W.va. Bishop Denies Abuse Allegations

By John Raby
Lebanon Daily News
April 19, 2012

http://www.ldnews.com/state/ci_20433319/w-va-bishop-denies-abuse-allegations

West Virginia Roman Catholic Bishop Michael Bransfield on Thursday denied sexual abuse accusations made by a witness at a priest abuse trial in Philadelphia.

"I have never sexually abused anyone," Bransfield, the leader of West Virginia's 76,000 Catholics, said in a statement released through the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston.

Bransfield said he's deeply saddened by the child-abuse scandal that's been linked to former colleagues and friends from a Pennsylvania seminary where he graduated in 1971.

"Over the years, I have felt devastation for both the victims and the church as I learned about the terrible actions they took with innocent victims," Bransfield said. "To now be unfairly included in that group and to hear the horrific allegations that are being made of me is unbelievable and shocking."

A man testified Wednesday that the Rev. Stanley Gana raped him at a home owned by Bransfield and that his accused abuser told him Bransfield also sexually abused a boy. The testimony came at the trial of the Rev. James Brennan, who's accused in a 1996 child-sex assault.

The witness told jurors that Gana abused him throughout high school on trips to Disney World, Niagara Falls and at Bransfield's beach house in Brigantine, N.J.

Bransfield said he was in Rome attending meetings at the Vatican when the allegations were made.

"What did not get released was additional information available to the prosecutor that I

was not aware of the incident and was not present at the house at the time," Bransfield said. "Gana has confirmed those facts in prior reports."

The 48-year-old man also testified he saw Bransfield with a car full of "fair-haired" boys. He said that his abuser told him Bransfield was having sex with the boy in the front seat. The Associated Press does not generally identify people who say they have been sexually abused.

Another man has testified that Bransfield had a lewd conversation with him.

Advocates for abuse victims criticized Bransfield for issuing a statement instead of taking questions.

"It's important to remember that both accusers gave testimony yesterday under oath. Bransfield didn't," said David Clohessy, St. Louis director of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.

Earlier this week, a prosecutor at the trial complained of problems getting a Wheeling priest to come testify. The would-be witness, Monsignor Kevin Quirk, is an aide to Bransfield. A Wheeling judge now wants proof he's a material witness.

Quirk served as a canonical judge at a church trial of Brennan, whose co-defendant, Monsignor William Lynn, is the first U.S. church official charged with child abuse and endangerment for allegedly protecting predators in clerical collars.

SNAP previously chided the Wheeling-Charleston diocese for not making its priest readily available to testify in Philadelphia.

Bransfield said he has been an open advocate for the eradication of the abusive behavior by priests in every diocese, including his own. He concluded by asking for prayers for himself, the parishioners of both his diocese and the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, and victims of sexual abuse.

Bransfield was anointed the eighth bishop of West Virginia in February 2005 at age 61. He had spent the previous 15 years at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C., first as director of liturgy and later as rector.