MEXICO
The Daily Journal
MEXICO CITY (AP) – Mexico is not doing enough to bring clergy accused of sexual abuse to justice, a U.S. group representing people allegedly abused by Catholic priests said on Tuesday.
Leaders of the Chicago-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, known as SNAP, are visiting Mexico this week to pressure President Vicente Fox to take action.
“We want President Fox to assure us there will be justice and that any case against a priest will be treated the same as any case against a person who abuses children,” said Eric Barragán, the group’s spokesman.
The group wrote to President Vicente Fox a year ago, urging him to step up efforts to prosecute accused priests, among them the Rev. Nicolás Aguilar, who has been charged in California with 19 felony counts of committing lewd acts on a child.
Aguilar worked in Los Angeles in 1987 and later served as a priest in Mexico. He disappeared after similar accusations arose against him in Mexico. The group told a news conference Tuesday that Fox never responded to its letter.