Vatican Insider
December 8, 2011
http://vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/en/homepage/world-news/detail/articolo/ireland-irlanda-irelan-abusi-abuse-abusos-televisione-television-television-10555/
 |
| Fr. Kevin Renolds (Photo by C.Courts The Irish Times) |
The Irish Government has ordered an independent inquiry into how the National Television’s prestigious “Prime Time Investigates” program last May falsely accused an Irish missionary priest of raping a teenage woman – a minor – in Kenya in 1982, making her pregnant and secretly providing money to support the child. The investigation will be carried out by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland.
The Government acted after the national TV and Radio Company - Radio Telefis Eireann (RTE), publicly apologized to Father Kevin Reynolds, 65, following an out-of-court settlement with him that was confirmed before the High Court, Dublin, November 17. RTE admitted the story was false, and agreed to pay him a significant sum of money, said to exceed 1 million euro.
The case has many important dimensions. First, it relates to the defamation of an innocent priest by the national TV’s top program at a time when the abuse of minors is considered the worst crime in the country. Secondly, it did tremendous damage to the priest, his family, to Irish missionaries and to the credibility of the scandal hit Church. Last, but not least, it undermined the credibility of investigative journalism in Ireland.
It all began when the national television’s top investigative-journalism program “Prime Time Investigates”, led by the highly respected star reporter, Ms. Aoife Kavanagh, was finalizing the report on its investigation into evidence of sexual abuse of minors by Irish missionaries in Africa.
At that time, Prime Time’s credibility was at an all time high in the country. “No other team of journalists had contributed so much to uncovering that great (child abuse) scandal in Ireland”, according to Patsy McGarry, the religious affairs correspondent of the Irish Times.
Its States of Fear documentary series broadcast April-May 1999, exposed the abuse of children in orphanages, industrial schools and reformatories in Ireland (1930s-1970s). As a result of this, the Government set up a Commission, an investigation, and the publication of the Ryan Report (May 2009). Then in October 2002, its Cardinal Secrets program focused on the sexual abuse of children in the Catholic archdiocese of Dublin. This too moved the Government to set up another Commission that investigated the problem and resulted in the Murphy Report (November 2009).
In 2011, when the Prime Time team was investigating the alleged abuse of minors by Irish missionaries in Africa, it obtained information that Fr Kevin Reynolds, had raped and impregnated a teenage woman (then a minor), identified as Veneranda, while serving as a Mill Hill missionary priest in Kenya, and that from that act a girl child was born, named Shelia. They also alleged he had secretly provided funds for the education of the child.
Before finalizing the program, Prime Time sought out Father Reynolds, who was then working as parish priest at Ahascragh, Galway, in the west of Ireland. The reporter interviewed him, after the annual First Communion Mass, 7 May 2011, and confronted him with the allegations mentioned earlier. He immediately protested his innocence and denied the charges.
Between that interview and the broadcast of the program, Father Reynolds, through his lawyers, again denied the allegations and asked Prime Time not to broadcast the interview and offered to undergo a paternity test to prove his case.
On May 18th, a Prime Time reporter informed Fr Reynolds’s lawyers that it had a very credible third party source and other independent evidence, including that the priest had contributed financially to the education of his alleged child.
He repeated his denial through his lawyers. Moreover, on May 20, RTE received an e-mail from Bishop Philip Sulumeti of the diocese of Kakamega, Kenya, where Fr Reynolds had worked, describing him as “an exemplary priest” and denying the allegations.
Prime Time, however, dismissed all these protests, and broadcasted the program on national television in the evening of 23 May 2011. Some 500,000 people watched the program entitled “A Mission to Prey”, that purported to deal with the alleged abuse of minors by Irish missionaries in Africa, whom it accused of having abused their positions to prey on poor and vulnerable people, with impunity.
In one part, the program charged that Father Reynolds had raped a young woman, Veneranda, – then a minor, fathered a child with her called Shelia, and secretly provided funds for the child’s education. It presented interviews with the mother and daughter as corroborating evidence. It also carried the interview with Father Reynolds where he totally denied the charges, and the narrator reported that the priest had offered to do a paternity test.
The allegations concerning Father Reynolds were also discussed next day, May 24, on Morning Ireland, a top radio show, before an audience of 338,000 people. The story made headline news across the country and beyond its borders.
After the broadcast, Ireland’s Minister for Justice, Alan Shatter, expressed his “revulsion” at the abuse of children revealed in the program. He contacted the Garda (Police) Commissioner about this, saying people had the right to be reassured that everything was being done to counteract this “evil”, wherever it took place.
The Irish Missionary Union, which represents 1,080 Irish-born missionaries working in Africa, issued a statement to “condemn unreservedly any crimes of abuse or misbehavior, at home or abroad, which led to children or vulnerable adults being abused.”
In the tribunal of public opinion, Fr Reynolds had been judged and condemned as a criminal, a pedophile and a rapist. The bishop removed from his post as parish priest, and he had to leave his home.
Though disgraced in the eyes of people, Father Reynolds knew in his heart that he was totally innocent and decided to fight back. He took legal action for defamation against the powerful state broadcaster (RTE), and took his case to the High Court in Dublin.
On June 23rd, 2011, Fr Reynolds informed RTE that he would undergo a paternity test to prove his innocence, but on June 30th RTE said it would stand by the allegations in the program. The paternity test proved conclusively Fr Reynolds was not the father of the child.
The priest then initiated defamation proceedings against RTE to vindicate his good name and reputation, but the state company adamantly continued to defend its position, asserting its entitlement to broadcast the program on public interest grounds.
By September 28, however, RTE recognized that it had made what it’s Director General, Noel Curran, later described as “one of the gravest editorial mistakes ever made” in the history of the broadcaster. It reached an out-of-court settlement with the priest, agreed to make a public apology and to pay substantial compensation for damages to him. The High Court was informed of this on November 17.
RTE subsequently broadcast a public apology on TV and Radio. It admitted the defamation and said the allegations were “without any foundation and untrue.” It said Father Reynolds “was entirely innocent” and described him as “a priest of the utmost integrity who has had an unblemished 40 year career in the priesthood” and had made “a valuable contribution to society in Kenya and Ireland”.
Interviewed that same day, Father Reynolds said he was “not out for revenge or for any heads rolling” in RTE as a result of the program, but added “that people in authority, people at the heart of decision making in RTE, would have to face the consequences.”
In an earlier interview on Shannonside FM Radio, recalling the day that he had to step down from the ministry and leave his parish, he said, “I felt as if everything I had believed in had been destroyed, but now I feel very relieved it's all over. It has been an awful and devastating experience. So, so, so distressing; not only for me, but for my family and for my parish.”
As a Christian, he said, “I have no difficulty in saying openly and honestly that I forgive whoever inflicted such distress on me.”
RTE, for its part, has suspended the Prime Time program. It has also ordered “a full internal review”, as well as an “external review” under the Press Ombudsman. These reviews are expected to make their recommendations before December 15.
Most people, however, are waiting for the Report of the independent inquiry that the Irish Government set up on November 22, “to determine the true facts and circumstances” that led to the broadcast of the Prime Time program on Fr Reynolds in May.
The inquiry is being conducted by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland which will present its findings to the Government before the end of January 2012.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.