SWITZERLAND
The Local
Twenty criminal investigations have been launched into sexual abuse allegations in Switzerland against Roman Catholic priests and laymen working for the church since 2010, a media report said on Monday.
But this compares with 172 suspected sexual offenders from within the church reported by church authorities themselves, suggesting that many cases are not being actively pursued, the ATS news agency said.
Certainly, numerous suspects are already dead and cases go back as far as 1950.
But the Conference of Swiss Bishops (CSB) said that other suspects have shown themselves nowhere to be found.
It is therefore impossible to know whether possible offenders may be again in contact with potential victims, ATS said.
The low number of investigations being pursued — less than one in eight reported cases — can be explained by the fact that church dioceses have provided only “very incomplete” information for the 1950-1980 period, Joseph Bonnemain, a priest and member of a special commission set up by the CSB, is quoted as saying.
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