Marianist Brother Who Taught at North Catholic Gets 2-year Term for Sex Abuse in Australia

By Peter Smith
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
July 25, 2015

http://www.post-gazette.com/news/world/2015/07/25/Marianist-brother-who-taught-at-North-Catholic-gets-2-year-term-for-sex-abuse-in-Australia/stories/201507250054

A two-year prison sentence cannot repair the lifelong trauma of being sexually abused from age 8, but an Australian survivor of abuse by an American Roman Catholic religious brother says his incarceration is a sign of progress.

“Although two years is a very short amount of time in light of the gravity of the crimes, it is a much better result than for many survivors of historical crimes,” Mairead Ashcroft said via email. “My hope is that survivors of crimes of this nature might be given the positive message that childhood abuse, sexual, physical and psychological, is taken much more seriously than in the past.”

Bernard Hartman — a Marianist brother who also allegedly sexually abused a student at North Catholic High School during his tenure here from 1986 to 1997 — received a three-year sentence, with one year suspended, in Victoria County Court in Melbourne on Friday following his convictions earlier this year of sexually abusing three children.

He pleaded guilty to four counts of indecent assault on two girls who were sisters of students at the all-boys Catholic school where he was teaching. Ms. Ashcroft, of suburban Melbourne, told the court she was abused from ages 8 to 11. He had befriended the families and gained their confidence.

One of the girls was under 10 years old when Hartman would molest her while drawing pictures with her. Hartman once used a turkey baster filled with liquid to violate the other girl.

“You have breached the trust of those young girls with blatant offending in their homes ... which allowed little avenue for retreat,” Judge James Parrish told Hartman.

He was also convicted of one count of indecent assault and two counts of common-law assault on a young boy.

After the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported last year on Hartman’s pending trial, the Diocese of Pittsburgh wrote to North Catholic High School alumni, asking any victims of abuse to come forward. One person told the diocese of being abused by Hartman. The diocese reported the case to the Allegheny County District Attorney’s office, which attempted to contact the person but said the statute of limitations would have prevented prosecution.

Eighteen other people brought claims against seven other Marianist brothers for alleged abuse dating to the 1940s.

Judge Parrish said police as well as church authorities knew for years of the allegations against Hartman before prosecutors brought charges. The delay “can be described as ‘undue’ and most probably inordinate,” he said.

Hartman continued to present himself as a brother in good standing for years until Ms. Ashcroft went public with her story in 2011. He was extradited to Australia in 2013.

Father Martin Solma, provincial for the St. Louis-based Marianist Province of the United States, said in a statement that it placed Hartman on a “strict safety plan” that forbade him from working with children since it learned of Australian allegations against him in 1997, when he was pulled from North Catholic with no public explanation. He lived in a Marianist site in Dayton, Ohio, for much of that time.

“The Marianists thank the Australian legal and judicial officials who worked on the case,” he wrote.

“It has been our intent from the beginning to cooperate fully with Australian authorities in whatever way they needed. We continue to pray for all concerned, especially the victims in this case.”

He said that Hartman would remain a Marianist and that the order would continue to monitor Hartman after his release from prison.

“Unlike a diocese where a priest is in service of the bishop, members of religious congregations belong to a ‘family,’” he said. “If a member of a family commits a crime, even a serious one, he or she does not stop being a member of the family.” He said the safety plan has been “a safer situation for the public than making abusers leave the religious order and having them live on their own and unsupervised. Our primary concern is protecting children and caring for, supervising and monitoring offenders. Since 1997, Hartman has had no public ministry and no access where he could abuse again.”