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	Herhold: the Sadness of the Will Lynch Case By Scott Herhold Mercury News November 15, 2010 http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_16621299?nclick_check=1 Of all the sad cases wending their way through Santa Clara County's courts, few are sadder than that of Will Lynch, the 44-year-old man accused of severely beating a Jesuit priest Lynch says abused him as a child. According to police, Lynch knocked on the door of the Sacred Heart Jesuit Center in Los Gatos last May and asked the priest, Jerold Lindner, "Do you remember me? You abused me and my brother." Then, police say, Lynch beat the 65-year-old Lindner so severely that the priest's body was covered in bruises and seven stitches were needed to close a cut above his eye. Lynch went to court last week and told The Associated Press, "Somebody needs to be a face for this abuse, and I'm prepared to put myself on the line." In the eyes of his backers, Lynch has emerged as folk hero, a champion for those abused by church figures. Yet however much you sympathize with him -- the priest was never charged, though the brothers received a $625,000 payment from the Jesuits -- Will Lynch is deeply wrong. There are two reasons for this. One is practical. The second, and maybe the more important, is moral. As flawed as our judicial system is, we have laws for a reason. We do not trust ourselves to mete out justice. Down that path lies Iraq, or the murderous rampages in parts of Africa. San Jose lynching That ought to be of particular memory in San Jose: In 1933, a mob in St. James Square lynched two white men accused of kidnapping and killing Brooke Hart, the department store heir. To the mob, the lynching embodied swift justice. To historians, it went down as one of the city's worst moments, a surrender to passion. Lynch clearly wants to make a media affair of his case. In a basic way, he seeks to out Lindner. Few stories are easier to understand than that of a victim who seeks revenge for an incomprehensible wrong. It is not true, however, that there are no faces for abuse. In 2002, The Boston Globe ran a Pulitzer Prize-winning series that named victims. And there have been any number of memoirs by the abused. One of the best-written is "Beyond Belief," by Irishman Colm O'Gorman, who tells of his abuse as an altar boy. To say that beating up your abuser is the right, or moral, way to confront him insults the thousands of other victims who have chosen a more peaceful and resilient route. Robbed of innocence Lynch told the AP that Lindner had taken "my faith, my innocence, my sense of self. He raped me, he tortured me, he violated me in every single way, and he completely changed who I was supposed to be forever." This sounds the saddest note of all, because it says that a priest's sexual assaults leave a curse so indelible, so horrible, that justice demands beating the alleged victimizer to within an inch of his life. I can't believe that. I see too many other victims who, while deeply troubled, have tried to put their lives back together. So let the law take its course. This was a serious assault, and we should understand why the case should go forward. Will Lynch is not a folk hero. He is an infinitely sad man. We make our society more pitiable if we elevate him to a Robin Hood of the fists. Contact Scott Herhold at sherhold@mercurynews.com or 408-275-0917.
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