Walsh Credits Counseling Program with Opening His Eyes to Scope of Problem
By Martin Espinoza
Press Democrat [Santa Rosa]
May 17, 2007
http://www1.pressdemocrat.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070516/NEWS/705160384/1033/NEWS01
Santa Rosa Bishop Daniel Walsh said Tuesday he has changed diocesan policy as the result of a counseling program that allowed him to avoid criminal charges for failing to immediately report sex abuse.
Walsh said diocesan staff will receive more frequent training on state laws on reporting possible sex abuse to authorities.
He also said the Roman Catholic Diocese of Santa Rosa will create a separate policy highlighting those requirements.
Walsh was offered the diversion program in lieu of facing misdemeanor charges for his delay in reporting suspected child sex abuse by the Rev. Francisco Xavier Ochoa.
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As part of the five-month diversion program, Walsh said he met periodically with local leaders in the fight against child abuse.
"In consultation with people in the field and the District Attorney's Office, we have improved our policy," he said. "It was that exposure to the resources we have in this community that was an eye-opener to me."
A victims advocate dismissed Walsh's comments as "self-serving, disingenuous spin."
David Clohessy, national director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, said failures to report abuse by priests stem from "a lack of courage and decency," not inadequate training.
A middle-school student knows that anyone who suspects a crime has been committed should "call 911," he said.
But a parishioner from Sonoma's St. Francis Solano Church, where Ochoa served, praised the bishop for acting in good faith to improve protections for children.
Dan Welch of Sonoma said Walsh made "an error of judgment" by accepting "bad advice from his lawyer" about the timing of the reporting.
"Were there mistakes? Yes," said Welch, who is grand knight with the Knights of Columbus Valley of the Moon council. "But the broad picture is that he's working toward doing the right thing and he's refining his efforts to do so."
Walsh said his final meeting with his case worker in the diversion program will be Thursday.
Under the state's mandatory reporting law, certain professionals who work with children, including members of the clergy, must report suspected child sexual abuse by phone immediately, and in writing within 36 hours.
It is believed that Ochoa fled to Mexico several days after an April 28, 2006, meeting with Walsh and other church officials, during which he admitted that he offered a boy $100 to strip dance in front of him and that he kissed two boys on the lips.
After the meeting, Walsh removed Ochoa from his duties, but critics say a three-day delay in reporting the allegations to authorities may have allowed Ochoa to flee to Mexico.
Additional allegations surfaced during a subsequent police investigation and Ochoa, who had ministered to Latino Catholics in the Sonoma Valley since the late 1980s and at the church for six years, is wanted on 10 felony counts of child sex abuse involving three children from different families.
In an "Open Letter to the Citizens of Sonoma County" dated Monday, Walsh discussed the effect of the diversion program on church policy.
"Our ultimate goal is to ensure that there are no further incidents of child sexual abuse by anyone associated with the church," he wrote. "In addition, we continue to train all of our employees and volunteers in the areas of recognizing potential sexual abuse and mandated reporter requirements."
Walsh said church staff and volunteers now must go through training related to mandatory reporting laws every two years, as opposed to the previous three-year cycle.
Dan Galvin, an attorney for the diocese, said some of the "community advisers" who met with Walsh requested that the church's mandated reporting rules be made into a separate policy.
Galvin said the move "will allow the diocese to focus on training specifically geared to the reporting requirements."
Walsh said the diversion program showed him how prevalent child abuse is in society.
"If you go to the Redwood Children's Center and see what they are able to do and what they have to do, it's kind of shocking how people can treat kids that way," he said.
What's more, he said the "man in the bushes" is not the typical predator.
"The normal predator is known by the family, might be part of the family," Walsh said. "That's what makes it so insidious."
In his letter, Walsh again struck an apologetic tone for his role in the Ochoa scandal.
"I want to say to the victims and their families how truly sorry I am and continue to pray for their healing," he said.
Walsh said that because of a lawsuit against the diocese by some of Ochoa's alleged victims, diocese attorneys have asked him not to reach out to these families.
He also said he's done what he can to help warn other communities about Ochoa.
"I have warned the bishops in Mexico of this man's crime and told them that he should not function as a priest," he said.
Finding Ochoa, Walsh said, is "up to law enforcement."
Clohessy said the bishop should be making repeated calls from the pulpit, on the Internet and in church bulletins for information leading to Ochoa's capture.
SNAP believes at least 40 priests from the western United States suspected of abusing children have fled to Mexico and the church has not surrendered any of them, Clohessy said.
You can reach Staff Writer Martin Espinoza at 521-5213 or martin.espinoza@pressdemocrat.com.
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