ABUSE TRACKER

BUFFALO (NY)
WGRZ

March 13, 2018

By Emily Lampa

A national law firm calls for the Diocese of Buffalo to fully disclose names and information of all priests accused of sexual abuse and address concerns over victim compensation program.

A national law firm that represents thousands of alleged abuse victims is calling on the Diocese of Buffalo to release the names and information of all priests accused of sexual abuse.

Attorney, J. Michael Reck, and former Catholic priest, Patrick Wall, gave local news agencies the details of a report, compiled by Jeff Anderson & Associates, PA – a law firm based in New York City.

“We’re here today,” said Reck, “to call on the Diocese of Buffalo to do the right thing. And to release the of other credibly accused clerics that it knows of that it continues to hold in secret.”

The report highlights 13 accused Western New York priests. Reck explained that while the report documents the reported transgressions of 13 clerics, based on publicly available data, the Diocese of Buffalo has acknowledged that 40 more priests have been accused of sexual abuses.

“From the 53 that the Diocese of Buffalo has publicly acknowledged. That means there are 40…40 alleged clerics from the diocese of Buffalo whose identities and whereabouts are unknown to the public,” Reck 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.

SEATTLE (WA)
KOMO News

March 13, 2018

A man who was sexually abused as a child has reached a $2.45 million settlement with the Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle and the Franklin Pierce School District.

The man, whose name was not publicly released, alleged in a lawsuit that he was sexually abused in the early 1980s by former teacher Edward Courtney at Parkland Elementary, a now-closed grade school in the Tacoma area.

The $2.45 million settlement was reached just before the case was scheduled to go to trial Monday in King County Superior Court. It is believed to be one of the largest settlements involving the Catholic Church in Western Washington, said the victim’s attorney, Michael Pfau.

Under terms of the settlement, the Seattle Archdiocese will pay $1.5 million and the Franklin Pierce School District will pay $950,000. Seattle Archbishop J. Peter Sartain said he hopes the settlement will bring closure and assist the victim in his healing process.

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MONTEVIDEO (URUGUAY)
Merco Press

March 14, 2018

As Pope Francis marks the fifth year of his papacy next week, the pontiff once hailed as a fearless reformer is under fire for his handling of the sex abuse scandals that have rocked the Roman Catholic Church. Since taking over in March 2013, the 81-year-old Argentine has championed the cause of the marginalized, saying he wanted a “poor church for the poor” and shunning papal palaces and ostentatious displays of wealth.

His reform agenda has introduced the possibility in certain cases to allow divorced and remarried believers to take communion, although he still agrees with the Church’s traditional positions on other issues, such as abortion, artificial contraception and gay marriage. But the sex abuse scandals have haunted his papacy and last month the Vatican announced it was reviving its anti-pedophile panel.

A trip to Chile in January was seen as a resounding failure after he defended a bishop accused of covering up the crimes of a pedophile priest. Francis, who like his predecessor Benedict XVI, promised a “zero tolerance” approach to sexual abuse, sparked uproar when he said: “The day they bring me proof against Bishop (Juan) Barros, then I will speak.” But he later apologized to the victims and sent a Vatican top expert on sex abuse to hear the witnesses in the case.

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SOUTH AFRICA
Sowetan Live

March 14, 2018

By Matthew Savides

Archbishop Thabo Makgoba said on Tuesday that he took responsibility for cases of abuse within the Anglican Church‚ even when it happened under the watch of his predecessors.

He was speaking after award-winning author Ishtiyaq Shukri issued a statement earlier this month that detailed years of abuse at the hands of priests in Kimberley.

Shukri’s revelation came in the wake of Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu’s resignation as an ambassador for Oxfam amid a sex scandal that has rocked the international aid organisation.

Shukri said this resignation was hypocritical because Tutu had been silent on sex scandals in the church.

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GUAM
The Guam Daily Post

March 14, 2018

By Mindy Aguon

A Mongmong resident alleges he was sexually abused by a now-retired priest during Boy Scout outings more than 40 years ago.

P.Q., who used initials to protect his identity, filed a $10 million lawsuit in the District Court of Guam against the Archdiocese of Agana, the Boy Scouts of America and Louis Brouillard.

While he never served as an altar boy or joined the Boy Scouts, P.Q. said at the age of 12, he would join the other boys from the village on outings with Brouillard, who was a parish priest and a scoutmaster.

The priest routinely drove from village to village to pick up the boys and take them swimming at the Lonfit River.

P.Q. would be picked up with the other boys at the Nuestra Señora De Las Aguas Catholic Church, court documents state.

Brouillard allegedly instructed the boys to remove their clothes and swim naked, and promised to buy them burgers, fries and sodas after the outings, the lawsuit states.

P.Q. alleges Brouillard groped and touched his private parts as he swam naked and then offered a reward to the boys by taking them out to eat at different restaurants.

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UNITED STATES
The Huffington Post

March 12, 2018

By Carol Kuruvilla

“The church should have been the first group to stand up and say, ‘We will not allow this.’”

In early January, a Tennessee pastor who stood accused of sexual assault received a standing ovation from members of his evangelical Christian congregation after confessing to a “sexual incident” with a woman 20 years before. Now, the woman who went public with her allegations against her former youth pastor is again speaking out about her experience, this time urging American churches to more fully reckon with their responsibility to sexual assault victims.

“We as a church, of all places, should be getting this right,” Jules Woodson said in a New York Times op-ed video published on Friday. “It’s unfathomable to me that the secular world, Hollywood, are taking a stand. The church should have been the first group to stand up and say, ‘We will not allow this.’”

Woodson came forward in January with allegations against her former youth pastor, Andy Savage. She claims that when she was 17 in 1998, Savage drove her to a private location after a church event in Texas and forced her to perform sexual acts. She said church leaders at Woodlands Parkway Baptist Church (which later changed its name to StoneBridge Church) urged her to keep quiet and promised the church would take care of the matter internally.

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BUFFALO (NY)
Batavia News

March 13, 2018

By Scott Desmit

Six priests with ties to Wyoming and Genesee counties were among 13 priests in the Diocese of Buffalo who were accused of sexually assaulting children.

Jeff Anderson & Associates law firm of Minnesota released the names during a press conference in Buffalo Tuesday morning. The firm has led the way in the fight for the victims of priests and has filed numerous lawsuits seeking compensation and accountability from the Catholic Church.

In all, at least 22 priests who served the Diocese of Buffalo have been named since the 1980s and nearly 100 more have been targets of various lawsuits and complaints.

Tuesday, the names of 13 more were released in an ongoing effort to get the Diocese to identify all the priests who have been accused.

Among those named were five who served in Wyoming or Genesee counties and one who was arrested and charged with sodomizing children at a camp in Wyoming in the 1980s.

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SYRACUSE and OGDENSBURG (NY)
Press Connects

March 14, 2018

By Hannah Schwarz

A law firm that specializes in clergy sexual abuse will disclose on Wednesday the names of 27 New York clergy members accused of sexually abusing minors, the firm, Jeff Anderson & Associates, said Tuesday.

Nineteen of those clergy members are from the Diocese of Syracuse; eight are from the Diocese of Ogdensburg. The identities and other information on the clergy members will be released at a 10 a.m. news conference in Syracuse, where the firm will also discuss the Diocese’s recently unveiled sexual abuse compensation program, and will urge the Church to release the names of priests who have been accused of sexual abuse of minors.

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IRELAND
The Avondhu

March 14, 2018

By Donal O’Keeffe

Former President Mary McAleese is a decent and fiercely-intelligent woman who is hugely respected by the Irish people. She’s in for a disappointment, though, if she thinks the Catholic Church values her opinion any more than it does that of any other woman, writes Donal O’Keeffe.

They gave Cardinal Bernard Law a grand old send-off all the same last December. Granted, the turnout in St Peter’s Basilica was clearly sparser than anticipated, with ushers stacking away the chairs which had been set out for an expected larger crowd, but Law’s funeral Mass was presided over by senior Italian Cardinal Angelo Sodano, and the coffin was blessed by Pope Francis himself.

No mention was made at Law’s funeral of the reason he had been forced to resign on December 13 2002, after 18 years as Archbishop of Boston. Law’s resignation came at the culmination of a series of Pulitzer Prize-winning articles by Boston Globe reporters, in which they outlined how paedophile priests were moved – under Law’s watch – from parish to parish without notifying parishioners or authorities. This was dramatised in the superb 2015 film ‘Spotlight‘, a film I watched with a strange feeling of déjà vu, because – of course – we in Ireland had seen the Boston story before ever Boston saw it.

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OGDENSBURG (NY)
Watertown Daily News

March 14, 2018

By Larry Robinson

The names of eight priests associated with the Diocese of Ogdensburg who are alleged to have sexually molested children were made public by a Minnesota-based law firm representing victims of child abuse.

The names, along with some 19 others from the Diocese of Syracuse, were being released during a live press conference streamed on Facebook by the firm of Jeff Anderson & Associates.

The priests associated with sexual abuse allegations within the Ogdensburg Diocese are:

Father John F. Fallon; Father Theodore M. Gillette; Father John Hunt: Father Liam O’Doherty; Father Robert M. Shurtleff: Father Clark S. White; Father David E. Wisniewski; and Father Paul F. Worczak.

Some of the priests are deceased, others are listed as whereabouts unknown, according to the report.

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OGDENSBURG (NY)
Watertown Daily News

March 14, 2018

By Larry Robinson

A Minnesota-based law firm representing victims of child sexual abuse plans to release reports today that contain the identities, histories and background information on 27 priests accused of sexual offenses against minors in the Diocese of Syracuse and the Diocese of Ogdensburg.

The event will be streamed live on Facebook at 10 a.m. from the Marriott Syracuse Downtown Conference Center, according to a news release from the law firm of Jeff Anderson & Associates.

The news conference link is https://www.facebook.com/AndersonAdvocates/

Jeff Anderson & Associates is one of the nation’s leading law firms representing victims of childhood sexual abuse, according to its website.

The separate reports to be released today will identify 19 Diocese of Syracuse priests and another eight priests from the Diocese of Ogdensburg, according to the firm. All of the priests allegedly stand accused of sexual offenses against minors.

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IRELAND
The Tablet

March 13, 2018

By Sarah Mac Donald

McAleese also revealed that her 49-year-old brother had been ‘seriously, physically, sadistically’ abused by Fr Malachy Finnegan

The former president of Ireland, Mary McAleese has called for an independent inquiry into the Church’s handling of allegations of abuse against the late Fr Malachy Finnegan, a one time president St Colman’s College in Newry, and a priest of the Diocese of Dromore.

In an interview with RTE Radio’s Sean O’Rourke programme this week, Dr McAleese said she believed the victims were “legion” and said the first complaints against Finnegan dated back to the 1970s not the 1990s.

She also revealed that her 49-year-old brother had been “seriously, physically, sadistically” abused by Fr Malachy Finnegan for all the years he attended St Colman’s College.

“There are huge questions to be answered by all the people who were involved at a senior level in that school and in the diocese as to what they knew and when they knew it. It shouts for an inquiry really,” she said.

Mrs McAleese said that her 90-year-old mother had only learned about her brother’s treatment, when Clem Leneghan wrote a letter about his experiences at the college to the Belfast Telegraph last month. He described Malachy Finnegan as a sadist who had “presided over a culture of bullying, violence, intimidation and secrecy.”

In her RTE interview, Dr McAleese became emotional as she admitted that because the “culture of silence” was “so oppressive and because these children were made to be so fearful”, she had only learned of her brother’s abuse within the past year.

Fr Finnegan taught at St Colman’s from 1967 and was president of the school between 1976 and 1987. He later served in parishes in the diocese of Dromore and died in 2002.

“So many people who were in the school had to have known; so many people who could have done something about it. We know now that the very first complaints about Malachy Finnegan go back to the 1970s not the 1990s.”

Responding to Ms McAleese’s call, a spokesman for the Irish bishops indicated that they would cooperate with any public inquiry into child sexual abuse by Fr Finnegan.

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NIAGARA FALLS (NY)
Niagara Gazette

March 13, 2018

By Mark Scheer and Rick Pfeiffer

REPORT: Some of accused clergy have ties to Niagara County.

A list of priests accused of sexual abuse while serving in the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo includes several names with previous ties to parishes in Niagara County.

The list, released Tuesday morning by attorneys representing sexual abuse victims, covers clergy associated with the Diocese of Buffalo who have been accused of committing sexual offense crimes against minors.

Of the 13 priests on the list compiled by Jeff Anderson & Associates, P.A., five were shown to have service histories with ties to Niagara County communities, including Niagara Falls, North Tonawanda and Lockport.

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SAGINAW (MI)
Church Militant

March 13, 2018

By Christine Niles, M.St. (Oxon.), J.D.

17-yr-old victim accuses bishop of engaging in cover-up

A sex abuse victim is filing a federal lawsuit accusing the Saginaw diocese and Bp. Joseph Cistone of a cover-up.

According to the complaint, Linden v. Saginaw, filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, John Doe — the 17-year-old male victim — alleges that he was the victim not only of Fr. Robert DeLand (arrested for sexual assault) but also of Bp. Cistone and the Saginaw diocese, who knew about DeLand’s criminal behavior but did little to address it.

The complaint claims Fr. DeLand engaged in grooming behavior, giving him cash and other gifts (including buying John Doe an expensive “vape” machine), and paying for counseling sessions for John Doe as he dealt with a friend’s suicide. The priest allegedly called or texted the boy 17–20 times a day, and told him “he had set up a special bedroom” in his condominium that was offered to the boy for use.

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IRELAND
The Times

March 14, 2018

By Ellen Coyne

Mary McAleese’s younger brother has called on the British government to hold a swift inquiry into a priest who abused him and others at a school.

Clem Leneghan has said that many people both at St Colman’s College in Newry, Co Down, and the diocese of Dromore knew about Father Malachy Finnegan’s actions and failed to act. In a statement yesterday, he called on all those who knew about the abuse to come forward to the PSNI.

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MELBOURNE (AUSTRALIA)
The Australian

March 15, 2018

By John Ferguson

The Catholic Church yesterday began historic negotiations to join the Turnbull government’s $4 billion sex abuse redress scheme, a move that would place intense pressure on the remaining states and faiths yet to sign up.

Social Services Minister Dan Tehan said Catholic Church officials had agreed to hold intensive talks in the next three weeks to iron out problems with the draft laws to enable the faith to lead the way among non-government institutions. If the church opts in before the July 1 start — as expected — it will transform the rollout of the scheme in Australia.

Mr Tehan met Catholic officials in Canberra where the path was laid for the church to opt into the scheme, which would provide up to $150,000 in redress to proven victims but with a lower burden of proof compared with the courts.

Catholic bishops have agreed to opt into the scheme but officials are attempting to clarify and resolve a series of outstanding concerns to enable the church to become involved. No firm timeline has yet been agreed.

Church officials only received key documents on the scheme on Friday and are yet to see draft legislation proposed by the Victorian government.

But with momentum heading towards a deal within weeks or months, smaller institutions and churches will be under enormous pressure to fall into line. There remain real concerns that some entities with high abuse rates could be sent broke by the scheme.

The NSW and Victorian governments decided last Friday to opt into the scheme.

A spokesman for Mr Tehan said there would be intensive talks in the lead up to Easter.

“It was agreed to have ongoing, detailed discussions over the next three weeks with the intention of Catholic Church entities opting in to the national redress scheme,” the spokesman said. “The minister welcomed the constructive way the Catholic Church has engaged on the issue and looks forward to an ongoing dialogue.”

The Australian understands the church will negotiate on a series of concerns it still holds, many articulated in the Truth Justice Healing Council submission to a Senate committee investigating the original federal bill that was drafted to set up the scheme. Concerns in that submission include the standard of proof required to receive a payment, the formula for which compensation payments will be decided and the desire that all state governments should commit to participating in the redress scheme as a matter of urgency.

The scheme, if passed by parliament, will require participants to release offending institutions from civil liability for the abuse but in turn will enable them to receive a one-off payment or an additional top-up payment if any original redress were deemed inadequate.

The remaining states, churches and other institutions are facing intense pressure to opt into the scheme amid concerns they will struggle to fund some payments. Labor backs a $200,000 cap but the federal government and major states believe $150,000 will be as high as the scheme can go. The key number will be the average cost of each claim, which is likely to be about $75,000.

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SAN DIEGO (CA)
Snopes.com

March 13, 2018

By Dan MacGuill

The story behind a decades-old letter that went viral in 2018.

A letter purportedly documenting a Catholic orphanage’s sale of a Native American child to an Illinois couple received widespread attention decades later on social media, highlighting a practice that has not made it into many American history books — but which is an indelible part of the country’s recent past.

In the 1952 letter, Fr. John Pohlen, who ran the Tekakwitha Indian Mission in Sisseton, South Dakota, wrote:

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Seely,

Thank you very kindly for your donation of 10.00 for my little Indians. Yours is the first invitation that was ever extended to one of our papooses [Native American children] to come and spend the vacation somewhere. We have a few little boys and girls who have noone at all interested whether they live or die or come and go.

I would send a little boy of six years or older or a little girl whatever you prefer. These Indian children are very little trouble, especially the one I have in mind. If you really mean it, I will see that we get him ready; you may have him any time you desire. I am not making any inquiries about you, because it takes a good person to make an offer as you did.

Please, let me know.

With kindest regards,

Father John

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NEW YORK (NY)
New York Times

March 12, 2018

By Michael Cooper

The Metropolitan Opera fired the conductor James Levine on Monday evening, ending its association with a man who defined the company for more than four decades after an investigation found what the Met called credible evidence that Mr. Levine had engaged in “sexually abusive and harassing conduct.”

The investigation, which the Met opened in December after a report in The New York Times, found evidence of abuse and harassment “both before and during the period” when Mr. Levine worked at the Met, the company said in a statement.

It was an extraordinary fall from grace for a legendary maestro, whom many consider the greatest American conductor since Leonard Bernstein.

The Met did not release the specific findings of its investigation, which it said had included interviews with 70 people. But the statement said that the investigation had “uncovered credible evidence that Mr. Levine engaged in sexually abusive and harassing conduct toward vulnerable artists in the early stages of their careers, over whom Mr. Levine had authority.” It said that it was terminating its relationship with Mr. Levine, who is currently the company’s music director emeritus and the artistic director of its young artists program.

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NEW YORK (NY)
New York Times

March 13, 2018

By Zachary Woolf

It was about 9:30 on Monday evening at the Metropolitan Opera, just a few hours after the Met had fired the conductor James Levine, its musical lodestar since the early 1970s, for what the company found was sexual abuse and harassment, including of young artists under the Met’s guidance.

Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the 43-year-old the company has hired as its next music director, was taking his bow after Strauss’s “Elektra,” an opera about killing your parents that Mr. Levine led three dozen times with the Met. The audience roared its approval as Mr. Nézet-Séguin grinned. It felt like an anointing.

But is an anointing what the Met should want? The fate of Mr. Levine, 74, who has not commented publicly since denying any misconduct in December, after The New York Times reported a series of accusations, may be an opportunity to think about what it means to be a maestro, to consider the vast power we grant to conductors and whether that power has outlived its usefulness.

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DUBLIN (IRELAND)
RTE, Today with Sean O’Rourke

March 12, 2018

By Mary McAleese

[This important video might be viewable only through March 14, 2018. At 12:22 of the video, McAleese discusses Pope Francis’s statements about Bishop Barros. At 27:50 she discusses her brother’s abuse by Fr. Malachy Finnegan; her view that Pope Francis should visit Newry during his trip to Ireland in August 2018; and her position that an independent inquiry on Finnegan is needed.]

The former President of Ireland joins Sean O’Rourke to discuss recent comments she made about the Catholic Church.

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ROME (ITALY)
Independent Catholic News

March 8, 2018

By Mary McAleese

[See also a video of McAleese’s speech at the Voices of Faith conference.]

Mary McAleese, former President of Ireland, gave the following address today at the Voices of Faith International Women’s Day Conference, on the theme ‘Why women matter’ – held at the Jesuit Curia in Rome.

The Israelites under Joshua’s command circled Jericho’s walls for seven days, blew trumpets and shouted to make the walls fall down. (cf. Joshua 6:1-20). We don’t have trumpets but we have voices, voices of faith and we are here to shout, to bring down our Church’s walls of misogyny. We have been circling these walls for 55 years since John XXIII’s encyclical Pacem in Terris first pointed to the advancement of women as one of the most important “signs of the times”.

“they are demanding both in domestic and in public life the rights and duties which belong to them as human persons” .… The longstanding inferiority complex of certain classes because of their economic and social status, sex, or position in the State, and the corresponding superiority complex of other classes, is rapidly becoming a thing of the past.

At the Second Vatican Council Archbishop Paul Hallinan of Atlanta, warned the bishops to stop perpetuating “the secondary place accorded to women in the Church of the 20th century” and to avoid the Church being a “late-comer in their social, political and economic development”. The Council’s decree Apostolicam Actuositatem said it was important that women “participate more widely … in the various sectors of the Church’s apostolate”. The Council’s pastoral constitution Gaudium et Spes said the elimination of discrimination based on gender was a priority. Paul VI even commissioned a study on women in Church and Society. Surely we thought then, the post-Conciliar Church was on the way to full equality for its 600 million female members. And yes-it is true that since the Council new roles and jobs, have opened up to the laity including women but these have simply marginally increased the visibility of women in subordinate roles, including in the Curia, but they have added nothing to their decision-making power or their voice.

Remarkably since the Council, roles which were specifically designated as suitable for the laity have been deliberately closed to women. The stable roles of acolyte and lector and the permanent deaconate have been opened only to lay men. Why? Both laymen and women can be temporary altar servers but bishops are allowed to ban females and where they permit them in their dioceses individual pastors can ban them in their parishes. Why?

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AURORA (IL)
Associated Press via Fox Illinois

March 13, 2018

A former Catholic priest in suburban Chicago who was accused of sexually abusing two girls has returned to his native Colombia.

The Aurora Beacon-News report comes a little more than a month after the office said it had dropped felony charges of sexual abuse against 51-year-old Alfredo Pedraza-Arias in exchange for his guilty plea to misdemeanor battery with the understanding that the former priest would be removed from the United States when he served his jail sentence.

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AURORA (IL)
Beacon-News

March 13, 2018

By Hannah Leone

A former Aurora priest who avoided a jury trial on child sex abuse charges through a misdemeanor plea deal is back in Colombia, and his probation in Kane County has been terminated.

Alfredo Pedraza Arias, 51, lost his temporary religious worker visa after he was charged with sexually abusing two girls at Sacred Heart Church in Aurora and at one of the girls’ homes between 2012 and 2014. In June 2017, a federal immigration judge ordered Arias removed from the United States, a decision the priest waived his right to appeal.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement deportation officers arrested Arias Feb. 10 at the Kane County jail in St. Charles after he completed his criminal sentence, ICE spokeswoman Nicole Alberico said in an email. On Feb. 26, ICE deportation officers executed the removal order and removed Arias to Colombia, Alberico said.

On Friday, an order closed the Kane County criminal case, terminating his probation.

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NEW YORK (NY)
The Week

March 12, 2018

By Catherine Garcia

The Metropolitan Opera in New York fired James Levine on Monday, after an investigation into the conductor’s behavior found evidence of sexual misconduct and harassment.

A preeminent conductor, Levine, 74, made his debut at the Met in 1971, and went on to conduct 2,552 performances. He became artistic director in 1976, but stepped down two years ago due to Parkinson’s disease, taking on a new role as the head of the young artists program. Levine was suspended in early December when several New York newspapers printed allegations of sexual misconduct against him, some going back to the 1960s.

The firm Proskauer Rose was hired to head the investigation, and the Met said that after interviewing more than 70 people, investigators “uncovered credible evidence that Mr. Levine engaged in sexually abusive and harassing conduct toward vulnerable artists in the early stages of their careers, over whom Mr. Levine had authority. In light of these findings, the Met concludes that it would be inappropriate and impossible for Mr. Levine to continue to work at the Met.” He has not been charged with any crime. Levine’s representative did not respond to The Associated Press’ request for comment.

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NEW YORK (NY)
The Huffington Post

March 12, 2018

By Antonia Blumberg

The company suspended Levine in December over allegations dating back decades.

The Metropolitan Opera fired music director emeritus James Levine on Monday, citing “credible evidence” of sexual abuse and harassment by the once-renowned conductor.

The Met said in a press release that a months-long investigation carried out by “outside counsel” that included interviews with 70 people led to its decision to dismiss Levine.

The investigation, it said, “uncovered credible evidence that Mr. Levine engaged in sexually abusive and harassing conduct towards vulnerable artists in the early stages of their careers, over whom Mr. Levine had authority.”

“In light of these findings,” the statement said, “the Met concludes that it would be inappropriate and impossible for Mr. Levine to continue to work” at the opera.

Levine was fired as both music director emeritus and artistic director of the Met’s young artist program.

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NEW YORK (NY)
Agence France-Presse

March 13, 2018

By Shaun Tandon

New York’s Metropolitan Opera announced Monday it fired legendary conductor James Levine, for decades the face of its orchestra, after finding “credible evidence” that he sexually abused younger musicians.

The leading US opera house had already suspended Levine in December after allegations first became public against him. Levine guided the Met’s orchestra for 40 years as music director.

The Met said it has “terminated its relationship” with Levine, who retired in 2016 amid failing health but until the scandal had remained a frequent presence as a conductor.

“The investigation uncovered credible evidence that Mr. Levine had engaged in sexually abusive and harassing conduct both before and during the period when he worked at the Met,” the opera house said in a statement.

The three-month investigation concludes a spectacular fall from grace for a musician often hailed as one of the top US conductors of his generation.

Fittingly perhaps, his final Met appearance was conducting Verdi’s “Requiem” in December.

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SAGINAW (MI)
NBC25/FOX66

March 12, 2018

A Saginaw County priest accused of sexual assault wants more time to prepare his case.

71-year-old Fr Robert Deland is waving his rights to a preliminary hearing in 21 days.

He’s charged with two cases of sexual assault while he was the pastor of St. Agnes Catholic Church.

The assistant prosecutor in the case says police are still getting calls about other suspects.

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NOGALES (AZ)
Nogales International

March 13. 2018

By Arielle Zionts

Local authorities are searching for a Rio Rico man accused of child molestation who appears to have fled the area.

Mario Montano, 60, is accused of one count of continuous sexual abuse of a child that allegedly occurred between August 2010 through August 2011. He is also accused of two counts of furnishing harmful items to minors – child and adult pornography – between August 2010 and Sept. 15, 2010.

The felony charges were filed at Nogales Justice Court on Feb. 27, a day before a warrant was taken out for Montano’s arrest.

“The investigation in this matter is still ongoing and law enforcement is working diligently to take Montano into custody,” said County Attorney George Silva.

Silva confirmed that Montano’s whereabouts are unknown, but he would not say where officials suspect he is living or fled to. He said anyone with information on where Montano is should contact law enforcement.

He and a spokesman for the Nogales Police Department said they could not share any other details about the case.

The charges against Monano and his fugitive status came to public light after a family member of the alleged victim sent an email to the NI and a number of other news outlets on March 5 labeled as “breaking news” and containing news release-style accounts in English and Spanish. Some Mexican media immediately published information from the email and a version of it is also circulating on Facebook.

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GUAM
The Guam Daily Post

March 13, 2018

By Mindy Aguon

A new clergy sex abuse lawsuit against the Archdiocese of Agana accuses deceased Rev. Ray Techaira of sexual abuse while Techaira was a priest serving at Niño Perdido y Sagrada Familia Catholic Church in Asan.

J.M.R., of Dededo, filed a civil complaint filed with the District Court of Guam on Friday alleging he had been sexually abused by Techaira after asking questions about the Catholic faith during confirmation class in 1984.

J.M.R. asked Techaira, according to the lawsuit: If there is only one God – the Father – why address Techaira as “father?”

The priest became upset and told J.M.R. to stay after confirmation class, the lawsuit alleges. After the other kids had left, Techaira instructed the teen to go to the office and stand in the prayer position and allegedly began the sexual assault, the lawsuit alleges.

Techaira allegedly told the boy he had sinned and was not ready to receive the sacrament of confirmation.

When the boy told the priest to stop the sexual abuse, Techaira scolded the boy, the lawsuit alleges. The priest allegedly instructed the boy to continue praying and told the minor, “I need to do this to you, to cleanse you of your sins,” court documents state.

J.M.R. told the priest he was going to report him, but Techaira told him no one would believe him because he is highly respected in the Catholic Church and in the community, the lawsuit states.

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BUFFALO (NY)
The Buffalo News

March 13, 2018

By Jay Tokasz

A Minnesota law firm known for representing victims of clergy sexual abuse is urging Bishop Richard J. Malone to release details about the extent of abuse in the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo, including identifying the names of accused priests.

Attorney J. Michael Reck of Jeff Anderson & Associates P.A. sued the Catholic Diocese of Rockville Centre on Long Island in 2016, alleging that the diocese was committing a public nuisance by refusing to disclose the identity and history of allegedly sexually abusive priests.

Reck will be in Buffalo Tuesday to release a new report that identifies 13 priests in the Buffalo diocese who have been publicly accused of alleged sexual offenses against minors.

But Reck said in an interview that the number is a “big difference from what reality is. What’s the real number?”

Reck credited the Buffalo diocese with establishing an Independent Reconciliation and Compensation Program for survivors of clergy sexual abuse.

But, he also said, the new program falls short in the sharing of information with alleged victims.

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BUFFALO (NY)
WIVB News 4

March 13, 2018

A lawyer and advocate for sexual abuse victims of the New York Catholic Archdiocese is calling for Buffalo Bishop Richard Malone to release the names of every priest accused of sexual abuse.

It comes after Bishop Malone announced monetary settlements would be given to victims of the Buffalo Diocese.

Attorney Mike Reck says it’s a good step forward, but he thinks the Diocese is protecting the priests by withholding their names. He says it affects the victims even more.

“The secrecy breeds shame and shame means those survivors are held back from healing,” Reck says. “That holds them back from the accountability and the acknowledgment they need and they deserve.”

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UNITED STATES
Christian Headlines

March 12, 2018

By Amanda Casanova

Rachael Denhollander, the first woman to publicly accuse the USA Gymnastics doctor of sexual abuse, is now helping uncover child sexual abuse in the Sovereign Grace Churches.

Denhollander, a 33-year-old lawyer, has been speaking about the case and calling for justice.

Her comments come after the church network Sovereign Grace Churches was sued for a “pattern of sexual and spiritual abuse” within the network. The suit said that families were ostracized for not helping cover up the abuse and policies at the network discouraged filing police reports about the abuse.

The lawsuit was eventually dismissed in 2014, but a former youth leader was then convicted in a separate case of abusing three boys.

The church network changed its name to Sovereign Grace, relocated headquarters and replaced some of its leadership.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
BBC News

March 10, 2018

A nun embroiled in a property dispute with singer Katy Perry collapsed and died during a court hearing on Friday, US media report.

Sister Catherine Rose Holzman was 89.

She was one of two nuns locked in a legal battle with Perry and the Los Angeles Archdiocese over a former convent in the city.

Perry agreed to buy the property for $14.5m (£10.4m) in 2015, but the deal turned sour when the former residents objected.

Sister Catherine Rose and Sister Rita Callanan said they were uncomfortable handing the convent and its eight surrounding acres over to the star, whose sometimes provocative hits include I Kissed A Girl and Ur So Gay.

Perry reportedly visited the nuns to win them over, and is said to have shown them her tattoo of Jesus and sung a hymn for them. But the pair remained unconvinced.

“I found her videos,” Sister Rita Callanan told the Los Angeles Times. “I wasn’t happy with any of it.”

The nuns instead sold the residence to local restaurant owner Dana Hollister, without the approval of their Archdiocese.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
The Associated Press

March 12, 2018

Sr Catherine Rose Holzman’s order is involved in a dispute over the sale of their convent

A nun who was involved in a lawsuit with pop star Katy Perry over the sale of a convent in Los Angeles died Friday after collapsing during a court appearance.

Sister Catherine Rose Holzman, 89, had served the church “with dedication and love for many years,” Archbishop Jose Gomez said in a statement.

Holzman was a member of an order of elderly nuns involved in a dispute over the sale of their convent in the city’s Los Feliz neighbourhood.

Hours before her death, Holzman spoke to KTTV, decrying a judge’s ruling that cleared the way for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles to sell the convent to Perry.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
KABC

March 10, 2018

One of the nuns involved in a legal battle with the Los Angeles Archdiocese and singer Katy Perry over the sale of a Los Feliz property died Friday in court.

Sister Catherine Rose Holzman, 89, died during a court proceeding related to the case. The archdiocese released a statement regarding her sudden death.

“Sister Catherine Rose served the Church with dedication and love for many years and today we remember her life with gratitude. We extend our prayers today to the Immaculate Heart of Mary community and to all her friends and loved ones,” the statement said, in part.

Holzman was part of the order of nuns known as The Sisters of the Most Holy and Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary. That order of nuns owned a large hilltop property that used to be a convent. In 2015, the nuns sold the property to entrepreneur Dana Hollister, bypassing approval from Archbishop Jose H. Gomez.

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BUFFALO (NY)
WIVB

March 13, 2018

By Evan Anstey

[Note: For more detail see “Clerical Sexual Abuse in the Diocese of Buffalo“]

A lawyer serving as an advocate for victims has released the names of 13 priests in the Diocese of Buffalo who were accused of sexual abuse.

“The secrecy breeds shame and shame means those survivors are held back from healing,” Attorney Mike Reck said. “That holds them back from the accountability and the acknowledgment they need and they deserve.”

The priests of accused of abuse are the following:

Fr. John R. Aurelio
Fr. David W. Bialkowski
Fr. Robert J. Biesinger
Fr. James H. Cotter
Fr. Joseph P. Friel
Fr. Fred D. Ingalls
Fr. Gerald C. Jasinski
Fr. Timothy J. Kelley
Fr. Bernard M. Mach
Fr. Loville N. Martlock
Fr. Norbert Orsolits
Fr. James A. Spielman
Fr. William F. White

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BUFFALO (NY)
WKBW

March 12, 2018

By Charlie Specht

Report will be released Tuesday

Thirteen Buffalo priests are accused of committing sexual offenses against minors, according to lawyers who are planning a news conference for Tuesday morning.

Minnesota law firm Anderson Advocates, which specializes in cases of sexual abuse by clergy, plans to release a report Tuesday at the Hyatt hotel in downtown Buffalo that details “assignments and information regarding the alleged perpetrators,” lawyers said in a media advisory sent to reporters on Monday.

The lawyers, in addition to detailing the new claims of sexual abuse by priests in the diocese, will call on Bishop Richard Malone to release the names of priests who have been accused of sexual abuse in the past few decades.

The diocese has steadfastly refused to release the names in the past, even though victims say the release of the names and files regarding sexual abuse by priests helps in their healing process and discourages abuse from happening again.

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SAGINAW (MI)
The Detroit News

March 12, 2018

By Mark Hicks

A teen is suing a Saginaw-area priest, accusing him of “grooming” the high school student with gifts and invitations to his condo, leading to inappropriate contact including back rubs, groping and suggestions to view gay porn.

The Rev. Robert DeLand was charged last month with criminal sexual conduct following accusations from two males, ages 17 and 21. Police say they have received other complaints since his arrest.

The 71-year-old priest is on administrative leave from St. Agnes in Freeland, where he has had been pastor since July 2011, the Catholic Diocese of Saginaw reported. The suit also names the diocese and its leader, Bishop Joseph Cistone, claiming steps weren’t taken to stop the cleric or look into allegations about DeLand’s conduct.

DeLand allowed the 17-year-old he met last year to perform community service at the church that the youth was ordered to complete over six months, according to the lawsuit filed Monday in U.S. District Court.

When the youth returned to school that fall, the pastor was a volunteer “greeter” there, participated in school events and “engaged in a systematic pattern of ‘grooming’ behavior …, targeting the minor child, gaining his trust and/or providing him with gifts and favors,” attorney Todd J. Weglarz wrote.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Press Association

March 13, 2018

A former Irish president has revealed her youngest brother was “seriously, physically, sadistically” abused by a paedophile priest Fr Malachy Finnegan.

Mary McAleese said her brother only revealed the abuse at the age of 49.

She said the physical abuse happened throughout his seven years at St Colman’s College in Newry, where Finnegan – who died in 2002 – taught for 20 years.

Mrs McAleese said: “My baby brother, the youngest of nine children was seriously, physically, sadistically abused by Malachy Finnegan.”

She said her mother only found out three weeks ago.

Four of the former president’s five brothers attended St Colman’s.

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IRELAND
The Times

March 13, 2018

By Ellen Coyne

Mary McAleese has revealed that her youngest brother was “seriously, physically” and “sadistically” abused by Father Malachy Finnegan, head of a school in Co Down.

The former president said she only found out about the abuse suffered by Clem Leneghan, her brother, during his seven years at St Colman’s College in Newry in the past year.

Ms McAleese told RTÉ Radio 1’s Today with Sean O’Rourke about the abuse during an interview in which she indicated support for the reform of Ireland’s strict anti-abortion laws and claimed that her support for LGBT rights had had her banned from speaking in the Vatican.

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NEW YORK (NY)
The Associated Press

March 13, 2018

By Deepti Hajela and David Klepper

As a waitress, Nadine Morsch was used to having to force an occasional smile for an unpleasant customer. But when a man she was serving made a reference to grabbing her butt, she warned him he better not try. And he made her pay.

For the rest of the hour he was in the diner, she says, he was “running me around as much as possible.”

Morsch says she tolerated him, because she needed a good tip.

Experiences like that are one reason activists are invoking the #MeToo movement in the push for more states to adopt higher minimum wages for tipped workers. They say a wage structure that leaves workers dependent on tips often forces them to put up with harassing and abusive behavior from their customers or risk not being paid.

The effort has been around for years but has taken on new momentum lately with the increased reckoning and awareness of sexual misconduct. Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has called for public hearings; there’s a June ballot question in Washington, D.C., and an effort is underway to get the issue on the statewide ballot in Michigan.

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VERNON HILLS (IL)
Chicago Tribune/Pioneer Press

March 13, 2018

By Rick Kambic

Four former Vernon Hills High School students are now talking with police after an assistant soccer coach at the school was charged with sexual assault Friday, bringing the total number of students or former students involved to seven, according to police.

Monday night, the Community High School District 128 School Board voted unanimously to terminate the coach’s employement.

Cori Beard, 28, of the 300 block of Farmington Lane, Vernon Hills, was taken into custody for questioning Thursday evening shortly after a parent contacted a school employee, who then contacted police. She was charged Friday with 12 counts of criminal sexual assault and remanded to the Lake County jail on a $1 million bond.

Those charges stemmed from her actions involving two current students, police said.

The school board met privately behind closed doors to discuss Beard’s situation, among other personnel matters, and then voted swiftly upon returning to open session.

School Board President Pat Groody and Superintendent Prentiss Lea declined to take questions following the meeting. When asked if there was any indication other employees might have known of Beard’s activities, Groody and Lea provided a joint reply.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Christian Today

March 12, 2018

A parish priest in Northern Ireland has received threats telling him to ‘get out of town’ following publicity about a separate priest in the parish who died in 2002 and has recently been revealed as a paedophile.

Fr Charles Byrne made the revelations to parishioners during mass yesterday in the Clonduff parish in the village of Hilltown, County Down.

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ENGLAND
Christian Today

March 12, 2018

A Church of England priest has been banned from ministry after being found guilty of ‘spiritual abuse’ against a teenager.

Rev Timothy Davis, of Christ Church, Abingdon in Oxfordshire, was ‘prohibited from the exercise of holy orders’ for two years by a disciplinary panel on Saturday.

It comes after he was found ‘guilty of conduct unbecoming or inappropriate to the office and work of a clerk in Holy Orders through the abuse of spiritual power and authority over a person then aged 15-16’ in January.

The landmark case was the first of its kind in which a priest was found guilty of ‘spiritual abuse’.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

March 13, 2018

By Peter Gogarty

A CONVERGENCE of events has got me thinking about a question I raised during the 2013/14 Special Commission of Inquiry into Hunter Catholic paedophile priests James Fletcher and Denis McAlinden.

They were the preparations in New Zealand for a child abuse royal commission, a chat with a friend, and the debt of gratitude offered to courageous Newcastle woman Anthea Halpin by the Philippines ambassador to New Zealand for her role in having McAlinden removed from the Philippines in 1995.

The question is what the Catholic Church has done to identify and support victims of the paedophile priests it knowingly and deliberately exported all over the world – a reality proven by formal inquiries in Australia, Canada, the United States and Ireland. I remain particularly concerned about victims in developing countries where faith in the Catholic Church has rarely been questioned – much less shaken.

In the Hunter inquiry it was revealed that from 1949 until 1996 Denis McAlinden abused children, that people in the church including Bishop Leo Clarke, Vicar General Patrick Cotter, Bishop Michael Malone, Monsignor Allan Hart and Father Brian Lucas had knowledge of McAlinden’s offending, but he was not reported to police until shortly before his death. Instead he was moved from place to place, and those places included England, Ireland, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and the Philippines.

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IRELAND
The Journal

March 13, 2018

By Aoife Barry

Clem Leneghan said he does not want his story to take the spotlight away from where it belongs.

MARY MCALEESE’S BROTHER Clem Leneghan has said that he doesn’t want reports of his abuse to take the spotlight from the quest for justice against his abuser – and he wants those with knowledge of what happened to come forward.

He released a statement to the Today With Sean O’Rourke show on RTÉ Radio One this morning, in response to comments by his sister, the former President, yesterday.

In her interview with O’Rourke, McAleese said her brother was “seriously, physically, sadistically abused by Malachy Finnegan”.

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SAGINAW (MI)
WNEM

March 13, 2018

By Jessica Royce

A teen is suing a Mid-Michigan priest, accusing him of engaging in “grooming” behavior before groping the boy at his condo.

Fr. Robert DeLand was charged last month with criminal sexual conduct after accusations from two males following an undercover investigation.

According to lawsuit filed on Monday, March 13, the teen, referred to as John Doe, met DeLand at a friend’s funeral in May 2017 when he was 16-years-old. The teen was court ordered to perform community service at St. Agnes Church where DeLand was a priest.

When the teen returned to school in the fall, DeLand was a volunteer “greeter” at Freeland Community School District and often participated in school events.

The lawsuit claims DeLand would allegedly remove the teen from class, “taking him to an isolated area of the school to talk,” and making the teen late for on a daily basis.

“DeLand also made inappropriate physical contact with John Doe during the school day, including back rubs, hugs and groping of the buttocks,” according to the court documents.

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JACKSONVILLE (NC)
The Associated Press

March 13, 2018

By Justin Pritchard and Reese Dunklin

A decade after the Pentagon began confronting rape in the ranks, the U.S. military frequently fails to protect or provide justice to the children of service members when they are sexually assaulted by other children on base, an Associated Press investigation has found.

Reports of assaults and rapes among kids on military bases often die on the desks of prosecutors, even when an attacker confesses. Other cases don’t make it that far because criminal investigators shelve them, despite requirements they be pursued.

The Pentagon does not know the scope of the problem and does little to track it. AP was able to document nearly 600 sex assault cases on base since 2007 through dozens of interviews and by piecing together records and data from the military’s four main branches and school system.

Sexual violence occurs anywhere children and teens gather on base — homes, schools, playgrounds, food courts, even a chapel bathroom. Many cases get lost in a dead zone of justice, with neither victim nor offender receiving help.

“These are the children that we need to be protecting, the children of our heroes,” said Heather Ryan, a former military investigator.

The tens of thousands of kids who live on bases in the U.S. and abroad are not covered by military law. The U.S. Justice Department, which has jurisdiction over many military bases, isn’t equipped or inclined to handle cases involving juveniles, so it rarely takes them on.

Federal prosecutors, for example, pursued roughly one in seven juvenile sex offense cases that military investigators presented, according to AP’s review of about 100 investigative files from Navy and Marine Corps bases.

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ATLANTA (GA)
Christian Post

March 12, 2018

By Michael Gryboski

A Roman Catholic archdiocese has come out against a bill in the Georgia legislature that would, among other things, expand the opportunities for victims of sex abuse to file lawsuits, arguing that if enacted it could “drastically damage” their ministries.

Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory, the head of the Archdiocese of Atlanta, released a statement of opposition last week to Georgia’s House Bill 605.

Published by the Archdiocese’s official publication The Georgia Bulletin, Gregory listed multiple objections to the bill, including a concern over HB 605’s expansion of the statute of limitations for sex abuse cases.

“HB 605 would allow lawsuits against churches, private schools, businesses and non-profit organizations for actions asserted to have occurred many decades ago, potentially as far back as the 1940s, and the accused are very often deceased,” argued Gregory.

“Recognizing that these lawsuits can be very difficult if not impossible to defend, and risking grave injustice, the vast majority of states simply do not permit them.”

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VERNON HILLS (IL)
Daily Mail

March 12, 2018

By Keith Griffith and Mary Kekatos

– Suburban Chicago police on Monday said they were speaking with more potential victims of Vernon Hills soccer coach Cori Beard, 28
– Beard was charged on Friday with 12 counts of criminal sexual assault
– She allegedly engaged in a dozen sex acts between 2016 and February 2018
– Police do not believe that any of the sex acts occurred on school property
– Beard has coached both boys’ and girls’ soccer teams at Vernon Hills High
– She is currently being held at the Lake County Jail in lieu of $1million bond

Police in suburban Chicago have said they are speaking to additional potential victims of a female high school soccer coach.

Cori Beard, 28, was initially charged with 12 counts of criminal sexual assault in relation to three alleged victims, and cops in Vernon Hills, Illinois said on Monday they are speaking with four more.

‘All of these males have since graduated from Vernon Hills High School but were attending the high school when there may have been criminal conduct on the part of Ms. Beard between her and the boys,’ Vernon Hills police Deputy Chief Patrick Zimmerman told the Daily Herald.

No additional charges have yet been announced, however.

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EDMONTON (CANADA)
The Canadian Press

March 12, 2018

By Chris Purdy

Warning: Some of the details below may be distressing to readers.

A lawsuit claims female prison guards in Edmonton endured prolonged abuse from male co-workers that included sexual taunts, physical assaults, waterboarding and pepper spray being put on a toilet seat.

One female prison guard alleges a male co-worker pushed her over a desk, stuck his hand down her pants and locked a set of handcuffs through her underwear. She says she was put in choke holds and slammed into hard surfaces by her hair.

Another woman alleges she was constantly harassed for being gay and once suffered chemical burns on her buttocks and upper legs after she used a washroom where pepper spray was left on a toilet seat.

The claims are detailed in a lawsuit recently filed by four female guards at Edmonton Institution against the Correctional Service of Canada and the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers.

None of the allegations have been proven in court and statements of defence have yet to be filed.

The suit alleges that sexual assaults, abuse, bullying and harassment were rampant for decades at the maximum-security prison on the northeast edge of the city.

The lawsuit comes after an investigation at the prison last year that concluded the work atmosphere was toxic and made dozens of recommendations for change.

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AUSTRALIA
Eternity News

March 12, 2018

By John Sandeman

Frustration with slow response to national redress scheme builds

The Attorney-General Christian Porter has described the Catholic Church’s response to the news that NSW and Victoria had signed on to a national redress scheme as “pretty underwhelming.” The redress scheme will provide compensation to survivors of child sexual abuse in Australian institutions, including churches. (All the main parties in the South Australian election next week have said they will sign on, but the Queensland and West Australian state governments claim they need more information.)

According to Porter, the Catholic Church’s Archbishop Denis Hart has said the church would like to examine the Victorian Government’s basis for signing up to see if it is a good scheme for survivors.

“When you say that you need a review into how the state Government has signed on – as the Archbishop of Melbourne has said – to a scheme that has been reviewed more often than any scheme in Australia, quite frankly it starts to look like excuse-making,” Porter told the ABC’s Patricia Karvelas.

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CHICOPEE (MA)
Mass Live

March 9, 2018

By Stephanie Barry

Richard Koske sits at a restaurant not far from the Roman Catholic parish where he has worked as a janitor and handyman for 15 years.

It seems a suitable role for a devout man who traces many of his 62 years of memories back to the Catholic church — for better or for worse. A longtime South Hadley Falls resident, Koske and four siblings were students of Catholic schools growing up.

But he and the church remain at odds over the discipline of a once-trusted pastor who sexually assaulted him once when Koske was an adult — reflecting a hangover of sorts more than a decade after an international clergy abuse scandal enveloped the church. Massachusetts was ground zero for that calamity.

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LANSING (MI)
The Associated Press

March 11, 2018

Michigan is looking to shore up its law that requires certain people to report suspected child sexual abuse to authorities to address gaps that were exposed after disgraced former sports doctor Larry Nassar admitted to sexually assaulting female athletes.

Nassar’s victims are spearheading the initiative, saying he could have been stopped decades ago if coaches, athletic trainers or others at Michigan State University had listened to them. More than 250 women and girls have said the now-imprisoned Nassar molested them with his ungloved hands under the guise of medical treatment.

No one has faced charges yet for not reporting the abuse, but multiple investigations are underway into Michigan State’s handling of complaints.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter

March 9, 2018

By James Dearie

More details about the handling of predatory priests in the Diocese of Buffalo, New York, are coming to light after a 52-year-old man came forward last week with allegations that he was abused by Fr. Norbert Orsolits, a now-retired priest of the diocese.

The Olean Times Herald reported March 2 that Orsolits, now 78, claims he was assigned to serve at multiple parishes and to teach at Archbishop Walsh High School in Olean, New York, after receiving treatment for his predatory behavior in the 1980s. Earlier that week, Orsolits had admitted to The Buffalo News that he had abused “probably dozens” of young boys during his career as a priest.

Some who knew Orsolits during his time as a pastor of a parish in Portville, New York, his next assignment after Olean, told The Buffalo News March 1 that Orsolits had worked extensively with children there, too, leading youth groups and ski trips, often as the only adult present.

When asked about Orsolits’ claims regarding his post-treatment service, an attorney for the diocese said at a press conference March 1 that he was “not aware of that,” but the diocese would “take a look and see if” the claims were true.

Orsolits also says that he did not molest any more victims after his release from treatment.

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SAGINAW (MI)
WSGW

March 8, 2018

By John Hall

Saginaw County Prosecutor John McColgan says a special investigative team is being formed to coordinate and address allegations of abuse involving officials within the Catholic Diocese of Saginaw. The announcement Thursday follows criminal sexual conduct charges filed recently against 71-year- old Rev.Robert DeLand, which came from two male accusers, ages 17 and 21. Saginaw County Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Mark Gaertner estimates 20 to 30 accusations of abuse have been delivered to authorities, with some dating as far back as the 1970s. Gaertner predicts more tips will be provided that will have to be followed up on, possibly leading to other charges. He said those may not only involve Deland, but possibly other priests, as well.

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CAPE TOWN (SOUTH AFRICA)
IOL

March 11, 2018

By Bulelwa Payi

The Archbishop of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa has apologised for its past wrongs and failure to address sexual abuse claims.
Archbishop Thabo Makgoba was responding to damning allegations of sexual assault of a former Anglican and award-winning South African author Ishtiyaq Shukri by priests at St Cyprian’s School in Kimberley, Northern Cape.

Shukri’s best known work, The Silent Minaret, is about a South African Muslim boy facing prejudice in London in the wake of 9/11, which won the EU Literary Award in 2004.

“As the Archbishop of southern Africa, I take responsibility for what has happened during the time of my predecessors and where we have wronged or failed anyone, we beg their forgiveness,” Makgoba said.

He said the church’s Synod of Bishops in southern Africa was “shocked and distressed” to hear of Shukri’s abuse. He expressed his commitment to focus on claims of abuse levelled against the church’s leaders who were entrusted to give pastoral care, especially when nothing had been done about such allegations.

Makgoba said Shukri had been in touch with one of the bishops but was “unwilling to go into detail or name the person or persons who had abused him”.

“While respecting his wishes, we usually urge victims of abuse to lay charges with the police and with church authorities. The police are often better equipped to investigate cases than we are, especially in cases which go back many decades and may have occurred in dioceses whose former leaders have died,” Makgoba added.

Shukri broke his more than 40-year silence in an open letter to the press on sexual assaults he allegedly endured from various priests at St Cyprian’s Grammar School.

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ENGLAND
BBC News

March 12, 2018

A Church of England vicar who “spiritually abused” a boy has been banned from ministry for two years.

The Reverend Timothy Davis is understood to be the first priest to have been convicted of such abuse by the Bishop’s Disciplinary Tribunal.

Mr Davis, of Christ Church, Abingdon, held two-hour private prayer sessions in the teenager’s bedroom after moving in with his family in 2013.

He also told his victim his girlfriend was “evil” and a “bad seed”.

Mr Davis lived with the family, who were members of his congregation, for six months after meeting the boy during a mentoring programme.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
BBC News

March 12, 2018

A former Irish president has told how her brother suffered abuse by paedophile priest Fr Malachy Finnegan.

Mary McAleese described his experience as a student at St Colman’s College in Newry as “serious, physical and sadistic”.

She has called for an independent inquiry into the Catholic Church’s response to the allegations.

Fr Finnegan taught at the school from 1967 to 1976 and was later school president. He died in 2002.

He is accused of a catalogue of physical and emotional abuse on pupils.

Speaking to Irish broadcaster RTÉ on Monday, Mrs McAleese said the abuse against her youngest brother, Clement Leneghan, continued “all the years” he was at St Colman’s.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
Kansas City Star

March 11, 2018

By Eric Adler

District Court Judge Gregory W. Moeller peered down from the bench, aghast.

“I was horrified by the case,” the Idaho judge recalled recently.

In front of him, ready for sentencing, Keith Strawn — a father, 6-foot-3 with black-framed glasses the color of his boyish haircut — stood sad and penitent.

Strawn thought he had been doing right by his 15-year-old daughter, Heather, only to realize too late what a massive mistake he had made bringing her to Missouri — the easiest place in America for a 15-year-old to wed.

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VERNON HILLS (IL)
The Associated Press

March 11, 2018

Police in the Chicago suburb of Vernon Hills say a high school soccer coach who allegedly engaged in “unlawful sexual acts” with three boys has been arrested on felony sexual assault charges.

On Saturday they said they launched their investigation that led to the arrest of 28-year-old Cori Beard began last week after a parent of one of the alleged victims contacted a staff member at Vernon Hills High School where Beard is a part-time coach.

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ENGLAND
The Telegraph

March 11, 2018

By Callum Adams

Up to 1,000 children could have been abused in Britain’s biggest ever child abuse scandal, an investigation has revealed.

Hundreds of children, some as young as 11, are estimated to have been drugged, beaten and raped over a 40-year period in the town of Telford.

Lucy Allan, the Conservative MP for Telford, has called for an inquiry into child sexual exploitation, saying the latest reports were “extremely serious and shocking”. She has previously called for a “Rotherham-style inquiry” into the allegations.

“There must now be an independent inquiry into child sexual exploitation in Telford so that our community can have absolute confidence in the authorities,” she told the Sunday Mirror.

The investigation claims that allegations dating back to the 1980s were mishandled by authorities in Telford, who repeatedly failed to punish a network of abusers.

Victims claimed that similar abuse, which has been linked to three murders and two other deaths, has continued in the area.

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ATLANTA (GA)
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

March 10, 2018

On Friday the Roman Catholic Church came out strongly against legislation that would extend the time child abuse victims would have to sue the perpetrators and the institutions that harbored them.

Rep. Jason Spencer, R-Woodbine, introduced House Bill 605 and pushed it through his chamber, saying many victims don’t find the courage to acknowledge abuse until they’re older than 40. His bill would extend the statute of limitations from age 23 to 38 and possibly longer.

The bill is now in the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The Catholic Church and others lobbied quietly behind the scenes to gut the bill.

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BUFFALO (NY)
The Buffalo News

March 12, 2018

Great majority of priests have never harmed a soul

All are shocked at news of even one priest abusing a child. That shock is compounded by The News’ careful research and listing of 19 priests accused of abuse. I am equally shocked by the lack of compassion for the hundreds of priests who have served my church with sacrifice, love and devotion without any hint of wrongdoing.

Next month marks my 83rd year as a Catholic in this diocese. I have been active in my church and have volunteered most of my life and I have never met or even heard of a priest abusing anyone.

Judith Burns-Quinn’s unsubstantiated claim that the number of priests guilty of abuse is double or triple the number reported is simply her speculation based upon her unscientific sample.

Reporting that speculation places every priest in the Buffalo Catholic Diocese under suspicion of participating in abuse. How unfair that is to so many good men who have given their lives to be our spiritual solace in our good times and in our bad times.

Thomas R. Beecher Jr.

Buffalo

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

March 12, 2018

By Vivienne Clarke, Patsy McGarry

Ex-president says sibling only recently revealed abuse by Fr Malachy Finnegan

Former president Mary McAleese is calling for an independent inquiry into physical and sexual abuse at St Colman’s College in Newry, Co Down.

She told RTÉ’s Today with Sean O’Rourke show that her youngest brother had only recently revealed to her, at the age of 49, that he was abused by Fr Malachy Finnegan for all the years he attended the school.

She said her brother, Clem Leneghan, had been “seriously, physically, sadistically” abused, and her 90-year old mother had only learned of the abuse by reading a letter which he had published in the Belfast Telegraph some weeks ago.

Ms McAleese, who became upset as she spoke at the topic, said she had always thought that her brothers could speak to her about anything. She had been very distressed to think that her brother had suffered for so long and did not feel he could tell anyone.

The abuse went on for all the years he was at St Colman’s, she said. There were many people who knew what was going on and could have done something but did not do so.

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NEW YORK (NY)
New York Post

March 10, 2018

By Raquel Laneri

One day in February 2016, Chessy Prout, then 17, picked up an issue of Vanity Fair. The magazine had published a story about her rape case, in which she claimed an 18-year-old senior at her former high school, the elite New England academy St. Paul’s, had sexually assaulted her two years prior. But as she read, Prout grew furious.

Her assailant, Owen Labrie — who the previous year was acquitted of felony sexual assault but convicted on three misdemeanor counts of statutory rape and using a computer to lure a minor for sex — was described as a golden boy: handsome, suntanned, captain of the varsity soccer team and “a winner of the headmaster’s award for selfless devotion to school activities” whose Ivy League admission was rescinded after his arrest.

Prout, unnamed in the story, felt she was portrayed as a “blank nothing . . . privileged, preppy, naive, impressionable, flummoxed.”

“I’m tired of being an anonymous victim while my attacker is this superstar scholar-athlete,” she told her mother. “I want . . . the people who write about me to . . . see I’m a person.”

So she decided to come forward and not be an anonymous victim anymore. Now, Prout, 19, has co-written a memoir, “I Have the Right To: A High School Survivor’s Story of Sexual Assault, Justice, and Hope” (Margaret K. McElderry Books, out now).

The case was a lightning rod, attracting attention for its sensational details and setting off controversy about the prep-school world of privilege and elitism — especially as some members of the St. Paul’s community felt that their traditions were being threatened. (Alumni of the school include John Kerry and former New York City mayor John Lindsay.)

Right now, it’s particularly potent in the #MeToo era, when women — and men — are going public with their tales of harassment and assault.

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COLOMBIA
ACI Prensa

>>>Captured priest sentenced to 12 years in prison for child sexual abuse

March 10, 2018

El Cuerpo Técnico de Investigación de la Fiscalía General de Colombia capturó al sacerdote P. Carlos Mario Cadavid, quien deberá cumplir una sentencia de 12 años de prisión por cometer abuso sexual a una menor de 9 años.

Según indica la fiscalía, el presbítero de 40 años fue capturado el 8 de marzo “en una finca de la vereda Alto de la Virgen, en Copacabana (Antioquia) y será enviado al centro de reclusión que determine el Instituto Nacional Penitenciario y Carcelario”.

De acuerdo al fallo de agosto de 2014 de la Sala Penal del Tribunal Superior de Antioquia, el sacerdote tuvo actos sexuales con una niña que participaba en una reunión de acólitos en un templo de Abejorral, en Antioquia.

[Google Translation: Captured priest sentenced to 12 years in prison for child sexual abuse

The Technical Investigation Body of the General Prosecutor of Colombia captured the priest P. Carlos Mario Cadavid, who must serve a sentence of 12 years in prison for committing sexual abuse to a child under 9 years of age.

According to the prosecutor’s office , the 40-year-old priest was captured on March 8 “on a farm in the Alto de la Virgen district, in Copacabana (Antioquia) and will be sent to the detention center determined by the National Penitentiary and Prison Institute”.

According to the August 2014 ruling of the Criminal Chamber of the Superior Court of Antioquia, the priest had sexual acts with a girl who participated in a meeting of acolytes in a temple of Abejorral, in Antioquia.]

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SPRINGFIELD (MISSOURI)
Springfield (MO) News-Leader

March 11, 2018

By Harrison Keegan

After settling a lawsuit last year for an undisclosed sum, the Springfield-based national office of the Assemblies of God is again being sued in Oregon over child sex abuse allegations.

Six men sued the General Council and other church entities in February, claiming they were sexually abused in the 1980s by two volunteers in the Assemblies of God’s Boy Scouts-like Royal Rangers program in Oregon.

A similar lawsuit was filed in 2016, and a financial settlement was reached in that case in October, according to the plaintiffs’ Portland-based attorney Gilion Dumas.

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WORLD
The Pulse (Nigeria)

March 11, 2018

By Inemesit Udodiong

A new study shows Pontiff’s popularity in the US may be dwindling, ahead of his five year anniversary.

Catholics are unhappy with Pontiff for being “too liberal and naïve.”

This is based on a newly released Pew Research survey, conducted between January 10 and 15, among 316 Catholics and 1,503 American adults.

According to this poll, 55% of Republican-leaning Catholics say the Pope is “too liberal.” In 2015, only 23% felt this way.

Pew reports: “The share of American Catholics who say Pope Francis is “too liberal” has jumped 15 percentage points between 2015 and today, from 19% to 34%. And about a quarter of U.S. Catholics (24%) now say he is naïve, up from 15% in 2015.”

It is not all bad for Pope Francis

Overall, Pope Francis is still loved by most American Catholics. 84 find him great while nine in 10 U.S. Catholics describe him as “compassionate” and “humble.”

“The share of American Catholics who give Pope Francis “excellent” or “good” marks for his handling of the sex abuse scandal dropped from 55% to 45%,” the report adds.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

March 12, 2018

By Jane Norman

The Catholic Church has hit back at claims it is “making excuses” and dragging its feet on a compensation scheme for victims of child sexual abuse.

The Prime Minister and the Attorney-General have been pressuring the church to join the national redress scheme, with Malcolm Turnbull saying institutions that don’t sign up should be publicly “shamed”.

In a major development, New South Wales and Victoria last week became the first states to sign up to the scheme, which would provide up to $150,000 in compensation to victims of child sex abuse.

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CAPE TOWN (SOUTH AFRICA)
IOL (Independent Online)

March 11, 2018

The Archbishop of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa has apologised for its past wrongs and failure to address sexual abuse claims.

Archbishop Thabo Makgoba was responding to damning allegations of sexual assault of a former Anglican and award-winning South African author Ishtiyaq Shukri by priests at St Cyprian’s School in Kimberley, Northern Cape.

Shukri’s best known work, The Silent Minaret, is about a South African Muslim boy facing prejudice in London in the wake of 9/11, which won the EU Literary Award in 2004.

“As the Archbishop of southern Africa, I take responsibility for what has happened during the time of my predecessors and where we have wronged or failed anyone, we beg their forgiveness,” Makgoba said.

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MAITLAND (FL)
Orlando Sentinel

March 11, 2018

By Bianca Padró Ocasio

The whispers Kevin Busby overheard from classmates when students learned a basketball coach was leaving the Orangewood Christian School still ring out in his mind, more than 20 years later.

The news, delivered over the school’s speakers in 1996, was that Tim Manes, who coached basketball and cross-country at the Maitland school, would not be coming back to the school and no students were to contact him.

“I thought, ‘This is how we’re going to deal with this?’ ” Busby, now 38, said of Manes, the man he said abused him in a locker room shower when he was 15.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Christian Post

March 11, 2018

By Stoyan Zaimov

Over 60 percent of Christian women in the U.K. have said in a survey that they have experienced sexism in the Church, while 75 percent insisted that God finds both men and women equal and able to preach His word.

A booklet on the poll results, titled “Minding the Gap,” released March 8 by the Sophia Network, a group which seeks to empower women in Church leadership, said that while most respondents, at 86 percent, feel like valued members of the Church family, there are still big problems to tackle.

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TRENTON (NJ)
The Trentonian

March 10, 2018

By Sulaiman Abdur-Rahman

An Ocean County man who possessed over 36,000 videos and images of child pornography pleaded guilty Tuesday to distributing child pornography online.

Anthony White, 31, of Lakewood, is facing a six-year recommended prison sentence and will be required to register as a sex offender under Megan’s Law, but two New Jersey experts warn that sex offender registration and notification laws do not prevent sexual violence.

Psychology professors Elizabeth Jeglic of Cranbury and Cynthia Calkins Mercado of Union City dispute the conventional wisdom of Megan’s Law in a new book. …

… Their book, published Feb. 13, also talks about the child abuse sex scandals that have rocked the Roman Catholic Church in recent years, mentions convicted pedophile Jerry Sandusky of Penn State University football shame and highlights President Donald Trump’s controversial “locker room talk” from 2005 that emerged during the 2016 presidential campaign in which the billionaire real estate mogul talked about grabbing women by the genitals.

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COAHUILA (MEXICO)
Mexico News Daily

March 10, 2018

Sexual abuse ‘survivor’ alleges they are part of a network of pedophiles

A man who describes himself as a survivor of sexual abuse in the Catholic church has given church authorities a list of 17 priests whom he alleges are part of a “network of pedophiles.”

The first indication of sexual abuse in the diocese of Piedras Negras, Coahuila, was revealed when two men came forward and formally accused parish priest Juan Manuel Riojas of sexual assault.

Close to 20 men of the cloth are now facing similar accusations.

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TALLAHASSEE (FL)
Associated Press

March 10, 2018

A woman who was 11 when she was forced to marry her rapist has worked for six years to ban child marriages in Florida. On Friday, she was hailed as a hero after the Legislature passed a bill prohibiting marriage for anyone under 17.

State lawmakers have repeatedly cited Sherry Johnson as an inspiration to change the law. She watched in the House gallery as the bill passed the House on a 109-1 vote, then stood as representatives turned to face her and applauded.

“My heart is happy,” she said afterward. “My goal was to protect our children and I feel like my mission has been accomplished. This is not about me. I survived.”

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SPRINGFIELD (IL)
The State Journal-Register

March 10, 2018

By Steven Spearie

Teresa Morris Kettelkamp never envisioned such a quick return to Rome.

“Stunned. That pretty much captures it,” said Kettelkamp, a Springfield resident and Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception parishioner, about her appointment Feb. 17 by Pope Francis to a three-year term to the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, finding out after an early birthday lunch at Bella Milano.

The Vatican had taken note of her work as a staff member working in Rome with the same commission, which drafts guidelines for the protection of minors and vulnerable adults as well as healing and care for sexual abuse victims and survivors, before she left in November to be closer to her family in Illinois. Kettelkamp was the only American among the nine new members named to the commission.

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ATLANTA (GA)
Archdiocese of Atlanta

March 9, 2018

Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory has released the following letter in response to HB 605, a bill that is under consideration in the current session of the Georgia General Assembly.

My dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

When I am called to stand before our Heavenly Father to make a full and final accounting of my priestly life and ministry, I will first humbly ask His Mercy for all the times I’ve fallen short in my service to Him and to His people. If I’m asked what I did to bring people to Him, I’ll recall the countless Sacraments I’ve celebrated with so many of you, the faith-filled social interactions we have shared, the remarkable opportunities to teach and to lead and to be present during moments of incredible joy and incalculable sorrow.

And when He asks me that for which I am most thankful in my service to His Church, it will have been my work in restoring trust to His people, assuring safe environments in Catholic settings that serve as examples to the wider community, and helping to bring about healing and hope to those in our faith family who have been sexually abused by members of our Catholic clergy – work I still wish more than anything on earth had never been necessary, work that we can never call complete.

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GEORGIA
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

March 9, 2018

By Ty Tagami

A Georgia legislative proposal to give adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse more time to sue pedophiles and organizations has encountered opposition from the Catholic Church.

A lobbyist for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta proposes gutting a bill that would extend the statute of limitations for lawsuits and make it easier to sue entities that harbored pedophiles.

The Archdiocese is led by a clergyman who was in charge of the U.S. Catholic church’s response in the early 2000s to the priest pedophilia scandal and who has publicly spoken out for justice for the victims.

Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory issued a statement Friday after The Atlanta Journal-Constitution sought comment about the church’s lobbying effort, saying the bill was “extraordinarily unfair” to the church and would hinder its mission by allowing lawsuits for actions that occurred years ago.

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VATICAN CITY
Agence France-Press via Yahoo News

By Catherine Marciano

March 10, 2018

As Pope Francis marks the fifth year of his papacy next week, the pontiff once hailed as a fearless reformer is under fire for his handling of the sex abuse scandals that have rocked the Roman Catholic Church.

Since taking over in March 2013, the 81-year-old Argentinian has championed the cause of the marginalised, saying he wanted a “poor church for the poor” and shunning papal palaces and ostentatious displays of wealth.

His reform agenda has introduced the possibility in certain cases to allow divorced and remarried believers to take communion, although he still agrees with the Church’s traditional positions on other issues, such as abortion, artificial contraception and gay marriage.

But the sex abuse scandals have haunted his papacy and last month the Vatican announced it was reviving its anti-paedophile panel.

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BUFFALO (NY)
The Buffalo News

March 11, 2018

By Jay Tokasz

Bishop Richard J. Malone is reconsidering a longstanding Catholic Diocese of Buffalo policy that withholds the names of priests who have been accused of sexual abuse.

Publicizing the names of clergy alleged to have molested children would reverse a tradition that’s been in place for more than 15 years.

“We’re looking at it anew,” Malone said following his recent announcement that the diocese has established a new fund to compensate victims of clergy sex abuse.

A retired priest’s admission in February that he molested “probably dozens” of boys in the 1970s and 1980s re-ignited concerns that clergy sexual abuse in Western New York was more devastating and widespread than accounts provided so far by diocesan leaders. The Rev. Norbert F. Orsolits admitted the abuse to The News after a South Buffalo resident accused the priest of molesting him on a ski trip in the early 1980s. The admissions prompted additional allegations against Orsolits, as well as new public accusations against other priests.

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PORTLAND (ME)
Associated Press

March 9, 2018

A federal jury apparently didn’t believe seven men when they testified under oath that they were sexually abused by the founder of an orphanage in Haiti.

But things have changed since summer 2015. The number of men willing to testify about alleged abuse they endured as boys in Haiti has grown to at least 15, activist Paul Kendrick says, and the #MeToo movement has raised awareness of sexual misconduct.

Kendrick predicts a different outcome in a new defamation lawsuit targeting his claim that the orphanage was led by a serial pedophile.

“We have overwhelming amounts of evidence and testimony that this guy is a child abuser,” Kendrick said, “and we’re not done yet.”

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NEW YORK
Syracuse Post-Standard

March 9, 2019

By Editorial Board

New York should join 37 other states and the District of Columbia that have instituted early voting. The Legislature should do it this year, so that it can be tested in the 2019 off-year election and fully operational by the 2020 presidential election. …

… Here are two more proposals we support that have been kicking around Albany for years. Cuomo included them in his budget, which may raise their chances of passing:

Child Victims Act: Justice for sex abuse survivors

The current statute of limitations gives survivors of child sexual abuse five years from the time they turn 18 to bring a criminal complaint; civil lawsuits must be brought within three years of age 18. Abuse survivors often do not come to terms with the trauma until much later than that. Cuomo’s version of the Child Victims Act – tougher than the bill he supported last year – would allow criminal prosecution anytime of a sexually related felony that was committed against a child under age 18. It would extend the statute of limitations for civil claims to 50 years from the date of the offense. The legislation also would open a one-year window to allow past victims who were shut out by the statute of limitations to sue. They would still have to prove their claims to a judge.

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ROME
The Irish Times

March 10, 2018

By Patsy McGarry

He has appalled the Catholic right, disappointed liberals and delivered little real change

Last Wednesday evening in Rome was much like that of March 13th, 2013: damp and drizzly with an air of no great expectation. Sightseers and pilgrims wandered around St Peter’s Square as the business of the day wound down and queues for St Peter’s Basilica trailed to an end.

It was only day two of a conclave (the meeting of Catholic cardinals to elect a new pope) that was expected to be long. It had been brought about by the sudden resignation of Pope Benedict the previous month, the first pope to have done so voluntarily since Celestine V stepped down in 1294.

But, at about 7pm that Wednesday, white smoke rose from a chimney at the Sistine Chapel, disturbing a hitherto nonchalant seagull. For the next hour the world waited to see who the 266th pope would be, as Romans crowded into St Peter’s Square, many now stressed out after a dash through the rush-hour city.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

March 11, 2018

By Finbar O’Mallon

The Archbishop of Canberra and Goulburn has refused to throw his support behind legislation allowing child sex abuse victims to more easily sue the church.

Catholic archbishop Christopher Prowse said it was up to the ACT government to create loopholes in the ACT around the “Ellis defence” after they signalled last week it would be considered.

The Ellis defence is named after John Ellis, who was abused as an altar boy in the 1970s. Mr Ellis tried to sue the Catholic church in 2007, only for the church to argue it didn’t legally exist, so couldn’t be sued to compensate victims of child sex abuse by Catholic clergy.

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EAST FLATBUSH (NY)
News 12 Brooklyn NY

March 9, 2018

An anonymous woman has accused an East Flatbush priest of sexual harassment while she worked for him, and her lawyer says one of his alleged advances was caught on tape.

Until now, the Rev. Charles Oduro of the St. Catherine of Genoa parish, had been one of his community’s most trusted figures.

The purported victim has asked to remain anonymous, but her lawyer says Oduro forced her to kiss him.

In a recording the lawyer played for News 12, a man can be heard saying “Lip, lip. Just the lip. Oh come on. Just the lip.”

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SAGINAW (MI)
Diocese of Saginaw

March 8, 2018

The Diocese of Saginaw, in responding very quickly last week to questions raised by members of the media and members of the community, following criminal charges filed against Father Robert (Bob) DeLand, provided the following information:

“To the best of our knowledge, Father DeLand has not been subject to disciplinary action or accusations of priestly misconduct.”

While this information was believed to be accurate based on a preliminary review, the Most Rev. Joseph R. Cistone, Bishop of Saginaw, considered it imperative to conduct a further, in-depth study of Father DeLand’s files.

Upon thorough examination of these files, the Diocese can find no evidence of a previous accusation against Father DeLand by a victim nor someone with direct knowledge of sexual abuse of a minor. The Diocese provides this additional information from Father DeLand’s files:

A letter written by Father DeLand in 1992 to Bishop Kenneth Untener, who was Bishop of Saginaw at the time, referred to rumors damaging to Father DeLand’s reputation. In the letter, Father DeLand stated he took issue with the rumors and denied wrongdoing.

Also, in 2005, the Diocese was called about a family member’s suspicion [the family member had no personal knowledge nor did she have knowledge of an allegation against Father DeLand]. She wondered whether her brother, who committed suicide in 1993, might have been molested by Father DeLand in the 1970’s. In 2005, after an independent professional investigator completed a thorough assessment, the independent Diocesan Review Board, Bishop Robert Carlson, who was Bishop of Saginaw at the time, as well as the family agreed that the suspicion against Father DeLand was unfounded.

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SAGINAW (MI)
CBS News

March 9, 2018

The Catholic Diocese of Saginaw says a Michigan priest who recently was charged with sex crimes was cleared following a 2005 investigation into suspicion of possible molestation.

The diocese released the update Thursday about 71-year-old Rev. Robert DeLand of St. Agnes Church in Freeland. CBS affiliate WNEM reported last month that Deland was accused of sexual assault in August of 2017 at his home on Mallard Cove in Saginaw Township, according to Det. Brian Berg with the Tittabawassee Township Police Department. A police investigation began that November.

The station reports that five complaints have been filed against Deland since then, including claims of giving alcohol to a minor, sexual assault, illegally purchasing and possessing Ecstasy, and gross indecency.

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ROME
National Catholic Reporter

March 9, 2018

By Joshua J. McElwee

A Chilean cardinal and member of Pope Francis’ advisory Council of Cardinals has sent a letter to the presidents of various Latin American bishops’ conferences to rebut media reports that the pope’s visit to Chile in January was a failure.

Cardinal Francisco Errázuriz Ossa, the retired archbishop of the Chilean capital of Santiago, blamed some of the poor press coverage of the visit on the actions of Bishop Juan Barros Madrid, who has been accused of covering-up sexual abuse perpetrated by a fellow priest in the 1980s and ’90s.

In a five-page recounting of Francis’ Jan. 15-18 trip, obtained by NCR, Errázuriz said Barros made himself available for interviews with journalists after concelebrating at Masses with Francis along with other Chilean bishops.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
The Irish News

March 10, 2018

By Brendan Hughes

Police have “apologised” for refusing to accept a report of an alleged crime concerning the Fr Malachy Finegan child abuse scandal, a rights campaigner has said.

Amnesty International’s Patrick Corrigan said police phoned him to apologise and offer assurances that the issue he raised would form part of their investigations.

Last week Mr Corrigan asked the PSNI to examine concerns that some senior Catholic Church figures had failed to tell police about child sex abuse allegations against Finegan.

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AUSTRALIA
news.com.au

March 10, 2018

By Joe Hildebrand

At the very end of a church service I attended with my son on Sunday, the priest said something that left me thinking, “Holy sh*t.”

Last Sunday, for the first time in a long time, I darkened the door of a house of God.

Years earlier, when I was doing my confirmation, I had promised the priest that I wouldn’t be one of those Catholics who just showed up for Christmas and christenings. And yet here I was at the christening of my second child and I couldn’t be entirely sure that I had been to church since the christening of the first.

Priests are of course a forgiving bunch — it is, after all, a fairly central part of their job description — but nonetheless I felt deeply guilty, which is a fairly central part of a Catholic’s job description.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

March 10, 2018

By Ben Schneiders, Royce Millar and Chris Vedelago

The Catholic Church has failed to fully accept the horrific impact of child sexual abuse and its own role in a tragedy of “epic proportions”, a member of the royal commission has said.
In a surprisingly frank speech, Robert Fitzgerald – one of the six commissioners that oversaw the recently completed, five year inquiry – has slammed the church’s approach to abuse survivors, and its failure to tackle practices that contributed to the scourge of abuse and the secrecy around it.

Speaking at a Catholic Social Services Conference in Melbourne late last month, Mr Fitzgerald highlighted the ‘’disease’’ of ‘clericalism’ – the belief that the church’s male-only clergy are mystical beings, accountable to the Pope and to God, not to civil society or church laity.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

March 10, 2018

By Joan Chittister

There was a time in life when I wanted things done and wanted them done now. I still want things done now but over the course of the years, I discovered that, at least where the church is concerned, I was looking for action in the wrong places. As Sean Freyne, the Irish theologian and Scripture scholar, put it, “It’s a mistake to think that a pope has the power to do anything.” Translation: The right to reign as an autocrat, to take unilateral action about almost anything, does not come with the miter and crossed keys. Nor, for that matter, does it come with the capes and crosses of bishops. …

And yet, the manner in which popes and bishops move, the open ear they bring to the world, the heart they show, and the love and leadership they model can make all the difference in the tone and effectiveness of the church.

Five years ago, for instance, we moved from one style of church to another. It happened quietly but it landed in the middle of the faithful like the Book of Revelation. Gone were the images of finger-waving popes, stories of theological investigations, and the public scoldings and excommunications of people who dared to question the ongoing value of old ways.

When Jorge Bergoglio, the newly elected Pope Francis, appeared on the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, he bowed to the people and asked for a blessing; the faithful roared their approval of a man who knew his own need for our help and direction. …

***

And yet, at the same time, some things that must change clearly have not changed in these last five years. Instead, there is smoke without fire, commissions promised but not created, questions acceptable to ask, yes, but answers still scarce. …

***
… The leviathan of child abuse, the most glaring problem facing the church, continues to raise its hoary head. It reaches across the world and even up to the pope’s own household. Unless or until even bishops and cardinals are suspended until charges are resolved, the taint on the integrity of the Vatican itself will continue to undermine the sincerity of the church’s effort to dispel the venom. Meanwhile, an abuse commission itself was formed, allowed to lapse, is now formed again we’re told, but all of that with little or no evidence of palpable response to the problem itself.

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AUSTRALIA
AAP NEWS

March 9, 2018

Thousands of child sex abuse survivors are set to get access to compensation after Victoria and NSW signed on to the federal government’s national redress scheme.

The deal caps payments at $150,000 a person, although the average payment is about $10,000 higher than what the royal commission recommended.

“It’s a matter of getting the balance right and ensuring that as many institutions, both state and territory, and non-government institutions, like the churches, opt in to the scheme,” Mr Tehan told ABC TV on Friday.

Social Services Minister Dan Tehan said Victoria and NSW signing up was a “giant” step for the scheme.

“The fact that we’ve got the two largest states now on board, New South Wales and Victoria, is a significant breakthrough for survivors and a national redress scheme,” he said.

South Australian premier Jay Weatherill has softened his initial opposition in the lead up to the March 17 state election with an in-principle decision to opt in.

“I’m hopeful once we get the election out of the way, that they will see fit to come and join the scheme,” Mr Tehan said.

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MESA (AZ)
The Republic/azcentral.com

March 9, 2018

By Uriel J. Garcia

In April 1995, two sisters in their late teens reported to police that a family member had molested them as young children during sleepovers at his house in the 1980s.

The man they accused was a Mesa police officer, Gerald “Jerry” Salcido.

Later that year, Mesa police closed the molestation investigation against Salcido, with no charges brought.

But more than 20 years later, the case was reopened and police arrested him. Among the information included in the police report was that at least three Mormon bishops, one in Phoenix and two others in Utah, had learned of the allegations against Salcido years before.

Salcido, who refused to answer a Mesa detective’s questions during an October interview, denied he confessed to his bishop, police and court records show.

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ISRAEL
Haaretz

March 9, 2018

By Josh Breiner

Security camera footage of women changing into bathing suits allegedly leaked by settler rabbi who teaches at seminary for girls

A rabbi who lives in a settlement in the West Bank was arrested on suspicion of distributing nude video clips of an Israeli singer and model.

Over the past week, videos of singer Eden Ben Zaken and model Neta Alchimister trying on bathing suits in Alchimister’s swimwear store in Tel Aviv were leaked online.

The man is suspected of violating the privacy of the two women by distributing the video clips, but the police are not sure whether he is the person who hacked into the security cameras in the store and downloaded the videos. The punishment for the crime that he is now suspected of is up to five years in prison.

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ENGLAND
Press Association

March 9, 2018

An independent reviewer of child sex abuse by Church of England clergy was not shown documents that may have shed light on previous offending, an inquiry heard.

Roger Meekings, who carried out a 2009 past case review for the Diocese of Chichester, told the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse that information about clergy who were later jailed had not been in their personnel files.

They included former Bishop of Lewes Peter Ball and Canon Gordon Rideout, both of whom were later imprisoned.

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SCOTLAND
BBC

March 7, 2018

A priest claims he was indecently assaulted by a fellow cleric as he slept.

The 61-year-old was giving evidence at the trial of Father Francis Moore, 82, who denies sexually abusing three boys and a student priest.

The man, who has been a priest for more than 20 years, told a jury he woke on two separate occasions to find Fr Moore beside his bed.

Retired Fr Moore denies the alleged offences which span from 1977 and 1996.

The priest, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was giving evidence during the trial at the High Court in Glasgow.

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SCOTLAND
BBC

March 8, 2018

A retired priest offered to take a lie detector test when he was accused of sexually abusing a five-year-old boy.

Father Francis Moore, 82, from Largs, was being interviewed by police about the allegations which referred to events more than 40 years ago.

Fr Moore, who was known as Father Paul, is on trial at the High Court in Glasgow.

He denies all the charges against him, including that he sexually abused three boys and a student priest.

He also denies committing a breach of the peace at Prestwick swimming baths on various occasions between 1 August 1995 and 31 July 1996, by repeatedly staring at the bodies and private parts of young boys and others in the pool.

The comments about undergoing a lie detector test came as Fr Moore was interviewed at Saltcoats police station on 8 December 2015.

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SCOTLAND
The Scottish Sun

March 8, 2018

By Wilma Riley

Father Francis Moore denies the accusations of assault that allegedly took place 40 years ago

A PRIEST accused of sexually abusing a boy of five offered to take a lie detector test, a court heard today.

Fr Francis Moore, 82, denied assaulting the child at a primary school when he was quizzed by police about the claims.

The High Court in Glasgow heard he told cops probing two alleged incidents 40 years ago at St Mark’s primary in Irvine, Ayrshire: “It is absolutely untrue. I would take a lie detector test.

“It disgusts me that would happen to a child.”

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