Trial Starts in Lawsuit against Freeport Man Who Accused Orphanage Operator of Abuse

By Eric Russell
Portland Press Herald
July 7, 2015

http://www.pressherald.com/2015/07/07/haitian-orphanage-operator-accusing-freeport-man-of-defamation/

Shelley Wiley said from the moment they met, Michael Geilenfeld was upfront and open about the persistent sexual abuse allegations against him.

But she was not concerned because she never saw any signs of abuse, because Geilenfeld was a “good person, genuinely interested in helping youths, and because every investigation turned up empty.

Paul Kendrick, a child sex abuse victims' activist, is being sued for defamation by the American founder of a Haitian orphanage. 2014 Press Herald File Photo/Shawn Patrick Ouellette

“Did you believe that children were at risk or being harmed?” Geilenfeld’s attorney, Peter DeTroy, asked Wiley on Tuesday.

“Never,” she replied.

Wiley, who has served on the board of directors for the organization that helps fund Geilenfeld’s orphanage in Haiti, was the first witness called in the trial of his defamation lawsuit against the activist Paul Kendrick of Freeport.

Geilenfeld, an Iowa native, sued Kendrick in U.S. District Court in February 2013 for what DeTroy characterized in his opening statement Tuesday as a “campaign of vicious, unrelenting and merciless attacks,” based on discredited information.

Kendrick has defended his actions – which have involved a relentless series of emails and online posts accusing Geilenfeld of repeated sexual abuse of children – as necessary to fight for victims.

The trial got underway Tuesday in Portland and is expected to last as long as three weeks.

In their opening arguments, DeTroy and Kendrick’s attorney, David Walker, each outlined their side.

DeTroy said Kendrick, a longtime and admittedly zealous advocate for child sexual abuse victims, has deliberately used rumors and unfounded claims to “destroy” his client. Geilenfeld’s trial was even delayed last fall after he was imprisoned in Haiti while authorities investigated him, largely based on Kendrick’s claims.

Charges were dropped in April after Geilenfeld spent 237 days in jail, but Walker reminded jurors that the criminal case against Geilenfeld in Haiti is not closed. Authorities plan to ask for a new trial.

Walker, in his opening, said sexual abuse allegations involving Geilenfeld have swirled in Haiti and beyond for years. Indeed, he has been investigated more than once. Walker said Kendrick was simply asking Haitian authorities to aggressively investigate those allegations and challenging a nonprofit group, Hearts with Haiti, which provided funds for Geilenfeld’s orphanage, to look into them as well.

Walker also told jurors that he planned to offer testimony from seven people – two in person, the rest in video testimony – who claim that they were sexually abused by Geilenfeld.

That testimony likely won’t be heard until next week.

Jurors heard only from Wiley on Tuesday.

A church pastor from Ohio, Wiley said she has known Geilenfeld for nearly 20 years and has served on the board of Hearts with Haiti, the nonprofit group that helps fund his orphanage in the Caribbean island nation. She said she first traveled to Haiti and stayed at Geilenfeld’s orphanage in 1997.

“It was an incredible experience,” she testified.

Wiley has returned more than 30 times since.

She said Geilenfeld was open and honest about allegations against him, some of which dated back to the 1980s. But she was convinced that he was not someone capable of sexually abusing boys.

Wiley testified about the onslaught of emails she and others involved with Geilenfeld began receiving from Kendrick in 2011.

“They just started to appear out of nowhere,” she said.

Eventually, the board of Hearts with Haiti agreed to sponsor an investigation into some of Kendrick’s claims. But Wiley said that investigation “raised no concerns.”

It did, however, compel Kendrick to continue his campaign.

During cross-examination, Walker tried to establish that previous investigations of Geilenfeld were flawed and incomplete. That cross-examination will resume on Wednesday.

The trial is unusual in the sense that while much of the testimony and evidence will focus on whether Geilenfeld committed any abuse, he cannot be convicted of abuse in a U.S. court since the alleged abuse took place in Haiti.