ABUSE TRACKER

GUAM
Radio New Zealand

Two senior members of Guam’s Catholic Church have resigned from the archdiocese review board amid sexual abuse allegations against an Archbishop.

The Pacific Daily News reported the members resigned citing a conflict of interest as the board is likely to be called upon to review allegations against Archbishop Anthony Apuron.

52-year-old Roy Quintanilla alleges he was abused by Bishop Apuron when he was an altar boy more than 40 years ago, and says he knows of other victims.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MAINE
Bangor Daily News

By Judy Harrison, BDN Staff
Posted May 22, 2016

BANGOR, Maine — A Vermont man, who as a teenager was an altar server at a Bangor church, has sued in Penobscot County Superior Court the former Greek Orthodox priest convicted of sexually assaulting him, his supervisors and the church community he served.

Adam Metropoulos, 53, was convicted in March 2015 on four felony counts of sexual abuse of a minor following a jury-waived trial. The charges stemmed from the former priest’s sexual assault on a 15-year-old altar server, who is the plaintiff in the lawsuit, at the church in 2006 and 2007.

The man, now 24 years old, is not being named because he was the victim of sexual abuse.

The victim claimed to have sustained severe and permanent physical injury, emotional distress, mental anguish and future and past medical expenses because of Metropoulos’ sexual abuse. He claimed the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Boston, its leader Metropolitan Methodios, the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, based in New York City, and the Greek Orthodox community in Bangor were negligent in their supervision of Metropoulos.

The lawsuit did not name St. George Greek Orthodox Church by name.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Shawn Raymundo, sraymundo@guampdn.com
May 23, 2016

Whether Roy Quintanilla does decide to take legal action against Archbishop Anthony Apuron for allegedly molesting the 52-year-old man 40 years ago, Guam’s laws on sexual abuse crimes could thwart any attempts to bring the matter to court.

According to Guam law, a person who was sexually abused as a minor has until three years from the time they reach 18 years old to bring the issue to the attorney general’s office to file criminal charges against the assailant. The statute of limitations kicks in after the victim has turned 21 years old.

Speaking to the media in front of the Archdiocese of Agana Chancery Office last Tuesday, Quintanilla spoke about the reported encounter with Apuron. Quintanilla said the alleged abuse happened when he was a 12-year-old altar server for Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish in Agat while Apuron was the parish priest.

Apuron also faced sexual abuse claims back in late 2014, when John C. Toves accused the archbishop of molesting his cousin. The cousin, however, never came forward to confirm the allegations, news files state.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

JOANNE MCCARTHY
May 22, 2016, 10 p.m.

CATHOLIC priest David O’Hearn was the master manipulator who charmed and groomed people to get his way and told child victims to “look up at Jesus” pictures as he sexually abused them in church buildings.

He was the priest who stood in the dock during trials, waved to supporters and implored them to “keep the faith” in him as an innocent man and victim of injustice, despite juries finding him guilty of child sex crimes.

After four years of trials, appeals, re-trials and hearings where his name could not be reported in the media, O’Hearn on Friday could finally be revealed for what he is – a serial child sex offender who is sexually attracted to young boys and preyed on the most vulnerable.

“He was a predator. I faced him in court because we no longer have to carry the shame of what was done to us. That shame has now shifted. He should be the one who’s ashamed,” said a victim of O’Hearn’s who was 12 in the mid 1980s when he was sexually abused.

O’Hearn was convicted of 44 crimes against six boys. He gained sexual gratification from wrestling with boys. He was found guilty of multiple indecent assault charges in church buildings, parks, cars and on camps and forcing oral sex.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY MICHAEL O’KEEFFE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Sunday, May 22, 2016

Private school administrators in New York are not required to report sexual abuse allegations to law-enforcement officials — even after horrifying scandals roiled three prominent city prep schools.

Assemblyman David McDonough (R-Merrick) says it’s time to close a loophole that contributed to sex abuse scandals at Horace Mann, Poly Prep and Yeshiva University High School.

“The sad fact is so many students have been abused in schools and it is not reported,” McDonough said. “You can’t continue to sweep this stuff under the rug. Parents are surprised to learn that their kids are not protected under the laws of New York.”

Public school administrators are already required by state education law to report sexual abuse allegations to police or prosecutors. McDonough introduced legislation last month in the Assembly that would amend the law to include private school officials as well.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DOMINIKANISCHE REPUBLIK
Montecristi Horas

LA ROMANA.- El Ministerio Público de esta demarcación logró que fueran impuestos tres meses de prisión preventiva, como medida de coerción, contra un pastor evangélico que abusó sexualmente de una menor de 12 años de edad de un centro educativo de la comunidad de Villa Hermosa.

El Juzgado de Atención Permanente de La Romana dictó la medida cautelar en contra del pastor Maximiliano Mota, por supuestamente haber incurrido en los delitos de seducción, acoso y abuso sexual en perjuicio de la niña, cuyo nombre se omite por razones legales.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DOMINIKANISCHE REPUBLIK
DomRep Total

[A Protestant pastor is accused of sexual harassment in the Dominican Republic.]

21. MAI 2016

La Romana.- Drei Monate Untersuchungshaft erreichte das Öffentliche Ministerium gegen den evangelischen Pfarrer Maximiliano Mota aus La Romana. Sexuelle Belästigung und Missbrauch gegenüber einem 12 jährigen Mädchen werden dem Kirchenmann vorgeworfen.

Das Mädchen kommt aus Villa Hermosa und der Name wird aus Gründen des Jugendschutzes nicht veröffentlicht.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DEUTSCHLAND
Lotoskraft

[The hype is over, forget the victims again.]

Als 2010 die katholische Kirche in den Fokus geriet, weil sie über Jahrzehnte den sexuellen Missbrauch an überwiegend Jungen durch Geistliche bemäntelte und die Täter vor Strafverfolgung schonte, wurden für eine kurze Weile auch die Opfer der Schandtaten sichtbar und durch die Talkshows gereicht. Die kommerzielle Instrumentalisierung der Opfer war gewaltig. Schließlich muss man es so sehen, wenn Markus Lanz ein Opfer sexualisierter Gewalt vorführt, erhält das Opfer neben Reisespesen noch rund 150 € extra zugereicht. Der Profit des Moderators und seiner Produktionsfirma aber ist ein vielfacher davon.

Nachdem im Zuge des Skandals in der katholischen Kirche immer mehr Fälle in renommierten Institutionen wie der Odenwaldschule oder bei den Grünen aufgedeckt wurden, blieb das Thema virulent. Nach der Bundestagswahl 2013 hatten die Opfer ihre Schuldigkeit getan. Die Grünen hatten ihren Dämpfer bekommen und die Talkmaster ihre Sendeminuten gut verkauft. Das Interesse brach ab, die Welle war geritten und verebbt. Auch der veröffentlichte Bericht zu den Missbrauchsfällen der Berliner Grünen interessierte nur noch wenige. Nach einer Woche war das Thema aus den Medien, obwohl gerade dieser Bericht eine schreckliche Seite aufdeckte, nämlich dass die Grünen damals die Täter schützten und ihnen die Opfer – einmal mehr fast ausschließlich Buben ‑ auslieferten.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

TENNESSEE
WISH

KNOXVILLE (WATE) – The pastor of Grace Baptist Church said he is shocked after a children’s pastor at the church was charged for patronizing prostitution and trafficking.

Ron Stewart, the Senior Pastor at Grace Baptist Church said he found out about child youth pastor Jason Kennedy’s arrest when he got a phone call from a friend that knew about the situation that was taking place. Court records say Kennedy negotiated a $100 fee for a half hour of sex with a 15 and 18-year-old girl.

“I was devastated, I was totally shocked. It is something you can not anticipate, in fact I speak about it constantly,” said Stewart. “I have nine other pastors and I speak to them constantly, ‘we are held to a higher standard and what someone else may do and be accepted is not accepted and anything you do will be magnified and we understand much is given, much is required.’ It goes with being a pastor.”

During TBI’s operation to combat human trafficking in Knoxville, 32 people were arrested. However, the only two people charged with trafficking were pastors: Pastor Kennedy and volunteer creative pastor Zubin Parakh at Lifehouse Church in Oak Ridge.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MINNESOTA
The Journal

Breaking the Silence

May 22, 2016

By Kevin Sweeney – Journal Editor , The Journal

Editor’s Note: This is the second in a series of articles The Journal is publishing on the issue of sexual abuse of children by priests in the New Ulm Diocese. Today’s article tells the story of Kim Schmit, who was abused as a child in Willmar by Fr. David Roney.

Next Sunday: Leon’s story.

Kim Schmit is different from many other victims of clerical sex abuse of children. She told someone what happened, when it happened.

Her parents told officials at St. Mary’s Church in Willmar what Father David Roney had done to her, and were assured Roney would be dealt with. But Roney remained pastor at St. Mary’s and has been the subject of several lawsuits accusing him of sexually abusing more children in the years after Schmit’s accusation. To Schmit, it was an example of the way the Catholic Church as an organization has harbored and protected predatory priests.

Schmit’s family had moved to Willmar when she was 2. Her father, a self-taught musician, was the music teacher at St. Mary’s Catholic School. Her mother was a stay-at-home mom.

“She didn’t even have a drivers license. She would send a taxi cab to pick us up from after school functions,” Schmit recalls.

As a child, Schmit’s mother would send her and her younger sister to St. Mary’s for religious education classes on weekdays and Saturday mornings. She and her sister would wait at St. Mary’s school for the cab to pick them up.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Maria Hernandez, mohernande@guampdn.com May 22, 2016

In the midst of recent allegations of sexual abuse made by former Guam resident Roy Taitague Quintanilla against Archbishop Anthony Apuron, residents and a church official have shared their opinions on the developments.

Quintanilla, 52, spoke publicly at a press conference on Tuesday about abuse he allegedly suffered at the hands of Apuron 40 years ago when he was an altar boy. Quintanilla said he was a 12-year-old altar server for Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish, in Agat, when the alleged abuse took place.

Apuron was the pastor of the parish at the time, Quintanilla said. He said the archbishop touched his private areas through his pants.

“I was trying my best to push your hand away; it was painful,” he said as he read aloud a letter addressed to Apuron at the press conference.

Deacon Elias “Itoy” Ruda of Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Church, in Toto, said he doesn’t really know how to feel about the allegations.

“I’m just surprised. I’m just praying,” he said.

The news, he said, whether true or false, will possibly bring a divide in the church.

“My opinion is maybe the archdiocese is going to be divided into groups of people, but it’s better to stay strong in faith,” he said.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CANADA
Ottawa Citizen

MEGAN GILLIS, POSTMEDIA

The city’s archbishop vows that “we will do better” in tackling sexual abuse in the church.

Archbishop Terrence Prendergast makes the comment in a column in the Ottawa Sun, in the wake of a Postmedia series about historic abuse by local Catholic clergy published last week.

Prendergast calls the articles “shocking” despite containing “not many surprises,” the impact coming from “seeing all the details displayed in one place.”

“They laid out the enormity of the evil committed and the need for ongoing healing,” Prendergast wrote, later adding that “the situation in which we find ourselves humbles us all, making us feel raw in our exposure to public vilification and scorn.

“Still, the ties of communion among us Catholics will help us in this moment of testing. God is inviting us to come to grips with our sinfulness so that we can strive together towards a better future.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MINNESOTA
The Journal

May 22, 2016

By Bishop John M. LeVoir – Diocese of New Ulm , The Journal

The New Ulm Journal is publishing several powerful articles sharing the stories of victims and survivors of sexual abuse by priests. On behalf of the Diocese of New Ulm, I want to express my gratitude to those victims and survivors it takes great courage to come forward and tell this horrible story. It is essential that their experiences be shared and for the Church to publicly acknowledge what happened.

I have been humbled when personally meeting with and hearing the stories of victims and survivors. It is heartbreaking. Many times, the only response possible is one of sincere apology and a solemn vow to never forget the lessons of this tragic chapter in the Church’s history.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

ARIZONA
Arizona Daily Star

By Johanna Willett Arizona Daily Star

After 15 years serving the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tucson, Bishop Gerald F. Kicanas must submit a letter of retirement to Rome by mid-August.

He has no choice. The church’s canon law requires all bishops to submit a letter by the time they turn 75. Kicanas hits that benchmark Aug. 18.

From there, it’s up to Pope Francis to accept or reject the resignation. Usually, the pope accepts.

But that doesn’t mean August heralds the last days for the current Tucson bishop. Retiring bishops usually serve until the pope appoints a replacement. That can take six to eight months — sometimes longer.

Even after a successor is established, Kicanas, a Chicago native, has no plans to live elsewhere. …

Before Kicanas’ arrival, the diocese had paid $155,000 to settle claims from eight people who reported being sexually abused by diocesan personnel, Star archives show.

The following years would bring a $14 million settlement with 10 men who described abuse by four local clergy members from the 1960s to the 1980s, the sentencing of three priests to prison for sexually abusing children, and 22 lawsuits that drove the diocese to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2004.

“We were faced with abuse allegations, and we had no idea where the end was,” Kicanas said. “The concern was: How do we treat people equally and fairly so that the resources were available to help anybody who would come forward? And that’s when we went into bankruptcy.”

The Tucson diocese followed the Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon in the unprecedented move. At the time, plaintiffs expressed concern that the move was a copout.

The reorganization process took a year and involved the sale of diocese properties and creation of a $22.2 million settlement pool for victims both known and unknown, Star archives show.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CONNECTICUT
Republican-American

In 1965, a priest in Naugatuck, now accused of sexual abuse, made boys fear

BY MICHAEL DOOLING REPUBLICAN-AMERICAN

A new assistant pastor, Rev. Arthur J. Perrault, arrived at St. Francis Parish in Naugatuck in September 1965.

Two weeks ago, Perrault, an accused pedophile, was found living in Morocco. He had fled his New Mexico parish in 1992 after lawsuits alleging sexual abuse were filed against him and the Archdiocese of Santa Fe.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW ZEALAND
Stuff

EMILY SPINK

Sexual abuse support agencies in Christchurch have waiting lists up to six months long for victims needing help.

Demand for counselling and education services in the city has surged as well. One agency said it had more than doubled in the last five years as people become more willing to accept support and aware of how to get it.

Services have felt the strain with resource increases not “anywhere near” matching the rising demand. They welcomed a $46 million funding boost for the sexual assault services sector announced by the Government on Wednesday.

A survey of 24 support organisations, conducted by the Green Party and released the same day, found some victims were waiting up to three months for support.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MINNESOTA
Winona Daily News

Jerome Christenson Daily News

On May 31, 1958, Thomas Paul Adamson was ordained a priest for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Winona.

More than a half-century later, the Diocese of Winona has received 36 accusations of child sexual abuse by Adamson, one of 17 men who served as priests in the diocese who have substantiated claims against them of sexually abusing a minor.

The names of those 17 men, among the 320 Minnesota religious of all denominations — including priests, ministers, clerics, nuns and staff — credibly accused of sexual abuse as compiled by SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), are known largely because of a piece of state law that expires this week.

The law has led to hundreds of civil lawsuits against dioceses across the state, as well as the Archdiocese of St. Paul-Minneapolis, with the resulting claims raising significant questions about whether those dioceses will declare bankruptcy. The archdiocese filed for bankruptcy in January 2015, and has been reorganizing since.

Whether the Diocese of Winona will follow the same route isn’t clear, but also not out of the question, according to previous diocese statements and a reading of both internal and public documents.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY KENNETH LOVETT

ALBANY — When it comes to dealing with child sex abuse victims, Assembly Majority Leader Joseph Morelle says public and private institutions should be held to the same standard even while he opposes the idea of making it easier for some survivors to sue.

Morelle, a Rochester Democrat and the second most powerful lawmaker in the chamber, expressed serious concerns about doing away with laws limiting the window that adult child sex abuse victims have to bring civil or criminal cases.

Under current law, victims have up until their 23rd birthday to bring civil cases.

Morelle says he can support extending the timeframe for civil cases, but not eliminating it entirely, a position similar to one revealed by Gov. Cuomo this week. But Morelle opposes the idea of doing away with the time limits for bringing criminal charges on child sex abuse cases, a change the governor’s office says Cuomo would like to see.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DEUTSCHLAND
Schaumburger Zeitung

[Rintelner priest abused boys and other victims are possible.]

RINTELN. Vor 50 Jahren soll der damalige Superintendent des Kirchenkreises Grafschaft Schaumburg, Kurt Eckels, einen Jungen sexuell missbraucht haben. Erst jetzt wandte sich das damals 14 Jahre alte Opfer mit seinem Fall an die Kirche. Der Kirchenkreis geht davon aus, dass der mittlerweile verstorbene Geistliche auch andere Schutzbefohlene missbraucht oder zu missbrauchen versucht hat. Deswegen wurden vorgestern bereits mehr als 300 ehemalige Konfirmanden der Jahrgänge 1965 bis 1976 – der Dienstzeit von Eckels – postalisch kontaktiert.

In dem Brief, welcher der Schaumburger Zeitung vorliegt, räumt der aktuelle Superintendent Andreas Kühne-Glaser eine Mitschuld der evangelischen Kirche ein, „dass so viele zu Opfern sexuellen Missbrauchs wurden und sich viele Betroffene nie gemeldet haben“. Weiter schreibt er in dem zweiseitigen Brief: „Wir haben viele Jahrzehnte oft nicht richtig hingesehen und nicht reagiert.“

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DEUTSCHLAND
Frankfurter Rundschau

[Counties remain firm: No money for fund sexual abuse.]

BERLIN –
Trotz drohender Finanzierungsprobleme im Hilfsfonds für die Opfer sexuellen Kindesmissbrauchs in Familien lehnen viele Bundesländer eine finanzielle Beteiligung weiter hartnäckig ab. Bisher stellte der Bund rund 50 Millionen Euro für Therapien und Lebenshilfe bereit.

Mecklenburg-Vorpommern und Bayern zahlten zusammen rund acht Millionen ein. Alle anderen Bundesländer verweigern jedoch Zahlungen – oft mit Hinweis auf die Verantwortung des Bundes. Die meisten wollen, wenn überhaupt, für Missbrauchsopfer an staatlichen Schulen, Kindergärten und anderen Institutionen des Landes zahlen, ergab eine Umfrage der Deutschen Presse-Agentur.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DEUTSCHLAND
MissBIT

[Diocese of Trier: Bishop Ackermann encounters harsh criticism.]

Man habe die Sitzung in Freisen kurzfristig einberufen, um die zuständigen Gremien darüber zu informieren, dass gegen den ehemaligen Freisener Kooperator ein „Kirchliches Voruntersuchungsverfahren“ aufgrund Vorwürfen sexuellen Missbrauchs eingeleitet worden sei.

Mit diesen Worten leitet Ulrich Stinner als Verantwortlicher der Rätearbeit im Bistum Trier die Versammlung in Freisen ein.

Stinner weist daraufhin, dass die aktuelle Entwicklung im Fall von Pfarrer M. absolut nicht in Verbindung mit den seit Wochen laufenden Recherchen zu bringen sei. Dies sei reiner Zufall. Man könne dies glauben – oder auch nicht. Dies betont er mehrmals an diesem Abend. Er selbst sei davon überrascht worden, dass der „Volksfreund“ zufällig wenige Minuten vor Beginn der Veranstaltung den Artikel über Pfarrer M. online veröffentlichte. – Den ausgedruckten Artikel hatte er da bereits schon vor sich liegen.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DEUTSCHLAND
Volksfreund

[(Trier) After a Trierer Volksfreund on the diocese of Trier, a pastor has been provisionally suspended and church legal proceedings are to be initiated. The priest in a Saarland parish is accused to sexually abusing children and is said to have stockpiled weapons in the closet in the sacristy.]

(Trier) Nach TV-Informationen hat das Bistum Trier den beschuldigten Pfarrer offenbar vorläufig suspendiert. Ein kirchengerichtliches Verfahren soll eingeleitet worden sein. Dem katholischen Priester einer saarländischen Pfarrei wird vorgeworfen, Kinder sexuell missbraucht und Waffen im Schrank der Sakristei gehortet haben.

Das behaupten Pfarrangehörige. Mindestens drei Mal hat die Staatsanwaltschaft gegen den Geistlichen ermittelt – 2006, 2013 und 2016. Der Priester hatte weiter Messen gehalten. Das Bistum Trier hat die Suspendierung noch nicht bestätigt.

Der katholische Priester einer saarländischen Pfarrei soll Kinder sexuell missbraucht und Waffen im Schrank der Sakristei gehortet haben. Das behaupten Pfarrangehörige. Mindestens drei Mal hat die Staatsanwaltschaft gegen den Geistlichen ermittelt – 2006, 2013 und 2016.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

FRANCE
France Bleu

[Case Preynat: Cardinal Barbarin has had an “examination of conscience”.]

Par Émeline Rochedy, France Bleu Saint-Étienne Loire et France Bleu
Samedi 21 mai 2016

Le cardinal de Lyon reconnait qu’il ne s’est pas donné les moyens de prendre la mesure de l’affaire de pédophilie.

“J’ai fait mon examen de conscience”, estime Philippe Barbarin, au micro de Maurice Fusier. Le cardinal est visé par deux enquêtes préliminaires pour “non dénonciation” d’agressions sexuelles commises sur de jeunes scouts entre 1986 et 1991 par Bernard Preynat, qui a fini sa carrière dans le Roannais l’été dernier. “J’aurais dû aller au-devant, écouter les gens, essayer de me renseigner de manière beaucoup plus précise, et après, en constatant la gravité des faits dont je n’avais pas idée à ce moment-là, reconnait-il. J’aurais dû dire stop. (…) Ce n’est pas possible que quelqu’un qui a fait des choses comme ça continue d’exercer son ministère sacerdotal, de célébrer la messe ou des baptêmes.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
BishopAccountability.org

Compiled by BishopAccountability.org
From reports commissioned by the USCCB
May 20, 2016

As of May 20, 2016, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has counted 6,528 clerics “not implausibly” and “credibly” accused in the period 1950 through June 31, 2015 of sexually abusing minors. These USCCB counts effectively omit from the running totals any allegations made in 2003 and any allegations made in January-June 2014.

The USCCB has counted 17,651 victims who have alleged that they were abused as minors by priests. The USCCB counts effectively omit from the running totals any persons who made allegations in 2003, and any persons who made allegations in January-June 2014.

In the table below, we provide a year-by-year summary of the USCCB’s data and also calculate running totals, which are lacking in the USCCB reports. The numbers in the table are color-coded for easier reference – red for credibly accused priests and purple for victims. We also provide links to all the USCCB source documents from which the numbers are derived.

The USCCB hired the John Jay College of Criminal Justice to evaluate data submitted by member bishops regarding the sexual abuse of minors by Catholic priests, bishops, deacons, and seminarians. In its 2004 report, the John Jay College found, according to survey forms completed by the bishops, that the bishops had received in 1950-2002 “not implausible” allegations of sexual abuse of minors committed by 4,392 priests, including 12 bishops.

In 2004, the USCCB commissioned the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University to begin collecting annual data on allegations and settlements, and starting in Spring 2005, CARA has published a report each year. (See Bendyna’s 2/15/05 letter to Skylstad describing the commission, in the 2005 Report, PDF p. 12.) Among other data, that report counts the number of diocesan and religious order priests “credibly” accused of abuse during the previous calendar year, and states how many of those had been accused in prior years or are being accused for the first time. These data were obtained using a survey that was available to the bishops and superiors of religious orders online. See, for example, the 2009 diocesan and religious order surveys (populated by CARA with aggregate U.S. numbers), and see below for the Manchester diocese’s summaries of its responses to the surveys.

The latest CARA report – the CARA report on 2014-2015 allegations – was released on May 20, 2016 along with an audit of the implementation of the Charter. We have cached a copy of the report for safekeeping.

The previous report – the CARA report on 2013-2014 allegations – was the first report to implement a change in the reporting period for the reports, an unfortunate change that has been continued in the latest report.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
Boston Globe

Matt Rocheleau GLOBE STAFF MAY 20, 2016

The Catholic church paid $153 million in the United States last year to settle lawsuits, and fielded hundreds of new accusations, as fallout continued from the clergy sex abuse scandal exposed in the early 2000s, a new report from church leaders says.

The annual report from the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, which covers July 2014 to June 2015, said 384 victims came forward with allegations the church deemed credible.

The figure, while somewhat higher than the 330 allegations deemed credible in the prior year, generally fit into a trend in which the number of such allegations has declined in recent years.

“One instance of abuse is one too many,” Deacon Bernie Nojadera, executive director of the conference’s Secretariat of Child and Youth Protection, wrote in the report.

“May our Lord continue to heal all who have been victimized by this crime and may our efforts toward healing, reconciliation, and peace be blessed,” he added. …

David Clohessy, executive director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, was sharply critical of the bishops’ annual reports, calling them “flawed” and “deceptive.”

“Bishops’ policies, procedures, protocols, and panels sound good. But they are meaningless because there’s no independent monitoring or enforcement,” Clohessy wrote in an e-mail. “It’s as if bishops design the game, hire the umpires, and declare themselves winners.” …

Mary Gautier, a senior research associate there who worked on this year’s report, said the number of abuse allegations has generally declined each year as spending has increased on programs designed to protect youth in the church.

“It shows the proactive attitude of the dioceses, that they’re taking this seriously,” she said.

But Terence McKiernan founder of Bishop Accountability, an organization that tracks the abuse crisis, said holes still remain in the church’s annual reports, including one introduced when the report last year began using a different reporting period for some data.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CANADA
The Globe and Mail

SELENA ROSS
The Globe and Mail
Published Friday, May 20, 2016

The Service Ontario office on Lawrence Avenue West is the most public of places: public in its stream of passersby and public in the sense that it’s a conduit, bland and efficient, to the government.

That is where Joe Schacter sat down at a computer terminal in December and began looking at child pornography, police say.

Mr. Schacter reportedly appeared surprised when people were alarmed enough by the photos, allegedly of little boys in bathing suits, that they called police. The 55-year-old, a retired teacher at two private Orthodox Jewish schools, was arrested and charged.

That news, reported in local media, ended a 20-year internal battle for Adam, a North York man. He picked up his phone and asked to speak to a police detective. Joe Schacter, he said, had coached him into performing sex acts for three years of his childhood.

Adam was in his 40s and he says in every year of his adult life he had talked himself out of making that call. “‘I should go to the cops,’” he would say to himself. “‘I should go to the cops. I should go to the cops.’”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OKLAHOMA
KTUL

BY KRISTIN DICKERSON
FRIDAY, MAY 20TH 2016

It began as a short speech in a small room of the state Capitol. “This is the first time that I’ve gone public with my story,” said Ginger Lewis.

But the response from Lewis’s testimony, that she was a victim of sexual abuse by her father, has grown larger than she ever imagined.

“I’ve heard from hundreds and hundreds of survivors from all around the world,” Lewis said.

She was testifying in support of House Bill 2292, seeking to extend the statute of limitations for sexual abuse victims, giving them more time to seek justice. It passed unanimously in the House, but then, “it died in the Senate,” Lewis said.

An indication she says, of the amount of education needed by lawmakers who often fear a tidal wave of frivolous lawsuits if the statute is changed.

“The facts and the research just don’t back that up,” said Lewis.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
Metro

Ashitha Nagesh for Metro.co.uk
Saturday 21 May 2016

A formerly respected school teacher pretended to be a teenager online to trick young boys into sexual activity.

Richard Lythall, 35, has now been jailed after police discovered a trove of child abuse images on his computer in March last year.

Officers also found that he had been posing as a 15-year-old boy in order to chat to boys of the same age, and exchange explicit images with them, over a four year period.

As a result of the allegations Lythall, who also worked as a church organist, immediately lost his job at Sir Thomas Boughey High School in Halmerend, Staffs.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
Catholic News Service

By Mark Pattison Catholic News Service
5.20.2016

WASHINGTON (CNS) — The annual report on the implementation of the U.S. bishops’ “Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People” warns against complacency in dioceses, and the firm contracted to conduct audits of dioceses and parishes said there was “plenty of room for improvement” in implementing two of the charter’s articles.

In remarks prefacing the report, Francesco C. Cesareo, chairman of the National Review Board, the all-lay group that tracks for the bishops how dioceses address clergy sexual abuse, said this year’s audit results “continue to demonstrate the progress that has been made in ensuring safe environments for children in the church.”

“The bishops need to be acknowledged for keeping the protection of children and young people in the forefront of their leadership by continually enhancing their efforts to comply with the charter,” Cesareo said.

However, he also warned that the U.S. church’s progress can “foster a false sense of security” that can “lead to complacency.”

“Such complacency can lead to a minimalist approach to the charter, which can be seen simply as a series of requirements that need to be checked off, as opposed to an implementation that renders the charter fully operative,” he said.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY KEVIN T. MULHEARN

Assembly Majority Leader Joseph Morelle has expressed his reservations about supporting legislation that would reform the New York statute of limitations for sexual abuse survivors.

While I appreciate Mr. Morelle’s candor in addressing this hot-button issue, as an attorney on the front lines of this issue for more than a decade, I can state with confidence that his opposition is based on misconceptions, half-truths, and false suppositions.

Mr. Morelle raises the holy grail legal issue of due process. But he wrongly assumes that individuals accused of molesting children and institutions accused of facilitating their employees’ sexual assaults of children will be denied due process if the statute of limitations law is reformed. In fact, right now in New York State there are scores of men and women whose childhood innocence was stolen from them who, without a doubt, have already been denied due process, a fair procedure to give them their days in court on claims against those who grievously hurt them, by the existing law as it is written (by the legislators) and interpreted (by the judges).

The best example of this is the Yeshiva University case, where two venerable federal courts took the law into their own hands and — in direct opposition to the arguments made and investigation conducted by Yeshiva University itself — manufactured from thin air a preposterous judicial finding that 34 plaintiffs who sued Yeshiva University in 2013 after learning that the school’s top administrators had engaged in a multi-decade cover-up of sexual abuse at Yeshiva University High School in Manhattan, would have discovered Yeshiva’s own misconduct had they reported their abuse to school administrators before they turned 21.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MINNESOTA
KSTP

Joe Augustine
Updated: 05/20/2016

Survivors of child sex abuse in Minnesota have only five days left to file a claim under a state law that opened a window for civil lawsuits outside the statute of limitations. A state lawmaker says it is doubtful survivors will have another opportunity to take legal action, and advocates say it’s putting pressure on victims who may not feel ready to come forward.

The deadline to file civil claims under Minnesota’s Child Victim’s Act expires May 25.

Cordelia Anderson, a nationally recognized expert on child sex abuse prevention who has counseled adult survivors for forty years, says the deadline has created a “ticking time bomb.”

“What I’ve been hearing is just some painful pressure,” Anderson said Friday.

She believes the state should extend the deadline, re-open the window in the future or, in a perfect world, throw out statute of limitations in old sex abuse cases.
She says many survivors did not know about the state law or thought it only applied to victims of clergy abuse.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Dennis Coday | May. 20, 2016

The U.S. bishops’ conference released this morning its 13th Annual Report on the Implementation of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People.
The report, which covers the period July 1, 2014 to June 30, 2015, is really two reports in one:

An auditor — this year as in the last couple years, the Rochester, N.Y.-based StoneBridge Business Partners — reports on the compliance of bishops and diocese with the U.S. bishops’ Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, adopted in 2002 at the bishops’ meeting in Dallas.

Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate, or CARA, reports on its Annual Survey of Allegations and Costs of the abuse crisis, a report it has prepared since 2004.

“The Charter,” the report explains, “lays the foundation for child protection in our dioceses, parishes, and schools as it outlines a multi-faceted approach to how the Church responds to child sex­ual abuse.” The audit, then can be seen as a measure of the success of implementing the charter.

The audit reports that five ecclesial jurisdictions/ecclesiastical units are not in compliance with the Dallas Charter. For the 13th consecutive year the Lincoln, Neb., diocese and the eparchies (the Orthodox churches’ equivalent of a Latin rite diocese) of St. Peter the Apostle, Our Lady of Deliverance of Newark for Syrians, Our Lady of Nareg for Armenians and Stamford for Ukrainians did not participate in the audit.

The Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter, the diocese-like structure created by the Vatican in 2012 for former Anglican communities and clergy seeking to become Catholic, also did not participate in the audit. …

Cesareo notes, as has he and his predecessors have noted in past reports, that progress the bishops have made in addressing this issue can “foster a false sense of security and lead to complacency.” He cites several explains of complacency:

* Some diocesan review boards rarely meet or have not met in several years.
* Some dioceses do background checks on personnel and volunteers, but no follow-up rescreening after several years have passed.
* Some diocese policies have not been updated to reflect revisions that have been made to the Charter.

“These are examples of how easy it is to become complacent, which opens the possibility for problems to occur that could have been prevented,” Cesareo writes.

As evidence of the danger of complacency, Cesareo notes that while most allegations of sexual abuse come from adults reporting abuse from years past, in this reporting cycle are 26 allegations of sexual abuse of current minors by clergy. Seven of those allegations were substantiated and nine were under investigation. Nine were unsubstantiated.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
Catholic News Agency

Washington D.C., May 20, 2016 / 04:08 pm (CNA).- In their annual report on nationwide measures for the protection of minors, the U.S. bishops found extensive diocesan cooperation with recommended standards.

“When the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) approved the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People in 2002, we made a pledge to heal and a promise to protect. These promises remain essential priorities for our Church,” said Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, president of the bishops’ conference.

“We remain ever vigilant in the protection of children and the outreach to those most harmed by sexual abuse. The Church cannot become complacent with what has been accomplished. We look for new ways of addressing the issue and showing others a model of protection.”

In 2002, in response to the scandal of sexual abuse by clergy dating back decades, the U.S. bishops adopted the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People. The charter made voluntary recommendations to bishops, including an audit to ensure compliance.

The report, carried out by the bishops’ Secretariat of Child and Youth Protection and the National Review Board, found that 189 dioceses and eparchies were compliant with the Charter and one diocese was partially compliant specifically with Articles 12 and 13, which require proof that training programs are in place and that background checks are conducted on employees, clergy and volunteers.

The one diocese not fully compliant is the Diocese of Lincoln, Neb., though according to the report, the diocese plans to fully participate in the audit next year.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

PENNSYLVANIA
Catholic Philly

By Matthew Gambino • Posted May 20, 2016

About 350 priests and deacons of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia attended two sessions this week designed to inform the clergy about pending state legislation to lift the statutes of limitation on cases involving sexual abuse of minors.

The afternoon and evening meetings on Tuesday, May 17 at St. Helena Parish’s hall in Blue Bell were led by Archbishop Charles Chaput, archdiocesan officials and consultants, and were intended to equip the clergy to discuss the legislation immediately with parish pastoral and finance council members plus other parish leaders.

The speakers described House Bill 1947, which passed in the state House of Representatives in April by a 180-15 margin, and its potentially devastating effects to the Catholic Church and all other private institutions across Pennsylvania.

Parishioners throughout the archdiocese will be strongly encouraged in early June to contact their state senators and express opposition to the bill. It is now in the Senate Judiciary Committee, which will hold hearings beginning June 14 to study the constitutionality of the bill.

Speakers at the meetings described the dire financial impact upon Catholic parishes, schools and institutions that would likely result from an expected flood of civil lawsuits should the bill be approved by the Senate and signed by the governor.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops

May 20, 2016

WASHINGTON—The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Secretariat of Child and Youth Protection and the National Review Board released its 2015 Annual Report on the Implementation of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People May 20.

Protection and prevention efforts continue being a priority. Over 4.3 million children and 2.4 million adults have been trained to identify the warning signs of abuse and how to report them. Over 99 percent of priests (35,987), deacons (16,251), educators (162,803), and 98 percent volunteers (1,930,262) and candidates for ordination (6,473), and 97 percent (260,356) of other employees received training.

Over 2.4 million background checks were performed on adults at parishes and schools. These include, background checks performed on 99 percent of priests (35,720), deacons (16,257), 98 percent of volunteers (1,935,310) and other employees (263,690), and 96 percent of educators (158,556).

189 dioceses and eparchies were compliant with the Charter and one diocese was partially compliant specifically with Articles 12 and 13, which require proof that training programs are in place and that background checks are conducted on employees, clergy and volunteers. Ongoing efforts continue toward full participation of the one diocese and five eparchies that did not participate in the last cycle. Next year all dioceses and a majority of the eparchies will be involved in data collection or an on-site audit for the 2016 evaluation.

Between July 1, 2014, and June 30, 2015, a total of 26 allegations against clergy received were from current minors, of those, seven were substantiated. All allegations were reported to local civil authorities.

“When the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) approved the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People in 2002, we made a pledge to heal and a promise to protect. These promises remain essential priorities for our Church,” said Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, president of the USCCB. “We remain ever vigilant in the protection of children and the outreach to those most harmed by sexual abuse. The Church cannot become complacent with what has been accomplished. We look for new ways of addressing the issue and showing others a model of protection.”

Out of the 838 people who reported to have suffered past abuse as minors, 46 percent or 386 accepted diocesan outreach and healing. Continued support has been provided to 1,646 victims/survivors. All dioceses and eparchies have offices and personnel whose primary role is to assist victim/survivors, treating them with respect and offering them pastoral care.

The information in the report was gathered between July 1, 2014, and June 30, 2015. The report on the response of the Catholic Church in the United States to clergy sexual abuse includes an annual survey conducted by Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) and an annual audit to numerous dioceses and eparchies.

The full report is available at: http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/child-and-youth-protection/upload/15-118-CYP-Annual-Report.pdf.
—
Keywords: clergy sexual abuse, Catholic Church, Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, annual audit report, background checks, safe environment training, Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, Secretariat for the Protection of Children and Young People, Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate
# # #
MEDIA CONTACT:
Norma Montenegro Flynn
O: 202-541-3202

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
Daily Mail (UK)

By Scott Malone

BOSTON, May 20 (Reuters) – An annual audit of reports of sexual abuse by members of the U.S. Roman Catholic clergy released on Friday showed sharp increases in the number of new claims and in the value of settlements to victims.

The audit showed that 838 people came forward from July 1, 2014, through June 30, 2015, to say they had been sexually abused by priests, deacons or members of religions orders while they were children, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said.

That is up 35 percent from 620 new reports of abuse a year earlier, an increase that the bishops said largely reflected a large number of claims in six dioceses that had either filed for bankruptcy or were located in states that opened windows allowing victims to sue over old cases of sexual assault.

While the bulk of the reports related to cases of abuse date back to the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s, there were 26 reports made by minors of more recent abuse.

The report also found that Catholic parishes and other orders spent $153.6 million on settlements, legal fees and other expenses related to claims of sex assault over the audit period, up 29 percent from $119.1 million a year earlier.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW YORK
CNY Central

BY TYLER HEAD FRIDAY, MAY 20TH 2016

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Jason Kopp, the Liverpool man accused of multiple counts of child sexual exploitation, stood in an orange jumpsuit and was emotional as a federal judge accepted his guilty plea in federal court Friday morning.

Kopp, 40, pleaded guilty to a total of 22 counts; one count of conspiracy to sexually exploit a child, 10 counts of sexual exploitation of children, nine counts of distribution of child pornography and two counts of possession of child pornography.

11 of those counts call for a maximum of 30 years of imprisonment and a minimum of 15 years per count. Nine of the counts call for a maximum of 20 years and a minimum of 5 years per counts, and two of the counts call for a maximum sentence of 20 years per count. In all, Kopp faces a maximum of 550 years of imprisonment.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED STATES
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, May 20, 2016

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 566 9790 cell, 314 645 5915 home,davidgclohessy@gmail.com)

Year after year, bishops issue the same flawed, deceptive self-survey trying to promote complacency when they should be promoting vigilance.

Under intense public pressure 14 years ago, US bishops adopted a weak, vague abuse policy. Bishops ‘comply’ with these self-serving steps of course because their insurers, defense lawyers and public relations experts insist that they do.

And even then, they often give only the appearance of compliance.

For example, at least ten admitted, proven or credibly accused pedophile priests remain on the job in the US today.

[SNAP]

One of them, Fr. Eric Swearingen of Fresno, was actually found guilty of child sex crimes by a jury yet has since been promoted.

[SNAP]

So for all the pledges of reform, in reality, bishops are still safeguarding their comfort and careers instead of safeguarding innocent kids and vulnerable adults.

Bishops continue to ignore several massive ‘elephants in the room’ that aren’t changing. The biggest of them is the rigid, secretive, all-male monarchy in which prelates are never defrocked, demoted, disciplined or even denounced no matter how irresponsibly they act regarding kids’ safety. And it’s worth noting that this monarchy remains every bit as intact now as it was 14 years ago.

Bishops’ policies, procedures, protocols and panels sound good. But they are meaningless because there’s no independent monitoring or enforcement. It’s as if bishops design the game, hire the umpires and declare themselves winners.

It’s disingenuous for bishops to pretend their “review board” is in any way independent. They claim it’s a watchdog when in fact it’s a lap dog.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Coffs Coast Advocate

David Barwell | 21st May 2016

A FORMER Catholic priest charged with a string of historic child sex abuse offences will stand trial in Lismore next month.

John Patrick Casey has pleaded not guilty to charges relating to alleged sexual offences committed against two brothers, aged nine and 11, in 1985.

The 68-year-old was based at the Mary Help of Christians Primary School in Sawtell until the day before his arrest on July 9 last year.

Casey also worked as a part-time police chaplain, with his duties including conducting funerals and other religious services for police officers.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

TENNESSEE
Knowville News Sentinel

By Hayes Hickman of the Knoxville News Sentinel

KNOXVILLE — Two local ministers face felony charges for seeking sex with underage girls during an undercover sting targeting human trafficking and prostitution this week, authorities said Friday.

Jason Evan Kennedy, 46, head of the children’s ministry at Grace Baptist Church of Knoxville, was one of two men charged with felony human trafficking and patronizing prostitution after they answered online advertisements specifically offering sex with an underage girl, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation announced during a news conference.

Also charged with felony trafficking is Zubin Percy Parakh, 32, of Oak Ridge, who serves as creative pastor with Lifehouse Church in Oak Ridge, according to the church’s website.

In reality, the ads were placed by law enforcement as part of a four-day sting operation at a North Knoxville motel, deemed “Operation Someone Like Me,” conducted by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and the Knoxville Police Department.

Another 25 men who responded to the ads were cited for patronizing prostitution. They include a local engineer and a volunteer firefighter, whom authorities did not identify Friday.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

TENNESSEE
WBIR

[with video]

The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation announced Friday authorities arrested 32 people in a Knoxville human trafficking operation.

The TBI said in a release two of the men, including a children’s minister, arrested in “Operation Someone Like Me” responded to ads for what they thought were girls under the age of 18.

TBI identified Knoxville’s Jason Kennedy, 46, as the children’s minister arrested for patronizing prostitution and human trafficking. Kennedy was a minister at Grace Baptist Church in Karns. He was fired after the charges were revealed.

Grace Baptist Church released the following statement to the media about Kennedy’s arrest:

The children’s pastor of Grace Baptist Church has been terminated as as result of an arrest in a police sting related to prostitution and human trafficking.

The actions of the children’s pastor for which he has been arrested were part of his life outside the church, and we have received no questions or concerns related to his conduct within the church or its ministries.

The children’s pastor was hired two-and-a-half years ago. The church’s background check turned up no issues that indicate any previous problem. In fact, the children’s pastor in his application affirmed that he had no issues in his background of a criminal or other nature.

We are praying for his family and will continue to provide the services of our ministry to them.

According to a TBI release, the only other person charged with trafficking was Zubin Parakh, 32, from Oak Ridge.

Parakh is connected to Lifehouse Church in Oak Ridge. A church spokesperson said Parakh serves as a volunteer as a “creative pastor.”

Although Parakh is not officially a pastor at LIfehouse Church, he was working toward becoming one. The church said Parakh has never worked with children.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

TENNESSEE
Local 8

[with video]

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WVLT) — After a three-day investigation, nearly two dozen men were arrested on charges related to human trafficking, including Jason Evan Kennedy, a pastor of children’s ministry at Grace Baptist in Karns.

Grace Baptist responds

Those with the church say Kennedy lost his job as a result of the arrest.

The release stated:

“The actions of the children’s pastor for which he has been arrested were part of his life outside the church, and we have received no questions or concerns related to his conduct within the church or its ministries.”

It said Kennedy was hired two-and-a-half years ago. Church administrators got a background check on Kennedy and it turned up no issues at the time. It did not indicate any previous problems. Church leaders believed Kennedy was a good fit because he listed a children’s pastor as a reference on his application. That pastor affirmed Kennedy had no issues in his background.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

TENNESSEE
KGW

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — The children’s minister at a 4,000-member Baptist church was among 32 people arrested on prostitution and human trafficking charges, state investigators announced Friday.

Two men, including the children’s minister, answered ads for what they thought they were girls under the age of 18, said Mark Gwyn, director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation.

Jason Kennedy, 46, of Knoxville was charged Thursday with patronizing prostitution and trafficking. He was a children’s minister at Grace Baptist Church in the Knoxville suburb of Karns, Tenn., until his arrest; his name had been scrubbed as of Friday from the church’s website, Twitter and Facebook feeds.

Church officials have no comment, a church secretary said Friday.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

TENNESSEE
WKRN

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) – Thirty-two men and women, including a children’s minister, were arrested on prostitution and human trafficking-related charges in Knoxville.

The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation made the arrests during a three-day operation called Operation Someone Like Me.

It was fifth operation of its kind in the state between the TBI and other law enforcement agencies to help identify, investigate, and prosecute trafficking suspects as well as rescue victims.

Undercover agents posted ads on Backpage.com. Authorities say those ads received over 300 responses within three days.

In one ad, authorities posed as a juvenile girl. That ad received more than 24 responses, according to the TBI. …

WATE identifies the minister as Jason Kennedy for Grace Baptist Church in Knoxville. The church’s website says Kennedy, 46, is a pastor for children from birth through fifth grade.

Court records say he allegedly responded to an ad on May 19 via a text message and was made aware another girl would be present who was underage. A $100 fee for a half hour of sex with both females was reportedly negotiated, according to court records, and Kennedy arranged to meet them at a Best Western.

The children’s minister is further accused of finding out the underage girl was only 15 upon arriving and saying he wanted to have sex with both. WATE reports court documents say he placed $100 on the counter and removed his pants before law enforcement took him into custody.

Kennedy faces charges of patronizing prostitution and trafficking. He was fired from his position as a minister following his arrest.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW YORK
Syracuse.com

By Julie McMahon | jmcmahon@syracuse.com
on May 20, 2016

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — A Liverpool man faces more than 500 years in prison for his admission today that he sexually exploited three children to make child pornography.

Jason Kopp, 40, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Glenn Suddaby to taking sexually explicit photos of three children with help from an aide at All Saints Elementary School. At least one of the images was taken at the school, a source said. Kopp also possessed hundreds of lewd images and videos of other children.

Last week Kopp pleaded guilty to the charges, but Suddaby refused to accept his plea because he would not admit to a detailed account of his crimes.

Today, prosecutor Lisa Fletcher read the litany of Kopp’s crimes, including detailed and graphic descriptions of how he took photos of children in lewd positions and photos of himself making sexual contact with an infant. He transmitted those photos through text messages, messaging applications and email.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NORTHERN IRELAND
News Letter

MI5 and MI6 have agreed to be central participants at an imminent inquiry into a paedophile ring at a notorious Belfast care home, the Court of Appeal heard today.

Counsel for the probe into the Kincora scandal also insisted it has been given unrestricted access to information and documents from government departments and agencies.

The disclosure came during continuing legal action by one victim over claims of state collision and the cover-up of sexual abuse throughout the 1970s in order to protect an intelligence-gathering operation.

Gary Hoy, 54, is seeking to overturn a ruling that the examination should remain within the current remit of the Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry (HIA) sitting in Banbridge.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

By BETH DALBEY (Patch Staff) – May 20, 2016
MICHIGAN
Patch

EASTPOINTE, MI – The Rev. Kenneth Kaucheck, the banished priest who was removed from parishes in Royal Oak and Ferndale seven years ago over decades-old allegations he had sex with a teenage girl he was counseling, has resigned from a Catholic center that takes in pregnant teens and women.

The Archdiocese of Detroit said in a statement that Kaucheck’s job as development director for Gianna House Pregnancy and Parenting Center violated the restrictions placed on his ministry when he was removed from St. Mary Parish in Royal Oak and St. James Parish in Ferndale in 2009.

Kaucheck was in his mid-20s and was assigned to Guardian Angels Parish in Clawson in 1976 when he was accused of having a sexual relationship, which reportedly included a trip to Florida, with a 16-year-old pregnant teen he was counseling. Church officials became aware of the relationship and reassigned Kaucheck to a parish in Dearborn. The allegations resurfaced in 2009, and the Diocese banished Kaucheck from public ministry.

In a statement Thursday, the Archdiocese of Detroit said the church doesn’t own Gianna House, which operates out of a former convent adjacent to St. Veronica Catholic Church in Eastpointe.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DEUTSCHLAND
MissBiT – Sexueller Missbrauch durch Angehörige der katholischen Kirche im Bistum Trier

Ein erneuter Schlag ins Gesicht:
Sowohl für die Betroffenen als als auch für ihre Angehörige.

Bischof Ackermann, der nur wenige Wochen zuvor noch in einem Interview sagte, “Glaubwürdig zu sein, ist eine Frage des Handelns” gerät erneut in Erklärungsnot. Dass dieser neue gravierende Fall ausgerechnet von dem Missbrauchsbeauftragten der DBK, Bischof Ackermann, selbst vertuscht wurde, zeigt erneut und zugleich auch umso deutlicher, wie es um den versprochenen “ernsthaften Aufklärungswillen” der Kirche tatsächlich steht.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

VATICAN CITY
Crux

By John L. Allen Jr.
Editor May 20, 2016

This week, Edward Pentin of the National Catholic Register published a major sit-down interview with Bishop Bernard Fellay, leader of the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X, the headline from which was Fellay’s diagnosis that a deal for reunion with Rome is close, coupled with his insistence the society won’t betray its principles to get it.

There was a delicious throw-away line on a different topic, however, which shouldn’t get lost.

At one stage, Pentin asked Fellay about the pope’s repeated denunciations of “doctors of the law” and “fundamentalists,” wondering if Fellay takes those jibes as directed at his society or traditionalists generally. In response, Fellay said he’s asked around Rome what the pope means by that language.

“The answer I got most was ‘conservative Americans!’” Fellay, who’s Swiss, laughingly told Pentin. “So really, frankly, I don’t know.”

One might suspect Fellay was deflecting, except for this: He’s absolutely, one hundred percent right about what one typically hears in Rome on the subject of who leaves this pope cold.

By now, it’s clear that one defining feature both of Francis’ personality and his approach to governance – which shouldn’t be at all surprising, when you think about it – is a distinct ambivalence about the United States and about Americans.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

MAY 21, 2016

Gerard Henderson
Columnist

I have had two encounters of the personal kind with the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, neither of which was satisfactory.

The first occurred on May 6, 2014, when I was walking to my Sydney office on Phillip Street. It was early in the morning and I was surprised to see former ABC Radio National presenter, producer and journalist Stephen Crittenden on the corner of Phillip and Bent streets.

Crittenden was dressed in a fine suit, well-pressed shirt and tasteful tie. I asked him how it came to pass that a one-time left-wing ABC journalist looked so CBDish so early in the morning. Crittenden replied that he had been appointed to a senior bureaucratic position at the royal commission based in nearby Governor Macquarie Tower.

At the time, it was known that the royal commission appeared to be taking a special interest in ­George Pell relating to his time as a priest in the Catholic diocese of Ballarat in the 1970s and early 80s, as auxiliary bishop in Melbourne in the late 80s and early 90s, as archbishop of Melbourne from 1996 to 2001 and archbishop of Sydney before his appointment to the Vatican in February 2014.

There had been several pedophile priests active in both areas of Victoria — particularly Gerald Ridsdale in western Victoria and Peter Searson in Melbourne.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DEUTSCHLAND
Schwaebische

[In the 1960s and 1970s children were abused in the homes of the Brethren in Korntal and Wilhelmsdorf. The work-up process, however, has stalled.]

Wilhelmsdorf sz In den 1960er- und 1970er-Jahren wurden Kinder in den Heimen der Brüdergemeinde in Korntal und Wilhelmsdorf missbraucht, der Aufarbeitungsprozess ist allerdings ins Stocken geraten.

Es war vor fünf Jahren, als Detlev Zander nachts aufwachte, weil er im Schlaf eingenässt hatte. 50 Jahre alt war er zu diesem Zeitpunkt. Erholsamen und ruhigen Schlaf hatte er nicht mehr. Seine Alpträume katapultierten ihn zurück in seine Kindheit – zurück in die 1960er-Jahre, die er im Kinderheim der Evangelischen Brüdergemeinde in Korntal bei Stuttgart verbracht hatte. Alles kam wieder hoch: Misshandlungen und Vergewaltigung. Plötzlich bekamen die schwarz-weißen Bilder, die Detlev Zander in seinem Gedächtnis tief vergraben hatte, wieder Farbe. Bilder, wie er damals vom Hausmeister im Heizungskeller missbraucht wurde, wie er von einer Erzieherin windelweich geschlagen wurde, so sehr, dass sein rechter Wangenknochen brach. „Das wurde nie ärztlich behandelt. Quasi ein Andenken an früher“, sagt er ruhig und deutet auf sein schielendes Auge.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DEUTSCHLAND
Deutschlandfunk

[Sexual abuse of children and adolescents and again creating headlines. Many victims find it difficult to trust relatives or counseling centers – the sense of shame is often too large. An independent commission of experts will now work up the cases in homes, schools and families.]

Sexueller Missbrauch an Kindern und Jugendlichen sorgt immer wieder für Schlagzeilen. Vielen Opfern fällt es schwer, sich Angehörigen oder Beratungsstellen anzuvertrauen – das Gefühl der Scham ist oft zu groß. Eine unabhängige Expertenkommission will die Fälle in Heimen, Schulen und Familien jetzt aufarbeiten.

Von Dörte Hinrichs

Am Anfang steht eine Zahl. Eine unfassbare Zahl. Sie bestätigt die enorme gesellschaftliche Dimension von sexuellem Missbrauch an Kindern und Jugendlichen:

“Die Zahlen sind ja auch lange bekannt, sind jetzt kürzlich auch wieder belegt worden, durch eine Studie, die im Auftrag des Missbrauchsbeauftragten publiziert wurde: Also etwa für Deutschland jenseits dieser 12-13 000 Fälle, die jedes Jahr aktenkundig und juristisch verfolgt werden, eine Zahl von 1 Million betroffenen Kindern und Jugendlicher.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DEUTSCHLAND
Spiegel Online

[Three years ago, the federal government of Germany established a fund for victims of child sexual abuse – now it is out of money. SPIEGEL ONLINE has requested from the abuse officer: What’s going on?]

Von Annette Langer

Vor drei Jahren richtete die Bundesregierung einen Fonds für Opfer sexuellen Kindesmissbrauchs ein – nun geht ihm das Geld aus. SPIEGEL ONLINE hat beim Missbrauchsbeauftragten nachgefragt: Was ist da los?

Der Fonds wurde im Mai 2013 auf Empfehlung des Runden Tischs Sexueller Kindesmissbrauch eingerichtet. Das Ziel: Betroffene, die keine Hilfen nach dem Opferentschädigungsgesetz erhalten oder keinen Anspruch auf Kostenübernahme für Therapien durch die Krankenkassen haben, sollten unterstützt werden. Bis zu 10.000 Euro können seitdem jedem Einzelnen für Therapien und Hilfen im Alltag zur Verfügung gestellt werden.
Eine gute Sache, doch jetzt schlägt der Missbrauchsbeauftragte der Bundesregierung Alarm: Der Fonds sei bereits fast leer und eine Anschlussfinanzierung nicht in Sicht, sagt Johannes-Wilhelm Rörig.

Zwar stellte der Bund 50 Millionen Euro zur Verfügung. Die Länder sollten zügig noch einmal dieselbe Summe zuschießen. Doch es blieb bei einzelnen Absichtserklärungen: Bis heute haben lediglich Mecklenburg-Vorpommern und Bayern eingezahlt – knapp über eine Million Euro kam aus dem Norden, 7,6 Millionen Euro aus dem Süden. Der Rest der Republik scheint die Sache aussitzen zu wollen.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

The woman at the centre of an alleged abuse investigation, involving the Anglican Church in Jersey, has rejected a formal apology.

The Bishop of Winchester, Tim Dakin, has told ITV News he wrote to her to say sorry that ‘investigating her case had caused her further distress.’

But today she has hit back, describing it as a “pretence of apology.”

The allegation of abuse, involving a church warden, was investigated in 2013, and led to the temporary suspension of Jersey’s Dean, Bob Key, over his handling of the case.

He has received his own apology from the Archbishop of Canterbury for the “stress, hurt and uncertainty” of the past three years.

An investigation into the specific alleged abuse incident, and a wider study of safeguarding in Jersey’s church, are yet to be published.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW MEXICO
Gallup Independent

Published in the Gallup Independent, Gallup, N.M., May 14, 2016

Reorganization plan includes amends for sex abuse victims

By Elizabeth Hardin-Burrola
Independent correspondent
religion@gallupindependent.com

GALLUP – Once the Diocese of Gallup emerges from its Chapter 11 bankruptcy case, Bishop James S. Wall will have an extensive list of non-monetary commitments to fulfill as part of the diocese’s plan of reorganization.

The list of non-monetary commitments includes 17 provisions that were drawn up in negotiations between attorneys for the Gallup Diocese and attorneys and representatives for clergy sex abuse claimants in the case. The document (Doc 567-18) was filed May 3 with U.S. Bankruptcy Court. Some of the provisions call for the continuation of policies the Diocese of Gallup already has in place, while other provisions will require new policies and programs to be instituted.

Bishop’s participation

Two provisions require the active participation of the Gallup bishop. One provision requires Wall to send letters of apology to all abuse claimants in the bankruptcy case and/or, if requested, to immediate family members of the claimants unless claimants request in writing that they do not wish to receive a letter from the bishop.

“Letters of apology shall state that the survivor was not at fault for the abuse and the Diocese take responsibility for the abuse,” the document states. “The Bishop shall personally sign the letters of apology.”

A second provision requires Wall to personally visit each operating Catholic parish or school in which “abuse is alleged to have occurred or where identified abusers served” with the bishop’s schedule to be well publicized at least 30 days in advance of the visit. All known survivors of abuse in that area will be invited to attend, and Wall will be available to address questions and comments.

According to the list of credibly accused abusers posted on the Diocese of Gallup’s website, Wall may be making visits to nearly 40 currently operating Catholic parishes and schools in the diocese. Arizona communities in the diocese that have had abusers include Chinle, Cibecue, Fort Defiance, Holbrook, Lukachukai, McNary, Overgaard, Page, Pinetop, San Rafael/Concho, Show Low, Snowflake, Springerville, St. Johns, St. Michaels, Tuba City and Winslow. New Mexico communities include Aragon, Blanco, Bloomfield, Bluewater, Cebolleta/Seboyeta, Chichiltah, Crownpoint, Cuba, Cubero, Farmington, Flora Vista, Gallup, Grants, Lumberton, Pinehaven, San Fidel, Shiprock and Thoreau.

Communities like Gallup and Winslow have had credibly accused abusers in more than one parish, and Gallup has had abusers who volunteered at Catholic nonprofits, served in hospitals and worked in the chancery. Winslow’s two Catholic parishes had 15 known, credibly accused abusers serve as priests between 1955 and 1989. Winslow’s Madre de Dios parish, which served mostly low-income Hispanic families, had at least one credibly accused abuser as a priest for 15 straight years, from 1961 to 1976.

Other assignments

Abusers were also assigned to parishes that have been closed or parishes that were transferred to the Diocese of Phoenix. Closed parishes include the Tolani Lake Indian Mission near Leupp, Arizona, and New Mexico parishes such as St. Philip Parish in Churchrock, Mission Center for Navajo Indians in Smith Lake and St. Jerome Parish in Gallup.

The Diocese of Phoenix took over a number of Gallup parishes that also had abusers assigned to them. Those include churches in Ash Fork, Camp Verde, Clarkdale, Cottonwood, Flagstaff, Humboldt, Kingman, Mayer, Prescott, Seligman and Yarnell.

In addition, the credibly accused list posted on the Diocese of Gallup’s website does not include several priests who worked in the Gallup Diocese and have been identified as credibly accused abusers by other dioceses or religious orders. It also does not include some clergy identified as perpetrators by abuse claimants in the bankruptcy case.

If those additional names are added to the Gallup Diocese’s list, Wall’s visiting schedule to Catholic parishes and schools could grow longer.

.As part of that provision requiring parish and school visits by the bishop, the non-monetary commitment list requires that Wall “shall be available upon reasonable notice to have a private conference” with any person who informs the diocese he or she was sexually abused in the Gallup Diocese.

Editor’s Note: Other new policies and programs required in the plan of reorganization will be the subject of a future article.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

FRANCE
Religion News Service

By David Gibson and Tom Heneghan

(RNS) For years, seminaries and monasteries around France sent students and novices to Monsignor Tony Anatrella, a prominent French priest and therapist who has written disparagingly of gays, if their superiors decided the young men were struggling with homosexuality.

Now Anatrella, who argues that gay men cannot be ordained as priests, is facing mounting allegations that he himself had sex with male clients under his care, a scandal that could have repercussions all the way to the Vatican, where the priest is still regularly consulted on matters of sexuality.

The reports about Anatrella that have emerged in recent weeks also landed just as the Catholic Church in France has been embroiled in a crisis over charges that senior churchmen shielded priests even after they received reports that the clerics had molested children.

Anatrella stoked that furor earlier this year when it was revealed that he told new bishops at a Vatican-sponsored course that they are not obligated to report a suspected abuser to authorities even in countries where the law requires such reporting.

The Vatican quickly said that Anatrella’s remarks did not change in church policy on reporting, and Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley, head of Pope Francis’ new Commission for the Protection of Minors, issued a statement saying that beyond the requirements of civil law, all members of the church “have a moral and ethical responsibility to report suspected abuse to the civil authorities who are charged with protecting our society.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

GUAM
Pacific Daily News
May 20, 2016

The archdiocese review board may have to do without two more members who decided to remove themselves, following recent sexual abuse allegations against Archbishop Anthony Apuron.

Mariles Benavente, one of the review board members, said she will recuse herself from the review board if they are called to review the specific sexual misconduct complaint against the archbishop.

Juan Rapadas said he resigned from the board on Wednesday. This comes after Vincent Pereda, another board review member, resigned Wednesday, which means the five-member board may need to appoint more members.

The archdiocese said the review board would convene after Roy Taitague Quintanilla, 52, on Tuesday publicly accused Apuron of molesting him 40 years ago when he was an altar boy. Quintanilla is the first alleged victim to openly accuse Apuron of sexual abuse. Quintanilla said there are other victims.

Neocatechumenal Way

For Benavente, a conflict of interest was also the reason behind her decision to recuse herself. She said she will recuse herself because she is walking in the Neocatechumenal Way, a group within the Catholic Church whose members meet in small community settings to worship.

Apuron is also part of the Way. Other Catholics have taken issue with how the group appears to separate itself. Apuron’s ties to the Way have angered a number of Guam Catholics.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service – Bollettino

Vatican City, 20 May 2016 – With regard to recent information published by the press in relation to the facts pertaining to the management of the Institute for the Support of the Clergy of the diocese of Savona, Cardinal Domenico Calcagno, president of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See, awaits notification of the formal acts of the trial initiated by the Public Prosecutor at the court of Savona.

With regard to the merits of the case, Cardinal Calcagno confirms his serenity in relation to the work carried out, considering that it relates to issues that arose primarily in a period of time subsequent to 7 July 2007, when he left the office of bishop of Savona-Noli.

In any case the investigation in no way relates to Vatican-owned assets or to the office currently held by the Cardinal.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

ITALY
L’Huffington Post

[Cardinal Domenico Calcagno is under investigation for embezzlement. Cardinal Calcagno, former bishop of Savona, and now president of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See, is being investigated by the Savona prosecution for complicity in embezzlement in the management of the Institute for the Support of the Clergy.]

Il cardinale Domenico Calcagno, ex vescovo di Savona ed ora presidente dell’Amministrazione del patrimonio della Sede Apostolica, è indagato dalla procura di Savona per concorso in malversazione nella gestione dell’ Istituto di sostentamento del clero della diocesi ligure. Per la procura, Calcagno avrebbe avallato la strategia dell’allora presidente dell’Istituto, don Pietro Tartarotti (fino al 2014) e dal vice, Gianmichele Baldi (fino a ottobre 2013), indagati per malversazione. Lo scrivono Il Secolo XIX e La Stampa.

Nel mirino della Procura ci sono investimenti in operazioni immobiliari che avrebbero provocato un indebitamento di alcuni milioni. Tra le operazioni sotto osservazione quella delle ‘Colonie bergamasche’, una grande struttura a ridosso della costa a Celle Ligure che avrebbe dovuto essere trasformata in un complesso residenziale con tanto di albergo di lusso.

Nel 2004 il vescovo Vittorio Lupi, successore di Calcagno, commissariò l’ente dopo che Tartarotti e Baldi si erano dimessi.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service – Bollettino

Vatican City, 20 May 2016 – The Holy Father received in audience:

– Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, archbishop of Lyon, France;

– Cardinal Antonio Cañizares Llovera, archbishop of Valencia, Spain.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

VATICAN CITY
Today

VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis came under fire on Friday (May 20) after meeting Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, the Lyon archbishop who is suspected of covering up for a paedophile priest in a scandal that has rocked the Church in France.

“There was a meeting, nothing out of the ordinary,” Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said, adding that he expected the two men had discussed the crisis in the French church, as well as regular business.

A support group for the alleged victims in the French scandal voiced regret that Francis had met with Barbarin while magistrates are still mulling whether the cardinal should face criminal charges.

“We would have liked to have been received instead of the cardinal, we note that once again it’s the victims who are sidelined,” Mr Bertrand Virieux, a co-founder of Lyon-based group La Parole Liberee, told AFP.

Mr Virieux said he had written to the pope in March seeking an audience.

The surprise meeting with Cardinal Barbarin came three days after the pope was quoted as saying it would be “nonsensical and imprudent” to seek the archbishop’s resignation at this stage, arguing that would be to imply he was guilty of potential criminal charges against him.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

GUAM
Pacific Daily News

[with video]

Jasmine Stole, Pacific Daily News May 20, 2016

A longtime Guam deacon is supporting Archbishop Anthony Apuron, who was accused this week of molesting an altar boy when Apuron was a priest in Agat about 40 years ago.

In a video-recorded message released Thursday night, Deacon Francisco Tenorio, 79, was shown seated and appeared to be reading from a prepared statement not shown in the camera frame.

In the video, Tenorio referred to a recorded statement Apuron released Tuesday in which the archbishop stated that the allegations against him were false.

“When (Apuron) spoke very directly denying any involvement in this alleged offense, I accept that this is the truth,” Tenorio said. “I know this to be the truth since I too was assigned to the Mt. Carmel Catholic Church in Agat between (1973) and (1977).”

The alleged incident happened between these years. Apuron was a priest at Mt. Carmel during this time.

Roy Quintanilla, 52, on Tuesday publicly accused Apuron of molesting him one time when he was a 12-year-old altar boy.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

KENTUCKY
WAVE

[with video]

By Jessica Gavin, Reporter

UNION CO., KY (WFIE) –
14 News is hearing from a long-time parishioner of a church that an accused Western Kentucky priest in a sexual misconduct investigation, led for almost a decade.

Father Gerald Baker has been suspended from his duties as a priest at St. Mary of the Woods in Whitesville, after being accused of sexual misconduct with a child.

Baker had been a priest in Owensboro for the past few years, before that he served at St. Ann Catholic Church in Morganfield.

Father Gerald Baker was the priest at St. Ann for 9 years, from June 2003 to June 2012. Bishop William Medley tells us, the diocese opened its own investigation a few weeks ago, and is cooperating with Kentucky State Police.

Parishioners at Saint Mary of the Woods were told of the allegations against Baker, at mass this past weekend. 14 NEWS talked with Paul Monsour, he’s been a parishioner of St. Ann Catholic Church in Morganfield, for 35 years.

He told us he believes Father Baker positively influenced not only fellow church attendees, but many people throughout Union County, for years.

“He had a big impact not only on our church but on our community, he was very active, I know he joined the Lions Club,” said Paul Monsour, St. Ann Catholic Church parishioner. “He was very positive about a lot of things, he had a lot of friends and did a lot of good works. He had a little conservative bend on a few religious issues, I think that turned a lot of people off, but we were all stunned when we heard about this.” >

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NORTHERN IRELAND
Derry Journal

Andrew Quinn
Twitter: @AndrewEQuinn
Friday 20 May 2016

Derry abuse victim, Brian Doherty, believes having his picture taken beside a waxwork model of Pope Francis is the closest he will ever get to meeting the pontiff.

Brian travelled to New York recently where he had a picture taken beside a waxwork model of Pope Francis at Madame Tussauds.

“It’s been almost three years since I sent a letter to Pope Francis asking him to meet with me,” Brian said.

“I’ve yet to receive a reply from Pope Francis and the more time passes the more I am starting to think the closest I am ever going to get to talking to him is by standing beside a waxwork model,” he added.

Brian was born in Derry in 1947 and when he was three weeks old he was placed into the care of the Sisters of Nazareth in the St. Joseph’s Home in Termonbacca. Brian remained there until he was 14 years-old.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

By Alan Erwin
PUBLISHED
20/05/2016

Alleged state collusion and cover-up of a paedophile ring at a notorious Belfast care home amounts to a systemic failure, the Court of Appeal has heard.

Counsel for one abuse victim argued that the scale of the Kincora scandal, which includes claims of British security service involvement, warrants an investigation that will “vindicate” his human rights.

Gary Hoy (54), is seeking to overturn a verdict that the probe into the home should remain within the remit of a Stormont-commissioned body.

He believes the ongoing Historical Institutional Abuse (HIA) Inquiry sitting in Banbridge lacks the power to properly scrutinise what went on at the home in east Belfast.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CANADA
CBC News

As Canada’s Residential Schools Settlement Agreement draws to a close, some survivors are calling for a review.

A review is needed in order to identify any mistakes that have been made throughout the process and make them right, said Garnet Angeconeb, a residential school survivor who lives in Sioux Lookout, in northwestern Ontario.

“It’s not to renegotiate or reopen the agreement,” said Angeconeb. “It’s to look at what worked, what didn’t work and what needs to be worked on some more.”

The settlement agreement is the largest class action settlement in Canadian history, and it involves the distribution of billions of dollars in compensation to former students of Indian residential schools.

But in some cases, the alleged misconduct of legal advisors have left survivors feeling revictimized, and unsure of how their complaints will be resolved, said Angeconeb.

“So these things really need to be addressed and the questions that survivors have need to be thoroughly examined before the agreement expires,” he said.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

ISRAEL
Frum Follies

The Israeli news site, Arutz Sheva, reports:

Jerusalem prosecutors filed an indictment against a rabbi who served as a mashgiach [spiritual advisor] at a yeshiva in the city, for a series of rapes carried against a number of female relatives over the course of several years.

The accused began his horrific campaign of abuse when his first victim was just six years old, and continued abusing her and other female relatives by various means of coercion and manipulation……

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

VATICAN
Le Figaro

Le cardinal est mis en cause pour ne pas avoir dénoncé des affaires de pédophilie et d’agressions sexuelles dans son diocèse de Lyon.

Le pape François, qui a apporté son soutien au cardinal Barbarin dans une interview publiée par le quotidien La Croix mardi 17 mai, confirme son appui en le recevant en audience au Vatican, vendredi en fin de matinée.

Le cardinal Barbarin, visé par une enquête préliminaire à propos de sa gestion d’affaires de pédophilie et d’agressions sexuelles dans son diocèse de Lyon, confiera en exclusivité dans Le Figaro du samedi 21 mai sa rencontre avec le pape et s’expliquera, pour la première fois, sur l’ensemble de ces affaires.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

VATICAN CITY
Digital Journal

AFP

Pope Francis met Friday with Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, the under-fire Archbishop of Lyon suspected of covering up for a paedophile priest in a scandal that has rocked the Church in France.

“There was a meeting, nothing out of the ordinary,” Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi told AFP, without revealing the purpose or content of the talks.

The surprise meeting came three days after the pope was quoted as saying it would be “nonsensical and imprudent” to seek Barbarin’s resignation at this stage, arguing that would be to imply he was guilty of potential criminal charges against him.

French examining magistrates are currently carrying out a preliminary investigation to decide whether to pursue charges against the archbishop for his handling of the allegations against Bernard Preynat, a priest in his diocese who has been charged with sex abuse.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

A priest has been jailed for three years for sex attacks on a teenage schoolgirl more than 40 years ago.

John Farmer, now 84, abused the girl between the ages of 12 and 14 while her family were part of his congregation.

A court heard heard the Roman Catholic priest referred to his lap as “the soft seat” – and then abused her as she sat on him.

The girl “idolised” the family priest and the court heard she was “immature and blameless” during the assaults.

Farmer was a priest at St Mary’s Church in Newport, Gwent, and a governor at St Joseph’s RC High School in Duffryn, Newport.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW YORK
New York Daily News

Editorial

For a full two hours, Gov. Cuomo on Thursday engaged with men and women who suffered sex abuse as minors and are pressing Albany to reform statutes of limitations that deny justice to countless victims.

Kudos to Cuomo for affording the citizen activists the attention they deserve — and continue to be denied by leaders of the state Legislature.

While Cuomo explored the difficult legal and moral questions surrounding rewriting civil and criminal statutes of limitations, legislative leaders arrogantly maintained their anti-democratic practice of conducting the people’s business behind closed doors.

Republican Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan and Democratic Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie refused to answer even the most basic questions about their positions.

Daily News readers will know that this newspaper has campaigned since March for reforms to criminal and civil statutes of limitations for sex crimes against minors. The case of an alleged serial predator who could not be prosecuted on some accusations cried out for rewriting the law.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

PENNSYLVANIA
National Catholic Reporter

Ken Briggs | May. 19, 2016 NCR Today

The letter was like one of those from the bank, reminding you how special you are to them, reviewing everything they’ve done to upgrade your life, then offering you a chance to return the love by taking out a home equity loan.

Except this one was from Bishop John Barres, dated on Easter Sunday, that circled around to another kind of pitch. As read to Cathoics attending mass in his Allentown, PA, diocese, it began by acknowledging the “prevalence of the sin and crime of child abuse,” noting that the diocese was “not untouched” by this scandal but hastening to add that it was “Just as important” that the church was enforcing “zero tolerance” through a wide variety of strategies. The bishop wanted Catholics to know that the church was doing its utmost to protect their children. While admitting no culpability in fostering the menace, which was inferred to be much bigger than the church, parishioners could be sure the diocese was on the prevention side.

That billboard was the prelude to the punch lines at the end of the letter. Bishop Barres hoped that good will spawned by the diocese’s initiatives would impel parishioners to urge their state legislators to kill a bill that would end limits on the right to file lawsuits against dioceses by victims of church-related sex abuse. The bill’s leading backe was a committed Catholic, Rep. Mark Rozzi (D-Bethlehem) who claimed he was raped by an Allentown priest during his teens.

Bishop Barres warned that passage of the law (two weeks later it won House approval handily, 180-15) could trigger dire results including “crippling damage awards” and the “very existence of some ministries.” Understandable disaster from an institutional standpoint. Similar letters were being dispatched from lecturnes in parishes across the state at the behest of the PA conference of bishops.

Two cradle-Catholic friends who trundle to their respective churches every weekend told me separately that they were outraged by the letter and came close to walking out of church. They were appalled by by the suggestion that they join the bishops’ fight against an opening of lawsuits on behalf of victims Each said he’d never before even thought of storming out of church in protest. But there they were.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Geelong Advertiser

May 19, 2016

Fr Kevin Dillon
Geelong Advertiser

THE fence surrounding St Mary’s Basilica in Yarra St will look less colourful by Monday morning.

Since January, the almost 300 metres of “Loud Fence” surrounding one of Geelong’s most iconic buildings have been bedecked with innumerable multicoloured ribbons. They have all been tied by individuals wishing to recognise the suffering of the far-too-many victims/survivors of church-related sexual abuse.

During a public ceremony at 3pm this Sunday, the ribbons will be removed then taken into the Basilica where they are to be placed near the altar as a sign of “repentance, reparation and respect” for those who have suffered so much and for so long.

Just this week, I received an email from Brian, whose son Adam was abused at just seven years of age by a notorious priest offender who was eventually imprisoned for multiple assaults on many children.

Adam was irrevocably damaged by the assaults, which occurred 30 years ago. He has never had regular employment. He has had girlfriends but the relationships never last long. He still relies on his parents as his chief means of personal support.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

JOANNE MCCARTHY
May 20, 2016.

CATHOLIC priest David O’Hearn is in custody awaiting sentence after being found guilty of more than 40 child sex offences against six victims after a fight that has gone all the way to the High Court.

A jury on Friday found him not guilty of three offences against one boy, after separate juries in 2015 and earlier this year found him guilty of 44 offences against six other boys, including sexual intercourse, indecent assault and inciting a minor to commit an indecent act.

The offences occurred in the Hunter while O’Hearn worked as a trainee priest and priest in parishes including Cessnock, Muswellbrook and Windale in the 1980s and 1990s. Victims ranged from nine to 13.

In a statement released late today Maitland-Newcastle Bishop Bill Wright expressed “great shame that another member of the clergy has been guilty of crimes of this kind”.

Judge Richard Cogswell lifted an order on Friday preventing O’Hearn from being named as trials ran in Sydney over a number of years. In 2011 O’Hearn sought leave to appeal to the High Court to have trials involving six victims heard separately. He was first stood down in May, 2008.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
Irish Mirror

BY KATIE STOREY

An Irish Catholic priest sedated a schoolboy before sexually assaulting him at a church, a court has heard.

Canon Mortimer Stanley, 84, is accused of 19 counts of indecent assault over four decades while he was working at St Vincent de Paul Church in Norden, Greater Manchester.

A jury at Minshull Street Crown Court heard on Thursday how one of the alleged victims, who was nine at the time, claimed Stanley, who was born in Limerick, came up behind him while he was getting changed.

He allegedly covered his mouth and nose with a handkerchief soaked in a ‘chloroform-type’ substance, Manchester Evening News reports.

Chloroform is a volatile liquid once used as an anesthetic.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

20 May, 2016

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has released two research reports, with the first examining information-sharing frameworks and the second examining best practice in implementation.

A study into the legislative—and related key policy and operational—frameworks for sharing information relating to child sexual abuse in institutional contexts, considered the legislative frameworks for sharing information relating to child sexual abuse in institutional contexts, between institutions and across jurisdictions in Australia.

The second report, Implementation best practice: A rapid evidence review, examined the effectiveness of planned strategies to change or introduce new practices, programs or policies.

Royal Commission Chief Executive Officer Philip Reed said that along with private sessions and public hearings, the Royal Commission’s research agenda was vital in helping inform the Commissioners ahead of their final report.

“The research examining information sharing arrangements looked at a range of sectors, including out-of-home care, schools and juvenile detention, and consolidated the Australian information-sharing landscape in relation to legislative, key policy and operational frameworks, both within and across Australian jurisdictions,” Mr Reed said.

“The report found laws and common objectives across institutions can help ensure that children’s safety is the primary consideration when sharing information, while laws and policies for information sharing need to be clear and well understood to be effective.

“The second report demonstrates the importance of implementation as a factor in the success or failure of policy change. This report identified and critiqued existing evidence of implementation and identifies elements of best practice approaches, including behavioural change, planning and increasing the competencies and skills of individuals and organisations,” Mr Reed said.

A study into the legislative—and related key policy and operational—frameworks for sharing information relating to child sexual abuse in institutional contexts was conducted by Macquarie University’s Carolyn Adams and Krista Lee-Jones.

Implementation best practice: A rapid evidence review was conducted by the Parenting Research Centre.

The research reports can be found here.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

By KATIE STRICK FOR THE DAILY MAIL

One hundred allegations of child sex abuse are being passed to police every month as part of an inquiry launched in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal, a senior officer has revealed.

Simon Bailey, head of the police unit co-ordinating claims of historic child sex abuse in England and Wales, said he expected to be handed a total of 30,000 new reports by the Goddard inquiry.

The Norfolk Chief Constable also estimated that officers would be looking into about 200,000 claims of child sex abuse by 2020, given the current trajectory.

Mr Bailey told the Guardian: ‘It is fair to say I am surprised by the extent of abuse being exposed, it is shocking. In trying to get a message across to the public about the scale of this, it is important to remember that behind each of these figures there is a victim.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CANADA
APTN

By Paul Barnsley and Kathleen Martens
APTN Investigates

SIOUX LOOKOUT, Ont.– For the second time this month a call has come to review the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement (IRSSA).

In early May, Chief Bill Erasmus, the Assembly of First Nations executive member who is responsible for the residential schools portfolio, called for a review of the $4 billion out-of-court settlement that allowed the federal government and several churches to escape having to defend themselves against a handful of class-action lawsuits related to human rights violations and criminal acts committed against children who were students at the schools.

Erasmus said there is widespread criticism amongst the survivors about the way some of the defendants in the original class actions – the federal government and the Catholic Church – have conducted themselves as the settlement agreement has been administered.

Then, on May 17, Garnet Angeconeb, a respected long-time advocate for survivors of residential schools, sent a letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Indigenous Affairs Minister Carolyn Bennett, and several opposition politicians. APTN Investigates obtained a copy of that letter.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UTAH
Daily Herald

Katie England
Daily Herald

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints released a statement Thursday evening in support of Brigham Young University’s announcement that it has formed an advisory council and seeks public feedback on sexual assault response and Title IX compliance at the university.

BYU has been under widespread media scrutiny after several women approached multiple outlets, reporting that the religious school’s Honor Code Office would hold women accountable for Honor Code violations after they reported sexual assaults to the Title IX Office.

The church’s statement said that the victims’ stories are “painful to read.”

“But we do not believe (these stories) represent the ideals BYU or Church leaders follow when responding to victims,” the statement said.

The statement stressed that there is no place for any kind of abuse or assault on the campus or in the church.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CANADA
Ottawa Sun

Editorial

Several days after being approached by reporter Andrew Duffy about the abuse of children by Catholic priests, the Archdiocese of Ottawa issued a statement of regret. It wants us all to know it is horrified by the long history of priests abusing young people; Duffy’s reporting found at least 41 acknowledged cases in the Ottawa area since the 1980s.

The church wasn’t horrified enough to confirm the exact number, mind you; our reporter had to sift through court files as the church sues its own insurers to get back some of the money it paid in compensation to victims. Nor was the church horrified enough to actually answer any of the detailed written questions put to it about the scandal.

But in its statement, the archdiocese said that, several years back, it began “a process to create safe environments in our faith communities, notably parishes, for the protection of minors and other vulnerable persons.” This includes a code of conduct, and a detailed protocol regarding potential sexual abuse of minors. The documents make it clear – on paper at least – that priests and others have a responsibility not only to behave properly, but to report possible abuse to highers-up in the church.

That responsibility is interesting in light of what one lawyer for victims has found. He said he has rarely encountered a priest who spoke out. “Very rarely have I encountered a whistleblower priest,” said the lawyer. “Nobody steps forward. Nobody squeals on their brother priest.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
South Wales Argus

Hayley Mills

Don’t be last to know! Get the latest local news straight to your inbox.

A PRIEST who spent nearly a decade working in Newport was sentenced to three years in prison for indecently assaulting a girl 40 years ago.

John Farmer, who is also known as Barry, worked at St Mary’s Church in Newport from the 1960s to 70s before moving to a Cardiff parish.

The 84-year-old, now of Cranleigh Road, Guildford, was also a governor of St Joseph’s RC High School in Duffryn.

Farmer was initially charged with 27 counts of indecent assault against one girl, who was between 12 and 14 when the abuse took place, but was found guilty of nine charges after a trial at Newport Crown Court.

The victim was abused as a schoolgirl and as one of Farmer’s parishioners between 1974 and 1976.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
Manchester Evening News

BY KATIE STOREY

A Catholic priest allegedly sedated a primary school boy before sexually assaulting him at a Norden church, a court has heard.

Canon Mortimer Stanley, 84, is accused of 19 counts of indecent assault over four decades while he was working at St Vincent de Paul RC Church.

A jury at Minshull Street Crown heard one of the victims, who was nine at the time of the alleged offence, claim Stanley came up behind him while he was getting changed and covered his mouth and nose with a handkerchief soaked in a ‘chloroform-type’ substance.

The alleged victim says he then passed out slumped over a shelf.

He told the court when he woke up he was partially dressed and Stanley – still partially wearing his church robes – sexually assaulting him.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MICHIGAN
Detroit Free Press

Niraj Warikoo, Detroit Free Press May 19, 2016

A Catholic priest who was removed in 2009 from churches after allegations he abused a teenage girl has resigned from a center for pregnant teens in Eastpointe that he co-founded, Catholic officials said this week.

Fr. Kenneth Kaucheck, 69, was the co-founder, development director and a board member of Gianna House, a new Catholic center to help teenage girls who are pregnant. But after a Free Press report last week on his position there, officials with the center and the Catholic Archdiocese of Detroit are now saying he has resigned and no longer works there.

Kaucheck’s name has been scrubbed from Gianna House’s website, which used to say that Kaucheck co-founded the center along with Sister Mary Diane Masson, executive director at the House, and that he selected the board along with Masson.

Now the website says Masson alone had selected the board and is a co-founder.

The center has also selected a new board, with Dr. Robert Welch, formerly the board’s chairman, no longer on the board.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

CANADA
Ottawa Citizen

ANDREW DUFFY, OTTAWA CITIZEN

A victim of Rev. Barry McGrory’s sexual abuse is demanding to know why the Catholic priest has never been defrocked.

Colleen Passard sent a written statement to the Citizen after the newspaper published a story this week about McGrory, a Catholic priest who admitted in an interview that he sexually abused three adolescents at Ottawa’s Holy Cross Parish in the 1970s and 80s.

McGrory was convicted of sexually assaulting a 17-year-old native youth in 1993 — six years after he was moved to Toronto from Ottawa.

Passard, who asked that her name be published alongside her statement, said diocesan officials assured her in 1997 that he had been removed from the priesthood.

“However, despite assurances from church officials that Barry McGrory had been defrocked since his sexual abuse conviction in 1993, he has continued to be a priest, to hold a sacred trust in the community, under the auspices of the archdiocese,” she wrote.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

OHIO/ILLINOIS
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, May 20, 2016

Statement by Melanie Jula Sakoda of Moraga, California, Orthodox Christian Director for SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (925-708-6175, melanie.sakoda@gmail.com)

Former seminarian Dario Spasic pleaded guilty this week to one count of indecent solicitation of a child. He was sentenced to probation, and will be required to register as a sex offender for 10 years.

[News-Sun]

We had hoped for jail time, since that is the only proven way to stop a predator from hurting children. The former seminarian is a relatively young man. We firmly believe that he will try to harm more kids.

We now beg anyone who suffered, witnessed, or suspected abuse by this predator to call police. Another conviction will mean another chance to take Spasic off the streets.

Spasic was in his final year at Saint Sava Serbian Orthodox School of Theology in Libertyville, Illinois, when he was charged with two counts of indecent solicitation of a child on September 19, 2014. The seminarian contacted what he thought was a 14 year old boy to engage in sexual activity. When he showed up at the arranged meeting he was arrested by sheriff’s detectives. While Spasic was convicted in Illinois, the judge in the case agreed that Spasic can serve his probation under the supervision of the state of Ohio, where he is now living.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Exclusive: Extent of child sexual abuse in England and Wales begins to become clear as inquiry passes on 100 cases a month

Sandra Laville
Thursday 19 May 2016

The scale of child sexual abuse in England and Wales is being exposed by evidence from thousands of victims, with cases being passed to police at a rate of 100 a month by the public inquiry set up following the Jimmy Savile scandal.

Simon Bailey, Norfolk’s chief constable and head of the national coordinating unit Operation Hydrant, said his team was expecting to be given 30,000 reports of new child sexual offences by the Goddard inquiry, and predicted the rate of referrals of allegations of abuse would increase.

The chief constable said that given the trajectory of the number of reports, police would be investigating about 200,000 cases of child sexual abuse by 2020, giving an insight into the extent of child sexual abuse in Britain over many decades.

Bailey added: “It is fair to say I am surprised by the extent of abuse being exposed, it is shocking. In trying to get a message across to the public about the scale of this, it is important to remember that behind each of these figures there is a victim.

“We are seeing a significant rise in the number of referrals each month from the Goddard inquiry, and these allegations relate to abuse in a range of institutions from the church, to schools, the scouts and hospitals.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

The Archbishop of Canterbury has formally apologised to the Dean of Jersey for years of “hurt” following an investigation into allegations of abuse in the church in the island.

The Dean’s handling of a complaint from a parishioner about abuse she claimed she suffered at the hands of a senior figure in the church was the subject of a formal investigation, and led to the breakdown of relations between the Jersey church and the Winchester Diocese to which it officially belongs.

Jersey is currently being ‘managed’, instead, by the Bishop of Dover.

Today, the Most Reverend and Right Honourable Justin Welby has written to Jersey’s Bailiff, in which he acknowledges the “enormous personal stress hurt and uncertainty” suffered by Bob Key and his wife Daphne.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

LOUISIANA
KSLA

[with video]

By Nick Lawton, Reporter

SHREVEPORT, LA (KSLA) –
Back in April, a Shreveport mother spoke out to us anonymously about her lawsuit against St. Mark’s Cathedral School for her son, identified as M.R.

We’ve now obtained documents showing a Louisiana Senator asking for a full state investigation into the school.

The mother’s lawsuit alleges her then 12-year-old son was expelled for his behavior with his cabin mates on a 2014 school field trip to Pine Cove.

The school claims the boy inappropriately touched the other boys, behavior his mother claims did not happen.

“He agreed that he and several other boys were playing these same type of games, just boy dormitory-type behavior, but he was the one that was told on,” his mother said during an April 7 interview.

The lawsuit alleges that even though the camp counselors denied M.R.’s inappropriate behavior and a local psychologist reported M.R. showed no signs of sexual deviant behavior, St. Mark’s still expelled him for “inappropriate touching of other students when not in the presence of adults.”

The mother is suing the school, asking if this sexual abuse did happen, why didn’t Head of School Dr. Chris Carter follow LA R.S. 14:403, the Mandatory Reporter Law?

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

ILLINOIS
Aurora Beacon-News

Dan Campana
Aurora Beacon-News

Kane County prosecutors have added two new charges against North Aurora pastor Ralphael Robinson, who sits in jail accused of sexually assaulting and abusing a girl last month.

Robinson, 39, most recently of Aurora, has now also been charged with violating the state’s sex offender registration rules and not properly reporting his job status when registering with Aurora police in April, court documents show. Prosecutors allege Robinson “knowingly furnished false information” and “failed to furnish current employment information” to authorities, according to charges.

Robinson – who is still described as the “senior leader of Kingdom Church” on his website – is listed as a sexual predator on the Illinois Sex Offender Registry stemming from a 2004 sex abuse conviction in Cook County. He was arrested and charged with criminal sex assault and sex abuse in April on allegations he fondled a girl while at the church on South Lincolnway Street. Robinson is in Kane County Jail on $107,500 bail with a May 26 hearing date scheduled on all his charges.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW YORK
Forward

Sam Kestenbaum
May 19, 2016

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Wednesday backed a bill that would make it easier for survivors of childhood sexual abuse to seek justice from their abusers as adults.

By bowing to repeated calls by victims and advocates, Cuomo removes a significant roadblock to the reform measure, although it remains to be seen if lawmakers will pass it.

“This is an incredibly important issue and we are serious about addressing it this [legislative] session,” said Cuomo spokesman Richard Azzopardi, according to the Daily News . “We have been discussing options with the Legislature, have met with advocates and survivors, and are meeting with them again (Thursday).”

Cuomo had previously dodged questions from both the press and activists as to whether he would support current legislation, known as the Child Victims Act, which would eliminate New York’s statute of limitations for sexual abuse, one of the shortest in the nation. Currently, survivors have until their 23rd birthday to bring forward legal claims about their abuse.

Over 100 Jewish leaders, including rabbis from all major denominations , are lobbying in support of the legislation. A significant contingent of Jewish backers claim to have been abused by rabbis or teachers in religious schools as children.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

NEW YORK
Frum Follies

This morning’s (5/19/16) New York Daily News ran a headline, “Gov. Cuomo will push law allowing child-abuse victims to seek justice as adults.” The URL tells a different story about his position when they first created the article: “http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/gov-cuomo-pushes-liquor-law-reform-ignores-child-sex-abuse-vics-article-1.2641982.” Its seems the spirits have moved the governor to a new public stance.

The good news is that New York State’s governor is feeling the heat from anti-abuse activists. The bad news is that he is still committed to protecting the interests of the Catholic church and Agudath Israel of America. Both of them know, that for all their denials, there was a massive coverup of abuse. Opening a window for suing about past abuse will both cost them a lot and will further expose their moral indifference to the epidemic of abuse inflicted by the employees of their institutions.

Cuomo will probably maneuver the legislature to extend the SOL in the future while not opening a window for suing about past abuse by older victims/survivors who are now barred from suing after their 23rd birthday. Politically, such legislation will probably take the wind out of future efforts to open a window for suing about past abuse. This will only be half a loaf. It would have the beneficial effect of scaring the bejeebus out of Haredi schools that continue to protect molesters in their employ.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

GUAM
Pacific Daily News

[with video]

Jasmine Stole, Pacific Daily News May 20, 2016

A member of a board within Guam’s Catholic Church that reviews sexual misconduct complaints wrote an email to the church’s sexual abuse response coordinator Wednesday stating he believes accusations that the archbishop sexually assaulted a minor.

Vincent Pereda, the board member who wrote the email, also stated he would resign from the board immediately.

Pereda’s email addressed an accusation against Archbishop Anthony Apuron, who oversees the island’s Catholic Church.

Raymond Taitague Quintanilla, 52, on Tuesday came forward publicly accusing Apuron of molesting him as a 12-year-old altar boy about 40 years ago. Quintanilla delivered a letter for Apuron to the Chancery Office on Tuesday, detailing the abuse.

Hours after the letter was delivered, the Archdiocese of Agana issued a three-sentence statement that said it affirms its commitment to its sexual misconduct and harassment policy. In light of Quintanilla’s allegations, the archdiocese statement said the Sexual Abuse Response coordinator Deacon Larry Claros had been informed and was coordinating a response. Part of that response includes convening the Archdiocese Review Board.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

TEXAS/MALAWI
New York Daily News

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Wednesday, May 18, 2016

MIDLAND, Texas — A Texas man who managed an orphanage in Malawi has pleaded guilty to sexually abusing orphans at the East African facility.

Gerald Campbell pleaded guilty before a U.S. magistrate Wednesday in Midland, Texas, to one count of engaging in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign place.

The 66-year-old Odessa man could get 10 years to life in prison. Sentencing hasn’t been scheduled yet.

Campbell admitted to sexually abusing eight orphans at the Victory Christian Children’s Home in Malawi between 1997 and 2009.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MALAWI
Malawi 24

An American pastor has told a court in his native country that he raped orphaned boys in Malawi and knew he would get away with it.

The shameless pervert, Gerald Campbell, 66, raped eight orphans, including one who infected with HIV, at the Victory Christian Children’s Home in Malawi between 1997 and 2009.

According to Reuters, the rapist faces up to 10 years in jail after pleading guilty to one count of illicit sexual conduct in a foreign place.

The monster used his position as general manager of the orphan to lure his victims; he offered them access to better rooms within the orphanage and allowed them to use hot water at his house. He also lived with some of the victims for months in his house.

Campbell said he gave money and valuable things to two of his victims so that they should not disclose the sexual abuse. He told the court that he knew that no one will believe the children if they reported the sexual abuse.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

Christopher Knaus

The government is under pressure to move swiftly to scrap time-limits making it harder for historical child abuse victims to sue for damages.

NSW, Victoria and the federal government have all moved in recent months to remove the statute of limitations which prevented survivors from suing after too many years had passed.

The states were acting in response to the child abuse royal commission, which recommended last year that limitations be scrapped, that it be done retrospectively, and that a consistent approach be taken across jurisdictions.

It also recommended the establishment of a national redress scheme that would begin hearing applications for compensation by survivors in July 2017.

The ACT is yet to make a move on scrapping its time-limit, which is generally six years from the cause of the civil action or from the time the child turns 18.

A spokesman for the ACT Attorney-General Simon Corbell said the government was pushing for the establishment of the national redress scheme.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

PERU
RPP

[The Archdiocese of Piura said in a statement that Archbishop José Eguren Anselmi is surprised to have been included in the complaint against members of the Sodality of Christian Life by five alleged victims of abuse by the founder of this Catholic group, Luis Fernando Figari. The religious group expelled him months ago. The archbishop said the complaint in question does not refer to sexual abuse.]

El Arzobispado de Piura, mediante un comunicado, indicó que el arzobispo monseñor José Eguren Anselmi está sorprendido de haber sido incluido en la denuncia contra integrantes del Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana, por parte de cinco presuntas víctimas de abusos por parte del fundador de este grupo católico Luis Fernando Figari, a quien la congregación religiosa expulsó meses atrás.

En el comunicado del Arzobispado indican que la denuncia en cuestión no se refiere a abusos sexuales.

La denuncia penal ampliatoria presentada al Ministerio Público pide se añada a los cargos por los que se abrió una investigación de oficio, el pasado 22 de octubre de 2015, los delitos de secuestro, lesiones graves y asociación ilícita para delinquir.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

PARAGUAY
Ultima Hora

[Priest Estanisiao Arevaleos is alleged to have groped altar boys and tried to kiss them on the mouth. The information reached the ears of his superior who did not take it as a complaint and sent the priest to Paraguari to reopen a mission.]

jvargas@uhora.com.py

El presbítero Vicente Soria, superior de los misioneros redentoristas del Paraguay, tomó conocimiento del supuesto hecho de pedofilia contra dos monaguillos, ocurrido en la vicaría Divino Espíritu, a instancias de una catequista. Esto lo confirmó el religioso a ÚH. Igual, envió al párroco Estanislao Arévalos a Paraguarí con la misión de reasumir la casa provincial redentorista en Carapeguá, decisión que ya la habían tomado “a inicios de ese año 2013”.

Recién en diciembre del 2014, Soria le suspende de su ministerio sacerdotal a Arévalos, a raíz de la denuncia presentada por los padres de los menores ante el Ministerio Público sobre el caso que un año antes recibió “como una cuestión de confidencialidad”.

“Para mí la información llegó en diciembre del 2014, antes no tomé conocimiento del caso; así como denuncia, no (…) Desde que el curso de la denuncia tuvo la formalidad, estamos siguiendo lo que dice el protocolo (de la Iglesia) y la justicia paraguaya”, argumentó sobre la cita para declarar en el marco de la causa por supuesto abuso sexual contra un sacerdote de su congregación.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

PARAGUAY
ABC

[con video]

[Ask the Pope to investigate the rector of Catholic University. The rector of the Catholic University (UC) Our Lady of the Assumption, Father Narciso Velazquez, was allegedly one of the “abettors” of the Argentine priest Carlos Ibanez, who came to Paraguay from Argentina, where he had been accused of sexual abuse minors.]

El rector de la Universidad Católica (UC) Nuestra Señora de la Asunción, padre Narciso Velázquez, había sido supuestamente uno de los “encubridores” del sacerdote argentino Carlos Ibáñez, quien vino al Paraguay desde Argentina, donde había sido acusado de cometer abuso sexual contra menores, denunciaron funcionarios de la institución durante una manifestación, que se realizó ayer en horas de la tarde.

Por su parte, el rector Velázquez aseguró que no conoce a ningún sacerdote pedófilo y que está a disposición de la Comisión de Investigación para que se esclarezca el caso.

El secretario general del Sindicato de Trabajadores de la UC, Julio López, manifestó que solicitan al papa Francisco que intervenga y se interiorice de la situación de los sacerdotes en el Paraguay.

El gremialista solicita a las autoridades de la Iglesia que se investigue a fondo, no solo al sacerdote Ibáñez, sino también las posibles responsabilidades de otras personas que permitieron que por tantos años se engañe a la feligresía en el país.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

UNITED KINGDOM
Church Times

by Tim Wyatt

Posted: 19 May 2016

A MAN who was abused by two senior Church of England clergyman has demanded that senior bishops make public statements of “repentance” because of what he says is their failure to act quickly on safeguarding reform.

The survivor, known only as “Joe”, was sexually assaulted by the Revd Garth Moore, a former Chancellor of the dioceses of Southwark, Durham, and Gloucester, who died in 1990 (News, 4 December); and later exploited by Michael Fisher, who was then a brother in the Society of St Francis, and later became Bishop of St Germans.

An independent report on failings in his case called for sweeping changes to the Church’s safeguarding procedures, condemning them as “fundamentally flawed” (News, 18 March). But in an open letter, published last week, Joe said that there had been total silence from bishops since the report came out in March.

“I call on the House of Bishops to repent at your meeting in York at the end of this week,” he wrote. “Others in the survivor community are saying the same. Repentance implies action and not just word — it is about turning around 180 degrees and starting again.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

GUAM
Radio New Zealand

[with audio]

Transcript

There are calls for Guam’s Archbishop to stand down after an accusation of historical sexual abuse was made against him.

Archbishop Anthony Apuron is denying the allegation he molested an altar boy 40 years ago.
Jo O’Brien reports.

The allegation was made during an emotional media conference posted on the Pacific Daily News website. 52 year old Roy Quintanilla read out a letter addressed to the Archbishop, the most senior person in the Catholic Church in Guam.

ROY QUINTANILLA: “Dear Archbishop Apuron, when I was 12 years old and an altar boy you molested me when you were the pastor of Agat.”

Mr Quintanilla went on to describe how Archbishop Apuron had abused him after asking him to stay the night at his house. He says the abuse left him so confused he later considered suicide.

ROY QUINTANILLA: “I cried then and I’ve never stopped crying. I felt a lot of emotions. I was scared, angry, sad, alone, embarassed and humiliated. I did not know what to do.”

Mr Quintanilla says he wants the Archbishop to step down and apologise for what he did to him. But in a video statement on the website of the Catholic Archdiocese of Agana in Guam, Archbishop Apuron gave this response.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.