedrajas died in September 2009. In 2023 El Pais reported that Pedrajas had admitted in a diary to sexually abusing dozens of children, mostly in Cochabamba, Bolivia, and that the Jesuits covered it up. Pedrajas' nephew discovered the diary in an attic in 2021. He said he contacted the order in Bolivia but they did not want to take responsibility. The nephew then contacted the press. The Jesuit provincial told El Pais that it had opened a preliminary canonical investigation. An April 1964 entry in Pedrajas' diary reveals that he made his "first mistake" in Miraflores, Lima, Peru. He confessed his abuses in 1978 to his Jesuit superior in Madrid, Spain, who told him to keep it quiet and not to give up teaching.

Sources:

Diary of a Pedophile Priest, El País, 05.03.2023
Jesuit’s diary of sexual abuse prompts investigations in Bolivia, Irish Times, 05.07.2023
Bolivia’s attorney general accuses Jesuits of obstructing sex abuse investigation, Catholic News Agency, 07.14.2023
Judicial investigation of Bolivian Jesuits reveals pattern of covering up pedophilia cases, El País, 08.01.2025

Fr. Carlos Enrique Peralta Luna

Order: SDB
Ordained: 1989
Status: Sued

Diocese: Archdiocese of Chicago IL

Peruvian. Allegations of sexual misconduct began while Peralta was a seminarian in Chile in the 1980s. Other allegations followed in Guatemala and Peru. Accused in 1991 and 1995 in Peru of the sexual abuse of boys. Sent to Argentina for sex offender treatment 1997, then transferred to Chicago in 1998. Peralta arrived with permission papers from a top Salesian official in Peru saying Peralta "enjoys a good reputation and has no problem working with minors." In Chicago, he was accused of abusing four children in one family in 1998-1999. Order again transferred him before any investigation could begin, first to a treatment facility in VA, then to a monitored residence in NJ. After a year he returned to the Salesian Provincial House in Mexico City. Allowed active ministry in Mexico in 2001. Sued in 2002. In 2004 he was still working as priest in Mexico. Laicized in 2006, per the Salesians list of accused in 3/2020. Included on the Chicago Archdiocese's list in 11/2018. Included in the 5/23/2023 IL Attorney General's Report. It notes evidence that Peralta may have molested many other minors in Chicago.

Assignments:

Sources:

P. Ronald Jerry Peña Miranda

Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Trujillo, Peru

Parish priest in Guadalupe, province of Pacasmayo, when found by police with a 16-year-old girl on July 21, 2018 in a guest house room in Pacanguilla, Chepen. Peña was the girl's religion teacher at the Santa Ines Educational Institution. He was arrested, briefly detained, then released. Per the public prosecutor's office, the priest and girl stated that they were in a consensual sexual relationship, and had been since January. Further, the law allowed minors aged 14 and older to engage in voluntary or consensual sexual relations. Peña was suspended from ministry and investigated by the Archdiocese.

Sources:

Suspenden de funciones e inician investigación canónica a sacerdote hallado con menor en hotel, ACI Prensa, 07.22.2018
La Libertad: Priest found with minor in hostel and suspended from his duties, TV Peru, 07.22.2018
Liberan a párroco que fue hallado con una adolescente dentro de hostal, El Comercio, 07.22.2018
La Libertad: PNP detiene a sacerdote junto a menor de edad dentro de un hostal, 24 Horas, YouTube, 07.23.2018

Br. Abel Pérez Ruiz

Order: FMS
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

Spanish. Told the Marists in 2010 that he had abused 14 children in two Santiago schools over a 30-year period, beginning in the 1970s. It wasn't until August 2017 - seven years after Perez's admission - that the Marists filed a complaint with the Santiago prosecutor's office, after two of Pérez's victims came forward. The Marists said that Pérez was removed from contact with children and sent to one of its residences in Peru after Pérez admitted to the abuse.

Sources:

Sacerdote en Chile es denunciado por abuso de 14 menores, El Espectador, 08.29.2017
El oscuro sótano de los Maristas, by Claudio Pizarro and Jonás Romero, The Clinic, 10.25.2017

P. Waldir Pérez Salinas

Order: CSsR
Status: Convicted

Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

Chaplain of San Alfonso School in Santa Clara, in the district of Ate, when accused in May 2012 of repeatedly sexually assaulting a boy 2010-2012, beginning when the boy was age 10. Salinas admitted to the abuse. The boy was a San Alfonso School student. Salinas was suspended by his order and taken into custody by law enforcement. He was sentenced in October 2015 to 35 years in prison. He had also previously been ordered to pay the boy 8,000 nuevos soles as civil reparation.

Sources:

Cura confesó abuso sexual a escolar de 14 años en Santa Clara, RPP, 05.09.2012
Condenan a 35 años de prisión a sacerdote que abusó de menor en Perú, ACI Prensa, 10.27.2015
Perú condena a 35 años de prisión a un sacerdote por abuso sexual a un menor, Reuters, 10.28.2015
Corte Suprema de Perú ratifica condena de 35 años a sacerdote por violar a un menor, El Espectador, 10.28.2015

P. Filiberto Luis Revilla Lazarte

Donate Photo

Status: Convicted

Died: 2/22/2012
Diocese: Prelature of Caravelí, Peru

Revilla served a four-year prison sentence for raping two nine-year-old girls in Caravelí and Puquio in the 1960s. Revilla attacked the children when they came to the parish's storeroom to get food for their families. Despite his conviction, Revilla remained a priest until his death in 2012. In his 2026 book, ¿CUEVA DE ABUSADORES O IGLESIA SEGURA?: Los abusos sexuales contra menores en la iglesia peruana y su futura prevención, former Caravelí bishop Reinaldo Nann reported that he had discovered Revilla's conviction through news clippings he found in the prelature archives. Moreover, Nann said, he himself had spoken directly to one of Revilla's victims and to the sister of another victim.

Sources:

Oraciones por el P. Filiberto Luis Revilla, Prelatura de Caravelí, 02.27.2012
¿CUEVA DE ABUSADORES O IGLESIA SEGURA?: Los abusos sexuales contra menores en la iglesia peruana y su futura prevención, by Reinaldo Nann, p. 45

P. Julio Roberto Riaño Cuida

Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Arequipa, Peru

Colombian. Assigned to El Buen Pastor Church in the Samuel Pastor District (La Pampa), Camaná Province, Arequipa. He also taught at La Candelaria School. In October 2002 a 17-year-old girl filed a complaint with the DEINPOL-SR-PNP office in Camaná that Riaño had engaged in sexual misconduct with her and that he fathered her child, whom he failed to support. The girl was one of his students. Riaño reportedly said that he and the girl had been in a "romantic relationship" since 1998, when she was age 13. A 14-year-old girl also filed a complaint of sexual abuse by the priest; her parents would not cooperate with the investigation. A warrant was issued for Riaño's arrest. Riaño also was reported to have been accused of raping a 15-year-old girl and forcing her to have an abortion after she became pregnant. The priest allegedly went into hiding at the Arequipa Cathedral under the protection of Archbishop Sánchez Moreno and was later rumored to have fled the country. Fellow teachers and the school's principal were also said to have protected Riaño.

Sources:

¿Se fugó sacerdote Julio Riaño?, VoltaireNet.org, 01.06.2003
Resumen del caso y artículos de prensa sobre el cura Julio Roberto Riaño Cuida, Informe Guillén, 2012
Reporte para SNAP de los Casos Publicados en la Prensa Sobre Abusos Sexuales Relígíosos en Peru, Años 2000 Al 2012, by Héctor Guillén Tamayo, presented at SNAP’s 2012 Annual Conference, Chicago IL, U.S

Fr. Claudio Riol

Donate Photo

Ordained: 1930
Status: Sued

Deceased
Diocese: Diocese of Tucson AZ

Ordained for the Diocese of Trujillo, Peru in 1930. Worked in the Diocese of Tucson 1960-1966. Added in 12/2004 to Tucson's list of credibly accused. Also named in a 4/2005 civil suit regarding abuse at the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary convent in Tucson. Deceased.

Assignments:

Diocese of Tucson List 09.06.08

Sources:

Fr. Jesus Jeremias Rojas

Donate Photo

Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of San Antonio TX

From the Archdiocese of Huancayo, Peru. Rojas was assigned to a parish in San Antonio TX for less than a month in late 1962. He was dismissed from the Archdiocese after an allegation that he sexually abused a young girl. He admitted to the abuse, and the apostolic nuncio to Peru was informed. Named publicly as accused by the San Antonio archdiocese on its list 1/31/2019.

Sources:

Archdiocese of San Antonio List 01.31.19

P. Linán Ruiz Morales OFM

Order: OFM
Status: Accused

Died: 8/26/2010
Diocese: Archdiocese of Lima, Peru

From New York, of Puerto Rican descent. Arrived in Peru in 1978 to promote the Encuentros de Promoción Juvenil movement. Found murdered at age 80 in August 2010, along with his assistant, in the Convent of San Francisco in Lima. One month later, in September 2010, Diario Correio reported that in 2002 a complaint had been filed in Puerto Rico that Linán Ruiz had sexually abused a minor there several years earlier. The Archdiocese of Puerto Rico said it had informed the Franciscans' Provincial Superior and, in August 2003, notified Lima's archbishop Cipriani Thorne. The Lima archdiocese said that Linán Ruiz was prohibited from ministry as of September 11, 2003.

Sources:

Priest killed near soup kitchen in Peruvian capital, EWTN News, 08.30.2010
Asesino del sacerdote Linán Ruiz confiesa, Diario Correo, 09.04.2010
Padre Linán fue acusado de actos impropios con un menor en Puerto Rico, RPP, 09.06.2010
Cura Linán estaba prohibido de ejercer el sacerdocio, Diario Correo, 09.08.201

Obispo Antonio Santarsiero Rosa, O.S.J.

Order: OSJ
Status: Accused

Diocese: Diocese of Huacho, Peru

Bishop Santarsiero was prelate of Huarí from 2001 to 2004 and bishop of the diocese of Huacho from 2004 to 2026. On April 8, 2026, Infovaticana reported that it had obtained a dossier with two testimonies alleging sexual wrongdoing by Bishop Santarsiero. One of the alleged victims was a minor at the time of reported abuse, which began soon after he entered the minor seminary of the Huacho diocese, and included “forced embraces, genital touching, and coercion linked to promises of scholarships and employment in diocesan companies.” The other complainant, now a priest, was a deacon serving as Santarsiero’s assistant in his early years as bishop when Santarsiero allegedly subjected him to non-consensual touching, sexually explicit behavior, and retaliation when the man resisted. Infovaticana reported that the dossier been hand-delivered on March 31, 2026 to Peru’s papal nuncio and that it was sent simultaneously to Cardinal Víctor Fernández, the prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith. The priest alleging abuse said he had conveyed both testimonies twice in the past but had received no responses: he reported in November 2024 to then-Cardinal Robert Prevost, in his capacity as prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops; and in December 2025 to the office of Pope Francis. Santarsiero denied the allegations. On the day after the Infovaticana report, the Peruvian bishops’ conference announced that Santarsiero would be stepping down as the conference’s general secretary while the allegations were investigated. On July 15, 2026, one month after Santarsiero’s 75th birthday, the Holy See announced in a one-sentence statement that Pope Leo had accepted Santarsiero’s resignation as bishop; no explanation was given.

Sources:

El Secretario General de la Conferencia Episcopal de Perú, denunciado por abusos sexuales a un menor y a un diácono, Infovaticana, 08 de abril de 2026
Comunicado, Conferencia Episcopal Peruana, 09 de abril de 2026
Rinunce e nomine, Santa Sede, 15 de julio de 2026

Fr. William J. Spine

Order: SJ
Ordained: 1973
Status: Accused

Died: 6/27/2026
Diocese: Archdiocese of Chicago IL

Worked in Peru, Brooklyn NY, Moline IL, Chicago IL, and Lexington KY. Spent time 1990-1991 at the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley, CA. Worked as a teacher, parish assistant and pastor, and associate director of a diocesan hispanic ministry office. Removed from active ministry in 2/2006, several months after the Jesuits received a credible allegation that Spine sexually abused a teenage boy while assigned as a teacher in Tacna, Peru in the mid-1970s. The boy was Spine's student. Lived and worked in a Jesuit Community in Rome 2006 until 2012, when he was sent to a Jesuit Health Care Community. Included on the Jesuits Midwest Province list in 12/2018. On the Diocese of Lexington's list in 8/2020, where he worked 2001-2006 at St. Paul's. Included on the Chicago archdiocese's list in 10/2022. Included in the 5/23/2023 IL Attorney General's Report, which notes at least three "reported survivors," of abuse in Lexington KY, Tacna Peru, Bronx NY and Brooklyn NY. Spine died 6/27/2026 in a hospice facility in St. Louis MO.

Assignments:

Sources:

Fr. Albert A. Sylvia

Ordained: 1966
Status: Settled

Died: 1/10/2019
Diocese: Archdiocese of Boston MA

Ordained for the Archdiocese of Boston in 1966. Assigned as a parish priest in Pepperell, then in Piura, Peru 1969-1973, followed by parish assignments in Lynn, Chelsea, Boston, Lawrence, and Peabody MA. Sylvia was also a spiritual director and teacher at the archdiocesan seminary. Accused in a lawsuit settled in 2026 of sexually abusing a boy, ages 12-14, many times from 1974 to 1976. The abuse allegedly took place at St. Joseph's in Lynn. Sylvia died in 1/2019.

Assignments:

Law Office of Mitchell Garabedian Assignment Record 02.11.26

Sources:

Fr. James Tamburrino

Order: OCarm
Ordained: 1998
Status: Convicted

Diocese: Archdiocese of New York NY

May have offended while working in Peru prior to ordination. One of 4 priests accused of sexually abusing teenage boy 1996-1998 at St. Simon Stock in the Bronx. The boy worked in the rectory as a secretary; said the priests plied him with alcohol and porn, offered him money for sex, had him watch them group masturbate and threatened him with harm if he told. Transferred out 1999 after family went to the Archdiocese and Order. Assigned as chaplain to psychiatric hospital in Middletown NY while living at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel parish. Suspended 2001 after publicity about the case. Supported by Order through at least 2002. Arrested 2002 for harassing young man he met at NYC gay bar. Arrested again in 7/2005 for taking erotic photos of a 15-year-old boy and approaching another boy for the same. Convicted 3/30/2006. Sentenced 6/2006 to 5-15 years in prison.

Assignments:

BA.org Assignment Record

Sources:

Fr. Carl D. Tresler

Ordained: 1991
Status: Accused

Diocese: Archdiocese of Los Angeles CA

Ordained in 1991 for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, CA. Removed from ministry in 1998 due to an allegation that he sexually abused a boy. Tresler moved to Huancavelica, Peru; LA's Cardinal Mahony initially allowed Tresler ministry in Peru, but later told Huancavelica's then-bishop William Molloy that Tresler should not serve as a priest. Tresler was named in the 2004 Los Angeles Archdiocesan Report. He reportedly remained active in Peru in 3/2005.

Assignments:

L.A. Times Database 04.20.06

Sources:

P. Fredy Valdivia Velásquez

Donate Photo

Status: Convicted

Diocese: Diocese of Puno, Peru

Peruvian. Returned to Peru after missionary work in Canada in 2021, settling in Arequipa, though he was a member of the Diocese of Puno. Assisted at churches in Cercado, reportedly without permission from Arequipa archbishop Javier Augusto Del Río Alba. Convicted in the first instance in August 2025 of acts of a sexual nature or lewd acts performed without consent involving a 17-year-old boy in December 2022 and 21-year-old man in 2021. Valdivia was sentenced to 13 years, two months, and six days in prison. He was also ordered to pay reparations - 4,000 soles to the boy and 4,300 soles to the young man. In June 2026, the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights (MINJUSDH), through the Public Defender's Office, issued a news release reiterating the sentence, calling it precedent-setting, one of the few convictions obtained at the national level against a cleric for sex crimes. The sentence will become effective once it is ratified in the second instance.

Sources:

Boletín, Arquidiócesis de Arequipa, 02.19.2021
Arequipa | Sacerdote de la Diócesis de Puno recibe 13 años de cárcel por tocamientos indebidos, Radio Sol de los Andes, 08.12.2025
Condenan a 13 años de cárcel a sacerdote por tocamientos indebidos, El Pueblo el Diario, 08.13.2025
Arequipa: Defensa Pública del MINJUSDH logra sentencia condenatoria contra sacerdote por abuso sexual a menor, gob.pe, 06.03.2026
Arequipa: Condenan a sacerdote por abuso sexual a menor de edad, Diario Correo, 06.04.2026

P. Jozef Van Den Ouweland

Status: Accused

Died: 3/21/2025
Diocese: Diocese of Puno, Peru

"Padre Jef." From Belgium. According to some reports, Van Den Ouweland arrived in South America in 1984 and in Ichuña in 1990. He was head of a school in Ichuña, Moquegua in May 2010 when media outlets in Belgium reported that he had allegedly raped at least three children in the 1990s in Belgium. The Belgian newspaper De Morgen reported that in 2005, a lay-led commission set up by the Belgian church to investigate abuse allegations had written to Puno bishop Jorge Carrión to warn him that Van Den Ouweland was believed to be a child rapist. The lay commissioners were seeking Carrión's "guarantee" that the bishop was protecting the children in Padre Jef's school. The Belgian commission reportedly received no response. Van Den Ouweland remained active in the Puno diocese until May 2010, when his alleged crimes were revealed in Belgium. De Morgen further reported that the diocese of Antwerp, Belgium had paid one of Van Den Ouweland's alleged victims €106,000 in exchange for his silence. (The Bishop of Antwerp later told the victim, in regards to the payment, "I hope you know how to be grateful.")

On May 17, 2010, in the wake of Belgian media coverage, Van Den Ouweland left Peru for Belgium, likely summoned by the Antwerp bishop.

Van Den Ouweland died March 21, 2025. According to his obituary published in Peru, "His legacy extends beyond the religious sphere; he was a true driving force for development and education.... . Thanks to his efforts, hundreds of young people gained access to opportunities.... . " There was no mention of the allegations or outcome of the case. Van Den Ouweland had apparently returned at some point to Peru, where his funeral and burial took place.

Sources:

Dossier pedopriester heropend, De Morgen (Belgium), 05.11.2010
Bij de heilige pedofilius2, De Morgen (Belgium), 05.08.2010
Sacerdote belga acusado de violaciones en su país ejerce en Perú, La Tercera, 05.15.2010
Cura belga acusado de pedofilia abandonó el Perú, Educacionenred.pe, 05.18.2010
Le prêtre belge soupçonné de pédophilie a quitté le Pérou, RTBF, 05.18.2010
Un Mundo Con Curas Pero Sin Periodistas, La Republica, 05.19.2010
In memoriade quien en vida fue: Josef Eugeen Van Den Ouweland, Facebook, 02.21.2025
Moquegua en luto por muerte del padre Jef, Diario Viral, 03.21.2025

Fr. Clovis Vilchez Parra

Ordained: 2012
Status: Guilty plea

Diocese: Archdiocese of Chicago IL

From Peru. Arrived in the U.S. in 2007. Ordained in 2012 for the Archdiocese of Chicago, IL. Assigned to Our Lady of Mercy in Chicago, then to Mission San Juan Diego Catholic Church in Arlington Heights. Criminally charged 2/24/2015 with felony possession and reproduction of child pornography. Removed from ministry. Pleaded guilty. Sentenced in 4/2017 to four years in prison and ordered to register as a sex offender. Given 460 days credit for time served on electric monitoring. Laicized in 5/2019. Included in the 5/23/2023 IL Attorney General's Report.

Sources:

P. Maurilio Villafana Morales

Status: Convicted

Diocese: Diocese of Huaraz, Peru

In 2019 Villafana Morales became the subject of a 4-year criminal investigation after allegations that he sexually abused girl in his parish in the district of Mato, province of Huaylas, beginning when she was age 9 in 2014 and continuing until 2019. Reportedly, four additional victims had come forward alleging abuse by Villain Morales when they were between the ages of 8 and 10, and a second criminal investigation was initiated. The lawyer of one of the victims stated that the Church interfered with the judicial process. Further, three adult members of the parish were accused of enabling Villafana Morales’ abuse, and he was kept in ministry after allegations were reported. Parishioners rallied around the priest and harassed the victims’ families. The families contacted a news reporter who exposed the situation. Villa Morales filed a complaint against the reporter. Eventually Villa Morales was suspended from the parish and dismissed from the school. In July 2022 a judge rejected the prosecutor’s office request for pre-trial detention, asserting that the priest was not a flight risk. Villafana Morales was convicted. On May 3, 2023, the Juzgado Penal Colegiado Supraprovincial de la Corte Superior de Áncash unanimously sentenced Villafana Morales to life imprisonment. The priest failed to show up to begin his sentence. A reward was offered for his capture by the Ministry of the Interior. The Peruvian Episcopal Conference issued a statement expressing solidarity with victims of sexual abuse and urged Villafana to serve his sentence. In August 2024 Villafana Morales was captured and arrested in the district of Ticapampa, province of Recuay, in the Ancash region. He was imprisoned at the Huaraz penitentiary.

Sources:

Poder Judicial Condena a Cadena Perpetua a Sacerdote por Violación Sexual a Menor de Edad, Poder Judicial del Peru, 04 de mayo de 2023]
Perú: condenan a perpetuidad a cura católico por violación, Associated Press, 04 de mayo de 2023
Sacerdote condenado a cadena perpetua por violación de menor de edad fue incluido en el Programa de Recompensas, gob.pe, 06 de mayo de 2023
Recompensa de S/ 80,000 por paradero del sacerdote condenado por violación en Áncash, La Noticia Renovada, 10 de mayo de 2023
Conferencia Episcopal exhorta a sacerdote que abusó de una menor en Áncash a que cumpla su condena, La República, 12 de mayo de 2023
Capturan a sacerdote condenado a cadena perpetua por cometer abuso sexual infantil en parroquia de Ancash, Infobae, 22 de agosto de 2024

P. Eleuterio Vásquez González

Status: Accused

Diocese: Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru

Padre Eleuterio Vásquez Gonzáles, a priest of the diocese of Chiclayo, was first accused publicly in November 2023, when a Peruvian woman, Ana María Quispe, began posting on social media about being sexually abused as a child by Vásquez and Padre Ricardo Yesquén Paiva, both of whom were assigned in the early 2000’s to Chiclayo’s San José Obrero parish, to which Ana María Quispe and her family belonged.

Quispe said that she and two other victims had reported their abuse more than a year earlier to prosecutors and, before that, in April 2022, to Bishop Robert Prevost, OSA, who headed the Chiclayo diocese until April 2023, when he left Peru to serve at the Vatican as prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops.

Quispe reported being abused at different times by both Yesquén and Vásquez; the others alleged abuse by Vásquez only. The alleged abuses of all three girls by Vásquez occurred between 2005 and 2009.

In later media coverage, Quispe recounted that in 2005, when she was nine years old, Yesquén kissed her and put his tongue in her mouth.

The alleged abuse by Padre Eleuterio Vásquez, or “Padre Lute,” as the popular priest was called, occurred in 2007, when Quispe was around 11. Her parents gave the priest permission to take her on an overnight missionary trip to a remote town. In a September 2024 interview on the América Televisión program Cuarto Poder, Quispe said that the priest forced her to share a bed with him, wrapping his legs around her. Another complainant, identified only by the pseudonym “Lucia” in the broadcast, accompanied Vásquez on a similar mission trip when she was 11, and on two different nights, he had her sleep in the same bed with him. Lucia said that while in bed the first night, he embraced her and put his hands on her back, under her shirt, and on the other night, he rubbed his erection against her.

In her social media posts, Quispe said that during their meeting (in April 2022), Bishop Prevost told the three women that he believed them and encouraged them to report to civil authorities. In the meantime, he said, he would tell Vásquez to leave his parish while the women’s claims were investigated. According to Quispe, Prevost also said that Vásquez, who he characterized as a trusted pastor with a strong following, had admitted to the abuse, apologized, and asked for the names of the complainants. As for Padre Yesquén, the bishop told them, he was already out of ministry due to poor health.

[See Ms. Quispe’s Facebook posts on November 13, 2023 and November 16, 2023.]

Quispe’s social media posts attracted local media coverage, which in turn caused the Chiclayo diocese to publicly acknowledge the allegations for the first time. In a seven-point statement issued 12/12/2023, it stated that the prosecutor had closed the case “due to the statute of limitations and lack of evidence,” and that the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF), “seeing that the accusations against the accused priest [BA: Vásquez] had not been sufficiently proven,” had to decided to “archive the case pro nunc [for now].”

But because of the public attention, the diocese said, the apostolic administrator of Chiclayo, Monsignor Guillermo Cornejo Monzón, had “decided to reopen the case for greater clarity regarding the facts.” Vaszquez at this point was again in active ministry, serving at St Ignacio in Santa Cruz. The diocese pledged that it would again instruct him to step down.

Later, the diocese would stipulate the following timeline: the young women met with Prevost the first week of April 2022; Prevost gave the DDF the dossier of his preliminary investigation into Vásquez on July 21, 2022; the prosecutor told the young women in early 2023 that the case had been filed because of prescription; Prevost forwarded the prosecutor’s decision to the DDF on April 3, 2023; he started his new Vatican role on April 12, 2023; and the DDF “emitted” its pro nunc ruling on August 10, 2023.

For three months in 2024, from May to August, Quispe and the other victims enlisted a Peruvian priest, Fr. Ricardo Coronado Arrascue, to serve as their canon lawyer. While working with him, Quispe became more vocal publicly in criticizing Bishop Prevost’s handling of the case, accusing him of failing to investigate Vásquez and of letting him stay in ministry. It later emerged that Coronado had ties to the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, the corrupt and abuse-ridden religious association disciplined and ultimately suppressed by Pope Francis, with Bishop Prevost’s help. Coronado had to stop representing the women in August 2024, when the Peruvian bishops’ conference ordered him to cease acting as a canon lawyer, due to allegations of sexual misconduct. In an interview published by NCR in September 2025, Quispe acknowledged that it seemed that Coronado had taken her case to further his agenda against Pope Francis and Cardinal Prevost.

In October 2025, El País reported that Quispe had met with the new Chicayo bishop, Edinson Edgardo Farfán, on April 23, 2025. The bishop previously had told Quispe that he would be willing to re-open the case against Vásquez. But when Quispe and the others arrived at the meeting, the bishop told them that Vásquez had been removed from the clerical state, at his own request, and that therefore the case was permanently closed. According to Quispe, the bishop said that while Vásquez had not admitted to the abuse, he also told the bishop that he didn't consider the alleged acts to be crimes. The bishop explained that processing Vásquez under canon law would have taken months. He promised to issue the victims a public letter of apology for the diocese's handling of the case and to cover their psychological expenses. As of October 1, 2025, when El País published its article, neither of those promises had been fulfilled.

Sources:

Un post de Facebook de Ana María Quispe, 13 de noviembre de 2023
Un post de Facebook de Ana María Quispe, 16 de noviembre de 2023
Lambayeque: Citan a tres jóvenes que acusaron a sacerdotes de presunta violencia sexual, Diario Correo, 11 de diciembre de 2023
Nota de Prensa, Diócesis de Chiclayo, 12 de diciembre de 2023
Lambayeque: Obispo afirma que sacerdote reconoce haber cometido abusos sexuales, Diario Correo, 12 de diciembre de 2023
Diócesis en Perú investiga a 2 sacerdotes acusados de tocamientos indebidos a menores, ACI Prensa, 13 de diciembre de 2023
Sacerdotes son acusados de acoso sexual en Chiclayo: número de víctimas se incrementa, Infobae, 14 de diciembre de 2023
What’s going on in Cardinal Prevost’s former diocese?, The Pillar, 31 de julio de 2024
Cardenal Robert Prevost, consejero del Papa Francisco, encubrió abusos sexuales en Perú: tres sobrevivientes ignoradas por la Iglesia, Infobae, 09 de septembre de 2024
Pedido de justicia, Cuarto Poder, 10 de septembre de 2024
Church Answers False Accusations Against Cardinal Francis Prevost, Zenit, 12 de septembre de 2024
Cardinal Prevost never investigated abuse claims, alleged victims say, The Pillar, 18 de septembre de 2024
As Pope Leo XIV faces scrutiny, victims of abusive Catholic group say he helped when others didn’t, Associated Press, 24 de mayo de 2025
Two Contrasting Cases Raise Questions of Pope Leo’s Actions on Sex Abuse, The New York Times, 28 de junio de 2025
Exclusive: Pope Leo critic now says her lawyer might have had a secret agenda, National Catholic Reporter, 29 de septembre de 2025
Victim in Peru abuse case used against the Pope speaks out, confirming that her lawyer exploited her: ‘His intention was never to help us’, El País, 01 de octubre de 2025

Victim in Peru abuse case used against the Pope speaks out, confirming that her lawyer exploited her: ‘His intention was never to help us’, El País, 01 de octubre de 2025

Br. Robert D. Wood

Order: SM
Status: Accused

Died: 12/6/2016
Diocese: Archdiocese of St. Louis MO

Professed vows in 1945 as a Marianist brother, St. Louis Province. Educator. Worked in MO, TX, IL. Also Canada, Japan, Mexico, and in Lima, Peru. Died in 2016. Included on the Marianists' 6/24/2020 list of those "found to have sexually abused a minor." Location of abuse not indicated - placing him in the St. Louis archdiocese for now.

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P. Ricardo Yesquén Paiva

Status: Accused

Diocese: Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru

Padre Ricardo Yesquén Paiva was first accused publicly in November 2023, when a Peruvian woman, Ana María Quispe, began posting on social media about being sexually abused as a child by Yesquén and by Padre Eleuterio Vásquez Gonzáles, both of whom were assigned in the early 2000’s to Chiclayo’s San José Obrero parish, to which Ana María Quispe and her family belonged.

Later it would be revealed that Quispe first reported her abuse by Yesquén to Chiclayo bishop Robert Prevost in 2020. The Covid shutdown had started, so they spoke by phone. In 2022, she recovered her memory of being abused by Vásquez. In April 2023, she met in person with Prevost, along with two other young women reporting abuse by Vásquez.

Quispe reported being abused at different times by both Yesquén and Vásquez; the two other victims alleged abuse by Vásquez only.

In later media coverage, Quispe recounted that in 2005, when she was nine years old, her mother sent her to deliver a cupcake to the popular Vásquez, who was known as Padre Lute. At the rectory, she instead encountered only Yesquén, who allegedly sat her on his lap, kissed her, and put his tongue in her mouth.

According to Quispe, Prevost told the three women that he believed them and encouraged them to report to civil authorities. In the meantime, he said, he would tell Vásquez to leave his parish while the women’s claims were investigated. As for Padre Yesquén, the bishop told them, he was already out of ministry due to poor health.

The three women reported their abuse to prosecutors, who soon dropped the case against the two priests because of statute of limitations.

Yesquén also didn’t face disciplinary proceedings by the church: In September 2024, the Chiclayo diocese stated that because of Yesquén’s health, a canonical case against him had not been pursued:

“In regard to the case of Fr. Ricardo Yesquén, given the serious degenerative illness he is suffering, he does not have the capacity to defend himself, so that a case against him cannot be opened. He has not exercised the priestly ministry for years.”

Sources:

Un post de Facebook de Ana María Quispe, 13 de noviembre de 2023
Lambayeque: Citan a tres jóvenes que acusaron a sacerdotes de presunta violencia sexual, Diario Correo, 11 de diciembre de 2023
Nota de Prensa, Diócesis de Chiclayo, 12 de diciembre de 2023
Lambayeque: Obispo afirma que sacerdote reconoce haber cometido abusos sexuales, Diario Correo, 12 de diciembre de 2023
Diócesis en Perú investiga a 2 sacerdotes acusados de tocamientos indebidos a menores, ACI Prensa, 13 de diciembre de 2023
Sacerdotes son acusados de acoso sexual en Chiclayo: número de víctimas se incrementa, Infobae, 14 de diciembre de 2023
What’s going on in Cardinal Prevost’s former diocese?, The Pillar, 31 de julio de 2024
Cardenal Robert Prevost, consejero del Papa Francisco, encubrió abusos sexuales en Perú: tres sobrevivientes ignoradas por la Iglesia, Infobae, 09 de septembre de 2024
Pedido de justicia, Cuarto Poder, 10 de septembre de 2024
Church Answers False Accusations Against Cardinal Francis Prevost, Zenit, 12 de septembre de 2024
Cardinal Prevost never investigated abuse claims, alleged victims say, The Pillar, 18 de septembre de 2024
As Pope Leo XIV faces scrutiny, victims of abusive Catholic group say he helped when others didn’t, Associated Press, 24 de mayo de 2025
Two Contrasting Cases Raise Questions of Pope Leo’s Actions on Sex Abuse, The New York Times, 28 de junio de 2025
Exclusive: Pope Leo critic now says her lawyer might have had a secret agenda, National Catholic Reporter, 29 de septembre de 2025
Victim in Peru abuse case used against the Pope speaks out, confirming that her lawyer exploited her: ‘His intention was never to help us’, El País, 01 de octubre de 2025

P. Antonio José Zapata Calle

Status: Arrested

Diocese: Prelature of Ayaviri, Peru

Missionary priest from the Diocese of Santa Rosa de Osos, Colombia. Arrived in Peru in April 2009, assigned to a parish in the province of Sandia in the Puno region. In June 2009 the family of a 9-year-old girl with Down syndrome reported to law enforcement that Zapata had raped their daughter. The local mixed-jurisdiction court ordered Zapata’s detention. He was arrested in August 2009 and sent to a prison in Juliaca. In January 2016 the Colombian news outlet Las 2 Orillas reported that Zapata was “currently at liberty, and his whereabouts are unknown.”

Sources:

Alegría por el recibimiento de tres nuevos sacerdotes misioneros a la Prelatura de Ayaviri, Fides News Agency, 04.28.2009
Detenido en Perú cura colombiano por presunto abuso de niña con síndrome Down, Wl Espectador, 08.25.2009
Sacerdote colombiano detenido por presunta violación a niña en Perú, W Radio 08.25.2009
Primeros 18 sacerdotes colombianos acusados de pedofilia, Las 2 Orillas, 01.20.2016

Br. Douglas Zlatis

Order: CFC
Status: Sued

Died: 12/2/2009
Diocese: Diocese of Phoenix AZ

Member of the Edmund Rice, or Irish, Christian Brothers. Entered the order in 1959. Named publicly as accused by the Phoenix diocese on its list 10/29/2019. Assigned 2001-2008 to St. Matthew's in Phoenix, where he was the school's vice-principal. Previously worked in Chicago IL, Staten Island NY, Burbank, IL, Honolulu HI, and Seattle WA, and in Monsafu, Peru. Accused in a 2014 lawsuit of sexually abusing a student at Damien Memorial High School in HI. Also accused in a 2016 lawsuit in HI of abusing a Damien Memorial student in 1982. Died 12/02/2009.

Assignments:

Anderson and Associates Assignment Record

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Our Database of Publicly Accused does not state or imply that individuals facing allegations are guilty of a crime or liable for civil claims. The reports contained in the database are merely allegations. The U.S. legal system presumes that a person accused of or charged with a crime is innocent until proven guilty. Similarly, individuals who may be defendants in civil actions are presumed not to be liable for such claims unless a plaintiff proves otherwise. Admissions of guilt or liability are not typically a part of civil or private settlements. For more information, see our posting policy.

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