UNITED STATES
The Dallas Morning News
11:06 AM CST on Saturday, March 12, 2005
Some accusations may be false, but most are all too real, says David Clohessy.
If ever anyone doubted that our justice system makes mistakes, surely those doubts have largely been erased in recent years. Innocent people do go to jail sometimes (though far more guilty people do indeed go free). With luck, new evidence comes to light and sets them free. And yet, they can't get those years back, nor easily repair their broken relationships, careers and lives.
Tragic? Absolutely. Yet proportionality must be considered.
For each relatively rare case of an innocent man being deemed guilty, we should remind ourselves that far more heinous criminals are never charged, never found guilty and never locked up. As a result, more vulnerable adults and innocent children are taken advantage of, exploited and raped.
Let me get more specific regarding what I know best: child sexual abuse by clergy.
For decades, Catholic bishops and their PR staffs worked hard to minimize the now widely documented crisis caused by thousands of twisted priests and hundreds of complicit bishops. They repeatedly claim (citing fundamentally partial and misleading figures) that most of the crimes took place long ago.
But they rarely cite one telling number provided by their own most knowledgeable source, Patrick Schiltz, who for over 20 years as a defense lawyer has helped more than 500 Catholic priests accused of molesting children.
Posted by kshaw at March 13, 2005 09:07 AM