Female Catholic Teacher Rapes Boy; SNAP Responds

SNAP
March 7, 2014

http://www.snapnetwork.org/ny_female_catholic_teacher_rapes_boy_snap_responds

A female Catholic school religion teacher in the New York Archdiocese has pled guilty to raping a boy. Now, archdiocesan staff, under Cardinal Tim Dolan, must launch an aggressive public drive to find others who may have seen, suspected or suffered her crimes. And authorities must treat this criminal just like a male sex offender, with no special treatment.

[lohud.com]

So the justice system can do its job, and sentence her appropriately, those with more information about Amanda Iles' crimes must be prodded to come forward.

So that Dolan can do his job, and help others hurt by Iles, everyone else Iles hurt must be found and comforted.

So that all wrongdoers are identified and punished, anyone who may have ignored or hidden Iles' crimes must be reported to police and prosecutors.

In many child sex abuse cases in Catholic institutions, there are other school or church employees who saw or suspected or even knew about child sex crimes and chose to be silent or complicit. So there may well be other staff who broke the law here. We urge law enforcement to investigate as diligently as possible and file charges, if possible, against anyone – whether a paid employee or an adult volunteer – who failed to promptly call secular authorities the minute they knew about or had an inkling of Iles' crimes.

Whether the school operates as part of the archdiocese or not is irrelevant. Dolan is in charge of protecting every New York archdiocesan Catholic, regardless of which church institution they attend. He should use his vast resources and bully pulpit – his blog, his archdiocesan website, his parish bulletins and pulpits – to seek out anyone else who might have been raped by this Catholic teacher.