ABUSE TRACKER

DEUTSCHLAND
Kurier am Sonntag

[Summary: Has there been a case of abuse in Emmerick in the Munster diocese by one of several members of the pastoral team? According to a Facebook comment the CID has started investigations in Kleve. A police spokesman said there is initial suspicion but the diocese rejected the allegations.]

Emmerich (28.2.22014). Hat es in Emmerich einen Missbrauchsfall durch ein oder sogar mehrere Mitglieder des Emmericher Seelsorgeteams gegeben? Nach einem Kommentar auf Facebook hat die Kripo in Kleve Ermittlungen eingeleitet. „Ja, es gibt einen Anfangsverdacht“, bestätigte am Freitag Polizeisprecher Heinz Vetter dem Kurier am Sonntag.

Auf Facebook hat ein Mann schwere Vorwürfe erhoben. Er behauptet, dass es in der Zeit vor Pfarrer Karsten Weidisch einen Missbrauch durch mehrere nicht näher benannte Mitglieder des Seelsorgeteams gegeben haben soll und „viele wissen davon“.

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CHICAGO (IL)
NBC Chicago

[with video]

By Phil Rogers | Friday, Feb 28, 2014

Two months after a teacher filed suit against Hales Franciscan High School, saying she was fired for reporting a sex incident on school grounds against the administration’s wishes, a second teacher has now been fired, citing the same reasons.

Former Social Studies teacher Stephen Jennings is also suing Hales, saying he was fired last week because he reported the same girl’s allegations to the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, as is required by law. Jennings said he went to DCFS at the girls’s request, after she said the school was not doing enough.

“I felt as a teacher, and a man of God, that it was my responsibility to protect the young ladies and support them,” he said.

In his suit, Jennings alleged then-principal Erica Brownfield had even warned the staff not to say anything about the allegations.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Sun-Times

BY MEGAN GRAHAM Staff Reporter March 1, 2014

A second former teacher at a Catholic high school on the South Side filed a lawsuit against the institution, claiming he was fired because he reported an alleged sexual assault involving students to the state.

Stephen Jennings alleges in a suit filed Friday in Cook County Circuit Court he was wrongfully terminated from Hales Franciscan High School at 4930 S. Cottage Grove Ave., nearly four months after female students notified him of alleged sexual assaults by male students.

The students came to Jennings weeks after former principal Erica Brownfield conducted a staff meeting in fall 2013 in which she told staff that a female student had possibly been sexually assaulted by male students, the lawsuit said.

She allegedly acknowledged her responsibility to report the incident to the state Department of Children and Family Services but said she was not going to do so, the suit says. She also instructed staff members to not speak to DCFS or report the incident, Jennings claims.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Christianity Today

Timothy C. Morgan POSTED 2/28/2014

Dozens of individuals raised in Chicago’s Jesus People USA Christian community (JPUSA) are alleging that commune members sexually abused them as children, while leaders covered up the abuse for years.

The allegations are contained in a 90-minute documentary film, released today online, and in a civil lawsuit, filed in January in Cook County against the Evangelical Covenant Church (ECC) and JPUSA in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood.

“My intent is to expose truth, bring it to light, because it hasn’t been in the light,” filmmaker Jaime Prater told Christianity Today. “No one loves JPUSA more than I do. It’s my home. Why would I want to see Jesus People shut down? Do I believe that those in power need to step down? Absolutely. But it is my hope that the community can somehow get past this and safety precautions can be put in place to preserve the innocence of children.

“For the first time in the history of Jesus People, former members have come together and coalesced through this journey and have started to heal collectively. My ultimate goal is for reconciliation. When the chips fall where they may and appropriate action is taken towards leadership, I would love to walk in my childhood home again and see where I grew up. That’s irrational. But I’m an optimist. Healing on all sides is certainly possible.”

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ARKANSAS
Time

By David Winograd @davidwinogradFeb. 27, 20141

Seven women who were physically, sexually and psychologically abused by an evangelical preacher have been granted over half a billion dollars in reparations by an Arkansas judge.

The Associated Press reported Thursday that Miller County Circuit Judge Kirk Johnson awarded $525 million to the victims in actual and punitive damages.

Johnson made the default ruling this week against Twenty First Century Holiness Tabernacle Church, after the organization failed to answer charges. The women were abused by Tony Alamo, the church’s leader, when they were members of the ministry.

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UNITED STATES
Daily Mail (UK)

By MICHAEL ZENNIE and ASSOCIATED PRESS REPORTER
27 February 2014

Half a billion dollars in damages have been awarded to seven women who were raped and beaten for years by a pedophile televangelist who took them as his ‘child brides.’

They are the victims of Tony Alamo – a charismatic Pentecostal preacher whose massive Alamo Ministries has been branded a polygamist cult.

The women described being repeatedly molested and sexually abused, some starting at age 9, by Alamo.

Despite serving a 175-year prison sentence for rape and child sex trafficking, Alamo and his ministry are believed to have billions of dollars in assets, mostly water rights in California.

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ILLINOIS
Slow Church

March 1, 2014 By Christopher Smith

Although I heard awhile back that that this documentary on the sexual abuse of minors at the Jesus People USA (JPUSA) Community in Chicago was in the works, I happened to see this article on the Christianity Today website this afternoon and saw that it was released today. I knew that it would be one that I needed to watch, so I plunked down my ten bucks and downloaded the movie. You see, I have been acquainted with JPUSA for over 20 years; I have visited their community a couple of times and have friends who are members or former members. There was a block of 5 or 6 years — before my wife and I had kids — in which I attended their Cornerstone Music and Arts Festival every July.

No Place to Call Home is a heart-wrenching movie, offering story after story from victims who were sexually abused as children or teenagers while living as part of the JPUSA community (At one point the film offers the statistic that of 120 former members who were contacted in the course of making the film, over half were victims of sexual abuse at JPUSA). Including among the victims who speak out on camera, is the film’s director and producer Jaime Prater. The movie culminates with three stories of victims who name their perpetrator as Johnny Herrin, a member of the community’s — relatively small — leadership council, the son of the community’s founding pastor (who himself was ousted for sexual abuse), and the drummer for JPUSA’s seminal Christian rock group, The Rez Band. How could such a Christian community that had a relatively high profile in evangelical Christianity over the last four decades foster a culture in which sexual abuse was apparently all too common?

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