ROME (ITALY)
Crux

August 28, 2019

By Ines San Martin

Despite being investigated for allegations of having sexually abused two seminarians, an Argentinian bishop close to the pope has once again been allowed by a judge to travel to Rome.

The judge said that Bishop Gustavo Zanchetta has “collaborated” with the investigation and has a document from the Vatican saying he must return to Rome “to continue with his daily work” – even though he has been suspended from his job.

Crux can confirm that the document being used as justification for allowing Zanchetta to travel back to Rome is a certificate signed by Venezuelan Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, the Substitute for the Vatican’s Secretariat of State, arguably the third highest position in this office.

Peña Parra was appointed to that key role by Pope Francis last year. The Substitute is responsible for the Vatican’s daily workflow, and is usually the only person, including the Cardinal Secretary of State, who can simply walk in on the pope unannounced.

The Venezuelan prelate has been under fire recently, after Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, the controversial former papal representative to the United States, accused him of of perpetrating sexual abuse; the Venezuelan bishops’ conference released a statement last week strongly defending Peña Parra, calling Vigano’s claims “a series of calumnious accusations.”

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

NEW YORK (NY)
Black Entertainment Tonight

August 28, 2019

By Angela Wilson

Two Black male victims who received settlements over sexual abuse allegations against Catholic priests are coming forward to revealing that they were paid far less than white victims.

The Associated Press reports the Diocese secretly paid two Black men from Mississippi $15,000 each, requiring them both to sign NDAs (Non-Disclosure Agreements), also known as confidentiality agreements.

In 2006, the Catholic Diocese of Jackson settled lawsuits brought on by 19 different victims. Of those survivors, 17 are white and were paid at least $250,000 each — some up to $1.3 million — in similar settlements.

A Franciscan Friars official claims the settlement amounts had nothing to due with the two Black men’s race.

One victim, La Jarvis D. Love, who accused two Catholic priests of sexual abuse when he was 9-years-old, received a $15,000 payout during a meeting at an IHOP restaurant.

“He said if I wanted more, I would have to get a lawyer and have my lawyer call his lawyer,” Love said Rev. James G. Gannon, leader of a group of Wisconsin-based Franciscan Friars replied. “Well, we don’t have lawyers. We felt like we had to take what we could.”

At the time, Love was unaware other accusers who were white were paid significantly more in similar settlements when he was confronted by Rev. Gannon with legal paperwork.

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DENVER (CO)
Catholic News Agency

August 28, 2019

By JD Flynn

Bishop Andrew Cozzens became a bishop in the middle of a crisis.

“There was this kind of fire that was burning on the front page of the paper everyday,” Cozzens told CNA, “and then I got this call.”

The call was his appointment as an auxiliary bishop in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Cozzens was appointed to that role just days after a whistleblower leveled charges of misconduct and cover-up against Archbishop John Nienstedt, who eventually resigned from his post amid scandal.

The archdiocese was in a state of chaos, and, Cozzens said, Catholics were in a great deal of pain.

“I was named a bishop at a very unique time, and it was so unique that it was clear to me God had planned it,” Cozzens told CNA.

He told CNA that he knew, from the time he was appointed, “that the Lord was calling me to be a part of healing. I didn’t have any idea what that meant when I heard that word in prayer.”

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MILWAUKEE (WI)
WHBY Radio

August 27, 2019

A former brother for the Franciscan Friars accused of sexually abusing boys in Mississippi has ties to the Fox Cities.

59-year-old Paul West taught at a school in Greenwood in the 1990s. The Franciscan Friars reached $15,000 settlements with some victims. West moved to the Appleton area and he taught at St. John Catholic School in Little Chute from around 2000 to at least 2010.

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COLUMBUS (OH)
WOSU Radio

August 27, 2019

By Adora Namigadde

Advocates from SNAP gathered in front of St. Joseph Cathedral to demand the Catholic Diocese of Columbus add the names of three more ministers to its official list of clerics “credibly accused” of sexual abuse.

The Columbus Diocese in March published a list of 36 clergy, both alive and deceased, alleged to have sexually abused minors.

The Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests or Clergy says that Bishop Robert Brennan should add to the list Sister Lisa Zuccarelli, Father Stuart Campbell and Father Carleton Parker Jones – all of whom worked at one time in Central Ohio, but were accused of sexual abuse outside of Columbus.

SNAP’s Central Ohio coordinator Carol Zamonski says it is unknown whether these people abused anyone locally.

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DALLAS (TX)
NBC 5 News

August 27, 2019

Three months after members of the Dallas Jesuit community were named on a list of clergy “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of a minor, a lawsuit has been filed by a former student at Jesuit College Preparatory School of Dallas, Tuesday, March 19, 2019.

A graduate of Jesuit College Preparatory School of Dallas says the school’s former president, who was on a list of credibly accused priests, sexually assaulted him, according to a lawsuit filed Monday.

The lawsuit says Patrick J. Koch, who died in 2006, was the lone abuser, but that he couldn’t have acted alone.

Koch’s name was included on a list released by the Catholic Diocese of Dallas in late January of “priests with credible allegations of sexual of abuse of minors since 1950.”

Koch served as principal of Jesuit Dallas from 1972-79, president from 1979-80 and director of alumni from 1980-86, according to the school’s website.

The lawsuit says the school “created and fostered a community where abuse would occur and the School (sic) did nothing to prevent the problem despite its obviousness.”

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 27, 2019

A lengthy Associated Press investigation published today about a former member of a Wisconsin based Catholic religious under who is under current criminal investigation for multiple acts of felony child sexual assault in Mississippi, Wisconsin and New York State is raising troubling questions as to the treatment of racial or economically disadvantaged survivors of clerical child sex offenders by Catholic church officials.

Over the past nine months, church officials of the Franciscan Friars of the Assumption Province, headquartered in St. Francis, Wisconsin, have been actively soliciting secrecy agreements from African American victims of Paul West, 59, a former Franciscan, in exchange for financial settlements which are among the lowest in the United States. The settlements were brokered by church officials of the Jackson, Mississippi diocese. The secrecy agreements are not only in direct violation of the US Bishops policy on abuse but appear to have been engineered to mislead these victims into believing that West could no longer be prosecuted. The criminal statute on West’s alleged offenses, however, are currently active in both Mississippi and Wisconsin.

Fortunately, because these courageous victims have come forward, West is finally being investigated in both states, including in Milwaukee and Outagamie Counties, where West allegedly transported children across state lines for the purposes of committing criminal sex acts, a federal crime that should also trigger and investigation by the US Department of Justice.

There are likely many more victims of West, who was the principal of a traditional black Catholic “mission” school in Mississippi. The allegations against him, which the order has confirmed as credible, include “beatings, rape, and other sexual violations” beginning when the victims were as young as 10.

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SAN ANTONIO (TX)
Express-News

August 27, 2019

By Marina Starleaf Riker

John Delaney, a survivor of child sex abuse, wants other victims to know this: Starting Sept. 1, they could have another chance to hold their abusers accountable in court.

Delaney and the San Antonio chapter leader of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests gathered outside the Bexar County Courthouse Tuesday morning to raise awareness about a new Texas law going into effect next month that allows victims of child sex abuse to file civil lawsuits against abusers up to 30 years after they turn 18.

Right now, the window when they can file a lawsuit, called the statute of limitations, lasts just 15 years after their 18th birthday.

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SOUTHFIELD (MI)
WWJ News

August 27, 2019

A former Macomb County priest will undergo testing to determine if he’s competent to stand trial on sexual assault charges.

A judge ordered the exam requested by an attorney for 63-year-old Neil Kalina during a brief hearing in 41-A District Court in Shelby Township.

“What they call a competency and culpability exam will be done at a center in Ypsilanti that is known to be backed up with orders,” reported WWJ Newsradio 950’s Mike Campbell, “so it’s probably going to be awhile before there are results.”

Kalina faces four counts of criminal sexual conduct for allegedly sexually abusing young boys when he was a priest at St. Kieran Catholic Church in Shelby Township in the mid-1980s. He also worked in Sterling Heights and Utica.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 27, 2019

Six months after a massive exposé into cases of sexual violence and cover-up within the Southern Baptist Convention was published, church leaders have finally responded. Unfortunately, we feel that this response amounts to little more than a public relations effort.

SBC leaders unveiled their new “Caring Well” campaign today, a prevention effort focused on creating new teams and processes for churches in order to create safer environments within SBC churches. According to the Caring Well website, this campaign involves educating pastors about the importance of using secular law enforcement professionals to investigate crimes and how to respond “ethically, legally, and with good shepherding” when abuse is discovered.

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ST. CLOUD (MN)
St. Cloud Times

August 27, 2019

By Clairissa Baker and Jenny Berg

An Avon man pleaded guilty Tuesday as part of a plea agreement to engaging in a sexual relationship with a parishioner he counseled while he was a pastor at an Avon church.

Charles Normal Pelkey, 50, was charged in Stearns County District Court with one count of third-degree criminal sexual conduct in July 2018.

A jury trial was scheduled to start Tuesday; it was canceled in light of the plea agreement.

As part of the agreement, the judge will likely stay adjudication of the sentence, presuming Pelkey cooperates with his pre-sentence investigation, signs releases for a psychosexual evaluation and follows all recommendations, according to Ole Tvedten, chief of the criminal division in the Stearns County Attorney’s Office.

The remaining terms of Pelkey’s probation will be imposed at his sentencing, which is scheduled for Oct. 31. Probation violations would result in conviction, predatory offender registration and potential prison time, according to Tvedten.

Minnesota law bars sexual relationships between clergy and those to whom they give counsel; consent is not a defense.

Clergy members are treated similarly to counselors, physicians, psychologists, social workers and therapists who work with people seeking support, Tvedten said.

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PARIS (FRANCE)
LaCroix International

August 27, 2019

By Massimo Faggioli

If Vatican officials thought that they could regain control of the narrative concerning the Catholic Church’s clergy sex abuse crisis by defrocking Theodore McCarrick just days before the recent abuse summit in Rome, they failed to take into account the cases of Cardinals George Pell and Philippe Barbarin.

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DENVER (CO)
National Catholic Register

August 27, 2019

By Joseph O’Brien

The lawsuits are flooding into New York state, after it opened a one-year window in the statute of limitations for abuse survivors to file suit against individuals and institutions accused of abuse crimes — and the new lawsuits filed in the Empire State include one utilizing the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act.

On Aug. 14, 22 plaintiffs filed a federal RICO suit against the Diocese of Buffalo, the Society of Jesus, parishes, high schools and others for an alleged “pattern of racketeering activity” that allowed for and hid clerical sexual abuse. Both current Bishop Richard Malone and his predecessor, Bishop Edward Kmiec, are named personally in the lawsuit.

Among the plaintiffs, who are not named, are several alleged victims of clerical sexual abuse. The lawsuit alleges specific instances of sexual abuse by priests and claims that the diocese failed in its duty of care toward children by allowing abusive priests to have contact with minors through parishes and schools.

Calling the diocese and affiliated organizations an “association in fact” for the purposes of federal racketeering laws, the suit alleged “common purpose” in “harassing, threatening, extorting and misleading victims of sexual abuse committed by priests” and of “misleading priests’ victims and the media” to prevent reporting or disclosure of sexual misconduct.

The suit claims that the various diocesan persons and agencies are legal “alter egos” for the diocese, completely under diocesan control, and were used to “transfer, assign, commingle and conceal assets” totally $90 million, and that the diocese violated federal racketeering laws by using the internet and mail to “deceive the public about the illicit sexual conduct rampant within the Diocese of Buffalo.”

As the RICO lawsuit is being brought by federal law, it does not directly stem from the New York law opening the one-year window. But it was filed at almost the same time as the window went into effect, on Aug. 15.

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NASHVILLE (TN)
WMOT Radio

August 27, 2019

By Mike Osborne

The Nashville based Southern Baptist Ethics Commission has launched a denomination-wide response to sexual abuse.

The campaign is a reaction to the #metoo movement and recent sex scandals within the SBC.

Current Convention President J.D. Greear is out with a video introducing what’s being called “The Caring Well Challenge.” In the video, Greear explains what the denomination hopes the campaign will accomplish.

“It’s a free initiative designed to walk with church leaders step by step towards becoming a church that is safe for survivors and safe from abuse.”

SBC Ethics Commission leader Russell Moore launched The Caring Well Challenge at a Franklin church on Sunday.

The Tennessean quotes Moore saying congregations need to report abuse to authorities immediately, inform the entire congregation, and minister to survivors.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 27, 2019

We are here today because Texans need to know that the doors to justice just opened a little wider for survivors of child sexual abuse in our state.

House Bill # 3809, passed by the Texas Senate on May 2019, was the result of the emotional testimony of Becky Leach, State Rep. Jeff Leach’s wife, regarding her own abuse as a child. Even though this new law is limited in terms of applying to older cases of childhood sexual abuse, it is still a step in the right direction.

The new law, which becomes effective on September 1, 2019, gives more time for child sex abuse survivors to bring a civil lawsuit against their abuser and/or the institution that harbored him or her. It replaces the older law that only gave survivors 15 years past their 18th birthday to file a complaint. Going forward, victims now have 30 years.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 27, 2019

“It sends a discouraging message to survivors,” They Say

They Call on the Attorney General to Renew his Outreach to Witnesses, Whistleblowers and Survivors

WHAT
At a news conference, leaders of two clergy abuse prevention and advocacy organizations will address recent news regarding a private meeting between Chicago’s top Catholic official and Illinois’ Attorney General and will call for a public clarification regarding the current status of the investigation into clergy abuse in Illinois.

WHEN
Friday, August 23 at 10:30 AM

WHERE
On the sidewalk outside the Chicago Archdiocesan Headquarters at 835 N. Rush Street (corner of Rush and Pearson)

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 27, 2019

And they ‘out’ another Columbus predator priest
Days ago, a 3rd abusive local cleric was exposed
But none of them are on bishop’s ‘credibly accused’ list
Group wants all 3 added, plus their photos & assignments
Pope recently promised protection for church whistleblowers
So victims urge current & former Catholic staff to “call law enforcement now”

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will disclose the names of – and information about – two more credibly accused child molesting clerics who are or have been in Columbus but are NOT on the diocesan list of alleged clergy offenders.

One is a nun who was suspended and spent a decade in central Ohio.

And the victims will call on Columbus Bishop Robert Brennan to
–post names of ALL publicly accused clerics on their diocesan website,
–include details like their work histories, whereabouts and photos.

Finally, they will urge current and former Catholic church staffers to call law enforcement with “any knowledge or suspicions they may have about clergy sex crimes and cover ups” because the Pope recently adopted a policy guaranteeing them ‘whistleblower protection.”

WHERE
On the sidewalk in front of St Joseph Cathedral, 212 E Broad St, (corner of N. 5th St.) in Columbus, OH

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EASTON (PA)
Easton Express-Times

August 27, 2019

One year after an investigating grand jury gave Pennsylvania legislators all the evidence they needed to update laws on child sexual abuse – in fact, Pennsylvania’s groundbreaking work led to reforms in other states, including New Jersey – the response in Harrisburg has been little more than “we’ll get to it.”

Someday.

The grand jury report identified more than 300 priests as sexual predators and thousands of victims. It spawned investigations by other states’ attorneys general and a probe by the U.S. Department of Justice.

Instead of acting to extend the legal redress of survivors who suffered at the hands of Catholic Church clergy throughout the state, as painstakingly detailed by the Pennsylvania grand jury, state Senate Republican leaders have balked at proposals to set up retroactive “windows,” which would allow long-ago victims to file civil claims in court.

One rationale is that exemptions to create limited windows of liability are unconstitutional – and will require a multi-year effort to amend the state constitution.

The state House didn’t seem to have the same problem when it passed a reform package and sent it to the Senate, where it has lingered. Under the existing law, victims must file criminal cases by age 50 and civil cases by age 30.

Another rationale cited by GOP leaders, including Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati, is that Catholic dioceses in Pennsylvania are reviewing claims by abuse victims and making payouts, a process that is private and unpublicized. While that avenue may be working for some victims, including those who’d rather not go to court, it doesn’t allow for the disinfecting effect and documentation of open court action. More critically, it denies due process – or what should be a latent due process, in a civilized world – to people whose innocence was stolen at a tender age and have endured decades of suffering and wondering.

Some of them are in their 70s and 80s.

We were reminded last week that it is not just the Catholic Church and other religious institutions that have overlooked sexual crimes against children, putting up walls of denial or silence.

In a lawsuit filed in Philadelphia against the Boys Scouts of America, a 57-year-old former Scout claims he was sexually assaulted many times by an assistant scoutmaster in the 1970s. That suit might be the beginning of a wave of litigation, based on allegations raised by about

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EVANSVILLE (IN)
Courier & Press

August 27, 2019

By Jon Webb

Yet another child molestation complaint surfaced in the Evansville Diocese last week.

According to a scant police report, an unnamed accuser told the church they were abused more than 45 years ago in the 1700 block of Lodge Avenue: an address associated with the Holy Spirit Catholic Church and elementary school.

The accuser was reportedly younger than 14 when the alleged abuse occurred.

The report didn’t name the accused and didn’t give the incident an exact timeline. The incident summary on the police report contained all of 25 words.

Since the accused is apparently dead and the accuser now lives outside the area, Evansville police will not pursue an investigation – nor will they name the alleged perpetrator.

As far as the diocese, spokesman Tim Lilley declined to comment last week and reiterated that stance Monday morning.

We aren’t even sure if the latest accused person was a priest or a person affiliated with the church in a different way.

So, what do we know about this latest allegation?

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GREENWOOD (MS)
Associated Press

August 27, 2019

By Michael Rezendes

The IHOP in Southhaven, Mississippi, was an unlikely place to settle a sex abuse claim against the Catholic Church. But in January a white official from the Franciscan religious order slid into a booth across from a 35-year-old black man and offered to pay him $15,000 to keep years of alleged abuse by another Franciscan secret.

The Rev. James G. Gannon, the leader of a Wisconsin-based group of Franciscan Friars, arrived at the crowded pancake house with copies of a legal settlement for La Jarvis D. Love, who had arrived with his wife and three young children.

As La Jarvis skimmed the four-page agreement, his thoughts flickered back more than two decades to the physical and sexual abuse he says he suffered at the hands of a Franciscan Friar at a Catholic grade school in Greenwood. He told Gannon he wasn’t sure $15,000 was enough.

“He said if I wanted more, I would have to get a lawyer and have my lawyer call his lawyer,” La Jarvis recently told The Associated Press. “Well, we don’t have lawyers. We felt like we had to take what we could.”

La Jarvis considered his mounting bills, his young family and, with his wife’s consent, signed the agreement, dating it Jan. 11, 2019.

Then Gannon announced it was time to eat.

“He was all smiles then,” La Jarvis said.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

August 26, 2019

By Benjamin Preiss

New legislation forcing priests to report child abuse to authorities even if disclosed in confession now has enough support to pass through both houses of Victorian Parliament.

The Andrews government introduced the legislation earlier this month compelling priests to break the seal of confession to report disclosures of child abuse, but the Coalition stopped short of supporting it at the time.

However, on Monday Opposition Leader Michael O’Brien revealed he would back the bill.

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AUSTRALIA
National Catholic Register

August 23, 2019

By Gerard V. Bradley

COMMENTARY: Justice Mark Weinberg’s dissenting opinion should provide the basis for Australia’s High Court to finally correct this awful miscarriage of justice.

The Court of Appeal of the state of Victoria late Tuesday (Wednesday morning in Australia) dismissed Cardinal George Pell’s appeal from his sexual-abuse conviction. That conviction came at the end of a second trial on five counts of indecency with a minor, after a first jury could not agree on a verdict. (Reliable reports indicated that a majority of those jurors favored acquittal.) He was sentenced to six years, without the possibility of parole until November 2022. Cardinal Pell’s lawyers plan a further appeal to the Australian High Court. That process is likely to take up to a year. During the interim, the cardinal will remain in a Melbourne prison.

Because the trials were conducted in closed sessions and under a press “gag” order, accounts of the evidence against the cardinal have been incomplete and even sketchy. Until now. It was long widely known that the case involved allegations of assaults on two choirboys, both aged 13 when the crimes supposedly occurred in late 1996. The setting was said to be just after then-Archbishop Pell celebrated Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Melbourne.

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PINEVILLE (WV)
WVVA TV

August 26, 2019

Father Paul Wharton of St. Francis de Sales Parish in Beckley released the following statement Monday in response to revelations of possible abuse inside his Church in May of 2019:

“The Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston was deeply saddened to learn today of the alleged abuse of a minor by Francis Keiling. Although one of the the instances of alleged abuse purportedly occurred on church property, at no time was Francis Keiling an employee or volunteer at either St. Francis de Sales Parish or School in Beckley.”
—————————————————————————————–

A Wyoming County man was arrested on sexual abuse charges Friday.

Francis Stephen Keiling II is charged with 52 counts of Sexual Abuse by a Parent on Guardian.

According to the complaint, the abuse went on from late 2007 to September of 2017, with two teenage females.

Court records indicate one of the victims made the decision to come forward after she was abused three times in just one 24 hour period in the downstairs area of St. Frances de Sales Church in May of 2019.

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NEWARK (NJ)
Star Ledger

August 26, 2019

By Sophie Nieto-Munoz

Disgraced Roman Catholic priest Thomas Ganley was sentenced to four years in prison Monday afternoon after pleading guilty to raping and sexually assaulting a minor under the age of 16 in the 1990s.

Ganley, 64, will also register as a sex offender under Megan’s Law, is forbidden to contact the victim or her family and cannot be with anyone under the age of 18 unsupervised. He reached a plea agreement with the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office after he was arrested in January.

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[Próvolo Case: they analyze more than 30 hours of video of Gesell Camera made to the victims]

MENDOZA (ARGENTINA)
MDZ

August 21, 2019

Según uno de los abogados de los denunciantes, habrá “unos diez días hábiles mínimo de Cámaras Gesell”. La decisión del tribunal apunta a que los chicos abusados no vuelvan a declarar y se escuchen en la sala sus testimonios ya grabados.

[GOOGLE TRANSLATION:According to one of the complainants’ lawyers, there will be “a minimum of ten working days of Gesell Chambers”. The decision of the court indicates that the abused children do not have to testify again and their recorded testimonies are heard in the courtroom. ]

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AUSTRALIA
ABC Religion and Ethics

August 21, 2019

By Patrick Parkinson

The decision of a majority of the Victorian Court of Appeal will no doubt be shattering for very many people – not least Cardinal George Pell himself. There are those who believe, quite passionately, that Cardinal Pell should not only have been given the benefit of a reasonable doubt, but that he is entirely innocent of the charges against him. People are likely to experience grief, anger and a sense of helplessness.

Many have become emotionally invested in the outcome of the case – not merely out of respect for a towering figure in the recent history of the Catholic Church in Australia, but because of a fear that in some way the prosecution, conviction and dismissal of the appeal represent an attack on their faith and the Church they love.

Those feelings are understandable. We live in an age when there is a great deal of hostility in some quarters towards the Catholic Church. Former High Court judge Dyson Heydon quoted a German politician in a speech a couple of years ago to the effect that “anti-Catholicism is the anti-semitism of the intellectuals.” We also live in a country with an unprecedented level of scepticism about institutions, and that distrust may extend to the verdicts of judges and juries.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 26, 2019

Extension of Civil Statute of Limitations for Child Sexual Abuse Becomes Effective September 1
SNAP Applauds any Improvement that Offers More Victims Their Day in Court
But the State Still Needs a “Look-Back Window” so All Can Seek Justice

What:
Holding signs at a sidewalk news conference, survivors of clergy sexual abuse and their supporters will educate the public concerning a new Texas law extending the civil statute of limitations for child sexual abuse, and urge legislators and their constituents to work toward broader reform.

Where:
Outside the Bexar County Court House, 100 Dolorosa, San Antonio, Texas

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AUSTRALIA
National Review

August 22, 2019

By Madeleine Kearns

Where is the evidence?

Lady Justice wears a blindfold. She holds a sword in one hand and scales in the other. She is a product of ancient Rome but stands as a potent symbol in our modern age of “your truth,” “my truth” — and nothing but those truths, so help us all.

This week, Cardinal George Pell’s appeal against his conviction of “historic sexual abuse” was rejected by a vote of 2–1 at Victoria’s supreme court. Still blindfolded, Lady Justice might very well be shaking her head. The dissenting justice, Mark Weinberg, had reservations. He warned of a “significant possibility” that Pell is innocent, explaining that he found it “impossible to accept” the sole accuser’s testimony, which, uncorroborated, may have been “concocted.” From Justice Weinberg’s judgment:

[From] the complainant’s evidence, it can be seen that there was ample material upon which his account could be legitimately subject to criticism. There were inconsistencies, and discrepancies, and a number of his answers simply made no sense. . . .

An unusual feature of this case was that it depended entirely upon the complainant being accepted, beyond reasonable doubt, as a credible and reliable witness. Yet the jury were invited to accept his evidence without there being any independent support for it.

Weinberg explained that, on these grounds, after assessing the prosecution’s case at the previous trial, he would have acquitted the cardinal of all charges. Pell is expected to appeal next to the High Court of Australia, which could overturn earlier verdicts. Otherwise, he will serve six years behind bars.

So, what is the case against him?

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

August 21, 2009

By Adam Cooper

One of the three Court of Appeal judges who heard George Pell’s appeal believes there is a “significant possibility” the cardinal did not commit the child sex crimes he’s in jail for and would have acquitted him.

Justice Mark Weinberg said he was not convinced by the victim’s evidence and could not exclude the possibility that some parts of the former choirboy’s testimony were “concocted”.

Justice Weinberg, a former Federal Court judge who presided over the trial of Melbourne’s Bourke Street killer James Gargasoulas last year, said there was a body of evidence that made it “impossible to accept” the victim’s account.

“From … the complainant’s evidence, it can be seen that there was ample material upon which his account could be legitimately subject to criticism. There were inconsistencies, and discrepancies, and a number of his answers simply made no sense,” Justice Weinberg wrote in his judgment released on Wednesday.

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AUSTRALIA
Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC)

By Louise Milligan

Two 13-year-old choristers from humble backgrounds, who received scholarships to an expensive Catholic school because they could sing their little hearts out.

Two boys whose childhoods, a court has again found, were stolen from them in 1996 by a man who was supposed to represent all that was good in the world: the then Archbishop of Melbourne.

Neither chorister was in court this brisk Melbourne morning.

What happens now after Pell’s appeal loss?

Victoria’s Court of Appeal delivered one of the most significant judgments in Australian legal history. So what’s the next step?
One succumbed in 2014 to the heroin addiction that overwhelmed him from the age of 14 — the year after the event that changed their lives.

He was only 31 when he died.

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AUSTRALIA
The Saturday Paper

August 24, 2019

By Richard Cooke

As the Victorian Court of Appeal affirms the cardinal’s guilt, he retains dogged support from many in the conservative establishment.

In an age when even amateur broadcasters can attain professional production values, few telecasts still look as spartan as a real-life court proceeding. In prelude, the live feed from the Victorian Supreme Court presented only three empty seats, a state seal and a test soundtrack of tinkling piano music. As the judges filled those seats, the court website became inundated with viewers and crashed. Once restored, the video sometimes chopped or slowed under the weight of this absent audience. Chief Justice Anne Ferguson’s delivery of the summary was halting as well – The Saturday Paper’s legal correspondent, Richard Ackland, tweeted that she brought “all the drama of a dead wombat to reading a summary of one of the most important criminal judgments of the year” – but this dour diction was, in its way, more compelling than a mannered performance might have been. The ruling Ferguson delivered was brief, clear and surprising – George Pell’s appeal on child sexual assault charges had failed.

“It is fair to say that his case has divided the community,” said Ferguson, and so it divided the court. There were three grounds of appeal. One was that the defence had been unable to submit an animation, since nicknamed “the Pac-Man video”, purporting to show that the offending inside St Patrick’s Cathedral, Melbourne, was impossible. This was dismissed unanimously. So, too, was concern that Pell’s not guilty plea had been entered via video link only, and not in the presence of the jury. But on the most important question, of whether an “unsafe verdict” had been delivered, there was dissent. Justice Weinberg felt the evidence of the complainant, upon which the case hinged, was not satisfactory enough to preclude reasonable doubt. His colleagues disagreed. They found “A”, as he was called in the summary, was “not a liar, was not a fantasist and was a witness of the truth”. It was reasonable for the jury to believe him.

The microphones recorded only silence from the gallery, and it was possible to forget the rest of those present: the press and lawyers, the survivors and supporters, and Cardinal Pell himself – he is not yet Mr Pell – who had arrived to court in a prison van, and would leave by the same means. Depending on their vantage point, court reporters said Pell “barely reacted” to the ruling, was “gripping the dock with his left hand and looking down at the floor”, looked “destroyed” or merely pursed his lips. Abuse survivors thanked the Lord for a decision many thought even more consequential than the cardinal’s earlier guilty verdict.

Media and legal circles had tipped a different result, partly because of matters of law, and partly because of a cruder calculus – that elite power is so seldom brought to lasting accountability. There might yet be another appeal to the High Court by special leave, but “A”, or Witness J as he is better known, has already run an unusually long and vigorous gauntlet. He waited many years to speak to police, only doing so when the other choirboy abused by Pell died of a heroin overdose. It was at his former schoolfriend’s funeral that he decided to seek justice. As other cases prepared against Pell fell away, it was his that proceeded to trial. The first jury was unable to deliver a verdict. The second believed his version of events over the cardinal’s. Now two Supreme Court justices have made the same determination.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

August 25, 2019

By Chip Le Grand

George Pell will take his case to the High Court, setting the scene for a final legal battle over the senior Catholic cleric’s child sex abuse convictions.

Sources have told The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald that Pell is determined to pursue his last avenue of appeal after receiving unanimous advice from his legal team that the dissenting opinion of Victorian Supreme Court Justice Mark Weinberg provided reasonable grounds to have his convictions overturned.

Pell has 21 days from last Wednesday’s Court of Appeal judgment to formally lodge an application for special leave to appeal to the High Court. It is likely that a short hearing to determine his application will be listed for this year.

If Pell is granted leave, it is likely to be a further four to six months before his appeal is heard.

It is understood that Pell’s special leave application will be made by Bret Walker, SC, who argued the cardinal’s case before the Court of Appeal and who has extensive experience in High Court cases.

The Court of Appeal dismissed Pell’s appeal against his convictions for the oral rape of a choirboy and the sexual assault of another at St Patrick’s Cathedral when he was Archbishop of Melbourne in the 1990s.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

August 25, 2019

VSCP (Victims and Survivors’ Consultative Panel) update

Following recent press coverage around events from 2008, Peter Saunders has resigned from the Victims and Survivors’ Consultative Panel with immediate effect.

The Inquiry will not be making any further comment on this matter.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Telegraph (UK)

August 25, 2019

A child abuse victim who founded Britian’s leading charity for survivors has resigned from a government inquriy after it emerged that he had a sexual encounter with a victim in a restaurant toilet.

Peter Saunders, 61, who founded the National Association for People Abused in Childhood (NAPAC), was arrested following the encounter which took place in February 2008.

He was not charged with any offence but said that he was “deeply sorry” about the incident and that he would carry the shame for the rest of his life.

As a result, he was forced to resign from his post on the Victims and Survivors Panel of the Independent Inquiry into Childhood Sexual Abuse (IICSA), the public investigation into sys­temic sexual abuse in schools, churches and other institutions.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Mail on Sunday

August 24, 2019

By David Rose

– Peter Saunders had a sexual encounter in a Bella Italia toilet with the woman

– Mr Saunders, 61, was not charged with any crime but last night said he was ‘deeply sorry’

The head of Britain’s leading charity for survivors of child sexual abuse had a sordid sexual encounter in a restaurant toilet with a woman he knew had been molested as a youngster, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.

Peter Saunders, who founded the National Association for People Abused in Childhood, was arrested after the encounter, which happened during an alcohol-fuelled lunch paid for on the charity’s credit card.

Mr Saunders, 61, was not charged with any crime but last night said he was ‘deeply sorry’ and would carry the shame of the incident for the rest of his life.

The married father was also forced to resign from his post on the Victims and Survivors Panel of the Independent Inquiry into Childhood Sexual Abuse, the public investigation into systemic sexual abuse in schools, churches and other institutions.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 26, 2019

A priest in Kentucky who was convicted of sexual abuse had his hopes for an appeal shot down yesterday as the Kentucky Supreme Court declined to hear his case. We are grateful for this outcome and hope it brings closure and healing to his victims.

Fr. Joseph Hemmerle was convicted in 2016 for sexually abusing a child in Meade County. He appealed his conviction by arguing that the court had not proven his intent. Fortunately, the jurors on the Kentucky Supreme Court did not buy his argument and Fr. Hemmerle will remain in jail until at least February, 2020 when he is eligible for parole.

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Safe Horizon blog

August 22, 2019

By Brian Toale

In 1970, a predator working at my high school sensed a vulnerability in me and began “grooming” me. He showed me more attention than I was used to, which made me feel special. When he first touched me inappropriately, I froze. He said I let him do it and used the fear and shame I felt to silence me and escalated the abuse throughout my senior year. My graduation ended the ordeal, and I vowed to myself I would carry my secret with me to the grave.

I moved on, or so I thought. But the shame that was used to shut me up didn’t disappear. I pushed it out of my mind, but it ate away at me from the inside like rust corroding an iron structure in a place no one can see. Over the next twenty years, that structure slowly corroded until I crashed and burned. It took forty-five years before I found the inner strength to report the abuse to my former school. Today, I am grateful for years of therapy and 12 Step recovery and count myself among the lucky survivors who can tell their story.

Valentine’s Day, 2019, marked the signing of the Child Victims Act and the culmination of a 15-year David vs. Goliath battle to change New York State’s archaic, predator-friendly statute of limitations law for child sexual abuse. With his signature, the Governor gave survivors an opportunity to right a terrible wrong done to them as children.

Before the Child Victims Act, sexual abuse survivors had to seek justice by their 23rd birthday. Otherwise, their abuser was free to abuse still more children with impunity. The average age for an adult to disclose being sexually abused as a child is fifty-two, thirty years too late. Predators and their enablers had only to run out the clock, which they did over and over again.

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ALBANY (NY)
Times Union

August 26, 2019

In a letter issued over the weekend, Bishop Edward B. Scharfenberger said he shared the public’s “sorrow and anger” in the wake of the new wave of sexual abuse claims filed against priests and others earlier this month.

“Our beautiful Catholic faith, which gives comfort through hardships and adds joy during life’s great moments, can feel shaken,” wrote Scharfenberger, who took over leadership of the Albany diocese in 2014. “And, sadly, among you there are many who have suffered other types of abuse or trauma privately but now feel acutely painful memories reawakening when reading the news. My heart goes out to you.”

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Get Religion blog

August 21, 2019

By Terry Mattingly

One of the hardest things to explain to newsroom managers, when you’re making a case for them to hire a religion-beat pro, is the astonishing level of complexity that exists in religion news — in terms of the doctrines, rites, structures, history and language of the religious groups that simply must be covered.

Take, for example, the word “bishop.” What does this term mean in (a) the Church of Rome, (b) the United Methodist Church, (c) the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, (d) various Pentecostal denominations and (e) the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (formerly known to newsroom pros as the “Mormons.”)

While we’re at it, what does “evangelical” mean in the title of the ELCA, one of America’s most doctrinally progressive-liberal flocks?

Words matter. So you just knew we were in for a rough ride, journalistically speaking, when headlines like this one began to sprout online: “Peeping Tom in Nashville Store Turns Out to Be High-Ranking Mormon Leader.” Things got really rough when local-TV news kicked in.

Now, I realize that this particular headline ran at a Patheos advocacy site called — Friendly Atheist. But this online post did combine lots of the issues and stumbles one could find elsewhere.

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Get Religion blog

August 26, 2019

By Terry Mattingly

So, is Cardinal George Pell of Australia guilty or innocent?

If you say “yes,” is that answer a form of virtue signaling during the ongoing hell of the multi-decade Catholic clergy sexual abuse crisis?

If you answer “no,” does that mean that you aren’t taking the crisis seriously and that you want bishops and priests to be able to escape justice?

If you answer “yes,” are you a loving pro-Pope Francis progressive?

If you answer “no,” does that mean that you are a hateful traditionalist who is on the wrong side of history on this issue and many others?

What if you say that you are worried about the quality of the evidence and that you are worried that public officials in Austrailia have listened to an anti-clerical mob and rushed to judgement? If you are hard questions about the evidence — like a good skeptic or journalist would — does that mean you are a hater and don’t care about the victims?

It’s somewhat unusual to run a think piece on Monday, but I really think that readers — especially journalists — will want to read the short Crux essay that ran the other day with this headline: “Ruling cements Pell’s profile as the Dreyfus or Hiss of the Catholic abuse crisis.” The author, of course, is John L. Allen, Jr.

Allen uses a genuinely scary metaphor — if you know your European history — to describe this case. Here is the key, thesis passage, after Pell’s recent appeal was rejected.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 26, 2019

A new bishop has been installed in West Virginia’s Catholic diocese. We call on him to make the protection of children and prevention of abuse his number one priority now that he is officially at the helm.

Bishop Mark Brennan was installed as the head of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston last week. Now that he is formally on the job, we believe his first priority should be clear and simple: to protect the vulnerable. In order to demonstrate his commitment to this priority, we call on him to take two immediate steps.

First, to use his power and influence to do everything he can to insure that his predecessor, who has been accused of sexual abuse and harassment, lives in an independent, professionally-run, remote and secure treatment center. This will help ensure that former Bishop Michael Bransfield is monitored and kept away from vulnerable members of the community. For the past year, to our knowledge, Bishop Bransfield has been free of any supervision.

If an even higher-ranking abuser, Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, can be sent far away from his former diocese to a remote friary in rural Kansas, then so too can Bishop Bransfield.

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DENVER (CO)
Catholic News Agency

August 26, 2019

By Ed Condon

Cardinal George Pell will appeal his conviction to the Australian High Court, following the decision last week by the Court of Appeal in Victoria to uphold his conviction for child sexual abuse.

Sources close to the cardinal told CNA Aug. 26 that Pell would be exercising his final appeal and that, while the majority of “special leave to appeal” cases were not granted by the High Court, his case would likely be accepted given the controversy triggered by the split decision of the Appeal Court judgement.

In seeking to take his case to the High Court in Canberra, Australia’s supreme court, Pell will be exercising his last legal avenue to overturn a conviction which has divided opinion in the country and internationally.

Several Australian media outlets have reported that Pell will retain the same legal team which presented his case in Victoria, led by Brett Walker SC.

The cardinal was convicted Dec. 11, 2018, on five charges that he sexually abused two choristers after Sunday Mass while he was Archbishop of Melbourne in 1996 and 1997.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 20, 2019

He admits four abuse ‘mistakes’
But no wrongdoer is identified or apparently punished
“Disciplining the deceitful will stop cover ups,” group says
SNAP ‘outs’ 2 ‘credibly accused’ clerics who were left off list
And it worries that high ranking predator is in Salina diocese
They want KS bishop to disclose “others who are or were here too”

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will
–blast Salina’s bishop for refusing to release a FULL list of child molesting clerics,
–reveal the names of two credibly accused priests who are/were in his diocese but have received virtually no attention here,
–criticize him for hiding the names of church officials who made ‘mistakes’ in four clergy sex cases,
–urge him to ‘come clean’ about any other predators (besides a prominent cardinal) who have been sent into his diocese, and
–beg those with information or suspicions about abuse to contact the Kansas Bureau of investigation.

WHERE
Outside Seven Dolors of the Blessed Virgin Mary Catholic church, 731 Pierre St. (corner of S. 8th St.) in Manhattan KS (where at least 2 credibly accused abusive priests worked)

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 20, 2019

They name 5 accused priests who were in Eastern KS
SNAP blast KS Catholic archbishop for “still hiding them”
Prelate belatedly posted a list of 22 alleged abusive priests
But his list is “incomplete” and “leaves kids at risk” group says
SNAP: “Church staff should tell KBI what they know about crimes”

WHAT:
As part of a new ‘outreach’ campaign, abuse victims and their supporters will
–disclose a list of five credibly accused child molesting clerics who worked in/near Topeka but have virtually gotten no public or press attention here, and
–hand out fliers door-to-door seeking “anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes” by any of these clerics or others who worked in the Topeka area.

And they’ll urge Kansas City’s archbishop to
—explain why these names were left off his “accused” list,
—add the clerics’ names (along with photos, whereabouts and work histories of all publicly accused clerics) to his website, and
—include the identities of ALL who have sexually abused (including nuns, bishops, brothers, seminarians and priests).

They will also urge
—all Kansas bishops to post similar lists of accused clerics, and
—all current and former church-goers and staff to report known/suspected abuses and cover ups to the Kansas Bureau of Investigation.

WHERE
Outside Mater Dei Catholic Church, 911 S.W. Clay Street (corner of S. W. 10th Ave.) in Topeka (785 232 7744, materdeiparish.org)

WHO

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Patheos blog

August 26, 2019

By David Gee

A now-deceased priest from the Diocese of Buffalo (New York) sexually abused multiple young kids and forced them into group sex with each other while he watched and participated, according to a lawsuit.

The plaintiff, whose name is redacted in a version of the complaint that’s online, said he was sexually abused by Rev. Richard P. Judd along with several other children in 1975. In 2018, Judd was included on a list of priests who had been accused of child sex abuse, but further information wasn’t disclosed.

The plaintiff said Judd groomed several young boys and then sexually assaulted them, including by forcing them to have sex with a young girl in front of each other in the church rectory. The complaint says he talked to the boys about inappropriate topics, checked them out of school, and encouraged them to drink and smoke with him.

The specific incident that’s leading to all kinds of headlines occurred on Feb. 23, 1975. and it involved two other young boys, Jerry T. and Matthew W., and a young girl by the name of Grace Anne.

For several hours PLAINTIFF and the other boys and FR. JUDD drank beer, watched sports, and smoked cigarettes, until PLAINTIFF started to become intoxicated. After hours had passed, FR. JUDD asked Jerry T. if he should invite someone named Grace Anne to the apartment…

Shortly thereafter FR. JUDD called to PLAINTIFF and Matthew W. and they entered the bedroom. PLAINTIFF observed Jerry T. engaging in sexual intercourse with Grace Anne, with FR. JUDD assisting by manipulating Jerry T.’s penis and instructing Jerry T. from behind. All three were in a state of complete undress. PLAINTIFF quickly felt uncomfortable as he stood observing Jerry T., FR. JUDD, and Grace Anne naked in bed, the latter of which appeared to be under the influence of some type of drug. PLAINTIFF had never engaged in sexual intercourse before.

After this incredibly disturbing experience, Judd allegedly coerced Matthew onto the bed and repeated the actions he did with the first child. The complaint goes on to say Judd noticed the plaintiff didn’t have an erection and sexually assaulted the child to try to change that. The plaintiff was then allegedly pressured to have sex with the girl — at which point he left the building without even talking to his friends.

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RUTLAND (VT)
Rutland Herald

August 23, 2019

The report released this week by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington names 40 priests accused of sexually abusing children in Vermont since 1950. Many of them were long-serving and notable within their communities.

The findings are painful for what is likely to be hundreds — if not thousands — of Vermonters who were abused and mistreated. It also tears at communities.

Bishop Christopher J. Coyne in his statement, aptly titled “Sins of the Past,” once again attempts to apologize, but it can never truly be that. This report, even without specific claims and numbers of victims, suggests an institutional failure to protect the most vulnerable.

The report, which was compiled from records at the Diocese of Burlington over a 40-week period, is the most comprehensive, independent examination of “credible and substantiated allegation of sexual abuse of a minor made against” Vermont clergy.

“Until now, the scope of all of this has been our ‘family secret,’” Coyne said in his lengthy statement.

Family secrets can be toxic. Harmful past experiences — unspoken, unaddressed, and known only by a few — fester like neglected wounds. The innocent victims of the family secret are often made to feel ashamed about what happened, as no one seems to listen to them or even, sadly at times, believe them. While these secrets remain hidden, those who have been hurt are often unable to find the healing they need, especially if those who harmed them are still ‘part’ of the family, even if only in memory.”

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CORPUS CHRISTI (TX)
KIII TV

August 25, 2019

By Brandon Scott and Marcelino Benito

A Catholic priest in northwest Harris County is stepping down from his position while the archdiocese investigates allegations of “inappropriate behavior with an adult.”

The Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston confirmed the move Sunday.

“I started shaking,” said Eduardo Lopez de Casas. “I wasn’t sure if I could continue singing.”

Father Alfonso Delgado agreed to withdraw from all ministry until the investigation is complete, the diocese said.

Lopez de Casas was leading music during this morning’s mass. He’s also a member of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.

“I was in shock,” said Lopez de Casas. “As a victim when you hear this, it’s almost like you’re reliving your own experience.”

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HOUSTON (TX)
Houston Chronicle

August 25, 2019

By Nicole Hensley

Another priest accused of sexual misconduct has been removed from a north Harris County parish where a cleric was also suspended earlier this year.

hurch leaders at Prince of Peace Catholic Community announced during services Sunday that parochial vicar Alfonso Delgado was under investigation following an allegation involving another adult.

Pastor Gerald Goodrum divulged the removal after reciting a homily and at least four hail mary’s, said Eduardo Lopez de Casas, a leader of Houston’s Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests who was working a Mass service as a cantor. The nature of the allegation and when it was said to have happened was not revealed.

Goodrum asked that parishioners with any information about the allegation to contact law enforcement.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Christian Post

August 26, 2019

By Michael Brown

The internet is burning up with news of yet another scandal in the church, this time with serious accusations against Charismatic evangelist Todd Bentley. What is God saying to His people through this current crisis?

Regarding Todd’s situation, I have no specific comment, since: 1) I have not supported him being in ministry since his divorce and remarriage in 2008, and I am on public record to that effect. 2) I have no connection of any kind to Todd and his ministry. (I also disagreed publicly with the way other leaders handled things in Lakeland, where Todd became prominent.)

But, after prayer and reflection, I do believe there are important things to share that are applicable beyond this current, alleged scandal.

First, this is not the time to throw stones at Charismatics, as some non-charismatic critics have been quick to do. To be sure, we Charismatics have done a very poor job of self-policing, which is a major reason I wrote the book Playing with Holy Fire. And, to be sure, we have had more than our share of sexual scandals. (Note that I write “we” and “our” as a Charismatic myself. I will gladly point the finger within my own circles.)

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NEWARK (NJ)
Star Ledger

August 26, 2019

By Sophie Nieto-Munoz

A disgraced Roman Catholic priest who admitted to sexually assaulting a teenage girl three decades ago will be sentenced Monday in Superior Court in Middlesex County.

Thomas P. Ganley, 63, pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a girl who was a member of the youth group he led in the 1990s. The priest’s case was the first criminal case prosecuted after the start of the Attorney General’s Clergy Abuse Task Force, which was formed last year to investigate allegations of clergy abuse.

Ganley, who will be sentenced by Judge Diane Pincus, faces four years in prison. He will also be required to register as a sex offender under Megan’s Law and will be forbidden to have unsupervised contact with any child under 18.

When he was arrested in January, Ganley was a parochial vicar at St. Philip and St. James Catholic Church in Phillipsburg and a chaplain at St. Luke’s Warren Campus Hospital.

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PITTSBURGH (PA)
Post-Gazette

August 26, 2019

By Peter Smith

The new spiritual leader of West Virginia’s Roman Catholics is big on “hope.” He mentioned it several times during his homily last week when he was installed as bishop of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston.

So, given the cleanup task ahead of him, Bishop Mark Brennan can only hope for more moments like what he experienced after that service.

He had just emerged from the Cathedral of St. Joseph in Wheeling behind a train of dozens of priests and bishops in their festive clerical garb, the sounds of organ and brass still reverberating within. He went up to an elevated pulpit in an exterior turret to bless the crowds clustered below, dressed in their Sunday best even though it was a Thursday afternoon.

“Bishop, we’re over here!” shouted Yvette Smith, one of a cluster of women across the street. They were dressed in T-shirts and jeans or shorts in the humid afternoon. They live in apartments across the street or around the corner, and they often enjoy watching people coming and going from the beautiful weddings and other ceremonies that contrast with the otherwise bleak neighborhood.

This time, they weren’t just spectators.

Bishop Brennan accepted their invitation, walking over, talking with the women and offering blessings.

“Nobody’s ever taken the time to come over here,” Ms. Smith said, adding that the visit lifted her spirits on a discouraging day. She plans to attend Mass at the cathedral in the future.

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Good Men’s Project blog

August 24, 2019

By Brian Clites

It has been one year since the Pennsylvania grand jury report named 300 sexually abusive Roman Catholic priests in the state. After an 18-month investigation, the grand jury concluded that “over one thousand child victims were identifiable, from the church’s own records.”

At the same time, the jury also noted that the real numbers could be much higher. It said,

“We believe that the real number – of children whose records were lost or who were afraid ever to come forward – is in the thousands.”

As a scholar who has spent the last eight years interviewing Catholic survivors of clergy sex abuse, I know that even though there were only a few convictions in Pennsylvania, the release of the grand jury report was a watershed moment for survivors.

The report opened up space for new conversations and helped communities come to terms with the horror of their past.

Grand juries comprise up to 23 citizens. They investigate potential crimes under the leadership and jurisdiction of a prosecutor.

Each state governs the amount of time that victims have to prosecute a given crime, which is called the statute of limitations. Although the Pennsylvania grand jury report spurred other states to extend their statute of limitations, Pennsylvania has not.

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NEW YORK (NY)
New York Post

August 22, 2019

By Priscilla DeGregory

After years of failed attempts to sue Yeshiva University, 38 former students who say they were sexually abused by three rabbis and other school staff decades ago can now seek justice under the Child Victims Act.

The victims say while they attended all-boys Yeshiva University High School, the principal, Rabbi George Finkelstein, and four other staffers variously sexually abused them, beginning in 1955 and continuing through 1986, according to the Manhattan Supreme Court lawsuit.

The school received more than 20 complaints from parents and students about the alleged abuse but did nothing, the court papers allege.

One victim, Mordechai Twersky, claims he was twice sexually abused by Finkelstein in 1980 — and despite letting school officials know, they kept the rabbi at the school and even gave him the “Educator of the Year” award in 1985.

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GREENSBURG (PA)
Tribune-Review

August 25, 2019

By Deb Erdley

“It’s not about the money.”

In another time and place, Jack (not his real name) said he’d take the $41,990 offered through the Greensburg Catholic Diocese’s compensation fund for clergy sex abuse survivors and toss it back.

Nothing will ever erase what he says the Rev. John J. Nyeste, a trusted priest, did to him 53 years ago in a secluded farmhouse.

These have not been the best of times for Jack.

At 64, struggling to make ends meet and dealing with health problems, the one-time Connellsville altar boy and former seminarian says he’ll likely take what the church is offering. He was given until Monday to make his decision.

He is among hundreds of survivors of clergy child sexual abuse weighing monetary offers that seven Pennsylvania dioceses have extended.

The local dioceses will underwrite such settlements, but they otherwise washed their hands of the process. Church leaders have outsourced the duty of weighing claims to third-party mediators such as Kenneth Feinberg and Camille Biros or, in the case of the Greensburg Diocese, a Harrisburg-based service known as Commonwealth Mediation and Conciliation.

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DENVER (CO)
Crux

August 24, 2019

By John L. Allen Jr.

[With photo]

Rome – This Wednesday happened to be the feast of St. Pius X, who served as pope from 1903 to 1914 and whose primary claim to fame was unleashing an “anti-modernist” purge in the Catholic Church, the targets of which were a loosely defined network of Biblical scholars, theologians and others trying, in various ways, to reconcile the faith with science and modern thought.

Pius X issued an encyclical in 1907, Pascendi Dominici Gregis, which was more or less the charter document of the campaign, describing “modernism” as “the synthesis of all heresies.” He also imposed an “anti-modernist oath” on all clergy that lasted until 1967.

Here’s what makes this interesting: If you run a Google search using the keywords “Pope Francis” and “modernism,” you’ll get more than a half-million results, most of them accusing Francis of being a modernist himself.

Yet there he was on Aug. 21, attending a Mass for the feast in a side chapel in St. Peter’s Basilica like an ordinary member of the faithful, sitting unobtrusively in the sixth row. While we have no idea what was in Francis’s mind at that moment, it’s hard not to think he wanted to honor the memory of his predecessor – suggesting, among other things, that perhaps Francis’s view of “modernism” and the Church’s efforts to resist it are a bit more nuanced than is often appreciated.

Francis’s surprise drop-in didn’t make headlines – in part, of course, because it came on the same day an Australian court announced its ruling on Cardinal George Pell’s appeal of his conviction on child sex abuse charges, rejecting that appeal in a 2-1 split decision.

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DENVER (CO)
Crux

August 17, 2019

By Inés San Martín

San Francisco, Argentina – Although by now Catholics in some parts of the world have lived with the ferment caused by revelations of clerical sexual abuse for decades, a bishop who heads a commission for preventing abuse in Argentina says that in Pope Francis’s native country, the crisis is “just beginning.”

“It’s not that the abuses are beginning, but society’s awareness, with cases becoming public,” said Bishop Sergio Buenanueva, of San Francisco, in the region of Cordoba. “The cases that expose this problem to the public produce a domino effect which, I believe, is positive.”

Buenanueva also told Crux that while he believes Pope Francis is having a deep impact on the local church, no pope, even history’s first from Argentina, has the capacity to reverse a centuries-long trend of secularization.

On the abuse crisis, the bishop insisted that transparency is healthy.

“In the first place, it’s positive for the victims, who’re now being heard by the Catholic Church and society at large,” he said. “The media has been part of this, and the justice system is doing its job too, with priests being condemned with adequately harsh punishments.”

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DAYTON (OH)
Journal-News

August 24, 2019

By Michael D. Pitman

https://www.journal-news.com/news/liberty-twp-church-offers-discussion-series-wake-sex-abuse-allegations-its-former-priest/SMLmZoLYtPKm49hEkdXGNK/

St. Maximilian Kolbe is offering this weekend to parishioners a “short, yet powerful book” after each mass in the wake of a sex abuse scandal involving a former pastor of the Liberty Twp. parish.

Father Jim Riehle is establishing a series of Discussion and Holy Hour for Healing sessions.In a message to parishioners, Riehle wrote the book “addresses so much of the struggle, the pain, and the anger surrounding the evil of sexual abuse and the stain this has left on our church.”

*
Former Pastor Geoff Drew was indicted on Aug. 19 in Hamilton County on nine counts of raping a boy who recently came forward in the wake of other allegations.

*
The book, “Letter to a Suffering Church” by Bishop Robert Barron, directly addresses the issues currently facing the church, wrote Riehle.

Riehle said said he’s “encouraging” parishioners read the book “because I believe it addresses important and difficult topics” and hopes it will spark a conversation. He also hopes the book at the ensuing discussions will be “a small, first step towards the peace and healing and change that we all desire.”

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DENVER (CO)
Crux

August 25, 2019

By John L. Allen Jr.

Rome – Back in long-ago 1998, I spoke to a member of a small conservative Catholic watchdog group in the U.S. that had just publicly accused a prominent local priest of sexual abuse. I asked why all the churchmen this group targeted seemed to be liberals, and the answer was unhesitating: “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”

What he meant is that if a cleric is doctrinally and politically suspect, at least in this group’s eyes, then there’s likely moral corruption too.

In other words, what one might call the “weaponization” of clerical sexual abuse charges as part of the wars of culture in Catholicism is nothing new. Decisions to lodge such charges or to make them public, as well as whether people are inclined to believe or reject them, often are tied up with politics, try as reasonable souls might to remain objective.

This comes to mind in light of a recent controversy surrounding Venezuelan Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, the “substitute,” or number three official, in the Vatican’s Secretariat of State. He was appointed to that role by Pope Francis last year, and it’s a key one – the substitute, who’s responsible for the Vatican’s daily workflow, is the only person, including the Cardinal Secretary of State, who can simply walk in on the pope unannounced.

When Peña Parra was appointed a year ago, the Italian newsmagazine L’Espresso published a letter suggesting negative reports about him as a seminarian in Venezuela, but they mostly concerned his sexual orientation and didn’t clearly suggest abuse.

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IRONDALE (AL)
National Catholic Register

August 24, 2019

Father Geoff Drew was arrested Aug. 19 on allegations dating back 20 years, which concern Drew’s time as music minister at St. Jude parish, prior to his ordination as a priest.

Cincinnati – A Cincinnati news station is reporting on the contents of a letter, sent to Archbishop Dennis Schnurr and Auxiliary Bishop Joseph Binzer in August 2018, accusing them of ignoring “red flags” related to a priest now indicted on nine counts of rape.

*
Local news station WCPO reported that in the letter in question, a longtime lay leader at St. Maximilian Kolbe Parish told Schnurr he had failed to deliver on his promise of being “unequivocally committed” to children and that the church had ignored “red flags” about Father Drew.

WCPO reported that the author of the letter is a mother of three children who attended St. Maximilian Kolbe in Liberty Township, where Father Drew was pastor from 2009 to mid-2018.

CNA reported earlier this month that complaints were raised to at least one archdiocesan official about Drew’s inappropriate behavior with teenage and pre-teenage boys as early as 2013. Complaints were made to auxiliary bishop Joseph Binzer, who is the archdiocesan vicar general, in 2013 and 2015.

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DENVER (CO)
Crux

August 24, 2019

By Inés San Martín

After being away from my home country of Argentina for the past five years, only going back to visit with the family for Christmas and the odd long weekend, I decided to avoid Rome’s scorching summer this year and head back on a reporting mission to take the country’s temperature regarding my fellow Argentinian, Pope Francis.

Beyond the specific stories I came to pursue, I wanted to see if I could find a so-called “Francis effect.” I spoke to several bishops, priests and lay people, all of whom acknowledged that when it comes to Mass attendance, vocations, and the like, there is no such impact, at least not one that can tangibly reverse the country’s rapid secularization.

There is, however, a Francis effect in Argentine society. Perhaps predictably, it’s a mix of both lights and shadows, the bitter and the sweet.

*
And there are those who question his track record when it comes to addressing the clerical sexual abuse crisis.

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LITTLE ROCK (AR)
Bilgrimgage blog

August 24, 2019

By William Lindsey

Ruth Krall has generously prepared a brief afterword to her six-part series of essays entitled “Recapitulation: Affinity Sexual Violence in a Religious Voice.” I’ve published those six essays in installments at Bilgrimage, and at the end of this posting, will provide links to the entire series. The basic premise of Ruth’s series of essays is that sexual abuse of vulnerable people by leaders is an endemic problem in religious groups across the globe, and, as she states in the afterword below, “Until the world community learns how to accurately assess this world public health/community mental health phenomenon of clergy sexual abuse of the powerless and the vulnerable, the problem will continue to proliferate.” Ruth’s essay follows.

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BUFFALO (NY)
Spectrum News

August 24, 2019

By Madison Elliott

A Springville man spoke openly for the first time Saturday after filing a lawsuit against the Diocese of Buffalo under the Children’s Victim Act.

Richard Brownell, 62, alleges Father John R. Aurelio abused him when he was only 11-years-old. He says it started in 1968 when he was a parishioner at St. Gerard’s.

Aurelio, who was not a priest at St. Gerard’s at the time but instead at St. Leo’s, was introduced to Brownell through Father Bernard Mach.

On Saturday, Brownell recounted times when Aurelio allegedly gave him marijuana, alcohol and took advantage of him. He says Mach knew of the abuse and did nothing. Mach himself was also accuse of sexually assaulting a young boy in the early 90s.

In court documents, Brownell accuses the church of protecting Aurelio by “providing plaintiff with safe environment to in which to participate in in educational, youth and recreational activities.”

In 1993, Brownell spoke to a local TV news station about his abuse, but said he was able to fend off Aurelio’s advances. Now, after hearing the stories of other victims, he was inspired him to speak out.

“I’m still humiliated. I still feel the humiliation, but no more,” said Brownell. “I’ve come forward to lend my voice to those victims who haven’t found theirs yet.”

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RUTLAND (VT)
RuTland Herald

August 24, 2019

By Patrick McCardle

The release of a list on Thursday of 40 Catholic Church clergy members who have been the subject of at least one “credible accusation” of sexually assaulting a minor has not affected local Catholic schools which are set to start their fall school year next week.

Whether the scandal, one of the latest involving the Catholic Church, will be discussed during Sunday’s services will be up to the priests at local churches, according to Monsignor John McDermott.

On Friday, Lisa Millard, the new principal at Christ the King School said she hadn’t gotten questions or comments based on the report.

The report, compiled by an independent committee requested by the Diocese of Burlington, listed 39 priests accused of misconduct during their tenure and one facing an out-of-state allegation. From that list, 20 had spent time assigned to Rutland County churches including Christ the King.

Millard said CKS could accommodate about 300 students. During the school year, which is set to begin Thursday, the student body is expected to be 201.

“That’s growing every year,” she said.

While an informational meeting is planned for early in the school year, Millard said she hadn’t decided whether she will address the report. As of Friday afternoon, she said no parents had talked about withdrawing students.

Mike Alexander, principal at Mount St. Joseph Academy, said he expected to start his school year on Thursday as well, with at least 77 students, and possibly one more student expected to join the school.

Alexander said the average number of students through the past 10 years has been 81 so the enrollment for the coming year is about what he expected.

Alexander said he had not heard any concerns in response to the report.

If he believed a meeting for parents on the topic was necessary, Alexander said, he would reach out to the diocese for direction.

McDermott said the diocese has not directed the priests at Vermont’s Catholic churches to respond in a specific way.

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SAN LORENZO (CA)
Patch

August 23, 2019

A Catholic priest at a Fremont church has pleaded no contest to five felony counts of lewd acts upon a child for molesting a boy over an 18-month period in 2016 and 2017, according to court records.

The Rev. Hector David Vela, 42, also known as Hector David Mendoza-Vela, entered his plea in the courtroom of Alameda County Superior Court Judge Thomas Stevens in Dublin on Aug. 16.

In return for his plea, the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office agreed to dismiss 25 additional counts of lewd acts upon a child for inappropriately touching the boy in his genital area between June 2016 and December 2017, when the boy was 14 and 15 years old.

The plea agreement calls for Vela to be get a term of four years and eight months in state prison when he’s sentenced on Sept. 27.

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COLUMBUS (OH)
Columbus Dispatch

August 23, 2019

By Danae King

A priest accused in a lawsuit of molesting an 8-year-old boy in New York City about 30 years ago once served in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Columbus.

The Rev. Carleton Jones, a member of the Dominican Order, served at St. Patrick Catholic Church, Downtown, from 1992 to 1995, according to diocesan spokesman George Jones.

George Jones said the Columbus Diocese has no record of any complaints against Father Jones from his time in Columbus, but the Order of Dominican Friars Province of St. Joseph, which is based in New York, notified the diocese and St. Patrick about an allegation against him in October.

George Jones said the alleged abuse was announced at St. Patrick even though it took place outside the Columbus diocese, but it was later deemed not credible by the Province of St. Joseph.

The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in New York Supreme Court, alleges that Father Jones abused the 8-year-old boy at a New York City church while preparing him for his First Communion approximately 30 years ago.

“He was brought to the friar to help him learn, and when he was in private, horrible travesties happened,” said Evan Oshan, the plaintiff’s attorney.

The Dispatch is not naming the man because the newspaper doesn’t name potential victims of sexual abuse.

The Columbus diocese directed questions to the province, which did not return phone and email requests from The Dispatch for comment on Thursday and Friday.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) sent a news release about Father Jones, saying that Ohio Catholic officials should tell local residents about the allegation “for the safety of children and healing of survivors.”

The lawsuit names as defendants Father Jones, the Province of St. Joseph, and St. Catherine of Siena parish in New York City, where he served at the time. The suit alleges that the defendants were negligent in their duty to protect the child.

The plaintiff first reported in September 2018 that he had been abused years ago, Oshan said, but was able to file the lawsuit because New York state enacted a law giving sexual-assault victims a one-year window to file litigation.

The Columbus Diocese released a list of 34 priests accused of sexual abuse of minors in March and later added to it. There are now 40 names on the list.

For full coverage on sexual abuse by priests in the Diocese of Columbus, visit www.dispatch.com/catholicsecrecy.

Dispatch Librarian Julie Fulton contributed to this story.

dking@dispatch.com

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SPRINGFIELD (MA)
The Republican

August 23, 2109

By Anne-Gerard Flynn

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington, which covers the state of Vermont, has posted the names of 40 priests it says had credible allegations of sexual abuse filed against them since 1950 by victims who were under 18 at the time of the alleged incidence.

The posting, which is said to contain more than two dozen names not previously made public, is the work of a seven-member committee appointed last October by Burlington Bishop Christopher Coyne to review diocesan files to compile a list of priests with credible allegations, as many other dioceses have done.

The names of and allegations against two men with ties to Western Massachusetts who appear on the list have already been public for years.

Lawsuits previously settled by the diocese previously revealed accusations against Edward Paquette, who was laicized by the Vatican in 2009 and who has lived in Westfield, Mass. since 1978 when he had his faculties for ministry removed by then Vermont Bishop John Marshall.

Paquette grew up in Westfield, but never ministered in the Diocese of Springfield, though allegations of abuse were made against him here. He was ordained in 1957 for the Diocese of Fall River where he served until 1963 when he had his faculties for ministry removed in that diocese for similar reasons.

He underwent counseling and was hired for seven years by the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana, which now lists him with seven credible abuse allegations on its website. When he returned to Westfield, he appealed to Marshall to hire him in Vermont, citing counseling he underwent in Indiana. He ministered for six years in Vermont before numerous allegations of abuse forced Marshall to remove him from ministry.

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ROYAL OAK (MI)
Royal Oak Tribune

August 23, 2019

By Aileen Wingblad

A deacon from Sterling Heights on trial for allegedly sexually assaulting a teenage altar boy at a Troy church in 2017 was accused of inappropriate touching of a young girl months before the boy came forward with allegations, according to testimony heard Friday in Oakland County Circuit Court.

Hurmiz Ishak, 66, is charged with three counts of criminal sexual conduct involving the boy, who was between the ages of 13 and 16 at the time of the alleged incidents. And while Ishak was suspended from his duties at St. Joseph Chaldean Catholic Church after the allegations were made in October 2018, one of several of the church’s leaders who’ve testified so far said that it wasn’t the first time Ishak was ordered to stay away from the church due to alleged misconduct.

Earlier in 2018, a young female altar server had reported to a church leader that Ishak had touched her inappropriately, according to one of the church’s priests — who said she was somewhere between 12 and 15 years old at the time.

Assistant prosecutor makes his opening statement, telling jurors Hurmiz Ishak is “a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

None of the witnesses called to the stand are being identified, as ordered by Judge Phyllis McMillen, who is overseeing the trial. The Oakland Press isn’t naming the alleged victim either, due to the nature of the alleged crimes.

Ishak’s young female accuser, the priest testified, told him about “inappropriate touching” by the deacon, which was promptly reported to police and Children’s Protective Services, he said. No charges were filed, but the allegations did lead to Ishak’s first suspension from his deacon duties. He was allowed to return to the church a couple months later.

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BURLINGTON (VT)
Vermont Public Radio

August 22, 2019

By Jand Lindholm and Ric Cengeri

As the clergy abuse scandal in the Catholic Church continues to unfold, Vermont has not been immune. Last fall, Bishop Christopher Coyne of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington created a committee of lay people to examine the files of Vermont priests for reports of child sexual abuse. We’ll hear what they found.

Joining us are Bishop Coyne and John Mahoney, a member of the committee, to discuss how the review was conducted and allegations substantiated.

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CINCINNATI (OH)
700 WLW News

August 23, 2019

Speaking on 700WLW on Friday afternoon, the Cincinnati Archdiocese Communications Director, Mike Schafer, says church leaders are both aghast and embarrassed after the series of events that’s ultimately led to felony charges of rape being filed against a priest.

Father Geoff Drew this week pleaded not guilty to nine counts of rape dating back some 30 years. Fr Drew had been accused of “creepy”–though not criminal–behavior in 2013 and 2015. Despite Auxiliary Bishop Joseph Binzer knowing about that, he still supported Fr Drew’s transfer to St Ignatius, which has a large student population. When word of the transfer got out, a man came forward to say he was raped as a child by Fr Drew. That led to a nine-count indictment in Hamilton County.

The local representative for SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) has called for the Vatican to remove both Auxiliary Bishop Binzer and Archbishop Schnurr. Schafer says Binzer is no longer in charge of priest assignments, telling our own Bill Cunningham “some people are great at part of their job and they’re not great at another part of their job, and he’s been removed from the part of his job that, apparently, he wasn’t great at.”

Schafer says if church leadership could go back, they would’ve removed Fr Drew following a second complaint about behavior in 2015. He says no one in the church knew about the rape allegations until Fr Drew was indicted and arrested. He’s being held on $5 million.

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HAINES (AK)
Chilkat Valley News

August 22, 2019

On Aug. 21, the Catholic Diocese of Juneau released a report naming seven priests credibly alleged to have committed acts of sexual misconduct with minors and vulnerable adults—three of whom served at Sacred Heart Church in Haines from as far back as 1959, to as recent as 2007.

The Dioecies of Juneau established an independent commission in December 2018 to review files of alleged sexual assault dating back to 1951 when the parish was established. The five-member commission included law enforcement officers, lawyers and retired judges.

The commission was charged with evaluating all charges of reported sexual misconduct “to determine whether there was credible evidence to support the belief that any of them had engaged in sexual misconduct, as well as an accounting of improper handling of any sexual abuse cases by those in authority.”

Among the accused are Edmund Penisten, who served in Haines from 2004 to 2007, Javier Gutierrez (1986 to 1988), and Francis Cowgill (1959 to 1964).

Penisten is alleged to have viewed child pornography in 2010, and put on administrative leave in 2019, according to the report.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Sun Times

August 23, 2019

By Mitch Dudek

Advocates for victims of priest sex abuse called Friday for Attorney General Kwame Raoul to use his power of subpoena to compel the Catholic church in Illinois to hand over evidence in an ongoing probe into clergy sex abuse of minors.

Leaders of SNAP and The Archangel Foundation, nonprofit sex abuse survivor advocacy groups, also were critical of a recent private meeting between Raoul and Cardinal Blase Cupich.

Larry Antonsen, a leader with SNAP, said the one-on-one meeting doesn’t lend credibility to the integrity of the investigation.

“The church talks about transparency, and then the cardinal asks for a private meeting with the attorney general, which sounds kind of fishy,” Antonsen said during a news conference outside Cupich’s Gold Coast office.

“Across, the country, there’s still cover-ups going on, and there’s no reason that I know of why we should trust Cardinal Cupich or any other member of the hierarchy. I really think subpoena power should be used. That’s the only way we’re ever going to get where we’re going to actually believe what we see.”

A spokeswoman for Raoul said Friday the meeting Aug. 7 at Raoul’s Thompson Center office was “productive” and the two “discussed a variety of issues that have been important throughout the investigation.”

Cupich asked for the meeting, she said.

An archdiocese spokeswoman was not available for comment.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 21, 2019

They name 5 accused priests who were in Eastern KS

SNAP blast KS Catholic archbishop for “still hiding them”

Prelate belatedly posted a list of 22 alleged abusive priests

But his list is “incomplete” and “leaves kids at risk” group says

SNAP: “Church staff should tell KBI what they know about crimes”

WHAT:
As part of a new ‘outreach’ campaign, abuse victims and their supporters will
–disclose a list of five credibly accused child molesting clerics who worked in/near Topeka but have virtually gotten no public or press attention here, and
–hand out fliers door-to-door seeking “anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes” by any of these clerics or others who worked in the Topeka area.

And they’ll urge Kansas City’s archbishop to
—explain why these names were left off his “accused” list,
—add the clerics’ names (along with photos, whereabouts and work histories of all publicly accused clerics) to his website, and
—include the identities of ALL who have sexually abused (including nuns, bishops, brothers, seminarians and priests).

They will also urge
—all Kansas bishops to post similar lists of accused clerics, and
—all current and former church-goers and staff to report known/suspected abuses and cover ups to the Kansas Bureau of Investigation.

VISUALS: The group will hold signs and childhood photos before leafleting.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 23, 2019

He admits four abuse ‘mistakes’

But no wrongdoer is identified or apparently punished

“Disciplining the deceitful will stop cover ups,” group says

SNAP ‘outs’ 2 ‘credibly accused’ clerics who were left off list

And it worries that high ranking predator is in Salina diocese

They want KS bishop to discose “others who are or were here too”

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will
–blast Salina church officials for refusing to release a FULL list of child molesting clerics,
–reveal the names of two credibly accused priests who are/were in his diocese but have received virtually no attention here,
–criticize them for hiding the names of church officials who made ‘mistakes’ in four clergy sex cases,
–urge them to ‘come clean’ about any other predators (besides a prominent cardinal) who have been sent into his diocese, and
–beg those with information or suspicions about abuse to contact the Kansas Bureau of investigation.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 23, 2019

A priest who has just been accused of abusing a New York child also spent time in Cincinnati, according to church documents.

Fr. Carleton Parker Jones, a Dominican cleric, was sued days ago in Manhattan for reportedly sexually assaulting an eight-year-old boy while he was preparing for his first confession and first communion with Jones.

An on-line parish document says that he is moving to Cincinnati Archdiocese.

For the safety of children we believe it is the moral and civic duty of Cincinnati Archbishop Dennis M. Schnurr to publicly disclose that Jones has been accused of child sex abuse – and disclose any information he has about Fr. Jones, especially other assignments in Ohio that he may have had. Finally, church officials in both Ohio and New York should reveal Fr. Jones’ whereabouts and insist that he live in a secure, remote, independently-run facility or treatment center until this troubling case is resolved.

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KALAMAZOO (MI)
Kalamazoo Gazette

August 23, 2019

By Ryan Boldrey

After two investigations into a former Otsego priest this decade resulted in zero charges, a leading support group for survivors of clergy sexual abuse points to a recent investigation by the Michigan State Attorney General’s Office into the same priest as to just why it is imperative to continue to investigate sexual misconduct where it allegedly occurred.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) issued a statement in response to Thursday’s charges levied against the Rev. Brian Stanley by Attorney General Dana Nessel’s office, calling out the Diocese of Kalamazoo for not doing enough when it was warranted.

“Without her team taking a closer look at church records, it is likely that Father Stanley would never have faced criminal charges. Instead, communities are better informed, and children are safer thanks to her ongoing investigation,” said Zach Hiner, the executive director for SNAP.

If convicted, Brian Stanley, 57, could face up to 15 years in prison and would be required to register as sex offender.

Stanley has been charged with felony false imprisonment of a 17-year-old boy, who according to the attorney general’s office, Stanley was asked by the boy’s parents to counsel. Charges by Nessel’s office accuse the priest of “secreting away” the boy and “holding him against his will in the janitor’s room of St. Margaret’s Church in 2013.”

“Stanley reportedly immobilized the young man by wrapping him tightly in plastic wrap, then used masking tape as additional binding to cover his eyes and mouth,” the AG’s office states. “Stanley left the victim, bound and alone, in the janitor’s room for over an hour before returning and eventually letting him go.”

The alleged crime, according to Nessel, is considered “sexually motivated” and if convicted, Stanley would be required to register as a sex offender and face up to 15 years in prison.

The incident, according to the diocese, was first reported to the Diocese of Kalamazoo in 2013, prompting Stanley to be placed on administrative leave immediately, according to a statement from the diocese. The diocese states that it reported the allegation to Child Protective Services, who in turn referred the matter to the Otsego Police Department.

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ERIE (PA)
Erie Times

August 23, 2019

By Bernard J. Rabik

Question: What are statutes of limitations?

Answer: Simply put, the statutes of limitations describe how long you have to bring charges or a claim against someone who has victimized you. Each crime has its own statute of limitations, though they are the same for many of them. The idea is that they keep someone from being charged with a crime or sued for a wrongdoing long after the incident is supposed to have happened. If you hit another auto with your vehicle, the justice system says the other driver can’t wait 30 years to bring you to court.

Not all crimes have statutes of limitations, though. For example, someone could never admit to murder feeling secure that time had run out to commence legal proceedings against him or her.

State’s statutes of limitations

You may think that if you are the victim of someone else’s actions, you would be swift in taking them to court. But, this isn’t always the case. For that matter, you may not actually know who was responsible for an accident or injury. If you were hurt, your main concern may be looking after your health in the immediate future. There are all kinds of circumstances, which could delay you from doing the obvious.

When a plaintiff misses the cutoff date, the defendant can use the statute of limitations as a defense against any civil lawsuit that is filed. If the defendant establishes that the statute of limitations applies and has indeed “run,” the court will normally dismiss the case, unless some rare exception applies to extend the filing deadline.

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KALAMAZOO (MI)
WTVB TV

August 23, 2019

Documents seized by the attorney general’s office from Catholic Diocese offices around the state last fall have resulted in a charge being filed against a 57-year-old priest who used to be the pastor of St. Charles Borromeo Catholic Church in Coldwater and Our Lady of Fatima in Union City.

Father Brian Stanley of Coloma was arraigned by Allegan County Magistrate Daniel Norbeck Thursday on a charge of unlawful imprisonment.

Stanley was able to get his bond reduced from $100,000 to $5,000 on the condition he can not have any contact with minors.

According to documents, a teen was wrapped up in plastic wrap and masking tape with his eyes and mouth covered and left in a janitor’s closet for an hour at St. Margaret Church in Otsego in 2013. The teen’s parents had taken him to Stanley for counseling due to poor grades and drug use.

Attorney General Dana Nessel says documents from the Kalamazoo Diocese showed a history of such bindings dating back decades by Stanley, and she classified it as a sexual crime. He faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted, and would have to register as a sex offender.

The Diocese of Kalamazoo released a statement Thursday which stated the incident alleged in the Attorney General’s complaint was reported to the Diocese in 2013. They then referred the matter to the Otsego Police Department for investigation. Father Stanley was then placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation. But according to the Otseg

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FAYETTEVILLE (AK)
Arkansas Democrat

August 23, 2019

By Ron Wood

An unidentified person has sued the Diocese of Little Rock and St. Joseph Catholic Church in Tontitown, claiming they were negligent for allowing a priest to sexually abuse him.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of “John Doe 201” and says the priest involved was Joseph Correnti, who committed suicide in 2002.

The Washington County Circuit Court lawsuit claims “Doe 201” was sexually battered by Correnti when “Doe” was 14 to 15 years old. The suit says Correnti served at St. Joseph from 1995 to 2002.

“Doe 201” discovered the effects within the past three years of the sexual abuse perpetrated by Correnti, according to the lawsuit.

Rick Woods filed the lawsuit, which contends that there are at least five known victims of Correnti’s sexual abuse.

The diocese knew, or should have known, of Correnti’s “sexual misconduct, impulses, and behavior,” according to the lawsuit. But, it allowed Correnti to have unlimited contact with children, including “Doe 201,” the suit claims.

“Defendants had the duty to protect the moral purity of plaintiff and other Roman Catholic children within the Diocese of Little Rock and at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church,” according to the lawsuit. “Defendants breached their duties by exposing plaintiff to a known pedophile.”

The church and diocese failed to follow policies and procedures designed to prevent child sex abuse or failed to implement sufficient policies, and didn’t warn parents there was a risk of child sex abuse, according to the lawsuit.

The suit alleges that the church failed to report Correnti’s actions to police.

The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages for severe and permanent psychological, emotional and physical injuries, shock, emotional distress, physical manifestations of emotional distress, embarrassment, loss of self-esteem, disgrace, humiliation and loss of enjoyment of life.

“Doe 201” also continues to incur expenses for medical and psychological treatment, therapy, and counseling, and cannot lead a normal life, according to the lawsuit.

Correnti committed suicide April 3, 2002, according to Fayetteville police and the Washington County coroner.

He left a note alluding to the sexual misconduct scandal within the Catholic Church at the time.

“Especially in circumstances in the church today, I am sure that some may feel this has a connection, but it rather has to do with my long term depression,” Correnti wrote.

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CINCINNATI (OH)
WCPO TV

August 22, 2019

By Craig Cheatham

In a letter written to Archbishop Dennis Schnurr in August 2018, a longtime lay leader at Saint Maximilian Kolbe Parish told Schnurr he had failed to deliver on his promise of being “unequivocally committed” to children and that the church had ignored “red flags” about Father Geoff Drew.

Drew stands charged with nine counts of rape and has pleaded not guilty to all. According to prosecutors, he repeatedly assaulted an altar boy over a three-year period from 1988-’91.

The alleged attacks took place in Drew’s office at St. Jude Church, where he was the music minister. The victim, now 41, was 10 and 11 when Drew raped him, according to Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters.

The WCPO I-Team first reported on the contents of the letter two weeks ago.

It was written by a mother of three children who attended St. Maximilian Kolbe in Liberty Township, where Drew was pastor from 2009 to mid-2018. When he left, he became pastor of St. Ignatius Loyola in Cincinnati, a parish with the largest Catholic elementary school in Ohio.

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AMARILLO (TX)
ABC & TV

August 23, 2019

By Morgan Burrell

Since the formation of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People in 2002, the Catholic Church has been responsible for addressing allegations of sexual abuse of minors by Catholic clergy, according to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ website.

The Charter incorporated instruction on reconciliation, healing and the prevention of future acts of abuse, the Conference site states.

Along with the establishment of the Charter, the Diocese of Amarillo began utilizing a safe environment program.

“Initially, when we started this in 2002, we sort of had our own program we had to work with, with what we had available because it was brand new thing throughout the United States, it was required,” said Deacon Blaine Westlake, the director of the safe environment program for Diocese of Amarillo. “As time went on, we found better and better programs. Bishop (Patrick J.) Zurek just recently authorized us to implement the new ‘Circle of Grace,’ which is the title of the program, throughout the diocese.”

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WICHITA (KS)
KSNW TV

August 22, 2019

By Bret Buganski

The Catholic Church is promising to be transparent. Its message is to begin healing from the scandal to find the priests who’ve been accused of sexually abusing children. But how forthcoming are the Catholic Dioceses in our area? Decades after some accusations, there are still many questions.

The Catholic Diocese of Salina released a list in March, 2019, including 14 names of priests with what the Catholic Church calls “substantiated allegations” of clergy child sex abuse.

The Salina list, indicates the year the priest was ordained, the list of parishes they served in and the estimated time frame of the abuse. It also lists if there is one allegation of abuse or more than one, but doesn’t list the total number of allegations. In Kansas there are 4 Catholic Dioceses, but only Salina and Kansas City have released theirs. Wichita and Dodge City have not yet released a list to the public.

“It says they can’t afford to be transparent, it looks apparent to me,” said Janet Patterson.

Her pain never goes away. The Patterson family accused Father Robert Larson of sexually abusing their son Eric for nearly a year while he was an altar server in Conway Springs. Eric took his own life in 1999 after years of battling depression. Janet said they didn’t know about the alleged abuse until months before he died.

Larson was convicted of molesting boys in 2001, and a judge sentenced the former priest to five years in prison. He served the rest of his days in a St. Louis treatment facility until his death in 2014. Although Larson’s case is widely known, there is no publicized list from the Diocese of Wichita that includes his name or any other priest.

When KSN News called the Diocese of Wichita and asked an official when the list will be released, the answer provided was that it “wasn’t complete” and was “under audit.” KSN also requested an on camera interview with Bishop Carl Kemme but was told he was “on retreat” and “unavailable.”

On its website, Bishop Kemme writes, “A pledge to heal,” saying the diocese will address “every instance of an allegation of sexual abuse.”

Patterson is frustrated to know a list has yet to be released by the diocese, but not surprised.

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LONDON (ENGLAND)
The Tablet

August 22, 2019

Police in India’s Kerala state are investigating the actions of a Catholic priest and five women religious after a complaint by a nun who was dismissed from her congregation. The nun accused the six of defaming and harassing her through social media.

Sister Lucy Kalapura, a member of the Franciscan Clarist Congregation, complained to police that Father Noble Thomas Parackal and five women religious of the congregation collaborated to share closed-circuit TV footage of her entering her convent with two male journalists on social media with the intention of defaming her, UCA News reported.

The religious congregation dismissed Sister Kalapura, 54, with Vatican approval, citing several instances of indiscipline and disobedience. However, she appealed to the Vatican against the dismissal and continues to live in the convent.

Along with the video, Father Parackal posted comments that the dismissed nun had used the back door of the convent to invite two men inside. The 54-year-old nun claimed the tone of the comments seemed to question her character.

Sister Kalapura complained to the local police chief in the community where the convent is based.

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NEW YORK (NY)
Crux

August 23, 2019

By Christopher White

Yet another U.S. bishop has been caught up in the wave of sex abuse cases unleashed by the state of New York’s “lookback window” that took effect earlier this month.

Bishop Edward Kmiec, the now retired bishop of Buffalo, has been named in a lawsuit against the diocese of Buffalo by 23 plaintiffs alleging that the diocese systematically covered up the abuse of minors.

Kmiec, now 83 years old, served as bishop of the diocese from 2004 to his retirement in 2012 after serving as bishop of Nashville and as auxiliary bishop in Trenton, New Jersey. He was succeeded by Buffalo’s current bishop, Richard Malone.

NEW: Clerical abuse scandal makes headlines this week across US

The lawsuit claims the diocese engaged in a “racketeering enterprise” and is in violation of the Racketeers Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), which is meant to target criminal organizations.

Using the RICO statute is a rare move in suits against the Catholic Church, although the recent cascade of cases in light of last year’s Pennsylvania Grand Jury — which chronicled over 1,000 cases of abuse at the hands of 300 priests — has led to an uptick in efforts to use RICO as a means of challenging Catholic institutions.

The suit describes an environment of “harassing, threatening, extorting, and misleading victims of sexual abuse committed by priests” and of “misleading priests’ victims and the media to prevent reporting or disclosure of sexual misconduct,” and comes at a time when the diocese and Malone are under Vatican scrutiny for their handling of abuse cases.

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SONOMA (CA)
Index Tribune

August 22, 2019

By Anne Ward Ernst

Tracking down almost 2,500 boys will be a daunting task, but officials at Hanna Boys Center want to locate any sex abuse survivors whose stories have not come out yet and make reparations. To accomplish this they will hire a private investigator to find them.

“It’s a long overdue move,” said David Clohessy, an advocate of survivors of sexual abuse by priests. “Finally, Hanna Boys Center officials say they’ll seek out those who were molested at the facility. Santa Rosa Bishop Robert Vasa should do likewise, using church bulletins, pulpit announcements and parish websites.”

Clohessy, a former director with Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), has appeared in a support role in Sonoma with two alleged sex abuse survivors who claim they were sexually molested by Father John Crews when Crews ran Hanna Boys Center between 1983 and 2013.

Brian Farragher, Hanna’s current CEO, said they will be looking for students who were at Hanna between the years of 1983 and 2017. That period covers both the time when Crews was director of the center and, later, when another sexual predator, Kevin Thorpe, worked as a youth counselor and clinical director at Hanna. Thorpe was arrested in 2017 for sexual misconduct and was later sentenced to 21 years in prison for sexual abuse. Hanna and the Diocese of Santa Rosa recently agreed to a $6.8 million settlement with two brothers who were abused by Thorpe.

The former students Hanna seeks will be asked if they were abused in any way, or if they know of anyone who was victimized. And, where appropriate, Farragher said they will be offered treatment, support and restitution.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 23, 2019

By David Clohessy

One of my favorite poems begins “Sometimes things don’t go, after all, from bad to worse.”

I think of this line when my spirits sag and our progress seems slow. I stay motivated by finding and clinging to ‘silver linings’ like the one I just noticed the other day.

Fr. Norman Rogge may be the only priest anywhere to have twice pled guilty to child sex crimes, twice gotten probation, and twice been put back to work in a parish.

Fr. Fred Lenczycki may be the only priest anywhere to have twice pled guilty to child sex crimes and twice sent to prison.

Rogge’s encounters with the justice system began in 1974 and ended in the 2000s.

Lenczycki’s encounters with the justice system began in 2004 and ended just last week in St. Louis (when a prosecutor asked for a ten year sentence and the judge agreed).

Slowly and painfully, things DO change. Let’s remind ourselves, often, of this fact.

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BAKERSFIELD (CA)
The Californian

August 22, 2019

By John Cox

Accused priest Craig Harrison has filed a slander lawsuit against a Catholic group that recently disseminated letters and emails alleging the Bakersfield clergyman committed sexual abuse while working at a Firebaugh church in the early 2000s.

The suit filed Aug. 6 in Kern County Superior Court says Stephen Brady, president and founder of Illinois-based Roman Catholic Faithful Inc., whose self-professed goal is to rid the church of clerical corruption, shared and published “false, defamatory, libelous and slanderous statements” during a May 29 news conference in Bakersfield.

The correspondence Brady publicized during the news conference detailed allegations that Harrison had sex with two high school students while serving as pastor of the Firebaugh church and that he would examine boys’ private parts daily as a way of checking whether they had been using drugs.

The letters and email originated with an unrelated investigation conducted in 2004 by a retired FBI agent in Merced.

Brady said Thursday it was not his goal to harm or defame Harrison, and that he was only sharing information he uncovered while trying to find out whether the accusations against the priest were true. He called the lawsuit unwarranted.

“I have nothing personal against Monsignor Harrison whatsoever,” Brady said. “I was just looking for the truth.”

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ANCHORAGE (AK)
Associated Press

August 22, 2019

By Rachel D’Oro

An independent review has found credible accusations of past sexual misconduct against seven clergy members of an Alaska Catholic diocese, including a former priest who died in a July plane crash and another priest who was placed on administrative leave in recent months, church officials said Thursday.

The Diocese of Juneau released the results of the review, which identified six priests and a religious brother as those accused of misconduct involving minors or vulnerable adults during the diocese’s nearly 70-year history.

Bishop Andrew Bellisario could not immediately be reached for comment. At a press conference Wednesday, he offered a “very sincere” apology, the Juneau Empire reported.

“It brings a lot of shame and a lot of regret and a lot of sorrow to me personally as bishop of this diocese, but it is something that needs to be expressed to those who have been harmed,” he said.

In a letter Wednesday to church members, Bellisario said he established an independent commission consisting of former judges and a police official last December to review all personnel files going back to the diocese establishment in 1951.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

August 22, 2019

By Jeremy Roebuck

Among the prominent men accused of sexual abuse in a cache of recently unsealed court documents tied to financier Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged trafficking of underage girls, one name stood out to clergy sex-abuse victims in Philadelphia: George J. Mitchell.

Better known for his stints as a former Senate majority leader and a U.S. special envoy, Mitchell until May had led the board overseeing the Archdiocese of Philadelphia’s compensation fund for those abused by priests.

Philadelphia Archdiocese opens claims process for sex abuse victims compensation fund
Although he has forcefully denied the claims and his accuser has offered few details of their alleged encounter, the news has drawn consternation and bewilderment from Philadelphia-area victims and their advocates.

Some simply smirked at the optics that the man handpicked to oversee the archdiocese’s most significant attempt to date to compensate abuse victims had himself been accused as an abuser. Others said that Mitchell’s ties to Epstein have only deepened their reservations about the Church’s reparations process — a program many of them already viewed with skepticism.

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WHEELING (WV)
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

August 22, 2019

By Peter Smith

Bishop Mark Brennan entered the Cathedral of St. Joseph amid all the pomp, procession and fanfare typical of a bishop’s installation.

Less typically, he wasted little time in naming the elephant in the cathedral, acknowledging the alienation of many West Virginia Catholics in the wake of sexual and financial scandals that brought an abrupt end to his predecessor’s tenure.

“The scandals we have learned about have caused painful disappointments, anger, confusion and distrust of church leaders,” he said in his homily. “We have to face that situation with open eyes and determined spirits to bring about lasting change.”

The Boston-born bishop, who spent much of his career as a Maryland parish priest before becoming an auxiliary bishop in Baltimore, was appointed in June by Pope Francis as bishop of Wheeling-Charleston.

The diocese estimates it has nearly 75,000 Catholics across the entire state, with a significant amount concentrated in the Northern Panhandle, where cities like Wheeling and Weirton share the industrial and Catholic immigrant heritage of the Ohio River Valley communities in neighboring states.

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CHICHESTER (ENGLAND)
Church Times

August 23, 2019

By Hattie Williams

The diocese of Chichester should not be too hasty in its attempts to consign sexual abuse to history, a new report suggests.

The diocese was marked out by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sex Abuse (IICSA) for special interest, based on the number of high-profile cases of abuse. An earlier report by Dame Moira Gibb also examined aspects of abuse in Sussex.

This week, the diocese quietly published a third report, Sexual Abuse by Clergymen in the Diocese of Chichester: ‘You Can’t Say No to God’, which was written by Professor David Shemmings from the University of Kent, and his wife Yvonne Shemmings, who works with him in training and research.

The authors warn the diocese “not to be tempted to approach the future by adopting the mantra ‘That was then; this is now’.

“Inevitably there is now an understandable need to move on from what many believe has been a terrible stain on the diocese, but this can, in our view, only be safely and respectfully done by regularly training everyone’s collective eyes and ears on what happened in the past.”

Children were “sexually abused and humiliated” throughout the diocese, at all levels of seniority among the clergy, the authors write. “[Children] were sometimes plied with drink or drugs (and sometimes both). . . They were sometimes made to feel that the abuse they suffered was their fault or, even worse, ordained and sanctioned by God. As one of the individuals interviewed put it ‘You can’t say “No” to God.’”

The Shemmings were commissioned by the diocese to conduct a “small qualitative research study and review of key documents” to understand why the abuse happened. They interviewed 17 people, among them survivors of abuse, investigating police officers, and safeguarding professionals, to discover patterns of offending behaviour and victimisation, as well as possible links between offenders, institutions, and organisational responses.

In their analysis, the authors pick out patterns of secrecy and fear. “The apparent ‘openness’ of a diocese where, theoretically at any rate, people can come and go as they please, requires additional and more subtle levels of coercion. . . The level of fear some of the abusers instilled in the children and young people was pernicious and sometimes extreme.”

The use of alcohol and expensive gifts to groom children was common, and the power wielded by abusers who “mixed with the rich” was clear, they write.

There was a “difference of opinion” among interviewees, however, about whether this abuse was “unique” to Chichester, whether abusers were “predatory” and chose the Church or diocese because it presented an opportunity to abuse, or “whether there was something endemic about the ‘closed’ (some said ‘secretive’) community within the Church, which, coupled with the requirement for homosexual priests to remain celibate, produces in some men an unquenchable and unrequited need for intimate close relationships that can sometimes cross a line and become abusive and even coercive.”

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 22, 2019

Hanna Boys Center officials say they will finally seek out those who were molested at the facility. Santa Rosa Bishop Robert Vasa should do likewise, using church bulletins, pulpit announcements and parish websites.

In outreach messages, church and center staff should stress the importance of contacting the independent, unbiased and experienced professionals in law enforcement first, not employees of the diocese or the home. We feel it is especially crucial that those with knowledge or suspicions of wrongdoing at Hanna contact the California attorney general who is investigating sexual abuse by clergy and its cover up in the state.

While helping to heal adults who were assaulted as children is important, we hope that the diocese and the center will be completely transparent with any survivors who come forward and let them know if accepting this help will exclude them from filing a lawsuit in the future. This is particularly important since it is likely that California, like New York, will soon open a civil window, and help is also available through the Sonoma County Family Justice Center.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 22, 2019

A priest who has just been accused of abusing a New York child also worked in Columbus. For the safety of children and healing of survivors, Ohio Catholic officials must now alert their flock and share with law enforcement here any information they may have on the alleged offender.

Fr. Carleton Parker Jones, a Dominican cleric, was sued days ago in Manhattan for reportedly sexually assaulting an eight-year-old boy while he was preparing for his first confession and first communion with Jones. An on-line parish document shows that, from 1992-1995, Fr. Jones was at St. Patrick Church on North Grant Avenue in Columbus.

We believe it is the moral and civic duty of Columbus Bishop Robert Brennan and church officials at St. Patrick’s to use church bulletins, parish websites and pulpit announcements to aggressively seek out anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes or cover-ups involving Fr. Jones and beg them to call police.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 22, 2019

Days after the conviction for sexually abusing two boys was upheld, Pope Francis and the Vatican refuse to take steps to defrock or otherwise discipline Australia’s top catholic official. This is an embarrassing move by Vatican officials and only further underscores how out of touch they are when it comes to cases of clergy sexual abuse.

Cardinal George Pell was the third-highest ranking official in the Vatican before his conviction. Now he will spend the next six years in prison. And yet despite the fact that he has been convicted by a jury of his peers and seen his conviction upheld by a Australian appeals court, Cardinal Pell remains a Cardinal, with all the rights and honors it entails.

The Vatican argues that Cardinal Pell “has always maintained his innocence throughout the judicial process.” Fortunately for us, most the world’s justice systems do not consider a mere denial of charges as an adequate defense against them. It certainly was not an adequate defense in Australia. It is embarrassing and backwards that church officials in Rome even try to suggest such a denial is a good enough defense for their purposes.

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GUILDERLAND (NY)
The Enterprise

August 22, 2019

By Elizabeth Floyd Mair

Five adult siblings recently claimed a childhood of physical, sexual, and psychological abuse by Francis Melfe, a Roman Catholic priest whom, they say, kept them and their mother as his mostly-secret family at a large suburban Guilderland home.

Edith Thomas, the mother of the five adult children, told The Enterprise this week, “They haven’t spoken to me since 1992.”

She has prayed for them every day since then, she said.

She declined further comment except to add, “Whatever they want to tell, they can tell, and anything they say is the truth.”

The children now range in age from 47 to 62. One of them, the youngest, was fathered by the priest, their suit says. One of the plaintiffs declined comment, and the others could not be reached. Francis Melfe did not respond to requests for comment.

The Enterprise has a policy of not naming victims of sexual abuse.

JoAnn Harri of Smalline and Harri, of Albany, called the plaintiffs “proud survivors” and said that they have all been exemplary parents to their own children. Harri is representing the plaintiffs, together with her partner, Martin D. Smalline.

In their complaint, Thomas’s children allege a decade of sexual abuse, from 1969 through 1979, by Melfe against them while the priest maintained an elaborate deceit to try to keep his identity from their neighbors. He left the priesthood in 1979.

The complaint also alleges that the church hierarchy knew, before Melfe ever met this family, that he had been transferred from St. Joseph’s Church in Troy to St. Mary’s Church in Hudson “because he was stealing from St. Joseph’s Church and had been abusing children there.” Asked by The Enterprise how they know that, Harri said that they know “from another witness, an unnamed witness.”

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DENVER (CO)
National Catholic Register

August 22, 2019

By Lauretta Brown

Attorneys general in 20 states and the District of Columbia are conducting investigations into child sex abuse and cover-ups by the Church. These investigations continue one year after the bombshell Pennsylvania grand jury report, which subsequently helped prompt new guidelines from the Vatican on the handling of sexual abuse.

There are known investigations into Church sex-abuse allegations and cover-ups in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Missouri, Virginia, Vermont, Florida, New Mexico, New York, Delaware, California, Kansas, Indiana, Colorado, Georgia, Nebraska, West Virginia, Illinois, Michigan and Iowa. There could be as many as 45 states investigating the Church behind the scenes, as well, according to Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro.

The Pennsylvania report has also reportedly prompted statute-of-limitations reform laws in 21 jurisdictions, which extend or eliminate their statute of limitations for reporting child sex abuse.

On Aug. 14, 22 plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against the Diocese of Buffalo, New York, a province of the Society of Jesus, multiple priests, eight parishes, three high schools and a seminary, among others, alleging “a pattern of racketeering activity” that enabled and covered up clerical sexual abuse under federal racketeering laws, called RICO statutes, which primarily are used against organized crime like the mafia.

The state investigations have already spurred thousands of allegations of sexual abuse as well as some arrests.

The office of New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal told the Register that the state’s clergy-abuse hotline has received more than 540 calls since it was created in September 2018 as part of a task force to investigate allegations of sexual abuse by members of the clergy in the state’s dioceses.

Their investigation secured the guilty plea of Father Thomas Ganley, 63, of Phillipsburg, New Jersey. After an accusation was made through the hotline, Father Ganley was investigated by the task force and pleaded guilty in April to second-degree sexual assault, admitting that he engaged in sexual acts with a teenage girl in the 1990s, when she was 16 or 17 years old and he had supervisory authority over her.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

August 22, 2019

Another Michigan priest is being charged with child sex crimes because of the outstanding work of Attorney General Dana Nessel and her team. We commend her and the staff for all their hard work in reviewing the files from the Diocese of Kalamazoo. We hope this story inspires others who may be suffering in silence to come forward, make a report to the AG, and start healing.

According to news reports, Fr. Brian Stanley was arrested for kidnapping. The complaint alleges that the priest wrapped a teenager tightly in plastic, taped his eyes and mouth shut, and then left him alone in a janitor’s room at an Otsego, MI parish for more than an hour. Fr. Stanley later returned and released the boy.

The incident was reported to the Diocese of Kalamazoo in 2013. The priest was immediately suspended and, according to church officials, the allegations were also reported to police who said that “the complaint was not criminal and there would be no charges.” Fr. Stanley was then reinstated, it would appear without any internal investigation.

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NEW YORK (NY)
New York Jewish Week

August 20, 2019

By Hannah Dreyfus

Mordechai Twersky, one of the plaintiffs in a 2013 lawsuit against Yeshiva University accusing administrators and teachers of a decades-long cover-up of physical and sexual abuse at its affiliated high school, said the flagship Modern Orthodox institution “left us for dead” after a U.S. District Court judge dismissed the suit.

Citing federal and state statutes of limitations, which had expired, the judge wrote in a decision handed down on Jan. 30, 2014, “No exceptions apply.”

As of last week, that is no longer the case.

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LANSING (MI)
The Flint Journal

August 22, 2019

By Ryan Boldrey

The ongoing investigation into sex-abuse claims involving Michigan’s seven Catholic dioceses has resulted in more charges by the state Attorney General’s office, this time of a former Otsego priest.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced today that Father Brian Stanley, of Coloma, is being charged with one felony count of false imprisonment. If convicted, Stanley would face up to 15 years in prison and be required to register as a sex offender, according to state law.

“Stanley is accused of secreting away a teenage boy and holding him against his will in the janitor’s room of St. Margaret’s Church in 2013,” states a news release issued by Nessel’s office.

The priest reportedly immobilized the young man by wrapping him tightly in plastic wrap. He then used masking tape as additional binding to cover his eyes and mouth, according to the Attorney General’s office.

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

WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic News Service

August 22, 2019

By Russell Shaw

Reacting to the scandal of clergy sex abuse and cover-up 17 years ago, eight bishops offered a bold proposal.

The conference of bishops, meeting in Dallas, had lately adopted a charter and norms for the protection of children. Now the eight called for something more.

Convene a plenary council or regional synod, they urged their fellow bishops, and use it to get at the roots of what had happened so as to prevent anything like that from ever happening again. The signers of their joint letter included Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo of Galveston-Houston, then bishop of Sioux City, Iowa, and now president of the national bishops’ conference, and Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron of Detroit, an auxiliary bishop there back then.

More than a hundred bishops expressed interest in the suggestion, which eventually came to focus on the synod option. The bishops’ conference took some note of it. But in time, enthusiasm faded and the proposal died as the hierarchy went about implementing their new child protection measures.

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