ABUSE TRACKER

CANADA
Bayshore Broadcasting

by Kevin Bernard

Fred King will stand trial for charges related to sexual and physical assault at church.

(Owen Sound) –
The trial of a man known as “the Prophet” at the Church of Jesus Christ Restored in Chatsworth gets underway today.

57 year old Fred King is facing 24 charges related to the time he was leader of the Church.

Three weeks have been set aside for the case to be heard in Owen Sound Superior Court.

It is not a jury trial — as King elected to be tried by Judge alone.

The charges date from 1978 to 2008 and include sexual exploitation, sexual interference, three counts of sexual assault, and three counts of assault causing bodily harm.

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
New York Magazine

By Catie L’Heureux

In a new report, the Boston Globe’s Spotlight Team paints a horrifying portrait of the reality of sexual abuse in New England private schools. The report itself is an important read, providing a 25-year history of the issue and prompting a breakdown of the most sobering statistics here. It’s worth noting that besides these findings, there is currently no database of allegations against private-school employees (and limited research on sex abuse in public schools).

Among 67 New England private schools, over the past 25 years, more than 200 students have accused private-school authorities of sexual abuse or sexual harassment — teachers, administrators, staff members, and (in one case) an admissions officer.

Their claims: rape, fondling, molestation, and oral sex.

At least 90 students or their families have filed lawsuits.

At least 37 school employees were fired or forced to resign because of the claims.

Nearly two dozen employees ultimately pleaded guilty or were convicted on criminal charges of abusing children or related crimes.

Of at least eight New England private schools that have started investigations of alleged sexual misconduct this year, five schools have fired or placed staff members on administrative leave: at St. George’s School in Rhode Island, the Taft School in Connecticut, Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, and Thayer Academy and Concord Academy in Massachusetts.

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UNITED STATES
PBS Newshour

HARI SREENIVASAN: The past couple of years have brought new revelations about sexual abuse at private schools. At least eight private schools in New England have launched or disclosed investigations this year.

Now a Boston Globe investigation has opened a wider window on the scope of the problem. The report done by the Spotlight unit that exposed the sexual abuse scandal in the church found at least 67 New England schools have faced accusations since 1991. The Globe also found more than 200 former students say they have been assaulted or harassed, and years of alleged cover-ups in some cases.

St. George’s School in Rhode Island is one school under investigation.

Anne Scott is a survivor who was allegedly raped in 1977 at the school by a former athletic trainer when she was 15. Her family later brought a lawsuit, but the Globe said the school fought back with its own suit and pressured her to sign a gag order.

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 Guardian

Joshua Robertson
@jrojourno
Tuesday 10 May 2016

The Queensland government is facing calls to act on royal commission findings to abolish a legal loophole that prevents victims of child sexual abuse suing for compensation after the age of 21.

Queensland, which has one of Australia’s most restrictive regimes for victims seeking redress, is yet to make any move towards removing time limits used by churches and elite private schools to reduce their exposure to abuse claims.

That is despite the commission making it a final recommendation eight months ago and three other states since – Victoria, New South Wales and Western Australia – either passing or tabling reforms in parliament.

A group of researchers, lawyers and advocates are leading a push for the Palaszczuk government to remove what they say remains a critical obstacle to justice for victims potentially numbering in their thousands.

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ALABAMA
Times Daily

Tuesday, May 10, 2016
By Tom Smith Senior Staff Writer

RUSSELLVILLE — A Spruce Pine woman looked at Freddy Hovater on Monday morning and told him she never thought he could hurt her child.

“God will take care of this,” the woman told Hovater. “What gets me through this is knowing that you will have to answer to God one day.”

Hovater, 74, a former Franklin County pastor, pleaded guilty to charges he sexually abused the woman’s 8-year-old daughter in 2011. He pleaded guilty in March to child abuse and third-degree assault with sexual motivation.

On Monday morning, Franklin County Circuit Judge Terry Dempsey sentenced Hovater to 10 years, which was split with 18 months to serve on the child abuse charge and one year on the third-degree assault charge.

The two sentences are to be served concurrently.

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
Anglican Journal

By Diana Swift on May, 09 2016

The Anglican Communion’s Safe Church Consultation emerged from painful revelations in the 1990s that Christian churches—supposedly places of trust—were sometimes magnets for bullies and predators and sites of misconduct and abuse.

In 2008, the consultation addressed this phenomenon at Creating a Safer Church, an international conference in Woking, U.K., and in 2011, a second international conference, Partnering for Prevention, in Victoria, B.C., continued the scrutiny of religious structures that perpetuate abuse.

In a revitalized commitment to improving the welfare of all people in Anglican churches across the Communion’s provinces—clergy, parishioners and community members alike—renewed efforts in education, training and screening are under way to ward off abuse and when, inevitably, it happens, to quickly respond.

And the scope of efforts now extends well beyond sexual misconduct to the bullying and mistreatment of a broad range of victims. “Initially the focus was on preventing abuse of kids, youth and vulnerable adults, but as we got started, we realized we needed to help parishes prevent abuse in all forms, regardless of the victims and the abusers,” said Lorraine Street, a program and staffing risk-management consultant providing support and resources for SafeR Church, a project of the Halifax-based diocese of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Liverpool Echo

BY JANET TANSLEY

After years of pain and torment, Chris Ryder had finally had enough.

As he listened to yet more tales of historic child abuse on the TV news, tears welling in his eyes, he picked up the phone to the police…and told them of his own.

“I couldn’t live with the pain any longer,” he says. “I was fed up of hearing about historic sex cases each one bringing me to tears, I had to tell someone and get him off the streets and, hopefully, get help for myself!”

Like so many others Chris’s abuse had been inflicted on him by someone he should have been able to trust. John Michael Creagh – “we knew him as Michael Creagh” – was a scoutmaster who had become a friend of the family in Ormskirk.

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BALTIMORE (MD)
Fox Baltimore

BY ZOE ZELLERS MONDAY, MAY 9TH 2016

BALTIMORE (WBFF) – In an effort to improve transparency and encourage more victims of childhood sexual abuse by priests and religious brothers to come forward, the Archdiocese of Baltimore has published a list of those who have been accused of abuse in the past. The list, originally published in September 2002, included 57 men. It did not include those accused after their deaths or cases where an investigation “concluded that the facts did not indicate sexual abuse had occurred.”

The list below also includes priests and religious brothers who have been accused since 2002 of child sexual abuse after that list was originally published, totaling 71 clergymen. All allegations have been reported to law enforcement and to the Archdiocese’s Independent Child Abuse Review Board. If allegations against a person were investigated and not deemed credible, that subject’s name was not included in the list.

According to the Archdiocese of Baltimore, “None of the individuals listed here are in ministry in the Archdiocese of Baltimore; some have died and some have been laicized–all have had their faculties to function as a priest in the Archdiocese of Baltimore removed.”

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
CBS Minnesota

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — A St. John’s priest accused of sexual abuse allegedly told his victim it was required as a part of the confirmation process.

On Monday, a new lawsuit was filed against Father Michael Bik and St. John’s Abbey.

Prosecutors say Bik abused a boy at St. John’s Prep after the school learned he sexually abused two students in the 1970s, when he was a teacher at St. Stephens in Anoka.

They say Bik admitted to the abuse in 1998 and St. John’s allowed him to keep teaching.

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, STEPHEN REX BROWN NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, May 9, 2016

The state’s political leaders don’t have time to discuss reform a law shielding sex abuse offenders — so now the public’s voice must be heard.

Advocates asked average New Yorkers to urge lawmakers to support a bill that would extend the statute of limitations on civil claims involving child sex-abuse victims.

“Gov. Cuomo and leaders in the Assembly and state Senate need to hear from you right now. Tell them they should support the Child Victims Act,” Assemblywoman Margaret Markey (D-Queens) said Monday.

Letters, emails and phone calls would “reinforce the good work” of dozens of supporters who lobbied legislators last week regarding the bill, Markey added.

The urgent call for public support came the same day state Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan, Senate Independent Democratic Conference Leader Jeffrey Klein, Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie and Gov. Cuomo huddled behind closed doors for a discussion of what could be accomplished before the end of the legislative session next month.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY STEPHEN JIMENEZ NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, May 9, 2016

New Yorkers and people of good faith everywhere agree that the sexual abuse of children is among the most heinous of crimes. It is not a political or partisan “issue” – but a universal human concern with lifelong ramifications for all of us and our families and communities, especially our children.

Why, then, has this crucial issue been so neglected by the powers-that-be in our great state of New York? Why is our state plagued by one of the worst records in the nation when it comes to statute of limitations reform?

Sadly, New York ranks alongside Alabama and Mississippi, a potent reminder that the quest for civil and human rights must continue until our children are adequately protected – and all who were previously victimized are allowed to seek legal redress.

As a survivor of years of sexual abuse by a Xaverian teaching brother at Holy Name School in Brooklyn – from age 10 until nearly 14 – I was molested repeatedly in bathhouses, locker rooms, shower stalls, classrooms and other places. I have tried to seek justice for more than a dozen years from Catholic Chruch officials, including Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn. Because I have been barred by the statute of limitations from filing a criminal or civil suit, I approached church officials directly, only to find the church staunchly opposed to the Child Victims Act, including its one-year “window” that would allow older victims like me to pursue claims.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Tracy Bowden

David Ridsdale, a high-profile survivor of child abuse who travelled to Rome to watch Cardinal George Pell give evidence to the royal commission, has been accused of not being transparent about his own past as an abuser.

Mr Ridsdale had endured four years of sexual abuse at the hands of his uncle, Catholic priest Gerald Ridsdale, but in 1995 was himself charged with two counts of indecently assaulting a young victim.

He pleaded guilty and was placed on a 12-month good behaviour bond, with the magistrate noting that the behaviour was influenced by the treatment he had suffered at the hands of his uncle.

David Ridsdale’s victim was Corey Artz, who has broken his silence after 30 years, joining the hundreds of others who have told their harrowing stories to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

And he wants the man who abused him to be equally open about what happened.

“I am just surprised he gets up there and speaks as he does when he knows of his past, he knows he has done wrong,” Mr Artz told 7.30.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Written by Janela Carrera

The petition was put together by the group called Silent No More!

Guam – First an ad calling on victims of sexual abuse to come forward and now a petition drive for the legislature to lift the statute of limitations on past sexual abuse. While the goals may be similar, the two initiatives are separate.

Joe Santos is a George Washington High School teacher, but he’s taken time off so he could push a petition to collect signatures.

“Our goal is to achieve 100,000 signatures because everyone on this island should be against child sexual abuse,” says Santos.

Santos held a press conference today to announce his effort to get the entire island behind this initiative. After collecting the signatures, Santos will present the collected signatures to the Legislature to urge them to introduce legislation that will lift the statute of limitations on sexual abuse cases.

Santos says a law was passed in 2011 that lifted the statute of limitations for reporting sex abuse crimes, but at the time it only allowed for a two year window for victims to come forward.

“But that law has since expired and if you read the law, it’s somewhat handicaps people from pursuing civil actions. In the little research that I’ve been able to do … I’d like the law that gets passed out of this petition, to be one that’s more favorable to the victims as opposed to one that shields the perpetrator.”

Santos says just as there is no statute of limitations on murder, the same should be true for child sexual abuse.

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CONNECTICUT
WTNH

[with video]

By Tina Detelj, WTNH Reporter

MONTVILLE & DEEP RIVER, Conn. (WTNH) — 67 private schools in New England are named in the Boston Globe article on sex abuse.

News8 looked at two in eastern Connecticut where the alleged abusers have now passed away.

St. Thomas More in Montville is a private college preparatory school for boys and according to the article investigating allegations of sexual abuse and harassment by staff it is one of 16 private schools in Connecticut where alleged abuse took place.

“I’m not surprised at all because I’m religious so I guess you see my chains whatever but you just have to pray for the good that’s all,” says Kareem Lucas of Groton.

The article is written by the Globe’s “Spotlight” investigative team which was showcased in the academy award winning film of the same name for its exposure of the sex abuse scandal in the Catholic church.

At St. Thomas More a former student sued the school in 2003, saying Father Edward McGrath sexually abused him in the 1970s. McGrath who died in 1998 has also been accused by at least one other student.

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MARYLAND
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Monday, May 9, 2016

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 503 0003 cell, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org)

While we’re glad Baltimore Catholic officials are again listing predator priests on the archdiocesan website but wish they would do the same on local parish websites. We’re sad that this has taken so long to do and believe they can and should do much more to protect kids.

[Baltimore Sun]

We strongly suspect that this list is incomplete. We also suspect Archbishop William Lori will use this list to try and persuade lawmakers that reforming Maryland’s archaic, predator-friendly statute of limitations, claiming “Now, there’s no need to let victims expose pedophiles in court because we’re listing them ourselves.” If he tries this, he’ll of course be dead wrong and dreadfully disingenuous.

Still, most bishops refuse to take this minimal step to warn parents, police, prosecutors, parishioners and the public about child molesting clerics they’ve recruited, educated, ordained, trained, shielded and often still protect. So this is progress. We hope DC Archbishop Donald Wuerl – and about another 140 or 150 US bishops – soon do likewise.

No matter what lawmakers or church officials do or don’t do, we urge every single person who saw, suspected or suffered child sex crimes and cover ups in Catholic churches or institutions to protect kids by calling police, get help by calling therapists, expose wrongdoers by calling law enforcement, get justice by calling attorneys, and be comforted by calling support groups like ours. This is how kids will be safer, adults will recover, criminals will be prosecuted, cover ups will be deterred and the truth will surface.

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
St. Cloud Times

David Unze, dunze@stcloudtimes.com May 9, 2016

A former student at St. John’s Prep has sued the school, St. John’s Abbey, the Order of St. Benedict and the Rev. Michael Bik, accusing Bik of sexually abusing him in 1998.

The lawsuit filed Monday alleges negligence in Prep School leaders allowing Bik to teach at the school 28 years after Bik abused two boys while he was a lay teacher at an Anoka school.

The lawsuit accuses Bik of abusing the boy, who was 15 or 16 in 1998, during preparations for the boy’s confirmation. The boy asked another abbey monk if what Bik was doing was necessary to prepare for his confirmation, and that monk told him no.

“Michael Bik promised to confirm him if he had sex with him,” said Jeffrey Anderson, the attorney suing the abbey, the Prep School and Bik.

“Michael Bik denies the allegations … and will defend against them vigorously,” the abbey said in a statement released Monday afternoon.

It accused Anderson of building a case against Bik using out-of-context snippets of one monk’s candid, subjective thoughts. Those thoughts are attributed to Brother Robin Pierzina, who wrote memos and work assessments of Bik before Bik was accepted into St. John’s Abbey to study for the priesthood.

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MINNESOTA
Jeff Anderson and Associates

[with press conference video]

Bik abused the boy after St. John’s learned he sexually abused two students in the 1970s when he was a teacher at St. Stephen’s in Anoka

Bik taught at Twin Cities Catholic schools in Anoka and Shoreview before becoming a monk and priest of St. John’s

Doe 497 Amended Complaint
5-9-2016- Internal Statement Re the Impact of the May 25 Deadline
Bik, Michael Photo
11-5-2002 Letter from Klassen to Bik re negative media
9-1989 Work Assessment re Bik Unable to Resist the Preps
9-19-1988 Memo re Bik’s emotional needs in Preps
9-4-1988 Letter re Bik spending time with the prep students
9-3-1998 Note from Abbot Kelly allowing Bik to live at the Monastery
9-3-1998 Memo from Abbot Kelly re Allegation of Abuse by Bik
9-19-1988- Memo re Bik’s time spent with Prep Students
1992- Final Evaluation re Bik from RIverside Medical Center
4-11-2008- St. Luke Treatment Report re Bik
9-15-2006- Star Trib Article- Delay in Sex-Abuse Case Sparks Protests
Bik Assignment History
10-9-1998- Ltr from Abbot Kelly to Archbishop Flynn re allegation against Bik
2-28-2006- Treatment Summary from the U of M re Bik
8-15-2011- E-mail from Klassen to Bik re asking permission to go to town
8-15-2011- e-mail from Andert to Klassen re Bik out unsupervised
9-4-1988 Memo re Bik spending time with the prep students

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MICHIGAN
The Daily Beast

Kelly Weill

A teen sex scandal forced him from his church. Now he’s opened a teen pregnancy counseling center.

The Gianna House, a Christian-run teen pregnancy center outside Detroit, offers a safe haven for pregnant teens. Unfortunately, its co-founder is barred from working with the Catholic church, after he allegedly abused a teen girl in his parish.

The Archdiocese of Detroit barred Reverend Kenneth Kaucheck from public ministry in 2009, after a woman accused him of molesting her as a teenager in the 1970s, when he acted as her counselor. But Kaucheck’s ban hasn’t prevented him from working with teenagers. His new role as co-founder of the Gianna House has him leading an organization that advertises safety and guidance for pregnant teens and new mothers.

The sexual abuse charges against Kaucheck went public in 2009, when an alleged victim made an official report to the Catholic church. The alleged abuse had occurred some 33 years earlier, she said, when Kaucheck was her counselor at the Guardian Angels Catholic Church outside Detroit. She was prompted to report the decades-old abuse after Kaucheck scheduled an appointment at the doctor’s office where she worked, the Detroit Free Press reported in 2009.

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NEW YORK
New York Post

By Isabel Vincent and Susan Edelman

A former Queens biology teacher who allegedly forced an underage student to repeatedly have sex and demanded she have two abortions skirted authorities after a prominent Catholic school quietly fired him, allowing him to work for years in city public schools, officials report.

Rodney Alejandro abused the 15-year-old girl at St. Francis Preparatory School in Queens, and then went on to work for the Department of Education, a 2015 probe by the city’s Special Commissioner of Investigation charges.

First a city substitute in 1998-99, he worked from 2004 to 2010 at Robert Wagner Jr. Secondary School for Arts and Technology in Long Island City and was fired after his state license expired, officials said. He then went on to teach at a religious school in Georgia.

His reported victim, now 43 and living in Queens, declined to comment but confirmed to The Post horrendous details she published in a 2014 blog. The Post is withholding her name.

Alejandro, now 52, allegedly began raping the girl in January 1988.

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NEW YORK
Daily Mail (UK)

By JAMES DUNN FOR MAILONLINE

A teacher who allegedly repeatedly abused a 15-year-old girl and forced her to get two abortions was allowed to continue working in education after a Catholic school failed to report him, an investigation claims.

Rodney Alejandro, a biology teacher at St Francis Preparatory School in Queens, allegedly began raping the girl in January 1988, according to the Special Commissioner of Investigations (SCI) report.

But he resigned quietly from the New York Catholic school, and went on to work for various others between 1998 and 2012 when he was eventually fired for an unrelated reason.

The girl reported the case to investigators in 2014 when the school was the subject of a $17million lawsuit alleging sexual and physical abuse against teachers at the school in 2013. Her case was dismissed.

The victim, who said wrote a blog about the abuse she suffered, said it made her ‘suicidal’, but she was told too much time had passed since it happened and she could not launch a lawsuit.

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MICHIGAN
Mediaite

by Lindsey Ellefson May 9th, 2016

Sometimes, priests get in trouble for serious things, like railing coke on camera. Sometimes, they get in trouble for silly things, like riding hoverboards. The priest we are about to talk about got in trouble for something that falls into that “serious” category: He was dismissed from his position at two churches in 2009 when it was alleged that he had sexually abused a teenage girl in the 1970s.

According to the Detroit Free Press, church officials determined that Rev. Kenneth Kaucheck had acted inappropriately with the girl he was meant to be helping and they banned him from public ministry.

Now, though, he has been given a position as a director at the Gianna House Pregnancy and Parenting Residence. The Gianna House takes in young women and teenagers who are pregnant. It provides them with support and resources for themselves and any kids they may have.

Naturally, a number of people in Detroit and around the country are less than pleased that Kaucheck is being trusted with teenaged girls once again. The Archdiocese of Detroit and the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) have both spoken out against his placement.

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.

BALTIMORE (MD)
Roman Catholic Diocese of Baltimore

In September of 2002, the Archdiocese of Baltimore published a list of priests and religious brothers who had served in the Archdiocese of Baltimore and who had been accused, in their lifetime, of child sexual abuse. The 57 men on that disclosure are listed below with links to additional information. As was noted at the time by Cardinal William H. Keeler, Archbishop of Baltimore, the disclosure did not include priests and brothers who were accused after their deaths, nor did it include a few instances where an investigation concluded that the facts did not indicate sexual abuse had occurred. For greater context, the information accompanying the 2002 disclosures can also be found by hovering over the names listed below (FireFox is the recommended browser to use).

Also listed below are those priests of the Archdiocese of Baltimore who, after September 2002, were accused of child sexual abuse during their lifetimes along with information from the public disclosure that was made. All allegations of child sexual abuse are reported to authorities and to the Archdiocese’s Independent Child Abuse Review Board. If such reporting and investigation determined that an allegation was not credible, the alleged perpetrator is not listed here. We also provide names and links to public disclosures made by the Archdiocese regarding some priests from religious orders or other dioceses who were accused after 2002, although the Archdiocese’s information about such non-Archdiocesan priests is often limited.

Priests of the Archdiocese of Baltimore have no parenthetical after their names. Priests and brothers from religious orders or other dioceses have that noted in parentheses after their names. None of the individuals listed here are in ministry in the Archdiocese of Baltimore; some have died and some have been laicized–all have had their faculties to function as a priest in the Archdiocese of Baltimore removed.

Priests and Religious named in the September 2002 Disclosure:

Avant, James (Capuchin)
LeFevre, Francis
Ball, Bruce E. (Diocese of La Crosse, WI)
Lorento, Anthony (Pallotine)
Banko, John (Diocese of Trenton/Metuchen, NJ)
Loskarin, George
Bauernfeind, Thomas
Mardaga, Ronald
Blackwell, Maurice
Martin, Kenneth (Diocese of Wilmington)
Brett, Laurence (Diocese of Bridgeport)
Maskell, A. Joseph
Brinkmann, Frederick (Redemptorist)
Maurer, Arthur (Josephite)
Bugge, Gerald (Redemptorist)
McGrath, Francis(Diocese of Trenton)
Carney, John
Melville, Raymond (Diocese of Portland, Maine)
Carroll, Douglas (Pallotine)
Michaud, Ronald
Cox, Brian
Mike, John
Deakin, Richard (Capuchin)
Murphy, Timothy (Trinitarian)
Dimitroff, Donald (Christian Brother)
Newman, Robert (Sons of Charity)
Dowdy, James
O’Toole, Henry (Redemptorist)
Duggan, John (Jesuit)
Pecore, Dennis (Salvatorian)
Duke, Frederick
Rochacewcz, Thomas (Redemptorist)
Emala, Walter (Diocese of Memphis)
Rouse, Charles
Farabaugh, Kenneth
Rydzewski, Thomas
Gallagher, Joseph
Simms, William
Gerg, Joseph (Benedictine)
Smith, David
Haight, Mark (Diocese of Albany)
Smith, Thomas
Hammer, John (Diocese of Youngstown and Saginaw)
Spillane, Michael
Helowicz, Marion
Stroup, Edmund
Hopkins, Robert
Sweeney, Francis (Paulist)
Knapp, Paul (Redemptorist)
Toohey, Jerome
Kruse, Joseph
Toulas, James (Redemptorist)
LaMountain, Michael (Diocese of Providence)
Tragesser, Gerald
LaPorta, Ross
Wehrle, William (Jesuit)
Lee, Thomas B. (Archdiocese of Seoul, Korea)

Additional Allegations (in order of disclosure):

Barnes, Michael
Bevan, Thomas
Bonacci, Louis (Jesuit)
Coyle, Charles (Jesuit)
Cristancho, Fernando (Diocese of Istmina-Tado, Colombia)
Dean, Alfred (Josephite)
Girard, Steven
Kolodziej, Michael (Franciscan)
Lentz, Robert
Lippold, John
Murray, J. Glen (Jesuit)
Salerno, Michael (Pallotine)
Smith, Richard
Wielebski, John

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MARYLAND
The Baltimore Sun

Alison Knezevich
The Baltimore Sun

Posting list of accused priests is response to request by survivors, Baltimore archdiocese says.

The Archdiocese of Baltimore has posted a list of dozens of priests and religious brothers accused of sexual abuse in a move church officials say came from listening to feedback from abuse survivors.

All of the names had previously been disclosed by the church, in most cases years ago. But activists say having them in one place can help encourage victims to come forward — and help expose the scope of abuse.

“We’ve wanted it a long time,” said David Lorenz, Maryland director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “We’ve asked every diocese around the country to do it.”

The list, posted on the archdiocese website, includes the names of 71 clergymen about whom church officials have received what they call “credible” accusations during the priest’s lifetime.

Archdiocese spokesman Sean Caine said the list was posted in January, but church officials didn’t announce it because the list included no new information.

The decision to post the names was “a response to what we’ve heard from survivors,” Caine said. “It’s something we’ve been working on for a while.” …

Only a fraction of Catholic dioceses have published the names of accused priests. Some lists have been required as part of a lawsuit, said Terry McKiernan, president of BishopAccountability.org a Massachusetts-based watchdog group that tracks data on clergy sexual abuse.

“I personally feel that it’s valuable that they are putting these names out there and taking some ownership,” McKiernan said. “In all fairness, Baltimore is to be commended for just doing it, not doing it because it they have to.”

Still, McKiernan said the way the list is formatted makes it difficult for website users to view all the details released.

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WISCONSIN
Fox 11

GREEN BAY (WLUK) — A retired priest was ordered Monday to stand trial on allegations he exposed himself to a minor.

Fr. Richard Thomas will enter a plea May 23 to four counts of exposing genital area to a child. He waived a preliminary hearing Monday in Brown County Circuit Court.

After the report of misconduct, the Catholic Diocese of Green Bay restricted Fr. Thomas from performing any public ministry.

Thomas was living in Grellinger Hall, a home for retired priests in Allouez. He allegedly exposed himself four times in March to a 16-year-old boy when the boy was walking to school.

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GEORGIA
Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Sandy Springs police announced Monday their investigation involving a Catholic school priest and a juvenile is over and no laws were broken.

The investigation began a week ago, but the school, Holy Spirit Preparatory School, and police released little information about the case, not even what was being investigated.

A police incident report was blank except for listing an unnamed female student at the school’s Long Island Drive campus as the victim and Thomas Flynn as a suspect. Flynn had been listed previously on the school website as chaplain. On Friday, police said detectives were still gathering information.

Sandy Springs police Sgt. Forrest Bohannon said via email the department’s investigation is closed and referred questions to the school.

The school’s headmaster, Kyle Pietrantonio, declined comment via email Monday, saying the school doesn’t comment on personnel matters.

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MICHIGAN
ClickonDetroit

Any way you look at this, it’s outrageous.

Niraj Warikoo of the Detroit Free Press reports that Rev. Kenneth Kaucheck, 62, a Catholic priest removed from churches in metro Detroit after he was accused of sexually abusing a teenager, is now the development director of Gianna House Pregnancy and Parenting Residence, next to St. Veronica Catholic Church in Eastpointe, a new Catholic center in Eastpointe that counsels pregnant teenagers.

The church found he had sexual misconduct in the 1970s with a 16-year-old girl he was counseling as a priest.

The organization declined to respond to attempts by the Freep to get a comment.

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MICHIGAN
Patch

By BETH DALBEY (Patch Staff) – May 9, 2016

EASTPOINTE, MI – A priest who was banned from public ministry while serving parishes in Royal Oak and Ferndale in 2009 after allegations that he sexually abused a 16-year-old girl he was counseling in the 1970s resurfaced is again working with teens at a Catholic center in Eastpointe — for now.

The Catholic Archdiocese of Detroit is asking the Rev. Kenneth Kaucheck to step down from his position as development director of Gianna House Pregnancy and Parenting Residence, which he co-founded a year ago with a Catholic nun, The Macomb Daily reports.

Gianna House, located in the former convent adjacent to St. Veronica Catholic Church in Eastpointe, takes in pregnant girls and women, and assists them and any children they may have.

If Kaucheck doesn’t voluntarily resign, he could be removed under canon law because his position at Gianna House “violates the restrictions placed on his ministry in 2009,” John Kohn, a spokesman for the archdiocese told the Detroit Free Press.

“We assert that he should not be allowed to continue in this position.” Kohn said.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Jane Lee
Legal affairs, health and science reporter

Survivors say a national redress scheme for child sexual abuse should be beyond party politics, as research reveals that the Royal Commission’s preferred model could cost the federal government about $872 million.

Adults Surviving Child Abuse, Care Leavers Australia Network (CLAN) and Broken Rites called on the Coalition and Labor to commit to fully funding a national scheme on the first full day of the election campaign.

CLAN executive director Leonie Sheedy said: “Redress shouldn’t be about party politics. It should be bipartisan. We’re all Australian citizens and care leavers who were abused in orphanages and children’s homes and foster care were the children of the (states’ and territories’) government.”

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, started under Labor and extended under the Coalition, recommended last year that institutions compensate survivors under a single national redress scheme for 60,000 survivors, which it said was the “most effective” for ensuring justice and the most cost-efficient model.

The Coalition has opted for the commission’s “next-best option” of allowing states and territories to run their own schemes under a set of national principles, which are still being negotiated. A taskforce in the Prime Minister’s Department will continue these consultations throughout the campaign and present recommendations following the election.

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RHODE ISLAND
ABC News

By MICHELLE R. SMITH AND DENISE LAVOIE, ASSOCIATED PRESS
PROVIDENCE, R.I. — May 9, 2016

An email obtained by The Associated Press shows that an elite Rhode Island boarding school where dozens of alumni say they were sexually abused is negotiating possible settlements with lawyers for more than 30 people.

Carmen Durso, an attorney representing people who say they were abused, wrote in the email to clients on Friday that St. George’s School in Middletown wants to start individual settlement discussions in June. If agreements can be reached, he said he expects most claims could be resolved by the end of the month.

Durso would not comment in more detail Monday. A school spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier-Mail

May 9, 2016
Kate McKenna
The Courier-Mail

THE Palaszczuk Government is considering falling into line with other states and eliminating a “demoralising” time limit preventing child sex abuse survivors from pursuing civil claims.

Communities and Child Safety Minister Shannon ­Fentiman will tonight host an open forum at Parliament House about the limitations, which, under Queensland law, require survivors to lodge a civil claim against institutions by the age of 21.

Both NSW and Victoria have passed reform legislation, while Western Australia has introduced a Bill.

Last year, the royal commission into child sex abuse said many survivors, advocacy groups and academics had labelled time limits a major — “sometimes insurmountable” — barrier to bringing legal action and the commission recommended that governments get rid of them retrospectively.

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NEW MEXICO
Gallup Independent

Published in the Gallup Independent, Gallup, N.M., May 4, 2016

Judge sets Diocese confirmation hearing

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

ALBUQUERQUE – U.S. Bankruptcy Judge David T. Thuma scheduled a confirmation hearing on the Diocese of Gallup’s Chapter 11 plan of reorganization for June 21, after attorneys for the diocese filed amended copies of the plan and disclosure statement early Tuesday.

Thuma then spent much of the court hearing working out the deadlines that will lead up to the confirmation hearing.

As outlined in the order Thuma signed later in the afternoon, diocesan attorneys will mail solicitation packages to classes of creditors in the bankruptcy case by May 17. Clergy sex abuse claimants will receive ballots to accept or reject the diocese’s plan of reorganization. The ballot voting deadline of June 10 will also be the filing deadline for any objections to the agreements the Gallup Diocese has negotiated with the insurers and participating parties that are contributing money to fund the plan of reorganization.

But before the voting deadline, abuse claimants have been promised they should be able to electronically access a read-only personnel file of their abuser.

“They will be able to access the file of the person named in the proof of claim as the abuser,” Susan Boswell, the diocese’s lead attorney, told Thuma. “There will not be the ability to download or print the file or duplicate it in any manner,” she added, explaining that abuse claimants who view their abuser’s file are bound by a confidentiality order.

Although court documents outline how this password protected system should work, James Stang, the legal counsel for the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors that represents the interests of abuse claimants, told Thuma the attorneys’ Internet technology specialists have yet to work out the security details of the system.

“If it’s not possible,” Stang said, “I don’t know if this provision ends up going away.”

Stang also raised a question about the procedures of the upcoming confirmation hearing, asking if members of his committee and possibly other abuse survivors could address the court personally. Thuma, who expressed hesitation about the idea, agreed to the request after questioning Stang about how long those abuse survivor statements might be, noting he didn’t want the statement period “to drag on” during the hearing.

“I think it’s important for them to give their piece,” Thuma said, “but since I don’t think I’m going to let the debtor have a counter argument … try to make it so it’s not just a broadside attack on the debtor.”

Non-monetary commitments

In addition to filing the amended plan documents, diocesan attorneys also filed two exhibits they hadn’t filed previously. The first was the diocese’s agreement with St. Bonaventure Indian Mission and School. The Catholic mission in Thoreau has agreed to contribute $550,000 to the diocese’s plan of reorganization in exchange for settlement of its property dispute with the diocese.

The second exhibit was the list of non-monetary commitments diocesan attorneys negotiated with Stang’s committee and attorneys representing abuse claimants. Contrary to the wishes of a number of abuse survivors, the Diocese of Gallup did not agree to publicly release the files of credibly accused abusers. The diocese, however, agreed to let abuse claimants have digital access to their own abuser’s file for up to one year — under the tight Internet security provisions the attorneys and computer specialists are trying to arrange.

Other non-monetary provisions include referring to abuse claimants as survivors of clergy sexual abuse rather than “alleged victims” or “alleged survivors,” providing a mechanism for abuse survivors to tell their stories, posting clergy abuse-related information on the diocesan website for specific lengths of time, and prominently displaying abuse awareness plaques in Catholic parishes and schools.

In addition, Bishop James S. Wall will be required to send personally signed letters of apology to all abuse claimants, and he will be required to make well publicized visits to each operating Catholic parish or school “in which abuse is alleged to have occurred” or where identified abusers have served. Invitations will be extended to all known survivors of abuse from those communities.

The confirmation hearing will be held at 9 a.m. June 21 at the Sandia Courtroom in Albuquerque’s U.S. Bankruptcy Court. The hearing is open to the public.

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WISCONSIN
WBAY

[Assignment History– Rev. Richard L. Thomas – BishopAccountability.org]

By Rhonda Roberts
Published: May 9, 2016

A retired priest accused of exposing himself to a teenager has been bound over for trial.

Richard Thomas appeared in a Brown County courtroom Monday where he waived his preliminary hearing. A judge ordered the case move forward to trial.

Thomas, 78, was arrested in April on four felony counts of exposing himself to a minor.

According to a criminal complaint, Thomas exposed himself to a 16-year-old boy on March 14, 15, 16 and 17.

The teen told investigators while he walked to school, past Grellinger Hall in Allouez, he saw a naked man standing in one of the windows. Grellinger Hall is an independent living facility for retired priests.

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MICHIGAN
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 503 0003 cell, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org)

Catholic officials should demote and discipline two nuns who are letting a suspended Detroit predator priest work at a center for teenagers. And Detroit’s archbishop should stop pretending to be powerless and discipline the priest harshly while warning the public about him vigorously.

[Detroit Free Press]

Fr. Kenneth Kauchek was temporarily ousted because he molested a girl. He now works for Gianna House Pregnancy and Parenting Residence, a Catholic-run group that reportedly helps girls.

[Daily Tribune]

This is a stunningly irresponsible move. Those responsible should be demoted and punished for putting youngsters in harm’s way.

In 2009, Fr. Kaucheck was removed from Guardian Angels parish in Clawson because of credible allegations he had molested a girl.

Sister Mary Diane Masson is Gianna’s co-founder. Sr. Theresa Mayrand is on the board. Both are recklessly endangering kids. Demoting them would deter such recklessness in the future. Doing nothing will encourage such recklessness in the future.

But the one person who could and should move immediately to protect kids, warn parents and discipline wrongdoers is Detroit Archbishop Allen Vigneron.

As best we can tell, Vigneron evidently told few or no parishioners where Kaucheck was which, we believe, is a violation of church policies and Vigneron’s repeated pledges to be “open and transparent” in clergy sex cases.

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MICHIGAN
Raw Story

DAVID EDWARDS
09 MAY 2016

A Catholic priest who was accused of sexually abusing a 16-year-old girl has been appointed as director of a teen pregnancy center, prompting activists to call for him to be removed from the post.

The Detroit Free Press reported on Monday that Rev. Kenneth Kaucheck was named director of the Gianna House Pregnancy and Parenting Residence in Eastpointe.

According to the paper, “the center takes in teenagers and young women who are pregnant, assisting them and any children they might later have.”

The report said that Kaucheck was removed from two churches after the Archdiocese of Detroit determined in 2009 that he had sexually abused a 16-year-old girl who he was counseling in the 1970s.

At the time, prosecutors declined to file charges against Kaucheck, arguing that the girl was old enough to legally consent.

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GUAM
KUAM

[with video]

By Krystal Paco

It’s the latest of accusations against the Archdiocese of Agana. An advertisement published over the weekend suggests there’s victims of sex crimes who have kept quiet because their alleged molester is the head of the island’s Catholic church.

Like the popular church hymn says, be not afraid. “The only way to stop this is to come out and come forward,” said Tim Rohr, a blogger and concerned resident. Big and bold, a full-page ad in a print publication over the weekend suggests there’s been sex crimes occurring in the local church community for over four decades and calls on alleged victims to speak out.

Said Rohr, “Because they’re from here, they have the pressure from their family, their culture, the church, family embarrassment, all these things that have kept them quiet for 40 years. I’m just saying that enough is enough 0953 this diocese has been completely broken.”

Rohr confirms the ad was paid for by the Concerned Catholics of Guam, a group formed in 2014 in response to various areas of concern within the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Agana. According to Rohr, an alleged victim spoke out late last year…that as a young alter boy in Agat, he was molested. “The ad is targeted at finding out who else is out there. Because these things don’t happen in isolation. We know that kind of a practice is basically serial. That there’s a long period of where kids are groomed and selected and targeted,” he said.

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic Culture

May 09, 2016

In the latest session of the “Vatileaks” trial, an Italian newspaper editor and two booksellers testified on behalf of one of the defendants, Gianluigi Nuzzi.

Nuzzi and another journalist, Emiliano Fittipaldi, are charged with “soliciting and exercising pressure” on Vatican employees to obtain confidential documents.

In November 2015, Nuzzi and Fittipaldi published separate works on Vatican finances based on documents from a special commission set up by Pope Francis to offer suggestions on reform. Testifying on behalf of Nuzzi, Venetian booksellers Marco Bernardi and Paola Brazzale said on May 7 that neither Nuzzi nor Fittipaldi knew of the other’s work, according to remarks made by Nuzzi and reported by La Stampa.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service – Bollettino

Vatican City, 7 May 2016 – This morning a further hearing was held in the ongoing trial for the dissemination of reserved information and documents in Vatican City State Tribunal, according to information provided by the director of the Holy See Press Office, Fr. Federico Lombardi, S.J. The hearing was convoked for 9.30 a.m., and began with a slight delay. It was attended by the members of the Tribunal (Professors Giuseppe Dalla Torre, Piero Antonio Bonnet, Paolo Papanti-Pelletier and Venerando Marano), the Promoter of Justice (Professors Gian Pietro Milano and Roberto Zannotti), and all the defendants, Ángel Lucio Vallejo Balda, Francesca Immacolata Chaouqui, Nicola Maio, Emiliano Fittipaldi and Gianluigi Nuzzi with their respective legal representatives Emanuela Bellardini, Laura Sgrò, Rita Claudia Baffioni, Lucia Teresa Musso and Roberto Palombi.

The hearing was dedicated fully to the further examination of witnesses. Five “external” witnesses – those not employed by the Vatican – had been summoned, of whom three were present, request in the defence of Nuzzi. The hearing was therefore dedicated to the examination of Paolo Mieli, a renowned journalist, and two Venetian booksellers, Marco Bernardi and Paola Brazzale. Those who were not present, despite having received a court summons, will be summoned again for a subsequent hearing, as in one case a lawyer and in another the Promoter of Justice did not consider it appropriate to renounce their testimony. Following the interrogation of each witness, the report of the examination was read and approved.

The hearing ended at approximately 11.15 a.m. The next hearings will take place on Saturday, 14 May at 9.30 a.m., Monday 16 at 15.30 p.m. and Tuesday 17 at 10.30 a.m., and will be dedicated to further examination of witnesses.

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ISRAEL
Times of Israel

Police spokesperson Luba Samri says officials are looking into sexual harassment claims against Father Gabriel Naddaf, a controversial leader of Israel’s Arab Christian community, after accusations surfaced against him Sunday night.

Channel 2 aired recordings and transcripts of conversations allegedly between Naddaf and a series of unidentified young men — including both Israeli soldiers and Palestinians — in which the priest appeared to promise to help them in exchange for sexual favors.

“Some of the claims have reached the police and they will be checked by professionals in the police investigations and intelligence unit as needed,” Samri says.

The police move is not an official probe or investigation, but may lay the groundwork for one.

Naddaf, who heads a group promoting IDF service among Arab Christians, has been named as one of the ceremonial torch lighters at the state’s Independence Day ceremony in Jerusalem next week, has firmly denied the allegations against him.

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INDIANA
NWI Times

Bob Kasarda bob.kasarda@nwi.com, (219) 548-4345

The fate of a Michigan City priest accused of engaging in sexual misconduct with a minor 25 years ago is still pending six years later with church authorities in Rome, according to the Catholic Diocese of Gary.

“It can be a lengthy process,” said Debbie Bosak, director of communications at the diocese.

Background

The Rev. Terrence Chase was placed on administrative leave in April 2010 after denying allegations of the misconduct at St. Patrick Church in Chesterton where he was serving as an associate priest.

Church officials did not identify the person, who they said came forward with the allegation in 2010.

Parishioners of Queen of All Saints Church, where Chase had been serving as pastor, expressed “shock and disbelief” at the news, Mark Plaiss, former director of communications for the Diocese of Gary and a church deacon, said at the time.

Chase said in a prepared statement at the time: “I can assure you that the allegations accusing me of inappropriate behavior are simply not true. I do not know why these destructive accusations were leveled against me.”

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ROMA
Blitz

ROMA – Era accusata dalla Procura di Roma di avere utilizzato il pass della zia disabile, deceduta nel 2008, per accedere nella zona Ztl del centro storico di Roma. Per questo Francesca Immacolata Chaouqui, ex membro della Commissione d’indagine per gli affari economici della Santa Sede e arrestata nel novembre scorso per lo scandalo Vatileaks 2, ha patteggiato una condanna ad 8 mesi di reclusione. Della vicenda ne dà notizia il Corriere della Sera.

Nei suoi confronti, le accuse erano di falso, tentata truffa e truffa aggravata. Secondo quanto accertato dall’accusa, la Chaouqui avrebbe utilizzato il permesso fino al 2014. Tra le contestazioni anche il tentativo di non pagare 95 contravvenzioni, che la pr ha impugnato sostenendo di avere il diritto di accedere nel centro storico con il pass della zia morta.

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ITALY
Morocco World News

Larbi Arbaoui

Rabat – Moroccan-Italian Francesca Chaouqui, who faces multiple charges in the Vatican for her involvement in the Vatileaks scandal, has reportedly been sentenced to eight months in prison for using her deceased aunt’s residence card to park in the center of Rome without difficulties for six years.

Francesca Chaouqui, an Italian public relations consultant who was accused of leaking classified documents to journalists, was sentenced on charges of fraud and falsifying identity papers.

The former Vatican adviser was found guilty of misusing a parking pass for her disabled aunt, who died in 2008.

The pass gave her the right to enter and park in a traffic-free area in central Rome, as well as in places reserved for the disabled.

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ISRAEL
Haaretz

Aimee Amiga May 08, 2016

Extradition proceedings against an Australian woman accused of sexually abusing students at an ultra-Orthodox girls’ school were halted Sunday, after a judge in Israel ruled her unfit to stand trial.

The move imposes a significant delay on an already-prolonged effort to extradite Malka Leifer, a former headmistress at Adass Israel School, who stands to face 74 counts of indecent assault and rape in Australia, brought against her by three former students of the school, located in the Melbourne suburb of Elsternwick.

Using her Israeli passport, Leifer fled to Israel in 2008, shortly after the allegations of sexual misconduct arose. She was taken into custody in Israel in 2014 at the request of Australian authorities, and released to house arrest in September that year.

Extradition proceedings were meant to begin the following month, but have been delayed some eight times, including for Leifer’s psychiatric hospitalization.

At a hearing Sunday morning at the Jerusalem District Court, Judge Amnon Cohen said that after having received the “unequivocal professional opinion” from a state-appointed psychiatrist, the sides have agreed to halt extradition proceedings against Leifer, citing a law that permits stopping proceedings when a defendant is deemed unfit to stand trial.

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ISRAEL
Sydney Morning Herald

May 9, 2016

Kate Shuttleworth

Jerusalem: An Israeli court has ruled that all legal proceedings against a fugitive principal should be suspended until she receives psychiatric treatment, further delaying a decision on her extradition to Australia.

Malka Leifer faces prosecution in relation to 74 alleged sexual offences against girls she taught at Adass Israel School, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish school in the Melbourne suburb of Elsternwick.

Ms Leifer on Sunday failed to appear in the Jerusalem District Court for the eighth time in two years, but her legal team led by Yehuda Fried managed to avoid a court hearing on an extradition order to Victoria.

So far all court hearings have concentrated on Ms Leifer’s psychiatric state.

Ms Leifer’s lawyers have consistently argued she is unwell and unfit to appear in court. They argue she experiences panic attacks and bouts of depression as each court hearing approaches, resulting in each session proceeding without her participation.

Prosecutor Avital Ribner-Oron asked Judge Amnon Cohen to hospitalise Ms Leifer for treatment, with the district psychiatrist’s reporting that she had suffered a psychotic episode ahead of her last court appearance in April. At the time she was hospitalised for two days.

Ms Ribner-Oron told the judge the state believed Ms Leifer should be hospitalised and not treated in an outpatient capacity.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

AAP

The commonwealth should cough-up an initial contribution of $250 million for a national redress scheme for child abuse survivors, the Greens say.

And that amount should be matched by the states and territories.

The minor party is prepared to work with whoever forms government after the July 2 election to get a redress scheme in place as soon as possible, West Australian Greens senator Rachel Siewert told reporters in Canberra on Monday.

“Survivors have suffered long enough; it’s time that action is taken,” she said.

Australia had a responsibility to look after all its children which is why it was so essential the commonwealth show leadership.

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ISRAEL/AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

May 8, 2016

Shannon Deery, Andrew Friedman
Herald Sun

EXTRADITION proceedings against a fugitive school principal accused of molesting and raping students at an ultra-orthodox Jewish school have been dropped.

In a major blow to Victorian authorities an Israeli court ruled overnight that it would suspend extradition hearings against Malka Leifer because she is unfit to stand trial.

It means the former principal of Elsternwick’s Adass Israel Girls School may never face justice.

Authorities have been fighting for her return to Victoria since 2014, but Ms Leifer has told family and friends she would never return to Australia.

She fled under the cover of night just days after one of her alleged victims spoke out about her abuse for the first time in 2008.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Written by Janela Carrera

Father Edivaldo Oliveira issued a statement denouncing the ad, calling it a malicious intent to destroy the Catholic faith.

Guam – An ad paid for by the Concerned Catholics of Guam is stirring up some controversy as it calls on victims of sexual abuse to come forward. The targeted dates and locations, according to Catholic blogger Tim Rohr, are directly related to when Archbishop Anthony Apuron was a priest.

The paid advertisement starts off by asking “Were you sexually abused? Molested?” In the background is the image of an altar boy with his back facing the camera. It then lists dates and locations as to when and where victims may have been sexually abused. Local Catholic blogger Tim Rohr says he didn’t pay for the ad, but he is working with the people behind it.

“The dates and the locations are specifically targeted as to when the now Archbishop Apuron, when he was serving as a priest and pastor–was in that capacity in those dates and locations,” explains Rohr.

Rohr says this advertisement came as the result of an interview K57 host Patti Arroyo had with a guest on her show. The guest, Mae Ada, had claimed that she was at a funeral service when someone had mentioned to her that he was molested by Archbishop Anthony Apuron as a child.

“Since then we’ve had a pretty regular stream of information,” notes Rohr. “There has been a pretty regular flow of information and contact. I won’t say with how many but more than one–people who have identified themselves as having been sexually molested.”

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TEXAS
San Antonio Express-News

By Roy Bragg
May 8, 2016

Southern Methodist University lost the right to play football when it was caught cheating in 1987.

Penn State fired Joe Paterno for failing to tell police assistant coach Jerry Sandusky was raping boys.

The NCAA and school presidents have punished other coaches and programs for much less.

What, then, are we to do with Baylor University in light of allegations head coach Art Briles knew players had sexually assaulted women and didn’t act quickly and responsibly?

And what of Baylor President Ken Starr, who famously prosecuted a sitting American president for lying about a consensual sexual encounter, but who has been largely invisible in this case?

The Baylor rape scandal began with the 2013 recruitment of Sam Ukwuachu, a transfer from Boise State. Briles and his staff made little or no attempts to learn about the player’s off-field life.

Had they done so, they would have learned Ukwuachua’s former girlfriend accused Ukwuachu of sexual abuse (there were no criminal charges in that case).

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UNITED STATES
New York Times

By KATHARINE Q. SEELYE
MAY 8, 2016

BOSTON — Since 1991, more than 200 students from at least 67 private schools across New England have accused teachers, administrators or other staff members of sexually abusing or harassing them, according to a report on Sunday by The Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigation team.

These and other allegations, going back decades, include claims of rape, fondling, molestation and oral sex by trusted adults in positions of authority, including, in one case, an admissions officer.

At least 90 lawsuits or other legal claims have been filed on behalf of the people who have made the accusations, and at least 37 school employees have been fired or forced to resign because of the allegations, the newspaper said. In addition, nearly two dozen employees eventually pleaded guilty or were convicted on criminal charges of abusing children or related crimes.

The Globe’s tally of abuse claims at New England’s private schools, many of them among the nation’s wealthiest and most prestigious institutions, appears to be one of the first efforts to quantify the extent of the problem. There is no central database of allegations against private school employees. A 2004 analysis of the scant research on sex abuse at the nation’s public schools estimated that 9.6 percent of students between kindergarten and 12th grade had experienced some form of sexual misconduct by an educator, ranging from offensive comments to rape; there is no comparable research on private schools.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Telegraph

Brian Morris

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull swept many budget options off the table — both revenue and expenditure — but glaring opportunities for bold new revenue measures were never considered.

Religion is a multi-billion dollar entrepreneurial colossus that pays virtually no tax, and the extent of this tax-free bonanza helps create a budgetary black hole.

A new national poll in April shows 64 per cent of Australians think religions should now be taxed. People are fully aware of the wealth owned by big churches — not the hard-pressed charities — but the large religious institutions and the corporate enterprises they run.

While two-thirds of the nation support the notion of taxing religious businesses, only seven per cent think they should remain tax-exempt, while 13 per cent say they simply don’t know.

Much has contributed to the public’s view that the big churches now operate well beyond the traditional parish precinct. There’s disquiet over revelations from the Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse, the Vatican Bank scandals and the rank politicisation of religion across a raft of contemporary social issues.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Mary Gail Frawley-O’Dea | May. 9, 2016 NCR Today

Editor’s note: This blog introduces “Hell, hope and healing”, an NCR four-part series on sexual abuse. Part 1 of the series has been posted online. Parts 2, 3 and 4 will be published first in our print edition first and then posted to our website. You will be able to read the whole series at the feature series page Hell, hope and healing.

Since 2002, we rightly have been bombarded by stories about sexual abuse in the Catholic church. Many Catholics have felt the church has been singled out as a particularly heinous committer of crimes. There is truth to this, but it is also important to contextualize clergy abuse as a part of the wider phenomenon of serious child maltreatment that is still much too prevalent in this country and in others.

The first article in this four-part series, therefore, will place clergy sexual abuse within the universe of child abuse and neglect and will describe the damage suffered by victims of early maltreatment. The other three parts will be published in upcoming issues of NCR, and later posted to NCRonline.org.

We also have heard many times since the church crisis exploded into the public square that victims/survivors of clergy sexual abuse are damaged for life, that these horrible experiences never leave them and instead turn their lives into hell on earth forever. While this can occur, it does not have to. Survivors of adverse childhood experiences can heal and the second article in this series extends hope by describing what processes can help that happen.

In the third article, I extend the discussion beyond healing to discuss the possibility, now validated through research, that some trauma survivors actually experience post-traumatic growth. While never suggesting that somehow the survivor is better off because of the abuse, it is possible to derive meaning from those traumatic experiences and the healing processes addressed in Part 2 of this series. At that point, survivors often develop capabilities, interests and skills that add fullness to their lives. Part 3 also suggests that institutions and organizations affected by trauma can strive for growth by understanding the parts they are playing in healing or impeding their own and others’ recoveries.

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.

INDIA
Nyoooz

Summary: In 2015, 27 sexual abuse cases were reported against madrassa teachers in various parts of Malappuram. In another case, Kalapakanchery police recently arrested two Madrassa teachers for sexually abusing more than fifteen boys of a madrassa.A madrassa teacher in Pookottumpadam was arrested for molesting a Class II student at Koottampara two months ago. The details of the abuse tumbled out after the parents of the children called up the Childline authorities. Kottakkal sub-inspector Manjith Lal said the police have collected statements from the abused children and that they have widened their search for the accused.In another incident, Tirur police have received a complaint of child sexual abuse against a madrassa teacher at Paravanna. They said the parents had lodged a complaint with the madrassa authorities who hushed up the matter and dismissed the teacher.

Malappuram: Just two days after the Tirur police arrested a madrassa teacher for sexually abusing seven Class I girl students, two more cases of child abuse involving religious teachers were reported from the district on Saturday.Police have begun their hunt for a madrassa teacher at Puthuparamba in Kottakkal after several children alleged that he had been sexually exploiting them for almost a year. The details of the abuse tumbled out after the parents of the children called up the Childline authorities. They said the parents had lodged a complaint with the madrassa authorities who hushed up the matter and dismissed the teacher.

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
The Jewish Press

By: David Israel
Published: May 9th, 2016

A Channel 2 News report Sunday night presented serious evidence of sexual abuse against Gabriel Naddaf, an Israeli priest of the Greek Orthodox Church, a judge in the community’s religious courts, and a spokesman for the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem. Naddaf, who has been selected to light a torch at the Independence Day ceremony this year for his role in encouraging Christian Arabs to enlist in the IDF, has allegedly conducted conversations rife with sexual innuendo with soldiers who sought his help. He is also accused of soliciting benefits from PA Arabs in return for helping them obtain entry permits into Israel.

Naddaf has been embraced by the Israeli establishment for his pro-Zionist activism, as part of a growing group of Israeli Arab activists of the Christian faith who declare their loyalty to the Jewish State and insist on being viewed and treated in a different manner than Muslim Arabs.

Naddaf issued a statement Sunday saying the source for the complaints against him are criminal elements in the Arab community who are determined to deny him the success he has enjoyed in promoting Christian youths’ enlistment in the IDF. He noted that he had passed two separate polygraph tests regarding the allegations against him and that he had filed a complaint with police over them.

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
Legal Examiner

Posted by Mike Bryant

St. Paul News Conference Monday

New Lawsuit Against St. John’s brought by Survivor Abused by Father Michael Bik in 1998

Bik abused the boy after St. John’s learned he sexually abused two students in the 1970s when he was a teacher at St. Stephen’s in Anoka

Bik taught at Twin Cities Catholic schools in Anoka and Shoreview before becoming a monk and priest of St. John’s

What: At a news conference Monday in St. Paul, attorneys Jeff Anderson and Mike Bryant, along with advocate and former St. John’s monk, Patrick Wall will:

* Announce the filing of a civil lawsuit naming St. John’s Abbey and Father Michael Bik as defendants. The suit is being brought by Doe 497, a survivor who was sexually abused by Bik when he was a 15 or 16 year old Sophomore at St. John’s Prep School in 1998.

* Discuss the fact that just weeks before Bik started abusing Doe 497 he admitted to St. John’s that he sexually abused at least two boys in Anoka in the 1970s.

* Encourage survivors of sexual abuse by Fr. Michael Bik, and others, to come forward safely and confidentially before the Child Victims Act window legislation expires on May 25, 2016.

WHEN: Monday, May 9, 2016, at 1:00 PM CT

WHERE: Jeff Anderson & Associates

366 Jackson Street, Suite 100

St. Paul, MN 55101

Notes: The event will be live-streamed online with links available on our homepage shortly before the event at www.andersonadvocates.com

* A copy of the complaint and other documents from Bik’s file will be available at the press conference and on our website and the event will be live-streamed online with links available on our homepage shortly before the event at www.andersonadvocates.com.

Contact Jeff Anderson: Office: 651.227.9990 Cell: 612.817.8665
Contact Mike Bryant: Office: 320.259.5414 Cell: 800.359.0061
Contact Patrick Wall: Office: 651.227.9990 Cell: 949.307.3935

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MICHIGAN
Detroit Free Press

Niraj Warikoo, Detroit Free Press May 8, 2016

A Catholic priest removed from churches in metro Detroit after he was accused of sexually abusing a teenager is now the development director of a new Catholic center in Eastpointe that counsels pregnant teenagers, prompting calls for him to step down.

The Rev. Kenneth Kaucheck, 62, was banned from public ministry by the Archdiocese of Detroit in 2009 after church officials determined he had sexual misconduct in the 1970s with a 16-year-old girl he was counseling as a priest.

Kaucheck is now a director at the Gianna House Pregnancy and Parenting Residence, next to St. Veronica Catholic Church in Eastpointe. Opened last year in a former convent, the center takes in teenagers and young women who are pregnant, assisting them and any children they might later have.

The website for Gianna House says it “is a scared sanctuary for its residents, each of whom deserve to continue the life of her unborn child in an environment imbued with spiritual grace, emotional and social support, and knowledge.” The website says its “Board has been selected by Father Ken Kaucheck and Sister Mary Diane Masson to provide a wide range of ideas and skills.”

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Mary Gail Frawley-O’Dea | May. 9, 2016

The past two decades have witnessed an interdisciplinary explosion of new information about the prevalence and aftermath of child abuse and neglect.

From 1995 to 1997, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Kaiser Permanente conducted a study of more than 17,000 Americans to determine how many had been subjected to adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and what symptoms and disorders they suffered that differentiated them from those patients who did not have such histories. At the same time, researchers in clinical, developmental and neuropsychology, along with neurobiologists and trauma specialists, have increased our understanding of the potential impact of early abuse and neglect on virtually every aspect of a victim’s life.

So what do we know?

The CDC data indicates that only a little over one-third of subjects had no ACEs; 26 percent had one; 15.9 percent had two; 9.5 percent had three; and 12.5 percent had four or more. The study found that symptoms and disorders in ACE survivors were correlated with the number of ACEs experienced and with the frequency and/or intensity of each particular stressor. Let’s make this real.

The U.S. Census Bureau tells us that in 2014, there were about 245.2 million Americans over 18, meaning that more than 156 million adults have histories of ACEs, with more than 30 million having four or more. Over 50 million of us were sexually abused before the age of 18. Over 30 million watched our mothers get hit.

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VATICAN CITY
Crux

By Ines San Martin
Vatican correspondent May 9, 2016

ROME — When the Catholic Church in the United States, Australia, and Ireland was hit by sexual abuse scandals during the first decade of the new millennium, many in the global south looked on with dismay, describing it as “an Anglo-Saxon obsession” and a media-driven campaign to discredit the Church.

Today, it’s far more difficult to deny the widespread scope of the problem, which affects not only the Church but society: According to the Centers for Disease Control in the U.S., approximately 1 in 6 American boys and 1 in 4 girls are sexually abused before the age of 18.

A 2014 report from the United Nations estimated that globally, 1 in 10 women are abused before they reach their 20s.

New developments in Pope Francis’ own backyard in Latin America offer additional confirmation of the global nature of the challenge, and also appear to show that in many places, media exposure leads to the Church cleaning house.

In Uruguay, a country with a population of just 3.3 million, the local church recently received 20 allegations of clerical sexual abuse of minors, something which the Archbishop of Montevideo, Cardinal Daniel Sturla, defined as a “human tragedy.”

The alleged survivors came forward after church authorities opened a phone line for people to do so.

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
Courier-Mail

THERE is no place for statutory time limits in a society that prioritises child safety. Existing Queensland legislation that requires victims of child abuse to begin legal action against institutions by the age of 21 or be ruled ineligible for compensation is offensive and must be changed.

To date, institutions — be they churches, schools or orphanages — have invoked the statute of limitations “defence” either in direct response to being sued or in preliminary negotiations with victims to dissuade them from taking action.

Institutions that have known that an employee, such as a priest, teacher or counsellor, has sexually assaulted children have protected the perpetrator by refusing to report them to police, by relocating them, or deliberately destroying evidence.

The Anglican Diocese of Brisbane (under archbishop Hollingworth and then archbishop Aspinall) and Brisbane Grammar School (under chairman Howard Stack) both used the time limits defence in relation to pedophile Kevin Lynch. Lynch abused boys at Brisbane Grammar School in the 1970s and ’80s, and at St Paul’s School in the 1990s. He committed suicide in 1997 after being charged by police with indecent dealing with a boy at St Paul’s.

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CANADA
CBC News

By Simon Gardner, CBC News Posted: May 08, 2016

Mike Fitzgerald is a 60-year-old truck driver who grew up on a farm near Bancroft, Ont.

It’s with some trepidation that I ask him if we can meet at the Notre-Dame Cathedral Basilica, a grand Catholic church located in Ottawa’s ByWard Market. He readily agrees, but when I meet him and his wife Marla on the steps of the cathedral he admits to feeling uncomfortable.

“The good father destroyed my faith in the Catholic Church forever,” he explains.

When I hear about what happened to Fitzgerald when he was a teenager in the early 1970s, his bitterness comes as no surprise.

Fitzgerald grew up in a devout Catholic family. There was even talk of him becoming a priest.

He was musical, and when he turned 17 he agreed to help the parish priest, Father Henry Maloney, form a choir.

Because his family’s farm was about 35 kilometres from Our Lady of Mercy Church in Bancroft, it was decided Fitzgerald would move into a room in the church rectory.

He says he and his family had no idea he was about to fall into the clutches of a child molester. …

Though unable to forgive, these days Fitzgerald seems more at peace.

He credits much of his recovery to an unlikely saviour: a grandmother of 11 who maintains a website from her home in Fitzroy Harbour, a community on the outskirts of Ottawa.

People who meet Sylvia MacEachern are typically struck by her intensity, her deep outrage at the plight of abuse victims — and her unshakable devotion to the Catholic faith..

For years MacEachern has been a familiar face at trials and investigations into church abuse scandals. As a result, she’s amassed a huge collection of files, transcripts and other documents.

Sylvia’s Site, as she calls it, is a WordPress-based blog and database launched in 2010.

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ISRAEL
Jerusalem Post

The allegations were reported by Channel 2 on Sunday night.

The renowned Greek-Orthodox Christian priest Father Gabriel Naddaf who has led a public campaign for Christian Arab IDF enlistment, is facing allegations that he has attempted to seek sexual favors from youths with whom he came into contact.

The allegations were reported by Channel 2 on Sunday night, and also included claims that Naddaf, together with a Palestinian associate, helped arrange entry visas for Palestinians into Israel for illicit business purposes and sexual favors.

Naddaf denied the allegations, saying that “criminal elements in the community” had tried to frame him, and gained access to his Facebook accounts and cell phone to incriminate him by corresponding in his name.

In 2012, Naddaf established the Israeli Christians Recruitment Forum – Christian Empowerment Council to encourage Christian integration into Israeli society and increase Christian enlistment to the IDF.

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ISRAEL
Times of Israel

BY TAMAR PILEGGI May 8, 2016

An Israeli Greek Orthodox priest who heads a initiative aimed at integrating Israeli Christian Arabs into the Israel Defense Forces, was accused of sexually harassing young people who sought his help, a TV report said Sunday.

Channel 2 aired recordings and transcripts of conversations allegedly between Father Gabriel Naddaf and a series of unidentified young men — including both Israeli soldiers and Palestinians — in which the priest appeared to promise to help them in exchange for sexual favors.

None of the young men has lodged official complaints with authorities, the report noted.

Naddaf, who has been named as one of the ceremonial torch lighters at the state’s Independence Day ceremony in Jerusalem next week, firmly denied the allegations against him, and questioned the timing of the report’s publication.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Liverpool Echo

BY JANET TANSLEY

Chris who was abused by John Creagh says he wants to give courage and hope to other victims of abuse

A victim of a paedophile priest who pleaded guilty to abusing three boys has spoken about his ordeal in the hope it will stop others suffering in silence.

Chris Ryder, from Wigan, has waived his right to anonymity to talk openly about ho he suffered at the hands John Michael Creagh, jailed for four years at Liverpool Crown Court last week after admitting five counts of indecent assault while he was working as a scout leader.

Chris, 53, from Wigan, said: “I am speaking out to give courage and hope to others, not to sit and suffer, alone and in pain. Not to be ashamed.

“What Creagh did to me affected me drastically. It ruined my life.

“Only by speaking up can we keep evil men like him off the streets.”

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UNITED STATES
Boston.com

By Nik DeCosta-Klipa

At least 67 of New England’s elite, private schools have faced allegations of sexual abuse or harassment at the hands of its employees since 1991, and many of the incidents were ignored or covered up, according to a Spotlight report on the front page of Sunday’s Boston Globe.

The incidents involved more than 200 students since the early 1990s, according to the Globe. At least 37 staff members have either been fired or resigned, and nearly two dozen have been convicted or pleaded guilty to charges related to child sex abuse.

The Spotlight team also found 11 cases in which allegedly abusive school employees proceeded to find work at other institutions.

In one example, St. George’s School, at least three staffers accused of misconduct have left the Middletown, Rhode Island boarding school to work at other schools, where they were subsequently accused of additional misconduct involving children.

As the Globe reported in December, Anne Scott, a former St. George’s student, was pressured into signing a gag order about her alleged rape by the school’s then-67-year-old athletic trainer. Lawyers now say nearly 50 other St. George’s students have come forward with credible allegations of sexual abuse by the school’s employees.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Philly.com

by Maria Panaritis, Staff Writer

Rep. Thomas Caltagirone was disgusted. The veteran Democrat from Reading had been one of the Catholic Church’s staunchest political allies for years, but by March he had hit a breaking point.

A state grand jury had exposed clergy sex abuse in the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese and a bishop who used an internal payment chart to dole out money, correlating to the degree of the victim’s abuse. This, after Jerry Sandusky and two damning grand jury reports in a decade about predator priests in Philadelphia.

Then came another grand jury bombshell from Attorney General Kathleen G. Kane: Leaders in the Franciscan order had allegedly enabled a friar to abuse scores of children at a Catholic high school in Johnstown and remain free to roam as recently as January 2013.

“Enough is enough,” Caltagirone told his colleagues the day Kane announced charges. “We need to enact new laws that will send the strongest message possible: If you commit heinous crimes against children, if you cover up for pedophiles, if you lurk in the shadows waiting for time to run out, we are coming for you.”

His proclamation marked an unexpected shift from a key legislator long resistant to changing the law. It helped persuade others to pass a House bill that for the first time would let victims abused decades ago sue their attackers and institutions that supervised them.

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FLORIDA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Sunday, May 8, 2016

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

A serial predator priest who was found guilty of abuse by a Minnesota jury has quietly moved to Florida where he at least once visited a St. Petersburg area parish.

[Herald-Tribune]

This is an outrage. It shows that despite decades of pledges and promises, Catholic bishops continue to do be secretive and reckless about their thousands of child molesting clerics.

St. Pete Bishop Robert Lynch (727-344-1611, communicate@dosp.org) and Minnesota Archbishop Bernard Hebda should aggressively reach out to anyone who may have been hurt by Fr. Kapoun. They should use church bulletins, parish websites and pulpit announcements to beg those with information or suspicions about Fr. Kapoun to call police. We believe he can be prosecuted, convicted and jailed, which will safeguard kids and prevent horrific devastation to young lives.

And we believe that Catholic officials in both cities have a duty to make this happen.

Hebda should insist that Fr. Kapoun immediately move to a remote, secure, independent treatment center so kids can be safer. Or Hebda should end all financial support for this dangerous predator.

Lynch should insist that warnings about Fr. Kapoun be read aloud at every mass in the diocese for a month. He should also demote everyone at Holy Cross Catholic Church in Palmetto who played a role in letting this repeat sex offender cleric come to that parish or who kept it secret.

No matter what church officials do or don’t do, we urge every single person who saw, suspected or suffered child sex crimes and cover ups in Catholic churches or institutions to protect kids by calling police, get help by calling therapists, expose wrongdoers by calling law enforcement, get justice by calling attorneys, and be comforted by calling support groups like ours. This is how kids will be safer, adults will recover, criminals will be prosecuted, cover ups will be deterred and the truth will surface.

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FLORIDA/MINNESOTA
Herald-Tribune

[Rev. Robert Kapoun – assignment record – BishopAccountability.org]

Commentary

PALMETTO — He was known as the Polka Padre, and parishioners across the state of Minnesota couldn’t get enough of his accordion during church services. He was so popular he even put out an album and had his own billboard.

But there was more to Father Robert Kapoun than most people knew, a much darker side, a side that if you read through the allegations in hundreds of pages of court documents is abhorrent.

By 1995, at least six men claimed Kapoun sexually assaulted them between 1966 and ‘81 when they were boys. Kapoun admitted to three and reportedly there was a “substantial’’ settlement in at least one of the cases in 1990.

Furthermore, the Archdiocese of Minneapolis and St. Paul was aware of the abuse allegations as early as 1973, and yet Kapoun remained a priest until he was allowed to retire in 1996, a year after a jury awarded a former altar boy $1 million in what was the biggest trial involving the clergy in state history.

Now, if you look on the website of Holy Cross Catholic Church in Palmetto an interesting name appears under the title “visiting priests who we shall always cherish.’’ It’s Kapoun’s. His name shows up in very small type and if “Polka Padre” wasn’t in parentheses it would never even catch your eye.

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ISRAEL/AUSTRALIA
Mercury

May 8, 2016

AAP

The Jerusalem District Court has ruled to suspend all legal proceedings against an alleged pedophile and ex-principal of a religious Jewish girl’s school in Melbourne.

The move further delays a call for Malka Leifer’s extradition to Victoria where she would face prosecution for 74 sexual abuse offences against girls at the school she headed.

Leifer failed to appear in the Jerusalem District Court for the eighth time in two years, after her legal team have persistently argued she is unfit to stand trial due to her psychiatric state.

Leifer’s defence headed by Yehuda Fried has argued she suffers panic attacks and bouts of depression as each court hearing approaches.

A psychiatrist’s report presented to the court in April said that she suffered a psychotic episode ahead of a scheduled hearing in April and had to be hospitalised for two days.

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RHODE ISLAND
Providence Journal

By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer

Posted May. 7, 2016

MIDDLETOWN, R.I. — As part of its alumni weekend, St. George’s School lit a candle and offered a few minutes of silence amid widespread allegations of sexual abuse at the private Episcopal boarding school.

Headmaster Eric Peterson had planned to hold a healing event during the reunion but it was canceled after survivors threatened to picket. Survivors contended that it was too soon to hold a healing ceremony, especially one led by Peterson, who they say failed to report several cases of abuse.

One of the survivors, Katie Wales Lovkay, Class of 1980, said she attended last year’s reunion, where she met with Peterson to discuss what had happened to her as a student. She said that the school’s former athletic trainer had taken nude pictures of her and then showed them to male classmates.

“Peterson led me to believe that he didn’t know anything,” she said by phone on Saturday. “He had tears in his eyes. Months later, I found out he lied to my face. I really believed he would do something.”

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CONNECTICUT
Forward

Josh Nathan-Kazis
May 7, 2016

A politically connected Orthodox rabbi has been accused in a federal lawsuit of molesting a student at his New Haven Jewish boarding school.

In a civil complaint filed in federal court in Connecticut on May 3, Eliyahu Mirlis, a former student at the Yeshiva New Haven, accused Rabbi Daniel Greer, 75, the school’s founder and principal, of repeatedly molesting him over the course of three years while Mirlis was a student at the school.

Greer is a former member of the New Haven Board of Police Commissioners and a prominent, if controversial, figure in the city. Fundraising dinners for his yeshiva were regular stops for Connecticut public officials, including a current U.S. Senator, New Haven’s former mayor, its police chief, and New York City police commissioner Bill Bratton.

Connecticut’s governor even visited Greer’s kitchen table in 2012.

No criminal charges have been filed against Greer. His alleged victim, now 28, claims that Greer raped and abused him “dozens and dozens of times,” both at the school, at motels, and at properties owned by the school. Mirlis was 15 when the alleged abuse began and 17 when it ended.

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IOWA
Des Moines Register

Lee Rood, lrood@dmreg.com May 7, 2016

First of two parts

SPENCER, Ia. — Alex Jacobsen felt anxious and mentally exhausted. Sweat flushed his face.

The thin 26-year-old hadn’t slept well for days. He wanted to rest and get away from the handful of other participants in the faith-based treatment program.

Jacobsen tried to relax on a couch on the third floor of the Dream Center in downtown Spencer. But the feelings of agitation and hopelessness persisted. He got up and wandered into a hallway, where he spotted a box cutter sitting on a cart.

At first, Jacobsen drew the blade across his neck, careful not to break the skin. But then, he told The Des Moines Register during an interview last month, he began to press harder — slicing his neck and throat again and again.

Minutes later, a Dream Center pastor found Jacobsen lying on the floor of a nearby men’s restroom. He pressed a towel to the young man’s throat to slow the bleeding until paramedics arrived. They got there just in time: Five minutes more and he would have died, they said.

This is the story of a troubled and suicidal young man who agreed 10 days earlier, over his family’s objections, to abruptly stop taking the medications his doctors prescribed and skip an evaluation for outpatient treatment at University of Iowa Hospitals. At the urging of his pastors, he says, he would entrust his recovery to them and to God.

It also is a story about Iowa’s scattershot mental health system, and whether those who offer faith-based treatment programs should be subject to state standards and oversight if they are enrolling people such as Jacobsen and others with mental illnesses.

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UNITED STATES
Boston Globe

More than 200 victims. At least 90 legal claims. At least 67 private schools in New England. This is the story of hundreds of students sexually abused by staffers, and emerging from decades of silence today.

This story was reported by Spotlight team reporters Jenn Abelson, Bella English, Jonathan Saltzman, and Todd Wallack, with editors Scott Allen and Amanda Katz.

Steven Starr reached into the back of his hallway closet and fished out the old camera, a gift nearly 50 years ago from the man he says molested him.

“It’s like a talisman or a grim reminder,’’ he said, holding the dusty Minolta Autocord in his Los Angeles apartment. Not that he could ever forget what he alleges happened to him when he was 11 at the Fessenden School.

In 1968, he was a lonely sixth-grader from Long Island when he met James Dallmann, a Harvard graduate who taught geography at the all-boys private school in West Newton and was an avid photographer.

Dallmann took Starr under his wing. He made the boy his apprentice and encouraged him to visit the teacher’s bedroom in their dorm at Moore Hall after lights out to learn how to use his makeshift darkroom. The teacher photographed Starr and delighted the boy by giving him the twin-lens Minolta.

Then one night, Starr said, Dallmann served him a mix of Tang and vodka, got him to pose naked for pictures on a bed, and performed oral sex on him. This is our secret, Dallmann told Starr, who said the abuse went on for about a year.

For nearly half a century, Starr kept his feelings of betrayal and humiliation inside, sharing his story only with therapists and a few confidants.

But now he is among a growing number of former students at New England private schools who are breaking their silence about sexual abuse by staffers. They are emboldened by a cascade of recent revelations about cases — many of them decades old — that were often ignored or covered up when first reported, and that school administrators still struggle to handle appropriately today.

This video interview with sexual abuse survivor Steven Starr contains content that some viewers may find disturbing. Viewer discretion is advised.

So far this year, at least eight New England private schools have launched or disclosed sexual misconduct investigations. At least five of the probes — at St. George’s School in Rhode Island, Taft School in Connecticut, Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, Thayer Academy in Braintree, and Concord Academy in Concord — have led to staff members being placed on administrative leave or fired.

The troubles go way beyond those institutions. At least 67 private schools in New England have faced accusations since 1991 that staffers sexually abused or harassed more than 200 students, the Spotlight Team found through an examination of court cases, as well as interviews with alumni, relatives, school officials, and attorneys. …

The Globe also found 11 cases in which private school employees who were accused of sexual misconduct went on to work at other schools — an echo of the Catholic church scandal in which abusive priests were often moved to other parishes. At St. George’s School alone, at least three staff members accused of misconduct have gone on to jobs where they faced subsequent sexual misconduct allegations involving children, including one teacher accused in a lawsuit of abusing a teenager in Hawaii.

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UNITED STATES
Seth H. Langston

Posted on May 7, 2016

One of the most important lessons taught by the movie “Spotlight” was the critical role that the media can and must play in exposing the scope of the Catholic Church’s child sex abuse scandal. The crucial step that media should take is to seek to open all of the “sealed files” that have arisen out of priest sex abuse litigation.

It is a basic tenet of our judicial system, that our legal system should be open to all and subject to the scrutiny of society. That is why trials are open to the public. The only way that people will trust the process is through transparency. The validity of any Court decision can only be fairly judged when we know what evidence that the Court based its opinion on.

Despite our society’s commitment to open courts, many of the documents that would shed the most light on Catholic sex abuse, remain hidden and inaccessible to the public. At the request of the Catholic Church, Courts have frequently “sealed” those portions of the sex abuse litigation files that contain the Church’s own documents that reveal the scope of priest sex abuse scandal.

Unfortunately, this is precisely what occurred in the most recent lawsuit that we filed against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Charlotte. These cases involved allegations of child sexual abuse by Father Richard Farwell and Father Joseph Kelleher, as well as claims that the Charlotte Diocese transferred child abusing priests, destroyed documents and acted in other ways to protect child abusing priests. . Every piece of paper produced by the Diocese to us was stamped “confidential.” The Court then ordered that all of those documents had be protected from the public view as well as all of the evidence that we filed to support our allegations of misconduct, also had to be filed under seal. This included the Plaintiff’s Brief in Opposition to the Diocese’ Motion for Summary Judgment. This brief contained a detailed and extensive analysis of the Church’s “confidential” documents, as well as other evidence that we had obtained from other sources.

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.

ESPANA
El Diario

Sofía Pérez Mendoza

El Colegio Mayor Universitario Barberán y Collán, adscrito a la Universidad Complutense de Madrid y sostenido con fondos del Ministerio de Defensa, obliga a sus 196 estudiantes a asistir a la conferencia de un sacerdote y teólogo “especializado en el campo relativo al demonio, exorcismos, posesiones e infierno”.

El centro está empapelado de carteles que anuncian la charla “El mal”, programada para este jueves por la tarde. La actividad corre a cargo de José Antonio Fortea Cucurull, religioso de la diócesis de Alcalá de Henares y autor –entre otros títulos– de Summa dæmoniaca, un tratado sobre demonología que incluye un manual sobre exorcismos .

“El demonio no tiene cuernos ni un color, es una entidad incorporal que todas las religiones estamos de acuerdo en que vaga por el mundo. Existe”, explicaba el sacerdote, que sostiene que “el conocimiento del mal nos lleva al bien”, en una entrevista reciente en Antena 3. Fortea ha impartido conferencias en varios países y ha aparecido en programas de televisión.

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.

SPAIN
Mirror

BY ELLE GRIFFITHS

Students at the University College of Barberan and Collan in Spain will take a seminar called ‘The Evil’ with an expert priest

A University in Spain will force its students to attend a course on ‘exorcisms’.

The University College of Barberan and Collan has made attedance at the lecture, called “The Evil”, compulsory for its 196 students.

The bizarre course will be led by Roman Catholic priest José Antonio Fortea Cucurull, believed to be an expert on the controversial practice.

It will cover fields “related to the devil, exorcisms and being possessed and hell”, it was reported newspaper El Diario.

Father Cucurull has previously written a ‘manual’ on exorcism.

But the priest made headlines in 2010 when he defended the Vatican after the Pope’s chief exorcist claimed the child sex abuse scandals rocking the Church were evidence of the Devil’s presence there.

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
WTOP

By STEVE KARNOWSKI
May 7, 2016

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — It’s been nearly three years since Minnesota opened a path for lawsuits by victims of long-ago childhood sexual abuse.

In that time, more than 800 people have brought abuse claims against churches, the Boy Scouts, schools and a children’s theater company. Previously unknown offenders have been exposed. Two Roman Catholic dioceses have filed bankruptcy. Lists of credibly accused priests and thousands of documents have been released. And the heightened scrutiny played a part in the downfall of two bishops.

Minnesota’s window, which closes this month, was strongly opposed by the Catholic Church and other institutions that are now fighting to block similar exemptions to the statutes of limitations in Pennsylvania and New York, citing the effects in Minnesota and other states. The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis filed for bankruptcy protection last year, and the Duluth diocese followed after a jury found it responsible for $4.8 million of an $8.1 million jury award to just one man.

“This law has been one of the most transformative and far-reaching laws that have ever been passed — to not only protect kids in the community but to give survivors who have been hurt a voice and a chance to recover some power,” said attorney Jeff Anderson, who has filed the vast majority of the new cases in Minnesota.

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
Fios 1

[with video]

Two members of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, also referred to as SNAP, stood in front of the Diocese of Rockville Centre on Friday to call on Bishop Murphy and New York State to take several steps to protect sexual abuse victims.

This comes on the heels of a second case alleging sexual abuse is brought against St. Francis of Assisi Church and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rockville Centre.

The first case involves a female victim that was allegedly raped by Father Gregory Yacyshyn at the age of 8, just a few weeks before her First Communion. That case is still being litigated.

The second case was recently brought by a man who alleges that at the age of five he was sexually abused by Father Yacyshyn at St. Francis of Assisi as well.

“…Father Greg be removed immediately, he is a danger to children,” said Gail Howard of SNAP. “That the names of credibly accused priests for the diocese of Rockville be posted on their website, and that legislators move forward in removing the statute of limitations in New York.”

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 Observer

By Barbara Simpson, Sarnia Observer
Saturday, May 7, 2016

Inside a small-town confessional, Derek Trepanier said he was handed a secret he’d keep with him for close to 20 years.

That secret would quietly eat away at him, rob him of a chance to become a teacher, and poison his sleep with nightmares.

But for the life of him, Trepanier said he just couldn’t put his finger on what that secret exactly was until his son David was born in 2012.

“When my child was born, we had a conversation about sending him to church or Catholic school, and I was dead set against it,” the now 34-year-old Sarnia man recalled. “I was so intense with it and (my partner) Lori kept asking me, ‘What’s going on? I need to know what’s happening.’”

And that’s when he said the memories started to slowly flood back – months of sexual abuse and exploitation at the hands of Father Gary Roy during his time at St. Joseph’s parish and the former Father Gerald Labelle Catholic School in Corunna.

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 7, 2016

Over almost twenty years on the Vatican beat, here’s one iron-clad certainty I’ve reached: A lot of stories that get covered around the world as “Vatican” news actually have much more to do with Italy and its foibles, rather than anything specifically related to the Holy See.

Of course, given the profound way Catholicism has shaped the culture of Italy, to say that some scandal or questionable move is actually more Italian than Vatican doesn’t quite get the Church off the hook, but it’s still a distinction worth making.

A recent court decision in Italy illustrates the point as well as anything else.

In a nutshell, Italy’s highest court ruled on Tuesday that the theft of roughly $4.70 worth of sausage and cheese by a homeless man in 2011 didn’t constitute a crime, because the culprit in this case, a Ukrainian national named Roman Ostriakov, was driven by hunger to commit the deed. …

An editorial in one of Italy’s biggest dailies raised the utterly reasonable question of whether, in a country where the estimated cost of corruption every year is $60 billion, this is really the best use of the legal system’s time and energy.

So, what’s the connection to the Vatican?

Well, the Vatican has its own dubious trial currently underway – the “Vatileaks 2.0 trial,” in which three former members of a papal commission on finances and two journalists are charged with conspiring to leak and publish secret documents from that commission.

The case reaches back to last November, when the two journalists published books based in part on the leaked documents. Since then, Vatican prosecutors and judges have poured countless hours into collecting testimony, hiring technical experts to reconstruct chains of social media exchanges, ruling on motions, staging painstaking court hearings, and so on.

Naturally, the whole thing has become a media sensation, and it raises questions on at least two different levels.

First, it seems abundantly clear that the main effects of this trial so far have been:

* To give a new lease on life to the books published by the journalists (which weren’t selling especially well before, anywhere outside Italy).

* To supply an otherwise implausible media platform to the defendants, prominently including Italian PR consultant Francesca Chaouqui, who seems to have something of a martyr complex.

Because it’s blindingly obvious that the journalists, at least, will never spend a minute behind bars in a Vatican jail even if convicted, since they’re citizens of Italy rather than the Holy See, many can’t help wondering what the point is.

Second, it seems clear the Vatican has more serious fish to fry.

A new tribunal created by Pope Francis to judge cases of bishops accused of covering up sex abuse crimes is struggling to get off the ground, there’s a backlog of cases in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith against clergy directly accused of committing abuse, and to date the Vatican has yet to prosecute a single instance of financial crime flagged by its own watchdog units.

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.

MEXICO
Desde Puebla

[No final legal judgment has been made against any priest who sexual abuse children despite all the evidence because there is complicity between the state, the Catholic Church and society, according to Joaquin Aguilar Mendez, a leader in Mexico of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests.]

Joaquín Aguilar

En México no ha habido ninguna sentencia firme contra ningún sacerdote que ha cometido abuso sexual de niños, a pesar de todas las pruebas existentes, porque hay una complicidad entre el Estado, la Iglesia católica y la misma sociedad, advirtió Joaquín Aguilar Méndez del Snap México durante su participación en la XV Semana Cultural de la Diversidad Sexual del Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, cuya sede es esta ciudad.

Para el especialista, cuyo caso ha sido uno de los más visibilizados en México porque señala al actual arzobispo primado, Norberto Rivera Carrera, como encubridor de los actos de pederastia cometidos por el sacerdote Nicolás Aguilar, siempre que hay una denuncia pública, hay una revictimización de los menores por que se cuestionan sus testimonios y se pone en entredicho su condición moral.

El titular de la organización que ha denunciado más de 203 casos de pederastia por parte de sacerdotes católicos en diferentes estados como San Luis Potosí, Oaxaca y la Ciudad de México, indicó que ese rechazo social ha derivado en situaciones como que más de 90 por ciento de los casos denunciados por quienes fueron víctimas del abuso ya prescribieron por el temor de hacer la denuncia y el largo tiempo transcurrido entre el hecho y la voluntad de denunciar.

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
Putnam Daily Voice

Carol Reif 05/06/2016

KIRYAS JOEL, N.Y. – A video that appears to show a Kiryas Joel school official fondling a male student was posted online after child advocates accused authorities of doing nothing about previous abuse complaints, according to multiple media reports.

The video hit Facebook on Sunday, May 1.

Kiryas Joel is a village in the Orange County town of Monroe.

According to a report by lohud.com , police are saying that the video is “similar in nature” to one investigated in the fall of 2015 by the Orange County Child Abuse Unit.

No criminal charges were brought in that investigation, police told lohud.com .

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

By Helen McGurk
Saturday 07 May 2016

Margaret McGuckin is the stalwart campaigner for victims of historical institutional abuse in NI. In this harrowing interview she talks about the horrendous years she spent in the notorious Nazareth House orphanage

Margaret McGuckin has a residual fear of going to the hairdresser as it reawakens horrific memories of the Belfast orphanage where she spent her formative years.

She recalls how the sadistic nuns in Nazareth House, a dour, cruel institution on the Ormeau Road, used to cut the children’s hair off as punishment.

‘‘Everyone used to line up, you were trembling in fear, because they (the nuns) came with big jugs of boiling water that they poured right round your scalp.’’

Margaret, now 59, adds: ‘‘To this day I hate going to a hairdresser. It’s not only about the water. The touch of scissors brings back memories of their big black scissors. They would cut your hair off as a punishment. You would see lovely girls coming in (to the orphanage) and they just chopped off their hair.’’

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
Bilgrimage

[with video]

William D. Lindsey

The story told in the video above is one to which a valued reader of this blog alerted me yesterday. The report is from KMSP (Fox News) in Eden Prairie, Minnesota. As you’ll see when you watch the video, a reporter from this news outlet, Tom Lyden, interviews a cousin of deposed Twin Cities archbishop John Nienstedt — Mike Hinske — who maintains that a priest-friend of Nienstedt’s, Samuel Ritchey, sexually abused him when he was 16 years old. Lyden also interviews an unwilling Nienstedt.

According to Hinske, Ritchey told him at the time that he had other “special friends,” who were, it was clear to Hinske, also minors. Ritchey went on to teach at Catholic schools in the diocese of Columbus, Ohio, where he was eventually removed from the priesthood due to his abuse of teenaged boys.

As you’ll also learn when you watch the video, Mike Hinske reports that he told his mother, a former Dominican nun who was Nienstedt’s cousin (and who is now dead), and his sister Mary Beth that Ritchey had molested him, and they informed Nienstedt of what had happened to Hinske. Nienstedt did nothing — and now claims that it was not clear to him that Hinske was actually molested, or that Hinske wanted him to do something.

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
KJZZ

By Kathy Ritchie
Published: Friday, May 6, 2016

Dozens of clergy sex abuse victims, including 49 from Arizona, may finally be compensated by the Catholic Diocese of Gallup.

A bankruptcy judge has schedule a June hearing on the diocese’s Chapter 11 reorganization plan. If the proposed settlement is approved by the victims, they could be compensated by early fall.

James Stang represents the victims. He said of the $22 million that is being offered by the diocese, $17 million will be divided among the 57 victims, with some receiving more than others.

Then there’s the non-monetary compensation.

“The bishop is writing an apology letter to all survivors,” said Stang. “If you don’t want one, you can opt out. There will be plaques posted in schools basically saying abuse is not tolerated. There are agreements to abide by existing child protection policies.”

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
Legal Examiner

Posted by Mike Bryant
May 5, 2016 5

There is less than a month and just over two weeks for Survivors to come forward and right so many past wrongs. There is still much more to do. Time is running out. Survivors of sexual abuse have until May 25th, 2016 to seek justice against their attackers. The Window is limited by the statute of limitation that was expanded by the Child Victims Act. Anyone who was sexually abused by an employee of the diocese, or who believes the diocese is liable for their abuse have until May 25, 2016.

Those with claims must act within that time.

Abuse of children and the continued silence by the offenders needs to be prevented. If you suffered, saw, or suspected such events, it is important to know that there is help out there

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 Age

May 7, 2016 –

Chris Vedelago, Beau Donelly, Cameron Houston

The Catholic Church is allowing paedophile priests to live anonymously in the community with limited supervision and has ignored warnings about their misconduct.

The Sunday Age can also reveal one of Victoria’s top Catholic officials, Bishop Les Tomlinson, has conducted mass alongside a priest banned from public ministry for committing acts of sexual abuse.

An investigation into the Melbourne archdiocese’s program for managing sex offenders within its ranks has found:

* The church is uncertain how many abusive priests are under its supervision

* No written policy for managing sex offenders exists despite the church identifying dozens of predator priests since the start of the Melbourne response victim compensation scheme in 1996

* Priests who have left the church’s jurisdiction without permission or ignore directives from superiors about their conduct are still being financially supported and protected

* Parishioners are unaware priests have been banned from public ministry for sexual misconduct because the information is being withheld or removed

A spokesman for the Melbourne archdiocese said risk assessments were conducted for each priest found to be an abuser and the church was “committed to managing these people responsibly”.

“Each case is obviously quite different with many of these people now very old indeed. Most, however, are under varied levels of supervision or monitoring as best we are able,” director of communications Shane Healy 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.

MICHIGAN
Record-Eagle

BY MATT TROUTMAN mtroutman@record-eagle.com

TRAVERSE CITY — A judge sentenced a former interim priest at Grace Episcopal Church to jail for trying to sexually touch a parishioner.

Accusations from three women prompted prosecutors in March to charge the Rev. Bryant Whitman Dennison Jr., 70, of Ann Arbor, with a sex crime. He eventually pleaded guilty to one count of attempted fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct, a misdemeanor.

Eighty-sixth District Court Judge Thomas J. Phillips on Thursday sentenced Dennison to a 180-day jail term and two years of probation.

“The victims from our conversations with them were very satisfied with this sentence,” said Grand Traverse County Prosecutor Bob Cooney.

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
CBS New York

[with video]

ROCKVILLE CENTRE, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) — The Diocese of Rockville Centre was under fire Friday for not removing a priest who is the subject of sexual abuse lawsuits.

As WCBS 880’s Sophia Hall reported, there are two lawsuits accusing the Rev. Gregory Yacyshyn of sexually abusing a girl and a boy decades ago.

Both accusers are now adults. The woman who filed suit claimed that Yacyshyn molested her as a young parishioner at St. Francis of Assisi Church in Greenlawn.

“As a child, I was sexually abused by Father Greg. With counseling and support of my family, I now know I did nothing wrong,” the woman’s attorney John Michael Reck said when the suit was filed in January 2015, reading from his client’s statement.

The lawsuit claimed the diocese “failed to protect children, ignored credible complaints of sexual abuse and failed to act on obvious warning signs of 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.

GEORGIA
Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A prominent Catholic school in north Fulton County and Sandy Springs police are not talking about a police investigation of an incident involving a priest and a juvenile.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution asked the police for an incident report filed Monday after hearing about the incident. The police provided a report that is blank except for listing an unnamed female student at Holy Spirit Preparatory School as the victim and Thomas Flynn as a suspect. Flynn had been listed previously on the school website as chaplain. It did not describe what the investigation is about or provide any other details, atypical for a police report.

Sandy Springs police Sgt. Forrest Bohannon said they did not have answers yet when asked what is being investigated, referring questions to the school.

“The detectives are still working on information gathering,” Bohannon said via 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.

NEW YORK
News 12

ROCKVILLE CENTRE – A group of clergy sex abuse victims say the leader of Long Island’s Catholics is putting kids at risk by refusing to suspend a twice-accused priest.

Gail Howard, of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, says Father Gregory Yacyshyn should not be allowed near children. In a pair of pending civil cases, the Roman Catholic priest is accused of sexually assaulting two children more than a decade ago while assigned to St. Francis of Assisi of Greenlawn.

As News 12 Long Island has reported, Father Yacyshyn is still an active priest and is the pastor at St. Jude Parish in Mastic Beach.

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

Summary of Case: Morin was ordained in 1942 for the CA Province of the Society of Jesus. He is referred to variously as Gerald or Gerard. He spent his career in parishes and schools in the dioceses/archdioceses of Seattle, Portland in OR, Spokane and, for a few years, in the Vicariate Apostolic of Alaska. For more than thirty years Morin was assigned to St. Leo the Great parish in Tacoma WA. He died in 1992. Morin’s name was included on the Seattle archdiocese’s list released January 15, 2016 of clergy and religious with admitted, established or credible allegations against them of sexual abuse of a minor.

Ordained: 1942
Died: January 18, 1992

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ILLINOIS
Newsday

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. – (AP) — In a story May 4 about Illinois legislation that would eliminate the statute of limitations on child sex abuse crimes, The Associated Press reported erroneously that former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert paid $3.5 million to silence someone who accused him of sexual abuse. Hastert agreed to pay that amount, but he ultimately paid only $1.7 million and the victim is now suing him to collect the rest.

A corrected version of the story is below:

After Hastert, Illinois weighs change to child sex abuse law

A state lawmaker and former prosecutor wants to eliminate the statute of limitations on child sex crimes in Illinois, a response to the hush-money case against former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert

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
Bilgrimage

William D. Lindsey

I have seen no reports about this story in English-language media. I thought I would share it with you since 1) we’ve previously discussed the role played by Monsignor Tony Anatrella, a Vatican “expert on homosexuality,” at the Synod on the Family and in a recent controversy about a Vatican document instructing new bishops that they need not report allegations of sexual abuse by clergy to criminal authorities; and 2) some readers of this blog may not read French and so may otherwise miss this report. A French-speaking friend of mine on Facebook has shared this news link with me.

The first two links above will provide background to the current story. As material discussed at those two links indicates, when news broke this past February that the Vatican was apparently informing new bishops that they need not report allegations of sexual abuse of minors by priests to criminal officials, it was also reported that the Vatican was relying on a training manual produced by Monsignor Tony Anatrella, a French priest-psychotherapist touted by the Vatican as its “expert on homosexuality.” Anatrella has a history of characterizing homosexuality as a psychological disorder that can be “cured” through reparative therapy.

He himself specializes in such therapy. Due to his retrogressive, scientifically ill-informed views on homosexuality, LGBTQ Catholic leaders objected to his invitation to the Synod on the Family, where he played a role in advising the synod attendees about homosexuality and “gender theory,” another of his bugbears.

And now it’s being reported in the French media (third news link above) that a France 3 journalist, Sylvie Cozzolino, has been provided with testimony of a lay Catholic in France who states that he was sent as a minor to Anatrella to be “cured” of homosexuality, and that, in the context of “curing” him, Anatrella sexually molested him, explaining that the “cure” for homosexuality is “corporal” and requires sexual touching.

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 3

De nouvelles révélations viennent jeter le trouble sur une personnalité éminente de l’Eglise de France, le père Tony Anatrella, psychanalyste et membre de la commission pontificale sur la famille.Un laïc vivant en Rhône-Alpes a été victime de sa part d’attouchements sexuels en 2011.

Ph.Bette avec Sylvie Cozzolino Publié le 29 avril 2016

Le témoignage recueilli par Sylvie Cozzolino, journaliste à France 3 Rhône-Alpes, dans le cadre de son enquête sur l’Eglise de France est explicite. Il provient d’un laïc vivant aujourd’hui en Rhône-Alpes et qui parle de ce qu’il a vécu voilà 5 ans. Il laisse peu de doute sur les pratiques du père Tony Anatrella, aujourd’hui 75 ans et membre éminent de la commission pontificale sur la famille et par ailleurs psychothérapeute.

Les faits remontent à 2011.La victime est alors majeure. A l’époque, un prêtre lui recommande d’aller consulter le père Tony Anatrella, qui officie à Paris. Ce prélat est considéré au Vatican comme “le spécialiste de l’homosexualité”,un mal qu’il se propose de soigner par une approche “corporelle”. Il considère en effet que l’homosexualité est un déréglement qui nécessite des soins. Et s’agissant de cette thérapie commencée en 2001, ce patient affirme que le père Anatrella l’a curieusement contraint à des attouchements sexuels durant la consultation. Provoquant chez lui un profond malaise.

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
Newsday

Updated May 6, 2016

By Bart Jones bart.jones@newsday.com

A national sex abuse victims group on Friday criticized Bishop William Murphy of the Diocese of Rockville Centre for refusing to suspend from ministry a priest who is accused of abusing two children in a parish where he worked.

The Rev. Gregory Yacyshyn was recently accused in two separate lawsuits of allegedly abusing a boy and a girl while serving at St. Francis of Assisi in Greenlawn more than a decade ago.

“Murphy is acting incredibly recklessly,” said David Clohessy, director of the Chicago-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “How does he justify not even temporarily ousting [Father] Greg while an investigation is done? That’s what he and his brother bishops have promised for years now, but refusing to do time and time again.”

If Murphy doesn’t act, church officials including Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York should “discipline and denounce him for his recklessness,” Clohessy said in a statement.

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
Croydon Advertiser

By Tom_Matthews | Posted: May 06, 2016

A COULSDON pastor found guilty of spanking women in his congregation for sexual pleasure has been jailed.

Howard Curtis, 73, was unanimously found guilty of six counts of sexual assault and two counts of child cruelty on March 24, after a four-week trial at Croydon Crown Court.

At the same court today, Judge Peter Gower QC ordered that Curtis, former minister of Coulsdon Christian Fellowship, in be jailed for six years and sign the sex offender register for life.

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.

SOUTH CAROLINA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Wednesday, May 4, 2016

Statement by Amy Smith, , Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests leader,

Florence church youth volunteer kissed and fondled teen boy, police say

By Eric Walters, April 29, 2016, WBTW News 13

FLORENCE, SC – A youth group volunteer at a Florence church has been arrested for sexually assaulting a minor.

According to Florence Police Major Carlos Raines, a 15-year-old boy claimed Leo LaSalle Comissiong, 20, of Florence kissed and fondled him through his clothes.

The incident happened in February at the NewSpring Church on North Cashua Drive, Raines said.

Comissiong is charged with criminal sexual conduct with a minor, 3rd degree.

[WBTW]

A spokesperson for NewSpring Church, Suzanne Swift, released the following statement regarding the case:

On Sunday, April 24, 2016, a NewSpring Church staff member saw Leo La Salle Comissiong III enter an unoccupied room with a 15 year old. The staff member immediately entered the room and questioned Comissiong. Comissiong denied any wrongdoing at that time. Because we take the safety of minors very seriously, we never allow adults to be alone with children or teens while on a NewSpring Campus. NewSpring Church questioned Comissiong again, and at that time removed him from volunteering in any capacity at NewSpring. After a separate conversation with the student, NewSpring staff contacted law enforcement. Since that time, NewSpring has fully cooperated with authorities and in this investigation.

NewSpring Church will continue to corporate with this investigation and we are praying for everyone impacted.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

EDITORIAL

Charles Curran, Roger Haight, Margaret Farley. What some of this country’s most prominent theologians share in common, sadly, is a history of investigation and censure by the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. And it’s not just an American problem. Consider Switzerland’s Hans Küng, Brazil’s Leonardo Boff or Sri Lanka’s Tissa Balasuriya.

Now some theologians and two bishops are calling for Pope Francis’ spirit of openness and transparency to be extended to Catholic theologians under investigation by the doctrinal office. In a letter sent to the congregation and Francis last month, a prominent group of church men and women are recommending that the current procedures be updated and reformed. The most basic demands are that the curtains of secrecy that envelop this process be lifted and that all parties involved engage in open, civil discourse.

The new approach should aim “to reflect the attitude of Jesus and to integrate values that the world sees as basic to a functioning, civilized society,” says a copy of the letter obtained by NCR.

Reforms should make the process “just and equitable,” with presumptions of “sincerity, innocence, and loyalty to the church on the part of the person being investigated,” the letter said.

We agree. While we have seen time and again church authorities giving the benefit of the doubt to those who prey on children or reject the Second Vatican Council, the treatment of theologians whose job is to wrestle with the tough questions of our faith hearkens back to the doctrinal congregation’s origins in the infamous medieval Inquisition. Such unjust practices are more befitting countries headed by dictators than the church founded by Jesus.

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MINNESOTA
Fox 9

POSTED:MAY 06 2016

The following is an emailed statement to Fox 9 investigative reporter Tom Lyden in response to this story: Family members claim Nienstedt failed to report abusive priest in the 1970s

Dear Mr. Lyden,

I am writing to address questions you recently asked me regarding my cousin’s son. Please allow me to answer your questions.

I want to start with the timeline because I think it’s important. I was ordained as a priest in July 27, 1974, which is important to note because I was not assigned to a parish until I was ordained a priest. I was immediately assigned as an associate pastor at Guardian Angels Parish in Clawson until 1976. During that time, I reconnected with a first cousin and her family as they were members of Guardian Angels parish. The family was very kind to me and opened their home for dinners, family gatherings or simply to enjoy each other’s company. I still remain very grateful to, and a deep regard for, all of them.

During the year and a half I served at Guardian Angels parish, then Father Sam Ritchey, a priest from Columbus, Ohio, whom I met during my schooling at the Pontifical North American College in Rome, would attend school during the summer at Marygrove College in Detroit. I introduced him to my cousin’s family and they were just as generous to him as they were to me during the two summers he was there. In 1976, I returned to Rome to study for my licentiate.

When I did return from Rome in January 1977, as I recall, I stopped by my cousin’s house for a visit, and she and her daughter told me they wanted to talk with me. As I remember, my cousin relayed an incident where her son had driven Father Ritchey to a retreat center. She told me that once they were in his room at the retreat center, Father Ritchey apparently said something inappropriate to her son and placed his hand on her son’s knee. It’s my understanding her son immediately left the retreat house.

It’s my memory that I asked my cousin if she wanted me to talk with her son, and I recall that she said he did not want to talk with anyone about what happened. We continued to discuss the matter, which I took very seriously.

After I left, I contacted Father Ritchey, who denied anything had happened. We did not discuss the matter again. However, I continued to keep in touch with my cousin.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Telegraph

Lexi Finnigan
5 MAY 2016

A respected deputy head at a prestigious Catholic school spent his weekends at chemsex child porn parties with paedophiles he met on Grindr, a court heard as judge said the teacher led a “double life”.

Peter Allott, 37, was accused of having a “split personality” after it was revealed he spent up to £600 a week on Class A drugs and was addicted to child sex images whilst teaching at St Benedict’s School.

He kept child abuse images on his iPhone and on a hard drive found in his office at the Ealing-based school, which includes comedian Julian Clary and actor Andy Serkis amongst its former pupils.

Jailing Allott for 33 months at Blackfriars Crown Court today Judge Peter Hillen said the teacher was addicted to “debauchery”.

Judge Hillen described how Allott turned to chemsex parties and Class A drugs after the deaths of his mother and grandmother.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Freethinker

Peter Allott, 37, above, a respected deputy head at a prestigious London Catholic school, has been jailed for 33 months for possessing child pornography and drugs.

According to this report, Allott, of St Benedict’s School, spent his weekends at chemsex child porn parties with paedophiles he met on the gay dating app, Grindr.

Judge Hillen described how Allott turned to chemsex parties and Class A drugs after the deaths of his mother and grandmother.

The consensual sexual activity between you and other people is of no concern of this court save for it was at the drug parties that you became aware of, and addicted to, indecent images of children.

You watched videos, moving images, of child sex abuse. That would lead you to online chat room Zoom where you and others, as many as 25 at a time I have been told, would watch and exchange the images.

I use the phrase of a paedophile ring, that’s precisely what that was.

Over the weekends you would engage in chemsex parties using crystal meth and m-cat and having sex with multiple partners but also watch these images.

Then on Monday morning you would put on your suit and you would be the brilliant, high-flying deputy was master doing your public duty and your work for society.

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NEW MEXICO
Albuquerque Journal

By Olivier Uyttebrouck / Journal Staff Writer
Published: Thursday, May 5th, 2016

After nearly a quarter of a century on the lam, a priest who helped ignite the clerical sex abuse crisis in New Mexico in the 1990s has turned up in Morocco, working at an English-language school for children, an Albuquerque attorney said.

Arthur Perrault, who vanished from his Albuquerque parish in 1992, was served last month with a civil lawsuit filed by a man who alleges he was sexually molested repeatedly by the former Archdiocese of Santa Fe priest.

“Getting (Perrault) away from children is priority No. 1 for me, especially if he is still surrounded by kids, because he will never change,” said Kenneth Wolter, 35, who filed the suit against Perrault in December.

Wolter was an altar server at St. Bernadette’s Church in Albuquerque in 1991 and 1992 when Perrault sexually abused him at the church and at Kirtland Air Force Base, where Perrault served as a chaplain, the lawsuit charges. Wolter was age 10 and 11 at the time of the abuse, which ended when Perrault fled New Mexico.

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