ABUSE TRACKER

NEW DELHI (INDIA)
New Delhi Times

February 22, 2019

U.S. and Italian advocates for victims of pedophile priests are pressing for Italy to overhaul legislation that allows bishops to dodge accountability for predator clergy in the predominantly Roman Catholic country where the church wields considerable political influence.

A U.S. state legislator joined an Italian lawmaker and American and Italian victims of pedophile clergy at the Italian Parliament on Thursday to put a spotlight on what they described as significant gaps in how the Italian justice system handles the problem.

Francesco Zanardi, who heads an Italian survivors’ advocacy group, said Italy must revise its 1929 Lateran Treaty with the Holy See. He noted that under that agreement, bishops can refuse to respond to magistrates investigating their alleged roles in hiding pedophile crimes by priests.

Thus, as long as they personally are not being investigated for abuse, bishops “have the right to refuse to answer questions from the judiciary,” Zanardi told a news conference in the Chamber of Deputies, Parliament’s lower house.

The same treaty, he noted, also requires magistrates to inform church hierarchy they have started investigations of priests, effectively giving bishops more time to possibly discourage witnesses or victims from coming forward.

Italian law doesn’t require bishops to denounce cases of abuse by clergy, Zanardi said.

“There is a legislative vacuum,” he said.

The Catholic church holds a privileged place in Italian society and wields significant influence in politics. Parishes in small towns and big cities alike run after-school and weekend recreation programs for youngsters, since public schools don’t offer them. That gives priests easy access to minors.

A U.S. advocate for accountability for pedophile priests noted that the American Catholic church was forced to “be more transparent” after victims came forward as adults when several states opened windows on statutes of limitations. That nudged U.S. bishops to adopt a “zero tolerance” policy toward abusive priests.

But the Italian church still allows itself to beguided by canon law, which “gives the priest a second chance”and “leaves it to the bishop’s discretion” on whether a priest should be punished or removed from children, said Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of BishopAccountability.org.

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.

MIAMI (FL)
Miami Herald

February 21, 2019

By Julie K. Brown

Federal prosecutors, under former Miami U.S. Attorney Alex Acosta, broke the law when they concealed a plea agreement from more than 30 underage victims who had been sexually abused by wealthy New York hedge fund manager Jeffrey Epstein, a federal judge ruled Thursday.

While the decision marks a victory for crime victims, the federal judge, Kenneth A. Marra, stopped short of overturning Epstein’s plea deal, or issuing an order resolving the case. He instead gave federal prosecutors 15 days to confer with Epstein’s victims and their attorneys to come up with a settlement. The victims did not seek money or damages as part of the suit.

It’s not clear whether the victims, now in their late 20s and early 30s, can, as part of the settlement, demand that the government prosecute Epstein. But others are calling on the Justice Department to take a new look at the case in the wake of the judge’s ruling.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Associated Press

February 21, 2019

Pope Francis’ high-stakes sex abuse prevention summit is meant to call attention to the crisis as a global problem that requires a global response.

His decision was sparked by the realisation that in many parts of the world, bishops and religious superiors continue to deny or play down the severity of the scandal and protect their priests and the reputation of the church at all costs.

Much of the developing world has largely escaped a public explosion of the scandal, as have conflict zones and countries where Catholics are a minority.

But even majority Catholic countries have lagged. Just this week, the online resource BishopAccountability listed Brazil, Mexico, the Philippines, Congo and a handful of other heavily Catholic countries as places where the church leadership has failed to respond adequately when priests rape and molest children.

Some countries where the scandal has played out visibly in recent years:

ARGENTINA

Francis’ home country is beginning to see an eruption of the scandal, with some cases even implicating the pontiff himself.

As Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, Francis played a decisive and divisive role in Argentina’s most famous abuse case, commissioning a four-volume, 2,000-plus page forensic study of the legal case against a convicted priest that concluded he was innocent, that his victims were lying and that the case never should have gone to trial.

Despite the study, Argentina’s Supreme Court in 2017 upheld the conviction and 15-year prison sentence for the Rev. Giulio Grassi, a celebrity priest who ran homes for street children across Argentina.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Crux

February 21, 2019

By Christopher White

Church leaders were warned not to blame the outside world for the Church’s abuse crisis and that “the enemy is within.”

In delivering his afternoon remarks at the pope’s closely watched abuse summit taking place at the Vatican this week, Cardinal Rubén Salazar Gómez of Bogotà, Colombia, and President of the Latin American Episcopal Council (CELAM), said “the damage is not done by outsiders but that the first enemies are within us, among us bishops and priests and consecrated persons who have not lived up to our vocation.”

Echoing a common theme from Pope Francis on this issue, Salazar pinpointed clericalism as the root cause, leading to a “distortion of the meaning of ministry,” which he said had heightened the severity of the crisis.

Clericalism is “a clerical mentality that leads us to misunderstand the institution of the Church and place it above the suffering of the victims and the demands of justice,” he said. “This mentality accepts the justifications of the perpetrators over the testimony of those affected.”

During his remarks, the South American cardinal urged for “conversion” to replace a clerical culture in the Church, which has led to abusive priests being transferred around to other assignments instead of properly being punished and using monetary settlements to “buy silence” from victims.

Salazar’s remarks were titled “The Church in a moment of crisis: Facing conflicts and tensions and acting decisively,” and he used them, to among other things, call for a new “code of conduct” for bishops as a “concrete” means of reform and heightened attention to screening candidates for the priesthood and renewed attention to priestly formation.

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.

ST. LOUIS (MO)
Post Dispatch

February 22, 2019

By Kathy Peterson and Anne Harter

To the west, the Jefferson City Catholic diocese has posted a list of accused abusive priests on its website. To the south, the Springfield-Cape Girardeau diocese has too. To the east, the Belleville diocese has posted a list. In fact, more than half of America’s 187 dioceses have produced such lists, starting in 2002.

It’s not just dioceses. A St. Louis-based Jesuit region revealed a list of 42 accused clerics (with 12 who worked at one local high school.) But the St. Louis archdiocese steadfastly refuses to do so.

Arguably if any area prelate should do this, it should be Archbishop Robert Carlson. In court filings five years ago, his lawyers admitted that 115 of the archdiocese’s staff had been accused of sexual misdeeds.

According to BishopAccountability.org, only 58 St. Louis-area clerics are publicly identified as accused of abuse. That means no Catholic jurisdiction in the bistate area is hiding so many alleged child molesters. So only half of the priests, nuns, brothers and seminarians who church officials acknowledge face accusations are known to the public. (And that information has come mostly because of brave victims who’ve filed civil lawsuits.)

These lists are not panaceas. They are small, long-overdue steps toward transparency. They’re happening now because of intense pressure on bishops — from parents, parishioners, police and prosecutors. Over the past few months, 16 attorneys general have announced investigations into the Catholic hierarchy’s handling of abuse cases.

But they do make kids safe? Sometimes. A Jefferson City priest, for instance, went on to work at Disney World after being suspended. After the Springfield, Ill., bishop posted his “accused” list, an ex-priest was fired from his taxpayer-funded job.

Even those prelates who have posted such lists usually still fall short in several key ways.

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.

WEST LEBANON (NH)
Valley News

February 21, 2019

On Thursday, Pope Francis convened a long-awaited meeting of Catholic bishops and other church leaders to frame a global response to the abuse by clergy of “minors and vulnerable adults.” The Vatican considered this so-called summit meeting so important that it asked the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops last year not to act on new measures to hold bishops accountable for covering up for abusive priests until after the meeting took place.

It’s scandalous that the Vatican is convening this meeting only now, after decades of revelations of abuse by priests of children and others, and delay and denial by church leaders (including the current pope, who has apologized after defending a Chilean bishop accused of covering up abuse). If this four-day meeting is to be judged a success, the pope must make it clear to participants that if they won’t deal decisively and transparently with predatory priests — and complicit superiors — in their home countries, Rome will do it for them. That message needs to be sent not only in connection with the abuse of children and adolescents by clergy, an evil that the church has been grappling with for decades, but also with a scandal that has attracted attention more recently: the sexual exploitation of adults, including seminarians and nuns, by powerful clerics. It’s increasingly clear that abuse of minors is only one dimension of the crisis.

Unfortunately, clerics involved in preparations for the summit have suggested that its focus will be primarily or even exclusively on sexual abuse of minors. Cardinal Blase Cupich, the archbishop of Chicago, said that although the sexual abuse of adults must be addressed, the summit should focus on young victims because “minors don’t have a voice.” But limiting the discussion to the abuse of children would be a mistake — the church needs to address on all forms of sexual misconduct by the clergy, and do it soon.

That reality is underlined by the Vatican’s announcement last week that it had defrocked Theodore McCarrick, the 88-year-old former archbishop of Washington, D.C., who had been accused of molesting a teenager decades ago while serving as a priest in New York. (McCarrick said he had no recollection of the abuse and believed he was innocent.) That revelation quickly led to McCarrick’s resignation from the College of Cardinals. But it then emerged that the prelate also had been accused of sexually harassing young seminarians, contriving to have them share his bed. Two New Jersey dioceses secretly paid settlements to men who said they had been preyed upon by McCarrick.

McCarrick’s behavior with seminarians figured in a sensational document published last summer by Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, a retired Vatican diplomat who accused Francis of rehabilitating McCarrick after Pope Benedict XVI had supposedly imposed “sanctions” on the American prelate. Vigano’s screed floated a conspiracy theory about a “homosexual current” in the Vatican, and it may have been unfair to Francis. But his description of McCarrick as a “serial predator” seems to have been confirmed by the Vatican’s decision to defrock him.

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

PARIS (FRANCE)
Associated Press

February 22, 2019

Still struggling to come to terms with their share of responsibility in the clerical sex abuse scandal rocking the Catholic Church, France’s bishops have agreed to award financial compensation to victims whose cases fall outside of the country’s statute of limitations.

“We have agreed in principle to make a financial gesture,” Vincent Neymon, head of communications for the French bishops’conference, told the Associated Press. He said he hoped to have a system for paying victims in place in less than a year.

France has not been immune to the scandal that has prompted a credibility crisis for the Catholic hierarchy, and that is the topic of a summit at the Vatican this week on preventing sex abuse and prosecuting pedophile priests.

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.

/ROME (ITALY)
Associated Press

February 22, 2019

Cardinals attending Pope Francis’ summit on preventing clergy sex abuse called Friday for a new culture of accountability in the Catholic Church to punish bishops and religious superiors when they fail to protect their flocks from predator priests.

On the second day of Francis’ extraordinary gathering of Catholic leaders, the focus of debate shifted to how church leaders must acknowledge that decades of their own cover-up, secrecy and fear of scandal had only worsened the crisis.

“We must repent, and do so together, collegially, because along the way we have failed,” said Mumbai Cardinal Oswald Gracias. “We need to seek pardon.”

Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich told the 190 bishops and religious superiors that new legal procedures were needed to both report and investigate superiors when they are accused of misconduct or negligence in handling abuse cases.

He said lay experts must be involved at every step of the process, since rank-and-file Catholics know far better than priests what trauma abuse and cover-up has caused.

“In large part it is the witness of the laity, especially mothers and fathers with great love for the church, who have pointed out movingly and forcefully how gravely incompatible the commission, cover-up and toleration of clergy sexual abuse is with the very meaning and essence of the church,” he said.

“Mothers and fathers have called us to account, for they simply cannot comprehend how we as bishops and religious superiors have often been blinded to the scope and damage of sexual abuse of minors,” he said.

Francis summoned 190 bishops and religious superiors for the four-day tutorial on preventing abuse and protecting children after the scandal erupted again last year in Chile and the U.S. While the Vatican for two decades has tried to crack down on the abusers themselves, it has largely given the bishops and superiors who moved them around from parish to parish a pass.

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.

Sex offenders keep their jobs in some parishes in Poland, with congregations’ blessings

WEGROW, Poland—One Sunday morning last year, the Rev. Jacek Wentczuk stood before his congregation and made a startling admission. He was a convicted sex offender, he said, found guilty in 2012 of molesting a 15-year-old girl in a nearby town. His bishop was considering transferring him.

Parishioners rallied to the side of the popular Catholic priest, who insisted he had done nothing wrong. They brought flowers and children’s drawings to persuade church leaders to keep Father Wentczuk in his job in this small town in eastern Poland, where he is known for ministering to the sick and dying.

“We gave him a chance,” said Monika Landzberg, a doctor at the local hospital. “This crime cannot weigh on a man until the end of his life.” Father Wentczuk didn’t respond to requests for comment.

There are deep splits in the world-wide Catholic Church over how to handle cases of sexual abuse involving priests, with some clergy and laity arguing that any member of the clergy who sexually abuses a minor should be removed from ministry. Others call for a more flexible, lenient response.

In the U.S., the church has adopted a zero-tolerance approach. Church leaders in Australia, Canada, Ireland and elsewhere also have moved aggressively against clergy who transgress.

But in many other places, including Poland, a less-strict standard prevails. The faithful often defend accused priests. And church leaders can be reluctant to punish abusers.

“You have to exonerate the human being,” said the Rev. Bogdan Jaworowski, a priest in southeastern Poland whose congregation rallied behind a colleague convicted of distributing child pornography.

At the start of a Vatican conference on sex abuse on Thursday, Pope Francis said priests’ preying on children was a plague on the church. He called on bishops to devise “not simple and predictable condemnations but concrete and effective measures” to stamp out misconduct.

Victims and anti-abuse activists will hold a “March to Zero” in Rome on Saturday, urging the pope to institute a world-wide zero-tolerance policy for abusers.

In a discussion guide for summit participants, Pope Francis wrote about clergy who commit abuse having to give up public ministry, but also emphasized the “traditional principle of proportionality of punishment.”

Since America’s sex-abuse scandals erupted in 2002 in Boston, the church in the U.S. has moved to remove any priest found guilty of sexual abuse of someone under the age of 18 from ministry, either by dismissal from the priesthood—“defrocking”—or restriction to a private life of “prayer and penance.”

The church in the U.S. requires bishops to inform police of suspected abuse and cooperate with investigations.

The American rules “do not always transport or travel well,” said the Vatican’s top sex-abuse prosecutor, the Rev. Robert Geisinger, in a rare 2017 public statement of the Vatican’s thinking

on disciplinary policy. “Cultural sensitivity is needed in understanding how abuse is understood.”

Of the 20 countries with the world’s largest Catholic populations, including Poland, only the

U.S. church has a “zero tolerance” policy, according to Anne Barrett Doyle of BishopAccountability.org, a U.S. organization that tracks abuse cases and supports zero tolerance.

In Italy, the national bishops’ conference decided in 2014 against requiring bishops to report abuse to civil authorities. Students and teachers in Spain have formed human chains to protest on behalf of accused clerical sex offenders, and Italian Catholics have demonstrated for their own.

In Poland, at least nine Catholic clergymen convicted of child sex abuse-related crimes continue to offer Mass, according to court and church records reviewed by The Wall Street Journal and interviews with church officials.

A Krakow priest, the Rev. Lukasz Kubas, molested a 12-year-old girl, according to his 2010 court verdict, but still regularly celebrates Mass. Another, the Rev. Andrzej Seidler, who ministers to a town in Poland’s southeast, was sentenced to two years probation for molesting a 13-year-old girl. Neither responded to requests for comment.

In one case, the Rev. Roman Jurczak was convicted of the sexual abuse of a girl younger than 15, and spent four months in prison. He celebrates Mass weekly at a church in southern Poland, a local church official said.

Father Jurczak didn’t respond to a request for comment. In a 2016 statement, the local bishop said the accusations “have never been repeated…. The media have destroyed his good name.”

In some cases, parishioners have thronged courtrooms, thumbing rosaries, to show their support for accused priests.

“In the 70s and 80s, this topic was like a taboo,” said Boleslaw Senyszyn, a judge under Communism and now a lawyer for sex-abuse victims. Even today, “many lawyers feel afraid to take these cases against the church. It’s the reaction from the society.”

Polish church officials referred requests for comment to local dioceses, several of which said they hadn’t broken Polish church rules in allowing convicted sex offenders to remain in the ministry.

In 2007, in the village of Sarnaki, about an hour from Wegrow, Father Wentczuk began his abuse of Ernesta Miłkowska, then 15, as her parents moved toward divorce, after he recruited her for a play about the life of St. John Paul II, according to the court verdict. Ms. Milkowska confirmed this account to the Journal.

For three months they met regularly late in the evening in his apartment, the verdict said. Neighbors including another priest began to notice and in July 2007 her mother, Marta Miłkowska, reported her suspicions—first to the bishop and then to police and prosecutors. A fellow priest testified against Father Wentczuk during a subsequent trial.

Father Wentczuk was found guilty by a local court of molestation in 2012. “The accused was perfectly aware of the fact that he as a priest and educated person, enjoys within the society, especially a village, huge trust and respect and used that fact in order to get closer to the victim without raising suspicion,” the judgment reads. “He used her to gratify his sexual needs.”

The church defrocked him, but he appealed and the Vatican reversed the ruling. “Because of this, the bishop of the diocese was free to appoint the priest to new assignments,” the Wegrow diocese said in statement to the Journal.

Classmates stopped talking to Ms. Milkowska, other priests blamed her, and neighbors grew cold, her mother said. “We were excluded from the society,” her mother recalls. “We could have escaped, but I wanted to prove to those wool hat ladies at the church that it is not we who are guilty.”

When Father Wentczuk arrived in Wegrow, some locals complained to the bishop. “He

shouldn’t be a priest, and he definitely shouldn’t be around children,” said Ewa Swiniarska, a church member. “Older people are more supportive…they grew up in a different world.”

Father Wentczuk was distraught when his bishop told him he was considering transferring him, according to Dr. Landzberg, in whom the doctor said the priest confided. The doctor, who describes herself as an atheist, defended the priest to the bishop. “It’s typical man behavior.

And this is just a man in a cassock,” she said.

After Father Wentczuk told parishioners he might be moved, dozens of churchgoers stormed the bishop’s office carrying a roll of wallpaper signed by most of the church’s several hundred regulars. People deserve a second chance, one said. Fifteen-year-old girls dress like women, another protested. A week later, the bishop decided to allow him to stay.

Ms. Milkowska, now 27, was frustrated when she heard of the decision, and expressed outrage that anyone would blame her for what happened.

“What he did is still very much alive in me,” she says. “I find it hard to comprehend.”

Corrections & Amplifications

The Rev. Roman Jurczak was convicted of the sexual abuse of a girl younger than 15. An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated he was convicted of performing sexual acts on two girls. (Feb. 22, 2019)

Write to Drew Hinshaw at drew.hinshaw@wsj.com and Francis X. Rocca at francis.rocca@wsj.com Appeared in the February 23, 2019, print edition as ‘Forgiveness for Abusive Priests Divides Church.

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

NEW YORK (NY)
CBS News

February 22,2019

At the Vatican summit on clergy abuse Friday morning, attention turned to abuse by nuns. Victims’ advocates delivered a letter to an organization representing nuns asking predator nuns be exposed so survivors can begin to heal. This call to action comes as more victims speak out.

Nun abuse survivor Virginia June was at home in Ann Arbor, Michigan, when she heard fellow survivor Trish Cahill talking about her experience on “CBS This Morning.”

“I whipped around. I could not believe that somebody was actually talking about it,” June told CBS News’ Nikki Battiste.

In a CBS News report last month, Cahill called nun abuse “the secret not yet told.” Hearing that made June feel “validated” for the first time.

Facing a troubled childhood at home in the Detroit suburb of Farmington Hills, June said she turned to Sister Pat Kulwicki for guidance. Kulwicki taught June’s religious study class at what was then Our Lady of Mercy High School.

“She seemed to be very consoling and very nurturing and very wonderful and she became a mentor to me,” June said.

The 57-year-old said Sister Kulwicki began molesting her when she was 14 years old. The first time was at Kulwicki’s apartment.

“I knew it was wrong and I didn’t know who to tell … I was so confused it was like this sister is doing these sexual things to me and I thought she was married to God,” June said.

June said the abuse continued for a decade and fueled her addiction to drugs and alcohol. She claims the school and the Detroit Archdiocese failed to act when June and her family say they reported the alleged abuse in the late 80s. June said Kulwicki denied any wrongdoing, allegedly calling June troubled. She continued to teach at the school until she died in 1994.

In response to June’s allegations, Mercy High School said it is “deeply saddened” and “immediately contacted local police and initiated an internal investigation” upon receiving our request for comment.

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.

ST. LOUIS (MO)
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

February 21, 2019

By Rachel Rice

New assault charges have been filed alleging a priest assaulted a boy in the early 1990s in St. Louis County.

Fred Lenczycki, 74, now faces two charges of deviate sexual assault and two counts of sodomy.

Lenczycki is a known sexual predator with multiple allegations in three states that span several years during the time he was active as a priest.

He was removed from ministry in 2002 and later laicized.

He is currently listed in the Illinois sex offender registry as “sexually violent,” having been convicted of acts of aggravated sexual abuse against victims younger than 13 . He currently lives in Berkeley, Ill., in suburban Chicago.

According to the charges filed in St. Louis County Circuit Court on Thursday, between January 1991 and December 1994 Lenczycki abused a boy younger than 14 by grabbing his genitals on multiple occasions, and abused a second boy by trying to force the boy to expose himself. The abuse reportedly happened in the 12300 block of DePaul Drive in Bridgeton.

Online listings by a law firm that advocates for sexual abuse victims say he was assigned to the DePaul Health Center in that block in the 1990s and until 2002. Those listings also say Lenczycki’s other local assignments in the 1990s included the Church of North America Martyrs Rectory in Florissant and St. Blaise Parish in Maryland Heights in the 1990s.

Charging documents note that the abuse described by the victims “fits within the pattern of abuse perpetrated by the defendant over many years.”

In 2008, Lenczycki was the first clergy member committed under Illinois’ Sexually Violent Persons Commitment Act, which allows prosecutors to seek commitment in a state facility of sex offenders they believe will re-offend.

David Clohessy, advocate for Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said that while he knows of Lenczycki, the predator priest isn’t yet infamous enough. Parishioners deserve to know, he said.

“We’re deeply grateful to both the victim for having the courage to report and law enforcement for having the will to pursue charges,” Clohessy said. “He’s obviously a very dangerous man, and shame on every church official who knew of or suspected his crimes and ignored or hid them.”

Victim’s advocate Jeff Anderson said he had worked to bring at least half a dozen allegations against Lenczycki to light over the years.

“(Lenczycki) is an incredibly dangerous offender, and the more that can be known about him the more likely he will be put behind bars,” Anderson said. “The number of kids he actually violated is not known, but he’s among the most dangerous perverse serial predators.”

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

VATICAN CITY
AFP

February 21, 2019

By Ella Ide

A leading cardinal acknowledged the global scale of the child sex abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church on Friday, on the second day of a landmark summit at the Vatican on tackling paedophilia in the clergy.

The refusal by some bishops — notably in Asia and Africa — to admit clerical paedophilia was an issue in their countries was unacceptable, Indian Cardinal Oswald Gracias told the extraordinary summit.

“The point is clear. No bishop may say to himself, ‘This problem of abuse in the Church does not concern me, because things are different in my part of the world’,” he said.

His comments came after Pope Francis opened the global summit on Thursday — the first of its kind — calling on the 114 top bishops present to forge “concrete measures” to deal with sex abuse cases in the Church.

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

CHICAGO (IL)
WLS – Chicago

February 21, 2019

A historic event for the Catholic Church began Thursday. Bishops from around the world gathered at the Vatican to discuss the clergy sex abuse crisis.

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

VATICAN CITY
Reuters

February 21, 2019

By Philip Pullella

Pope Francis promised that concrete action against child sexual abuse by priests would result from a conference he opened on Thursday, with one cardinal acknowledging that the Church had to fight “the enemy within”.

Francis convened Catholic leaders from around the world for the four-day meeting to address the scandal that has ravaged the Church’s credibility in the United States – where it has paid billions of dollars in settlements – Ireland, Chile, Australia, and elsewhere over the last three decades.

His opening remarks appeared aimed at countering scepticism among victims who said the meeting looked like a public relations exercise.

“Faced with the scourge of sexual abuse committed by men of the Church against minors, I wanted to reach out to you,” Francis told the assembled bishops and heads of religious orders. He asked them to “listen to the cry of the little ones who are seeking justice”.

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

VATICAN CITY
The Associated Press

February 21, 2019

By Nicole Winfield

Pope Francis’ high-stakes sex abuse prevention summit is meant to call attention to the crisis as a global problem that requires a global response.

His decision was sparked by the realization that in many parts of the world, bishops and religious superiors continue to deny or play down the severity of the scandal and protect their priests and the reputation of the church at all costs.

Much of the developing world has largely escaped a public explosion of the scandal, as have conflict zones and countries where Catholics are a minority.

But even majority Catholic countries have lagged. Just this week, the online resource BishopAccountability listed Brazil, Mexico, the Philippines, Congo and a handful of other heavily Catholic countries as places where the church leadership has failed to respond adequately when priests rape and molest children.

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

VATICAN CITY
The Telegraph

February 21, 2019

By Nick Squires

Pope Francis put forward a 21-point plan for combating the sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests on Thursday, but the proposals were dismissed by victims as wholly inadequate and a recycling of procedures that already exist.

The list of “reflection points” was put forward by the Pope on the first day of a summit that was convened in response to sex abuse scandals that have undermined faith in the Catholic Church around the world.

“The holy people of God looks to us, and expects from us not simple and predictable condemnations, but concrete and effective measures to be undertaken,” the Pope said as the conference, the first of its kind, got underway at the Vatican. “Hear the cry of the little ones who plead for justice.”

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

VATICAN CITY
MSNBC via NEWS WATCHER

February 21, 2019

Velshi & Ruhle

Pope Francis: We Need To ‘Hear The Cry Of The Little Ones’ | Velshi & Ruhle | MSNBC
An historic summit is underway at the Vatican over the Catholic church’s sex abuse scandals, with the Pope saying “we need to hear the cries of little ones.” NBC’s Anne Thompson and attorney for priest abuse victims Mitchell Garabedian join Stephanie Ruhle to discuss whether this meeting means the church will actually confront the decades old problem.

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.

WHEELING (WV)
WTRF

February 21, 2019

By Kathryn Ghion

It’s been a long few months for the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston, that all started with the resignation of Bishop Michael Bransfield.

It’s a time that’s left parishioners with questions, and some questioning their faith. In a time that leaves many searching for answers, 7News wanted to know: what’s next?

“Our faith is founded on truth,” said Archbishop William E. Lori. “Jesus said the truth will set you free.”

Since being named the Apostolic Administrator for the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston in September, Archbishop William Lori said he has aimed to seek the truth and be transparent.

“I want to thank the priests, the deacons, the religious and above all the lay people of the diocese for their patience, their love and their understanding,” Archbishop Lori continued.

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.

PITTSBURGH (PA)
Newsradio 1020 KDKA

February 21, 2019

By Robert Mangino

Judy Jones from the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests joins Robert Mangino to talk about the sex abuse summit that is being held at the Vatican by Pope Francis. She explains the five demands the survivors want from the Pope. At the top of the list is that any bishop or cardinal should be fired if there was any evidence that they covered up any sex scandal.

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

VATICAN CITY
MSNBC

February 21, 2019

An historic summit is underway at the Vatican over the Catholic church’s sex abuse scandals, with the Pope saying “we need to hear the cries of little ones.” NBC’s Anne Thompson and attorney for priest abuse victims Mitchell Garabedian join Stephanie Ruhle to discuss whether this meeting means the church will actually confront the decades old problem.

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.

BROOKLYN (NY)
Brooklyn Paper

February 22, 2019

By Colin Mixson

The Diocese of Brooklyn must release the criteria its leaders used to determine the credibility of sex-abuse accusations against the dozens of Catholic priests included in a list of alleged predators church officials unveiled this month, according to a lawyer for abuse victims.

“Many of my clients are looking at the list with skepticism,” said Mitchell Garabedian, a Boston-based attorney with local clients alleging abuse at the hands of Kings County Catholic clergymen. “The Brooklyn Diocese has not stated what criteria it has used to determine if a priest should be listed as a perpetrator, or sex abuser.”

The Catholic Church’s 166-year-old Kings County diocese on Feb. 15 published a list of 108 clergymen — a whopping 5-percent of its borough priests — facing sex-abuse accusations that diocesan officials believe “may be true.” The list features additional information including the named priests’ past parish postings and their current status within the church, according to the diocese, whose leader said he published the list in an effort to help victim’s heal.

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.

WASHINGTON (DC)
National Review

February 21, 2019

By Mairead McArdle

On Thursday, the opening day of a Vatican summit addressing the sexual abuse of minors by members of the clergy, Pope Francis laid out a 21-point plan to combat the crisis battering the Church in almost all corners of the world.

“We hear the cry of the little ones asking for justice,” Francis said. “We sense the weight of the pastoral and ecclesial responsibility that obliges us to discuss together, in a synodal, frank, and in-depth manner, how to confront this evil afflicting the Church and humanity. The holy people of God looks to us, and expects from us not simple and predictable condemnations, but concrete and effective measures to be undertaken.”

Some of the recommendations Francis listed include informing the civil authorities and higher ecclesiastical authorities about incidents of abuse, protecting and offering support to victims, raising the minimum age for marriage to 16, and setting up protocols to handle various situations.

The Vatican’s top sex-crimes investigator, Archbishop Charles Scicluna, called Francis’s “reflection points” a “road map for our discussion.”

The four-day summit, dubbed “The Protection of Minors in the Church,” has gathered 190 Church leaders from around the world. Francis has said that the summit is designed to determine “how best to protect children, to avoid these tragedies, to bring healing and restoration to the victims, and to improve the training imparted in seminaries.”

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.

EAST LANSING (MI)
WKAR Radio

February 21, 2019

By Cheyna Roth

More than 70 police officers, special agents and government officials executed search warrants on each of the seven Catholic dioceses in Michigan simultaneously.

They loaded vehicles with boxes and filing cabinets – everything they could find related to potential sexual abuse by priests who have worked in Michigan from 19-50 until now.

Attorney General Dana Nessel said Michigan is the first state to execute a search warrant on the Church in this way.

“We did not depend on the dioceses to turn over documents which is what primarily happened in other states.”

Nessel said she expects her office’s investigation to last at least two years.

“Hundreds of thousands of documents were seized during the raids and an investigative team is reviewing more than 300 tips already received. “

Attorney General Dana Nessel was slim on details about the investigation since it is ongoing. But Michigan State Police Colonel Joe Gasper said not all dioceses are being as cooperative as investigators would like.

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.

ST. LOUIS (MO)
KMOV TV

Feb 21, 2019

A group of demonstrators gathered outside the Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis in the Central West End Thursday, pushing St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson to publish the names of all alleged predator priests.

The group, Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP), released five more names of priests who are in or have served in the St. Louis community who have faced allegations of sexual assault.

The president of SNAP, David Clohessy, said it’s time for some stern punishment.

“What needs to happen is heads need to roll. Pope Francis needs to fire, publicly fire, bishops who conceal abuse. Not let them voluntarily resign,” he said. “Not quietly move them somewhere else. But he needs to fire them and he needs to say that publicly.”

News 4 reached out the St. Louis Archdiocese today about SNAP’s demands to publish the names of priests.

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.

WICHITA (KS)
KAKE TV

February 21, 2019

“Upon our meeting lays a burden of pastoral and ecclesial responsibility that compels us to discuss together, in a frank and in-depth way, how to tackle this evil that afflicts the church and humankind at large,” Pope Francis told leaders of the Catholic Church Thursday morning as he opened an International Summit on how to deal with sex abuse scandals rocking the church.

A Wichita activist says she’s happy the pope is recognizing the church has a problem, but now victims want action.

“I call it third degree burns of the soul,” Janet Patterson says about the psychological injuries victims of sexual abuse at the hands of priests have to deal with. “Maybe they can’t see those burns, but they hurt and they hurt constantly.”

Patterson has spent the last nineteen years working with survivors of sexual abuse by Catholic priests. She does it in part, because it’s something she wasn’t able to offer her own son, Eric.

“He had been sexually abused at the age of 12 by his parish priest in the Wichita diocese,” she 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.

ENID (OK)
Enid News

February 21, 2019

By James Neal

The release of a report by the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City detailing allegations of abuse by clergy dating back to 1960 has been delayed, at the request of a law firm retained to draft the report.

Archbishop Paul Coakley commissioned the report last August, and it had been scheduled for a release Feb. 28. It now has been delayed to “before the end of March,” said Diane Clay, director of communications for the archdiocese, in an email to the News & Eagle.

According to an archdiocese press release from last August, the report was commissioned to identify “instances where credible allegations of child sexual abuse were reported, substantiated, prosecuted or admitted to among priests serving in the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City.”

The archdiocese retained the services of Oklahoma City law firm McAfee & Taft to examine all files containing any allegations of sexual abuse by clergy, dating back to 1960 in a first report. A second report is expected to examine earlier files.

According to the August press release, McAfee & Taft attorney Ron Shinn, “an expert in internal institutional investigations,” will “conduct an independent review of the files and investigate further, if necessary.”

Clay said Thursday the law firm “asked for more time to review a few more files before completing the first stage of this review process.”

“There were a couple of files where they wanted to do more interviews, so they requested more time,” Clay said. “They also are producing the report and wanted to make sure they had the information added.”

There currently are 119 priests serving in the archdiocese, according to figures provided by Clay. She said she expects the number of priests implicated in the report, dating back to 1960, to be fewer than 20.

Clay said in an earlier interview the current review is focused solely on ordained clergy and does not include non-ordained church or school staff members in the archdiocese.

The review process currently underway also includes implementation of new reporting protocols that will enable the archdiocese to better track and process any abuse allegations, Clay 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.

DETROIT (MI)
Detroit Free Press

February 21, 2019

By Niraj Warikoo

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel accused Catholic Church leaders of not fully cooperating with law enforcement, telling them to stop “self-policing” and allow state investigators to probe sexual abuse by clergy.

Speaking Thursday at her first news conference, Nessel said she will continue the investigations into Michigan’s seven Catholic dioceses launched under her predecessor, former Attorney General Bill Schuette. Schuette conducted raids in October at dioceses in Michigan that involved 70 police officers and 14 assistant attorney generals, Nessel said.

Nessel told victims of abuse and others to speak with state investigators rather than Catholic officials, expressing concern that nondisclosure agreements (NDAs) are being used to discourage victims of abuse to speak with law enforcement authorities.

“Stop self-policing” and let the state do its investigations, she said. “Our office is conducting a thorough investigation and it’s important we be able to talk with any and all victims harmed by these egregious acts without the intervention of the church.”

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

QUEENS (NY)
Queens Daily Eagle

February 21, 2019

By David Brand

Survivors of clergy sex abuse have named 112 additional clergy members from the Archdiocese of New York, who they say molested and abused them when they were children.

Attorney Jeff Anderson, who represents survivors of clergy sex abuse, said that 57 of the alleged perpetrators are alive, 42 are dead and 13 could not be located. Anderson joined survivors to publicize the list today in Manhattan.

“We are releasing this list publicly because Cardinal [Timothy] Dolan will not release a list,” Anderson said. Dolan is cardinal at the Archdiocese of New York. “He has made a conscious and calculated choice to keep these names and documents secret and he has the power to release the names right now.”

On Friday, the Diocese of Brooklyn, which includes Queens, released the names of 108 clergy members “credibly” accused of sexual abuse.

The Archdiocese of Brooklyn and The Archdiocese of New York did not provide a response to requests from the Eagle.

It is unclear how Catholic schools are preparing to discuss the latest church abuse revelations when students return from winter break on Monday.

At one K-through-8 school in the Bronx, which is located in the Archdiocese of New York, staff members have not received any guidance on how to talk about child sex abuse, one 8th grade teacher who asked to remain anonymous told the Eagle on Wednesday.

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.

MINNEAPOLIS (MN)
Minnesota Public Radio

February 21, 2019

By Cathy Wurzer ·

Catholic leaders from around the world are gathered at the Vatican today for the start of a four-day summit on clergy sex abuse.

MPR News host Cathy Wurzer spoke with Frank Meuers about his expectations for the summit. Meuers leads the Minnesota chapter of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP.

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.

TORONTO (CANADA)
CBC News

February 21, 2019

By Jonathon Gatehouse

How big is the problem of child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church?

No one but the Vatican knows.

Last summer, Pope Francis wrote an unprecedented letter to the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics apologizing for the church’s abandonment of “the little ones,” and asking for the laity’s help in “uprooting this culture of death.”

But as a special four-day summit on abuse prevention opens in Rome this morning, the scope of the crisis might best be described as both huge and hazy.

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

NEW YORK (NY)
Huffington Post

February 21, 2019

By Carol Kuruvilla

Pope Francis’ highly anticipated summit on sex abuse kicked off on Thursday ― but there appears to be a glaring gap in the official list of speakers.

Of the nine individuals chosen to give presentations and offer recommendations for combating sexual abuse, none have publicly identified themselves as abuse survivors. Nor are any of them advocates representing prominent survivors’ networks.

While victims’ testimonies are woven into the summit during some key moments, there appear to be no sessions wholly dedicated to listening to survivors freely share their demands for concrete action.

This lack of representation for sex abuse survivors at a sex abuse summit would be surprising if it weren’t taking place under the auspices of the Vatican ― a notoriously hierarchical institution exclusively run by men.

“Put very simply, the church is a monarchy and has been for centuries,” Zach Hiner, the executive director of the U.S.-based Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP), told HuffPost. “Its hierarchy hasn’t had to be responsive to their essentially powerless constituents.”

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Religion News Service

February 21, 2019

By Jack Jenkins

Pope Francis on Thursday (Feb. 21) opened a highly anticipated four-day meeting on his church’s ongoing sex abuse crisis by calling on the assembled bishops and other Catholic leaders to “hear the cry of the little ones who plead for justice” and be “concrete.”

“The holy People of God look to us, and expect from us not simple and predictable condemnations, but concrete and effective measures to be undertaken. We need to be concrete,” Francis said.

But as the day wore on and the nearly 200 clerics debated ways to respond to the crisis, it became less clear which “concrete” responses can be agreed upon by a global church rattled by multiple scandals, or whether they will satisfy abuse victims.

Francis opened the conference the featured episcopal presidents of the more than 150 nations by distributing 21 “reflection points” for consideration by church leaders. The recommendations included preparing a handbook for local churches to follow in abuse cases, establishing protocols for handling accusations against bishops and raising the minimum age for marriage to 16.

At a news conference after the session, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, former director of the Holy See press office, described the list as “starting points” for conversation among bishops. But Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane, Australia, speaking after Lombardi, made clear that the bishops’ various perspectives on abuse were as different as the countries they represented.

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

VATICAN CITY
The Associated Press

February 21, 2019

By Nicole Winfield

The day began with an African woman telling an extraordinary gathering of Catholic leaders that her priestly rapist forced her to have three abortions over a dozen years after he started violating her at age 15. It ended with a Colombian cardinal warning them they could all face prison if they let such crimes go unpunished.

In between, Pope Francis began charting a new course for the Catholic Church to confront the “evil” of clergy sexual abuse and cover-up, a scandal that has consumed his papacy and threatens the credibility of the Catholic hierarchy at large.

Opening a first-ever Vatican summit on preventing abuse, Francis warned 190 bishops and religious superiors on Thursday that their flocks were demanding concrete action, not just words, to punish predator priests and keep children safe. He offered them 21 proposals to consider going forward, some of them obvious and easy to adopt, others requiring new laws.

But his main point in summoning the Catholic hierarchy to the Vatican for a four-day tutorial was to impress upon them that clergy sex abuse is not confined to the United States or Ireland, but is a global scourge that requires a concerted, global response.

“Listen to the cry of the young, who want justice,” Francis told the gathering. “The holy people of God are watching and expect not just simple and obvious condemnations, but efficient and concrete measures to be established.”

More than 30 years after the scandal first erupted in Ireland and Australia, and 20 years after it hit the U.S., bishops and Catholic officials in many parts of Europe, Latin America, Africa and Asia still either deny that clergy sex abuse exists in their regions or play down the problem.

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.

RIVERHEAD (NY)
Riverhead News Review

February 21, 2019

By Steve Wick

The gigantic scandal that is the Roman Catholic Church continues to grow worse, with new revelations of criminal behavior and the sexual abuse of children. With each new disclosure, the church itself looks more and more like a criminal cabal partly inhabited by pedophiles whose behavior was covered up and filed away, hidden from the public.

The latest report involves two women now in their 60s who say they were sexually abused as children by former Diocese of Rockville Centre Bishop John McGann. They were about 11 at the time of the alleged abuse, when McGann was a monsignor and auxiliary bishop. One of them said she was also abused by another priest in the diocese at age 5. The parents of these girls were devout Catholics who believed priests and bishops were in a special class by themselves and were to be revered. Little did they know the truth.

McGann is the once-esteemed bishop whose name adorned the Catholic high school in Riverhead, which was shuttered by the current bishop of the diocese — whose name appears in a grand jury report published last year about abuse by priests in Pennsylvania and the bishops who knew about it.

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.

ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

February 21, 2019

We are members of a support group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. We exist for two reasons: To protect the vulnerable and to heal the wounded. We are here today for three reasons.

First, we are begging anyone with information or suspicions about crimes or cover ups by former Long Island Bishop John McGann to come forward.

McGann was sued this week by two brave women. We in SNAP strongly suspect there are others in and around Rockville Centre who saw, suspected or suffered McGann’s crimes and misdeeds. They should find the courage to speak up so that they can heal and so that others who ignored or hid McGann’s wrongdoing will be expose or punished.

Our message to victims: You CAN get better. But to do so, you must break your silence. Everyone recovers from the horror of abuse in different ways. But few recover alone. Reach out to trusted sources of help – police, prosecutors, therapists, loved ones or support groups like ours! Do it today.

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.

ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

February 21, 2019

For immediate release: February 21, 2019

As Pope Francis’ global abuse summit officially got underway today, the world’s top Catholic leader opened his global meeting with a list of 21 “reflection points” to help end the clergy sex abuse crisis.

Some of the points that the Pope has called for echo some of our own demands. We agree that Bishops must be cooperating with civil investigations and that they should be fully open and honest with the public when making decisions about accused priests.

But as we have grown to expect from the Church hierarchy, every step forward is complemented by at least one step backwards. What we wanted to see from Rome was action, yet we have heard these words before. Formalizing these points into policy is meaningless without any willingness to back them up with punishment.

In refusing to discipline those prelates in attendance who have had an active role in covering up and minimizing cases of child sex abuse, Pope Francis sends the message that Bishops and Cardinals are able to openly flout the very policies designed to hold them accountable. For example, despite being published more than 15 years ago, the guidelines within the Dallas Charter were ignored by Cardinal Daniel DiNardo in his recent dealings with cases of abuse within the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston.

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.

[“Raza de Víboras:” Argentine nuns sexually abused and whipped victims]

CHILE
BioBioChile

February 20, 2019

By Paola Alemán

Cuando las historias que llegan casi a diario acusando de violaciones a sacerdotes en todo el mundo, incluyen a monjas entre los verdugos, la trama se vuelve más oscura para la iglesia católica, pero sobre todo para las víctimas. Así lo revela una entrevista publicada por la revista Perfil en Argentina. El abuso sexual no solo tiene cara masculina en las iglesias. También hubo vejámenes en conventos de ese territorio, donde las víctimas de las superioras, hablaron del calvario vivido.

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.

[Lawyer Hermosilla confirms there are new accusations against priest Renato Poblete]

CHILE
BioBioChile

February 20, 2019

By Tamara Rojas

El abogado Juan Pablo Hermosilla, quien representa a Marcela Aranda denunciante del excapellán del Hogar de Cristo, Renato Poblete, aseguró que hay nuevos casos y testimonios de presunto abuso sexual por parte de Poblete.

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.

[Archbishop of Concepción notifies priest about his rape trial]

CHILE
BioBioChile

February 21, 2019

By Yessenia Márquez and Carlos Avendaño

El Arzobispado de Concepción notificó al sacerdote Hernán Enríquez del inicio del juicio administrativo penal en su contra por la presunta violación de un exseminarista en el año 2002. El religioso en conversación con Radio Bío Bío en la zona, valoró la instancia por permitirle defenderse de las acusaciones.

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.

[Cruz in historical role against abuse at Vatican: “In Chile there are priests who are a scum”]

CHILE
BioBioChile

February 21, 2019

By Valentina González and Nicole Martínez

Este jueves comenzó la cumbre de obispos en el Vaticano, que estuvo antecedida ayer por un encuentro del comité organizador con 12 sobrevivientes de abuso sexual eclesiástico de varios países. La reunión estuvo encabezada por el arzobispo de Malta, Charles Scicluna, quien integra el comité que organiza la cumbre de obispos en el Vaticano. Los sobrevivientes, de distintos puntos del planeta, estuvieron encabezados por el chileno Juan Carlos Cruz, uno de los denunciantes de Fernando Karadima.

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.

[Five months of research reveals hidden clergy abuse in Spain]

MADRID (SPAIN)
El País

February 21, 2019

By Íñigo Domínguez and Julio Núñez

Cinco meses de investigación de EL PAÍS han sacado a la luz 19 casos con 87 víctimas de la pederastia, casi la mitad de los que se conocían hasta ahora en los últimos 30 años

EL PAÍS se propuso hace cinco meses comprobar si España era una excepción, o si lo excepcional era que en este país aún no hubieran salido a la luz más casos de pederastia en la Iglesia. La respuesta empieza a estar clara: los abusos en España sí han existido. Queda ahora por saber cuál es la dimensión del problema. Este periódico ha investigado y desvelado ya 19 casos, con al menos 87 víctimas. Es más de la mitad de lo que estaba registrado oficialmente en los últimos treinta años: 36 casos, a través de 34 sentencias civiles y seis eclesiásticas. Además, por primera vez hemos contabilizado los casos de los que se tiene constancia, sumando los judicializados y los que han aparecido en distintos medios de comunicación. Suman un total de 82 casos conocidos en 33 años; 28 de ellos en los últimos 14 meses. Un acelerón vertiginoso tras décadas de silencio. Un secreto que empieza a caer. Ha sido posible por la valentía de las víctimas, que se han decidido a hablar.

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.

[Scicluna delves into sexual abuse committed by the Church in Chile: “Only the truth will set us free”]

CHILE
The Clinic

February 18, 2019

El religioso que viniera a nuestro país para recopilar información sobre este tipo de casos, sostuvo que “sé que abrimos una caja de Pandora” y que “hay una serie de casos que están siendo revisados. El material que se nos entregó durante esas dos misiones en Chile es enorme, y cada caso debe ser estudiado por sus propios méritos y debido al debido proceso”.

En medio de la cumbre de “La Protección de Menores en la Iglesia” a realizarse entre el 21 y 24 de febrero en el Vaticano, el secretario adjunto de la Congregación para la Doctrina de la Fe, Charles Scicluna, profundizó en los abusos sexuales cometidos por miembros de la Iglesia en Chile.

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.

[Schöenstatt order seeks new defender for ex-bishop Cox]

CHILE
La Tercera

February 20, 2019

By Juan Castellón

Las denuncias por presuntos abusos contra el exarzobispo serán vistas por los juzgados del crimen.

“Este magistrado y este tribunal no tienen la competencia, ni la jurisdicción, para poder mantener el conocimiento de esta causa”. Esa fue la determinación que ayer comunicó el juez Alaín Maldonado, del 2° Juzgado de Garantía de La Serena, respecto de los presuntos abusos sexuales cometidos por el exsacerdote Francisco José Cox, quien no asistió a la audiencia.

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.

[Scicluna warns the Catholic Church of Chile: “They will have to clean the dirt”]

CHILE
Publimetro

February 18, 2019

El arzobispo de Malta y secretario adjunto de la Congregación para la Doctrina de la Fe analizó el momento de la iglesia criolla sumida en una profunda crisis.

En conversación con el sitio Crux, Scicluna señaló que “hay una serie de casos que están siendo revisados. El material que se nos entregó durante esas dos misiones en Chile es enorme, y cada caso debe ser estudiado por sus propios méritos y al debido proceso”.

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.

[The “Chile factor” breaks into Pope Francis’ anti-abuse summit]

CHILE
La Tercera

February 18, 2019

By S. Rodríguez, S. Rivas, C. Reyes y M. J. Navarrete

Juan Carlos Cruz, denunciante de Karadima y quien tiene demandada a la Iglesia de Santiago por supuesto encubrimiento, coordinará al grupo de víctimas que entregará este miércoles su testimonio. Su rol fue solicitado por Charles Scicluna.

“El arzobispo (Charles) Scicluna me pidió no solo asistir y entregar un testimonio, sino que conversar con los demás denunciantes, que irán de otras partes del mundo, para coordinar y facilitar esta reunión con los organizadores, que en un principio será el miércoles”, dijo este lunes a La Tercera Juan Carlos Cruz.

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.

[“It is disgraceful that the Chilean Church is a symbol of sexual abuse worldwide”]

CHILE
BioBioChile

February 19, 2019

By Paz Fonseca

Comentario de Tomás Mosciatti y Katherine Ibáñez en la edición matinal de Radiograma sobre la cumbre del Papa con los obispos de todo el mundo y la posición de la iglesia chilena ante los casos de abuso sexual.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
New York Times

February 20, 2019

By Jason Horowitz

In parts of the vast Catholic world, some bishops view clerical sexual abuse as more of a sin than a crime. Others attribute it to homosexuality or question that it exists at all. Where Catholics are a minority, as in the Middle East, reporting a pedophile priest to the civil authorities is tantamount to sentencing him to death.

As Pope Francis convenes church leaders for a meeting at the Vatican starting on Thursday to address the scourge of clerical sexual abuse, victims’ advocates are demanding urgent and uniform church laws to impose zero tolerance for priests who abuse minors and for the bishops who cover up for them, regardless of the culture in which they operate.

But Vatican officials say such a demand reflects a misconception that change in a global and ancient institution can be made with the wave of a papal wand.

The diversity of legal and cultural barriers to identifying abusers and assisting victims, as well as entrenched denial, makes putting in place one world standard virtually impossible, they say.

Before the conference, The New York Times interviewed bishops and priests on four continents, and their views varied widely on the urgency, extent and very existence of sexual abuse of children and minors among priests — a problem that by now has been painstakingly documented in many parts of the globe.

“It is not so simple,” said the Rev. Hans Zollner, an organizer of the meeting, member of the Vatican’s child-protection commission and president of the Center for Child Protection of the Pontifical Gregorian University.

Vatican leaders have worked for weeks to tamp down expectations of a sudden revolution in the sprawling bureaucracy governing the church.

The conference instead will amount to a kind of four-day crash course to instruct church leaders on how to handle abuse cases with responsibility, accountability and transparency, and to convince some that the problem exists at all.

That has hardly appeased survivors of abuse and others in the church who call the arguments against more decisive action a cop-out.

“They are saying there are all these bishops who don’t understand sexual abuse, which is stunning!” said Peter Isely, an American abuse survivor and leader of Ending Clergy Abuse, an advocacy group for survivors of clerical child abuse.

“How do you get to be a bishop if you have to be given an education about the rape of a child?” he said, after he met on Wednesday with Father Zollner and the prelates organizing the conference. He was furious that Pope Francis himself did not show up.

“The only way to solve this is at the top,” Mr. Isely said. “He can do it with the stroke of a pen.”

Father Zollner said he understood the anguished call from victims and advocates for action. But while the Vatican is a monarchy, it is not monolithic and has “as diverse backgrounds as you can imagine in humanity,” he said.

“If you think that by the pope declaring that these are guidelines you have solved the problem, actually I think that you may run the risk of being very much disappointed,” Father Zollner said in an interview in his office in Rome.

The pope has already provided the church with zero-tolerance laws, he argued, adding that if Francis introduced new norms prematurely, he would risk eroding papal authority, because they had a good chance of being ignored.

When the pope emphasized change starting at the bottom, Father Zollner said, he was not shirking responsibility, but making the only choice available, because that was where the change needed to happen.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Washington Post

February 21, 2019

By Julie Zauzmer

As the Vatican’s much-anticipated first summit on the abuse of children got underway Thursday, Pope Francis said he hopes “concrete and effective measures” will emerge from the gathering of the world’s leading bishops. To get that discussion started, Francis handed out a list of points for the days-long conversation among 190 Catholic leaders.

The document raises a number of ideas: a handbook for how abuse cases should be handled, an increase in the church’s minimum marriage age to 16, mandatory codes of conduct, and background checks for all church staff and volunteers worldwide.

Some of the suggestions are already in place in the United States, such as psychological evaluations of men who want to become priests and removal from ministry of any priest found guilty of abusing a child, but not in all countries.

The document recommends protocols for handling accusations against bishops, which was a central proposal at a meeting of U.S. bishops last fall, when the Vatican asked the Americans not to implement their ideas yet.

Read the complete list of Francis’s proposals, as distributed by the Vatican, here.

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

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

February 21, 2019

By Jeremy Roebuck

Pope Francis warned the globe’s top Roman Catholic leaders Thursday that they would need to emerge with more than just “predictable statements” as he opened a highly-anticipated summit aimed at finally defining a worldwide response to the issue of sex abuse within the church.

In an opening address before an audience of leading bishops from more than 100 countries, Vatican officials and experts, the pontiff urged those in attendance to “listen to the cry of the small who are asking for justice.”

“The holy people of God are looking at us, expecting not only simple and predictable condemnations but concrete and effective measures in place,” he said. “We need to be concrete.”

Francis’ remarks kicked off the three-day, closed-door meeting at the Holy See, which will see the presidents of the world’s bishops’ conferences participating in lectures and work sessions on how to prevent sex abuse, hold each other accountable and care for victims in their churches back home.

Organizers have said they hope it will prove to be a “turning point” for a hierarchy battered by a series of scandals — especially in the United States, which saw top Cardinal Theodore McCarrick defrocked over allegations he abused seminarians and minors, a scathing grand jury report in Pennsylvania and the launch of several similar investigations in more than a dozen states all within the last year, including New Jersey.

The meeting also presents an opportunity for Pope Francis to shore up his own record on the issue. His critics have described him as sluggish to respond and, at times, callous.

Clergy sex abuse victims and representatives from their most outspoken advocacy groups — have turned the area surrounding St. Peter’s Square into their own home base in the days leading up to Thursday’s session and have sought to wrest the spotlight from the summit’s official agenda.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Crux

February 21, 2019

By Elise Harris

As part of Pope Francis’ high-stakes summit on clerical sexual abuse this week at the Vatican, during Thursday’s opening session he released a list of 21 “points for reflection”- including a couple that didn’t necessarily sit well with abuse survivors, who say they fall short of the Catholic Church’s pledge of zero tolerance.

One of those points, which Pope Francis said he got from suggestions made by bishops’ conferences ahead of the summit, dealt with releasing names of accused priests. Another concerned defrocking clergy guilty of abuse, and still another with listening structures so bishops can hear victims’ stories.

In comments following the opening session of Pope Francis’ Feb. 21-24 summit on the protection of minors in the Church, abuse survivor and co-founder of the U.S. branch of the Ending Clergy Abuse advocacy group Peter Isely said the pope’s list contains “not-very-concrete points,” despite a statement from Francis earlier in the day that people want “concrete, effective” measures.

The suggestions are not a sign of progress, Isley said, because “they don’t go anywhere, they’re not moving the line anywhere.”

“There’s nothing different in here than there was yesterday. Where is it in these points that if you’re a bishop or a cardinal and you’ve covered up child sex crimes, that you’re going to be removed from the priesthood or that any action will be taken against you?” he said.

“That’s not in here at all, so that’s not accountability and that’s not zero tolerance,” he said.

Speaking of point 15 on Francis’ list, which suggests that the Church’s traditional principle of “proportionality of punishment with respect to the crime committed” should be observed and asked for “deliberation” on defrocking, Isely said the idea that some priests guilty of abusing children would not lose their clerical status is “unacceptable.”

In a news conference after Thursday’s morning session, Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta, a former Vatican prosecutor on clerical abuse cases and a leading figure in the protection of minors in the Church, said that dismissing abuser priests from the clerical state is not always a given, but in his view, should happen on a “case-by-case” basis.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Associated Press

February 21, 2019

The Latest on the Vatican’s conference on dealing with sex abuse by priests (all times local):

3:40 p.m.
Pope Francis has issued 21 proposals to stem the clergy sex abuse around the world, calling for specific protocols to handle accusations against bishops and for lay experts to be involved in abuse investigations.

Francis distributed the list on Thursday as he opened his high-stakes abuse prevention summit at the Vatican. The four-day event brings together some 190 bishops and religious superiors for tutorials on preventing abuse and protecting children.

The aim is to show pedophile priests a global problem and therefore require a global response.

The pope’s proposals draw heavily from existing best practices, including establishing rules for transferring seminarians and priests.

Another idea suggests a basic handbook showing bishops how to investigate cases.

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.

WARSAW (POLAND)
Associated Press

February 21, 2019

Activists in Poland toppled a statue of a prominent Solidarity-era priest early Thursday amid allegations that he sexually abused minors, a protest against what they called a failure by the Catholic Church and society to resolve the problem of clergy sex abuse.

The protest came only hours before Pope Francis gathered Catholic leaders from around the world for a landmark summit at the Vatican to address the Church’s sex abuse crisis.

Video footage showed three men attaching a rope around the statue of the late Monsignor Henryk Jankowski in the northern city of Gdansk and then pulling it down to the ground in the dark. The activists then placed children’s underwear in one of the statue’s hands and a small white lace church vestment worn by altar boys on the statue’s body to symbolize the suffering of the young people he allegedly molested.

It was a striking act in a country where more than 90 percent of the population identifies as Roman Catholic and where the Church still enjoys significant authority in public life. That position appears to be changing, however, as secularization grows along with a developing economy.

Church leaders have also alienated some Poles with their close ties to the conservative ruling party, which has been accused of eroding Poland’s democratic culture and institutions.

Police detained the three men and opened an investigation into whether they committed the crime of “insulting a monument.”

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

NEW YORK (NY)
CBS News

February 21, 2019

By Matthew Sheridan, Elizabeth Gravier and Alexandra Myers

In the past six months, authorities and Catholic Church dioceses across the U.S. have said that credible accusations of abuse have been made against more than 2,600 priests and other church employees over a span of several decades, according to a CBS News tally. The number includes sexual abuse accusations made against 301 priests over 70 years that a Pennsylvania grand jury revealed last summer.

Since then, individual dioceses and archdioceses across the country have been reviewing their files and releasing lists of people who they said face credible allegations of abuse. The issue has prompted Pope Francis to call church leaders from all over the world to the Vatican for a summit that started Thursday.

Between the release of the Pennsylvania grand jury investigation on Aug. 14, and Monday of this week, dioceses in two states have each named more than 300 people who have been accused of abuse. In New York, dioceses have named a total of 343 people, and Texas dioceses have named 304.

Dioceses in 31 other states and Washington, D.C., have come forward with what they said they’ve found in their files. The findings range from Mississippi, where the diocese of Biloxi said in January that credible allegations have been made against three priests since 1989, to California, where the diocese of Oakland on Monday released a list of 45 clergy members accused of abuse dating back to the 1960s.

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.

ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

Nearly 100 alleged predators are now publicly known here

Many abused elsewhere but are or were in St. Louis area to0

In last 6 months, 37 accused child molesting clerics are ‘outed’ here

Still, archbishop won’t disclose more than 50 others who are accused

Local Catholic victims will also discuss upcoming Vatican abuse summit

WHAT

Holding five signs listing 100 accused clericsa at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will

reveal the identities of five accused priests who are/were in St. Louis but have escaped virtually all scrutiny or attention here, and
challenge local Catholic officials to disclose the names of ALL alleged predator priests,
prod Missouri’s attorney general to work harder to bring victims, witnesses and whistleblowers forward for his statewide probe into clergy sex crimes and cover ups.

WHEN
Thursday, February 21 at 1:00 p.m.

WHERE
On the sidewalk outside the Cathedral Basilica of Saint Louis (“new” cathdral), 4431 Lindell Blvd, (between Taylor & Newstead) in the Central West End in St. Louis

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

GUAM
Pacific Daily News

February 20, 2019

By Haidee V. Eugenio

Two leading U.S. organizations protecting victims and documenting the sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic priesthood have called on Pope Francis to sustain the guilty verdict on Archbishop Anthony S. Apuron in a case involving sexual abuse of minors, and to defrock or expel him from priesthood.

“It is wrong for Pope Francis to leave Guam Catholics twisting in the wind and waiting to discover the fate of Archbishop Apuron, especially since it has been nearly a full year since the archbishop was found guilty of abusing children,” according to Zach Hiner, executive director for the Missouri-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, the world’s largest and oldest survivors group for abuse victims.

BishopAccountability.Org, which documents the Catholic clergy sex abuse crisis, said Apuron and four other bishops must be defrocked, just like the disgraced former cardinal archbishop of Washington, D.C., Theodore McCarrick.

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.

ROME
Crux

February 20, 2019

By Elise Harris

In the 1994 movie classic “The Shawshank Redemption,” Tim Robbins plays a wrongly convicted inmate who eventually escapes by tunneling out of the thick stone structure using only a tiny rock hammer he uses to chip the prison wall away over a long stretch of time.

His primary confidante behind bars is played by Morgan Freeman, who, after the escape, comments on his friend’s passion for geology: “Geology is the study of pressure and time. That’s all it takes, really … pressure and time.”

At a Rome news conference Tuesday, a panel of women activists touted what might be called a “Shawshank solution” to the woes plaguing the Catholic Church, including the clerical sexual abuse crisis and sexual assaults against women religious – recommending the application of pressure, combined with the determination to stay the course.

It was a piece in a women’s supplement published by the Vatican newspaper earlier in February that prompted Pope Francis to acknowledge sexual abuse of nuns by clergy.

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.

PITTSBURGH (PA)
Trib Live

February 20, 2019

By Deb Erdley

Clergy sexual abuse survivors were left waiting for answers Wednesday as an international mix of Catholic Church leaders gathered in Rome to address the child sexual abuse scandal that has rocked parishes around the world — including Western Pennsylvania.

Calls for an apology to survivors, an acknowledgement of their pain, sweeping global policy changes and the ouster of a Pennsylvania bishop some deemed to have been complicit in cover-ups were among the demands survivors took to Rome.

Shaun Dougherty, a 49-year-old Johnstown native, was among 12 survivors invited to meet with church leaders in advance of the official call to order of the four-day summit on clergy sexual abuse, which Pope Francis will convene at the Vatican beginning Thursday. Dougherty was disappointed but not surprised the pope did not attend Wednesday’s meeting with survivors.

“I’m aggravated. This is the CEO of the Roman Catholic Church,” Dougherty told CBS News reporter Nikki Battiste. “We came to his house to meet with him about his abusive priests … and he wasn’t there. He delegated.”

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.

PARIS (FRANCE)
AFP

February 18, 2019

By Lucie Peytermann

Denise Buchanan was 17 when she was raped by a seminarian who continued to abuse her when he became a priest in her native Jamaica. The Catholic Church, she says, has offered her nothing but their “prayers”.

“I got pregnant and he arranged a clandestine abortion,” Buchanan, still shaking and close to tears 40 years after the ordeal, told AFP.

Today aged 57, the academic is a leading member of a new international organisation, Ending Clerical Abuse (ECA), which is bringing together victims in Rome this week to pressure Pope Francis to take a tougher line on child abuse by clerics.

She has struggled in vain for years for the Church to officially recognise her as a victim — even writing to the pope himself — while the priest who abused her has escaped justice.

Buchanan’s struggle underscores the sense of isolation felt by many victims who see the institution as still in denial, particularly in poorer countries where the Church remains politically and socially influential.

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

VATICAN CITY
Reuters Videos

February 20, 2019

Pope Francis will convene the Church’s first conference solely about sex abuse this week. But victims and activists fear it won’t touch senior clerics who cover up the crimes. Philip Pullella and Lucy Fielder report.

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

VATICAN CITY
USA TODAY

February 19, 2019

By John Bacon

A crucial summit on clergy sexual abuse, which opens Thursday at the Vatican, will draw church leaders from around the world in an effort to break a “code of silence” that allowed the misconduct to take place over decades.

Presidents of more than 100 bishop conferences will be joined by high-ranking Vatican officials – and Pope Francis himself. The summit will focus on making bishops aware of their responsibilities, accountability and transparency, the Vatican said.

Archbishop Charles Scicluna, a member of the organizing committee, described the summit as a major step in the pope’s efforts to end the code of silence. The Rev. James Bretzke, a theology professor at Marquette University, said the pope demands a change in “clerical culture.”

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.

SAN FRANCISCO (CA)
KGO – San Francisco

February 18, 2019

The Catholic Diocese of Oakland published a list of 45 priests who have been credibly accused of child sexual abuse, but survivor advocates say the list omits names of dangerous priests.

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

MEXICO CITY
Reuters

February 18, 2019

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Monday he would not confront the country’s Catholic Church over sexual abuse allegations and that it would fall to the prosecutor’s office to investigate such claims.

At least 152 Catholic priests in Mexico have been suspended over the past nine years for sexual abuse against minors, and some of those priests have been jailed over those offences, Mexico’s Archbishop for Monterrey said earlier this month.

The Catholic Church has reeled from sexual abuse scandals in the United States, Chile, Australia, Germany and a number of other countries in recent years. Mexico is home to the world’s second-largest Catholic community after Brazil.

“We don’t want to confront the church,” Lopez Obrador said at a regular news conference when asked about the role his administration would take in investigating sexual abuse allegations.

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.

CHILE
Reuters Videos

February 19, 2019

Three former Chilean nuns who claim to have been sexually abused over two decades ago by priests in their religious order have hailed comments by Pope Francis earlier this month in which he recognized the abuse of nuns in the Catholic Church. Havovi Cooper reports.

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

VATICAN CITY
FOX News Videos

February 19, 2019

Vatican hopes global clergy abuse meeting will be ‘turning point’ and help repair the reputation of the Catholic Church.

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

CHICAGO (IL)
WLS – Chicago

February 19, 2019

A historic meeting is about to begin at the Vatican as leaders of the Roman Catholic Church gather for a global meeting on the clergy sex abuse crisis, led by Chicago’s Cardinal Blase Cupich.

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.

Victims ‘out’ two accused Long Island priests

They also blast Long Island’s Catholic bishop

SNAP: “He should identify child molesting clerics”

And he must seek out others hurt by his predecessor, group says

Victim to read a letter the now-accused McGann wrote to her dad in 1995

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will disclose the names of two publicly accused priests who are or were in the Rockville Centre dioceses but have largely been ‘under the radar,’

They will also prod Rockville Centre Catholic officials to
–reveal the names of ALL proven, admitted and ‘credibly accused’ predator priests,
–permanently and prominently post their photos, whereabouts, and work histories on church websites, and
–‘aggressively reach out’ to anyone who may have been hurt by a Long Island ex-bishop

WHEN
Thursday, February 21 at 1:00 p.m.

WHERE

On the sidewalk outside St. Agnes Cathedral, 29 Quealy Place in Rockville Centre, NY

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

VATICAN CITY
Reuters

February 17, 2019

By Philip Pullella

The Vatican will gather senior bishops from around the world later this week for a conference on sex abuse designed to guide them on how best to tackle a problem that has decimated the Church’s credibility, but critics say it is too little, too late.

The unprecedented four-day meeting, starting on Thursday, brings together presidents of national Roman Catholic bishops conferences, Vatican officials, experts and heads of male and female religious orders.

“I am absolutely convinced that our credibility in this area is at stake,” said Father Federico Lombardi, who Pope Francis has chosen to moderate the meeting.

“We have to get to the root of this problem and show our ability to undergo a cure as a Church that proposes to be a teacher or it would be better for us to get into another line of work,” he told reporters.

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.

WASHINGTON (DC)
Washington Post

February 20, 2019

In a recent letter to U.S. bishops, Pope Francis called for a “change of mindset” to regain credibility forfeited by the Catholic Church after nearly two decades of temporizing, equivocation and half-measures to address clerical sex abuse. In fact, the pontiff himself, whose response to the scandal has been a fog of mixed messages, would benefit from this advice. Just as important, as he prepares for a meeting of some 130 top bishops from around the world what is needed is a concrete blueprint that will shift the church toward a new era of accountability and transparency.

Those are among the stated goals of the meeting, called by the pope, of the presidents of the world’s Conferences of Catholic Bishops, scheduled for today through Sunday in Rome. Yet, rather than identifying specific agenda items that would signal a no-nonsense new approach, the Vatican has tried to lower expectations. Francis says the meeting will be an occasion for deep “discernment.” New policies would help more.

A good start would be the establishment of a muscular new mechanism, including lay members of the church, that would enable the Vatican to investigate and remove bishops and other senior clerics implicated in covering up for pedophile priests. Even now, more than 17 years after revelations of systematic abuse and coverups first rocked the American church, the wall of impunity that has long protected bishops is only gradually starting to crack.

In the United States, the church must also drop its largely successful efforts to block changes in state law that would allow adults who were once child victims of abuse to bring civil lawsuits against their abusers and the dioceses that enabled them. Owing to pressure by the church and insurance companies, only a handful of states have, so far, allowed such lawsuits. It’s hypocrisy on the church’s part to pledge “zero tolerance” for pedophile priests while lobbying resolutely to impede legislation that would allow victims to seek a measure of justice in the courts.

A genuine change of mindset would also mean a shift in tone by church officials at all levels. Many implicitly excuse the church’s epidemic of child sex abuse as no more than a reflection of society’s own problem with the same blight. It’s a fact that pedophilia isn’t limited to the church; it’s also a fact that no other large institution has been similarly plagued by the scale and scope of abuse that has beset the church, or by such massive systematic, institutional foot-dragging in the face of reform efforts.

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

UNITED STATES
Yahoo News Video

February 19, 2019

By Rebecca Corey

“Through Her Eyes” is a new weekly half-hour show hosted by human rights activist Zainab Salbi that explores contemporary issues from a female perspective. You can watch “Through Her Eyes” every Tuesday at 8 p.m. ET on Roku and see full episodes at yahoonews.com.

It has been a year since former USA Gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar was sentenced to 40 to 175 years in prison for abusing more than 150 girls entrusted in his care. But Aly Raisman — an Olympic gold medalist and former captain of the U.S. women’s Olympic gymnastics team — is still coming to terms with the sexual abuse she experienced as a teenager.

“When I go out on the street, or I’m at the airport, or the grocery store, or whatever it is, people are so supportive. And I’m so grateful for that,” Raisman said during an interview with the Yahoo News show “Through Her Eyes.”

Raisman is frequently approached by supportive strangers who are eager to share their own traumatic experiences of sexual assault. But these stories from fellow survivors can sometimes be difficult for Raisman to hear.

“I think sometimes people forget I am coping with it too,” Raisman explained. “And sometimes people will go into graphic detail.”

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.

LITTLE ROCK (AR)
Bilgrimmage blog

February 20, 2019

By William Lindsey

Pope news
@Pope_news
Poland’s most senior nun has been banned from further media contact after condemning the sexual abuse of religious sisters by Catholic priests in her country https://www.thetablet.co.uk/news/11385/polish-nun-silenced-for-speaking-out-on-abuse- …

12:36 PM – Feb 19, 2019
Polish nun ‘silenced’ for speaking out on abuse
Poland’s most senior nun has been banned from further media contact after condemning the sexual abuse of nuns by Catholic priests in her country

Talking abuse, Catholic context and Southern Baptist context: good things I’ve been reading and want to share with you:

Carol Howard Merritt, “The Problem of ‘Evil’ in Describing Southern Baptist Abuse Crisis”:

The Southern Baptist Church upholds gracious submission as godly and relegates the abuse as “satanic,” casting them into different realms. Yet, submission and abuse should not occupy spaces so far apart in our theological imaginations, because they work together. When leaders demand unquestioning obedience from women and girls, it sets up the perfect environment for predation to occur.

Jonathan Merritt, “The Lessons Southern Baptists Need to Learn”:

It’s correct that Southern Baptist churches are autonomous, unlike Catholic churches, are not under the authority of a hierarchy. And yet, claims that the denomination’s hands are tied in this matter will come as a shock to the many churches that have been censored or kicked out of the denomination due to their acceptance of LGBT people, ordination of women, or more progressive interpretations of the Bible. The denomination does actually possess the power to impose standards on its member churches, but heretofore protecting children from sex predators hasn’t been prioritized to that level. …

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.

LONDON (ENGLAND)
The Economist

February 21, 2019

“We hear the cry of the little ones asking for justice,” said Pope Francis on February 21st to 100 bishops from around the world and other leading members of the Catholic hierarchy who had gathered in the Vatican for a four-day meeting on clerical sex abuse. The conference is the most conspicuous effort yet to extirpate the cancer eating at the world’s biggest Christian church.

In the run-up to the meeting, a series of events had charged the atmosphere. Earlier this month, the pope admitted that there was truth in stories that nuns around the world had been raped by priests and bishops. This week a book by a French journalist, Frédéric Martel, was published, claiming that 80% of the clerics in the Vatican are gay. That may seem to have little bearing on the subject of the conference: there is abundant evidence to show that heterosexuals are as likely as homosexuals to prey on the young. But Mr Martel, himself gay, argues that sexually active homosexual priests are reluctant to report abusers for fear of being “outed” in revenge.

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

VATICAN CITY
The Telegraph

February 18, 2019

By Nick Squires

Victims of clerical sex abuse have warned Pope Francis that his credibility is on the line as he confronts the biggest challenge of his papacy with a landmark conference on protecting children from rape and molestation.

Nearly 200 bishops, archbishops, patriarchs and other senior Catholic figures from around the world will convene in Rome on Thursday for an unprecedented four-day conference that is supposed to tackle the scourge of child abuse by clergy.

It is the biggest effort so far to address scandals that have eroded faith in the Catholic Church in the US, Ireland, Australia and elsewhere.

“There’s going to be every effort to close whatever loopholes there are,” said Charles Scicluna, an archbishop from Malta who is one of the organisers of the summit.

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.

HOUSTON (TX)
KHOU TV

February 20, 2019

The Catholic Church often shuffled priests accused of sexually abusing children from one assignment to another instead of removing them from ministry immediately, a KHOU 11 Investigates analysis has found.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Washington Post

February 20, 2019

By Chico Harlan

This week, one arch-conservative Catholic website published a commentary saying that gay clerics needed to leave the priesthood “permanently.” Two traditionalist cardinals wrote an open letter decrying the “homosexual agenda” that they said was spreading throughout the church. And a gossipy 550-page book was set for release purporting to lift the veil on the double lives inside the Vatican, “one of the biggest gay communities in the world.”

The prevalence of mostly closeted gay priests has recently been portrayed in all manners, from the work of the devil to something the church should learn to embrace.

But church figures in Rome and beyond say one thing is clear: As Pope Francis opens a landmark conference at the Vatican on sexual abuse Thursday, the debate over gay priests is becoming a divisive undercurrent of the summit itself.

“Gay priests are in the cross hairs,” said Father James Martin, an American Jesuit who has advocated for the church to welcome LGBT members with more compassion.

The topic hints at the challenges for the Roman Catholic Church as it begins the most direct attempt in its history to address the problem of sexual abuse. Though abuse and sexuality have been found to have no correlation, according to widely accepted research, they have become intertwined on the ideological battlefield of the church — and Catholics of all stripes have descended on Rome this week, with some arguing that Pope Francis is overlooking homosexuality in diagnosing the root reasons for abuse.

“The church seems to have agreed, with a complicit silence, on a trivialization of homosexuality,” Jean-Pierre Maugendre, president of a French Catholic group, said at a news conference this week.

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.

CHICAGO (IL)
WBBM News Radio

February 21, 2019

By Bernie Tafoya

Victims of priest sex abuse in Chicago are closely watching to see if Catholic bishops meeting in Rome seriously deal with the abuse scandal that has haunted the church since it was uncovered 20 years ago.

Larry Antonsen is a leader of the Chicago chapter of SNAP, the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests. He said bishops meeting in Rome need to make some “serious, radical changes” to keep children safe and to address the needs of victims.

“They have a chance to do something really, really important right now. Whether they do it or not, I have a lot of question marks,” he said.

Antonsen is a Catholic deacon, as well as being a victim of priest sex abuse. He said he was abused by an Augustinian order priest on a trip to Wisconsin in 1962 when he was a student at St. Rita High School.

“I don’t think the pain ever goes away. I really don’t. I still wake up almost every night of the week with a nightmare or a thought or whatever,” the 72-year-old North Beverly resident said.

He said the bishops have done some good things over the years in dealing with the sex abuse scandal such as putting out lists of predator priests, but he said, “Lists aren’t enough either. If they put out lists, they should also put out pictures and work histories and where they are now, even if they’re dead.”

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

NEW YORK (NY)
Jeff Anderson & Associates

February 20, 2019

Survivors, attorneys and advocates demand transparency, accountability and action from Cardinal Dolan and Archdiocesan officials

Firm has released reports on sexual abuse nationwide, including reports involving the Dioceses of Buffalo, Syracuse and Ogdensburg

WHAT: At a news conference Thursday in downtown Manhattan, sexual abuse survivors and their attorneys and advocates will:

· Release the names and photographs of over 100 perpetrators accused of sexual misconduct with minors in the Archdiocese of New York;

· Demand that Cardinal Dolan release the identities and background information on all perpetrators in the Archdiocese of New York who have been accused of sexual misconduct with minors, including all the names reported to the Archdiocese during the Independent Reconciliation and Compensation Program, which closed in 2017;

· Announce an upcoming lawsuit to be filed under the Child Victims Act by survivor Monica Perez-Jimenez against Loyola High School for abuse by Louis Tambini.

· Expose how Church officials allowed Tambini, a former, successful basketball coach, to be placed with children at a second prestigious NYC private school.

WHEN: Thursday, February 21st at 1:00PM ET

WHERE: Andaz Wall Street Hotel – Studio 2
75 Wall Street
New York City, NY 10005

NOTES: Watch the event live on our website www.andersonadvocates.com, on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/AndersonAdvocates/, and on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/andersonadvocates.

Contact: Jeff Anderson: Office: (646)759-2551; Cell: (646)499-3364
Mike Reck: Office (646)759-2551; Cell: (646)493-8058
Trusha Patel Goffe: (646)759-2551; Cell: (646)693-6862

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.

TORONTO (CANADA)
Global News

February 21, 2019

By Rebecca Joseph

The Catholic Church is hosting its first-ever summit on sex abuse to address the scale of the scandals that have plagued the church over the past years.

The four-day meeting, which began Thursday, will bring together some 190 presidents of bishops’ conferences, religious orders and Vatican offices for lectures and workshops on preventing sex abuse in their churches, tending to victims, and investigating abuse when it occurs.

The Vatican isn’t expecting any miracles, and Pope Francis himself has called for expectations to be “deflated.” But organizers say the meeting nevertheless marks a turning point in the way the Catholic Church has dealt with the problem, with Francis’ own conversion last year a key point of departure.

Canadian bishops are participating in the conference as well, as Canada hasn’t been free from the scandals that have plagued the church worldwide.

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.

LONDON (ENGLAND)
The Tablet

February 20, 2019

By Christopher Lamb

The voices of sexual abuse victims are like the wounds inflicted on the body of Jesus Christ by the Church and must be heard by the world’s bishops, according to Pope Francis’s most trusted adviser on child protection.

In an interview which took place in the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith ahead of the Pope’s unprecedented summit dedicated to abuse, the Archbishop of Malta, Charles Scicluna, who has been helping to organise the 21-24 February gathering, defended the Pope’s legal document on holding bishops accountable, the stepping up of the Vatican’s attempts to process sex abuse cases and why bishops leading “double lives” lack moral authority to take the right decisions in this area.

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

UNITED STATES
Catholic Whistleblowers and Road to Recovery, Inc.

February 20, 2019

On February 20, 2019, on the eve of the international Papal summit on clergy sexual abuse, Pope Francis issued a statement indicating that those who criticize the Church are engaged in the work of the devil. The Holy Father’s words are unfortunate because, no doubt, he was referring to victim/survivors, advocates, and supporters who for decades have attempted to hold the Church accountable, especially members of the hierarchy who have covered-up, obfuscated, participated in, and enabled the sexual abuse of children.

It is outrageous that Pope Francis, after recently defrocking Cardinal Theodore Mc Carrick for his heinous sexual abuse of children and seminarians, would in any way blame anyone except himself, his predecessors, and his colleagues in the College of Bishops for the scandal of clergy sexual abuse that continues to infect the Catholic Church. Doesn’t Pope Francis realize that the “devil” is within, not without?

Pope Francis has indicated that his expectations are low for the international Papal summit with bishops from around the world which begins on February 21, 2019. The Holy Father must revise his expectations, for if nothing substantive comes from the summit, the credibility of the Pope might be lost forever. Unless Pope Francis and the bishops leave the summit on Sunday, February 24, 2019 with concrete solutions to very serious issues of clergy sexual abuse and accountability of the hierarchy, the Holy Father might be called upon to resign.

Catholic Whistleblowers and Road to Recovery, Inc., two advocacy organizations that assist victim/survivors of clergy sexual abuse and declare a preferential option for victim/survivors and their pursuit of justice, urge Pope Francis not to be distracted by foolish and unnecessary comments about “devil” critics; rather, he is urged to hold himself and the bishops of the world accountable for allowing the scourge of clergy sexual abuse to continue and flourish for so long.

Robert M. Hoatson, Ph.D., President
Road to Recovery, Inc.
Livingston, New Jersey 07039
862-368-2800
roberthoatson@gmail.com

Rev. James E. Connell, J.C.D.
Catholic Whistleblowers
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
(414) 940-8054
connell.jim951@gmail.com

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

DUBLIN (IRELAND)
The Irish Catholic

February 21, 2019

Parishioners must play a more active role in keeping their local churches afloat, Waterford and Lismore’s bishop Phonsie Cullinan has warned.

Dr Cullinan said that lay people are called to be involved in and support the Church which at a “very nuts and bolts” level requires financial contribution in their local parish.

His comments come after the diocese said it had no money to pay its priests’ wages at Christmas due to the depleting funds collected from parishioners.

“People don’t realise that bringing a child for baptism, first Holy Communion, Confirmation, that they too have a role to play in the Church – it’s not just the priest and the extraordinary ministers and those kind of people with specific jobs in the Church,” the bishop told The Irish Catholic.

“Everyone is called to be involved and an essential part of that, and just a very nuts and bolts part of that, is that people have to contribute to both the upkeep of the church building and keeping the parish going and of course to realise the priest has to be paid.”

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.

LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Times

February 21, 2019

By The Times Editorial Board

On Thursday, Pope Francis will convene a long-awaited meeting of Catholic bishops and other church leaders to frame a global response to the abuse by clergy of “minors and vulnerable adults.” The Vatican considered this so-called summit meeting so important that it asked the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops last year not to act on new measures to hold bishops accountable for covering up for abusive priests until after the meeting took place.

It’s scandalous that the Vatican is convening this meeting only now, after decades of revelations of abuse by priests of children and others, and delay and denial by church leaders (including the current pope, who has apologized after defending a Chilean bishop accused of covering up abuse). If this four-day meeting is to be judged a success, the pope must make it clear to participants that if they won’t deal decisively and transparently with predatory priests — and complicit superiors — in their home countries, Rome will do it for them.

That message needs to be sent not only in connection with the abuse of children and adolescents by clergy, an evil that the church has been grappling with for decades, but also with a scandal that has attracted attention more recently: the sexual exploitation of adults, including seminarians and nuns, by powerful clerics. It’s increasingly clear that abuse of minors is only one dimension of the crisis.

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.

BOSTON (MA)
Boston Herald

February 21, 2019

By Lisa Kashinsky

Pope Francis’ latest slam on church critics as cohorts of Satan stunned survivors of priest sex abuse and their advocates, who called the pontiff’s remarks “outrageous” on the eve of his clergy summit on the long-running scandal.

“It’s outrageous … He’s re-victimizing and re-traumatizing the very people he’s supposed to be meeting about,” said Robert Hoatson, co-founder of Road to Recovery. “Instead of criticizing people like us, he should be welcoming us into the dialogue and following the recommendations that we make.”

Attorney Mitchell Garabedian, an advocate for victims of sexual abuse by priests, said he’s “not surprised the pope would try to portray the Catholic Church as the victim,” but that it’s “really going to reopen a lot of wounds for clerical sex abuse victims and is very harmful to those victims.”

Church critics and advocates for victims of priest sex abuse told the Herald they have little hope for concrete reform to come out of the four-day summit on clerical sex abuse, which begins Thursday and is set to draw about 190 members of bishops’ conferences, religious orders and Vatican offices for lectures and workshops on preventing and investigating sex abuse, as well as caring for victims.

The summit comes three months after the Vatican pushed the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to delay voting last November on proposed steps to address clergy sex abuse.

Victims who met with summit organizers on Wednesday demanded transparency and accountability from the church. Among them was Phil Saviano, who urged the Vatican “break the code of silence” and release the names of abusive priests.

Hoatson said the defrocking of former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick last week, seen as a rare high-level act of accountability by the church, was also “an indication that cardinals and bishops are involved not only in the cover-up, but in the practice of clergy sex abuse.” But Hoatson said the church is “inherently incapable” of policing itself and that “we need outside forces to hold them accountable

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Associated Press
|
February 21, 2019

For centuries, the Vatican’s canon law system busied itself with banning books and dispensing punishments that included burnings at the stake for heretics.

These days, the Vatican office that eventually replaced the Roman Catholic Inquisition is knee-deep in processing clergy sex abuse cases. The procedures of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith will be on display this week as high-ranking bishops summoned by Pope Francis attend an unprecedented four-day tutorial on preventing sex abuse and prosecuting pedophile priests

Here is a primer on the Catholic Church’s regulations for investigating both priests accused of molesting children and superiors who have been accused of covering up those crimes.

___

ARE POLICE CALLED IN SUSPECTED SEX ABUSE CASES?

In countries where clergy are required to report child abuse, bishops and superiors of religious orders are supposed to notify police when someone alleges that a priest molested a child and they are supposed to cooperate with any investigations.

However, the policy is nonbinding and only was articulated publicly in 2010 when the Vatican posted it on its website. Prior to that, the Vatican long sought to prevent public law enforcement agencies from learning about abusers in the clergy.

Irish bishops who considered adopting a mandatory reporting policy in 1997 received a letter from the Vatican warning that their in-house church investigations could be compromised if they referred cases to Irish police.

Nowadays, the Vatican justifies not having a binding policy that requires all sex crimes to be reported to police by arguing that accused clergy could be unfairly persecuted in places where Catholics are a threatened minority.

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.

ROME (NY)
Rome Sentinel

February 20, 2019

The Rev. Paul F. Angelicchio, of Rome, has been named in a lawsuit accusing him of sexually abusing a teenage altar boy when the priest worked at a church in Onondaga County in the late 1980s.

Angelicchio is pastor of the Catholic Church of St. John the Baptist & Transfiguration on East Dominick Street. Angelicchio was placed on a leave of absence by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Syracuse in late 2016 to investigate the claims. Church officials deemed the accusations not credible at the time and Angelicchio soon returned to service.

The lawsuit, filed on Feb. 14, also accuses two Syracuse-area priests who were named by the Diocese in December as having “credible” accusations of sexual abuse made against them. Those priests, Charles Eckermann and James F. Quinn, are both deceased.

Angelicchio was not among the priests listed by the Diocese in December.

Kevin Braney, age 46, currently of Colorado, filed the lawsuit only hours after the Child Victims Act was signed into law. The Act extends the statute of limitations for sexual abuse victims to seek criminal charges or file lawsuits. Braney is represented by the Saeed & Little LLP law firm in Indiana.

The lawsuit has been filed as a class action case, meaning other possible plaintiffs can join. The lawsuit lists up to 1,000 possible “John Doe” victims of sexual abuse by Syracuse Diocese priests. The lawsuit also accuses four to 200 unnamed “John Doe” priests as defendants, alongside Angelicchio, Eckermann and Quinn.

Braney’s lawsuit also accuses impropriety from the Diocese itself, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and Bishop Robert J. Cunningham.

“We want to expose and discover the truth of what happened,” said attorney Lauren Berri, of California. She is one of several attorneys attached to the class action lawsuit.

“Who knew what and when? Who allowed these priests to abuse so many children, and why didn’t they do anything to stop it?”

Berri said that the attorneys attached to the lawsuit are working to find and involve more plaintiffs with accusations against the three priests and the Syracuse Diocese.

“It’s expected to be a very large number,” she stated. The plaintiffs will be allowed to remain anonymous, with Braney acting as the focal point.

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.

CHARLOTTE (NC)
Charlotte Observer

By Tim Funk

February 20, 2019

Bishop Peter Jugis, who heads the 46-county Catholic Diocese of Charlotte, issued a “sincere apology” Wednesday to victims of clergy sex abuse, which he called “this crime and awful sin.”

Jugis’ statement came a day after the Observer and others reported that the names of two monks who had once worked at Belmont Abbey College and at St. Michael Catholic Church in Gastonia appeared on a list recently released by the Diocese of Richmond, Va., of priests “with credible and substantiated allegation of sexual abuse of a minor.”

The two monks, Donald Scales and Frederick George, had also worked in Virginia, though the accusation against Scales, who died in 2008, dated to his time as pastor of St. Michael parish in the late 1970s.

Though Jugis said in his Tuesday statement that the Charlotte diocese was committed to being “open and transparent,” it has so far resisted the trend around the country of releasing a list of past and present priests in the diocese who have been credibly accused of child sex abuse.

According to the Catholic News Herald, the Charlotte diocese’s own newspaper, the scores of dioceses that have put out such lists in recent months include many of those nearby. The Archdiocese of Atlanta, and the dioceses of Raleigh, Charleston, Savannah, Richmond and Arlington, Va., and Nashville and Knoxville, Tenn., have all released their own lists, the newspaper reported.

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.

SAN JOSE (CA)
Bay Area News Group

February 21, 2019

Bt Nico Savidge

A former Roman Catholic priest and convicted sex offender is facing a civil suit filed by a minor who alleges that he repeatedly sexually assaulted her in her family’s home.

The lawsuit filed last week is the latest allegation against Hernan Toro, a 91-year-old former priest who was allowed to return to ministry in the 1980s despite the fact that he was a registered sex offender.

Toro, who retired in 1990, was also arrested in 2017 and charged with child molestation, but the criminal case is on hold, after doctors determined last year that the Toro was not competent to stand trial.

The civil suit in Santa Clara County Superior Court alleges that Toro molested the girl on five occasions from 2011 to 2016.

A complaint filed in the lawsuit states that at the time the girl was molested, her family was not aware that Toro was a convicted sex offender. Instead, according to the complaint, the family considered Toro “a close family friend,” who sometimes stayed overnight as a guest in their home.

The lawsuit alleges that during four of those visits, Toro entered the girl’s bedroom and touched her genitals. In a fifth instance, according to the lawsuit, Toro touched the girl while watching a movie with her in the family’s living room.

The girl said she did not report the assaults to her parents or to police because she feared Toro “would cause her more harm,” the complaint states. The girl is not identified in court documents, nor is her age specified.

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.

LAFAYETTE (LA)
KLFY TV

February 20, 2019

By Renee Allen

There are both survivors and attorneys committed to standing up against priests accused of sexual abuse.

Attorney Anthony Fontana, Jr. of Abbeville has tried one of the first priests in U.S. history to be convicted of child molestation.

“I believe the church has created an atmosphere of sexual abuse tolerance; and created an expectation that we’re going to protect you,” Fontana said.

Fontana has one clear emotion about clergy accused of sexual abuse. Fontana says there needs to be some secular oversight.

“A secular group that runs the church parishes and priests run the spirituality. Any complaints go to the secular group and they have mandatory reporters; and turn it over to police.”

Fontana talks about his stance on the summit and the Pope’s acknowledgement to address the issue of clergy sexual abuse. “Are we exposing it to protect the kids or to please the public? Or is there a bigger issue? I think there’s a bigger issue to protect the good religious,” Fontana said.

Fontana say he requested that the Diocese of Lafayette release the names and personnel records of those with credible accusations. “I had enough of all this. I’m tired and we’re going to expose it,” Fontana added.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
The Guardian

February 21, 2019

By Catherine Pepinster

When I got married in 2003 it turned out that my wedding was caught up – unbeknown to me – in the abuse crisis that has engulfed the Catholic church. There were three Benedictine monk-priests there, one as celebrant, two as guests. One of the guests was later tried and acquitted of assaulting a child, although he was banned from living in his monastery. The other, David Pearce, would go on to be convicted in 2009 of the assault of five children, and jailed for five years. At the time of the wedding I had no idea of any murmurs about child sexual abuse. But others did hold deep suspicions.

Abuse was certainly known about in Rome, where documents passed across the desk of the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.When Ratzinger stood in for the dying John Paul II at the torchlit Stations of the Cross on Good Friday 2005, he declaimed: “How much filth there is in the church, even among those who, in the priesthood, should belong entirely to Him.” Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI in April 2005. He did more than John Paul had done in 26 years, by removing the founder of the Legionaries of Christ, Marcial Maciel, from office after his own investigations revealed the extent of Maciel’s abuse of boys and seminarians.

But despite this decisive start, his papacy became engulfed by the abuse scandal. Eventually, exhausted by it, Benedict dramatically resigned and was succeeded by Pope Francis in 2013. But his papacy has also been mired in scandal over child abuse. What could once be seen as incidents involving a few rotten apples now suggest something rotten at the heart of the institution.

This weekend will see the most ambitious attempt yet to deal with the crisis, with a four-day summit, ordered by Francis, that brings together almost 190 church leaders plus Vatican officials, invited experts and guest speakers. It is being presented by organisers as a turning point for the way in which the church handles allegations across the globe and the way it strengthens child protection policies. If it is indeed a turning point, the survivors of clerical sexual abuse and lay Catholics, exhausted by the constant revelations, will be mightily relieved. But they will also be wanting the church to explain why there has been a pandemic of abuse over so many years, and why abusers were left free to assault and rape children.

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

LAFAYETTE (LA)
KATC TV

February 20, 2019

Fr. Jim Hummel

As church leaders from around the world meet at the Vatican this week to address the clergy sex abuse crisis, they will be hearing the story of a St. Landry parish family that was forever changed by clergy sex abuse.

Letitia Peyton, whose son has accused Father Michael Guidry of molestation, was asked by the Catholic Women’s Forum to write a letter to church leaders. It’s one of three documents the CWF has sent to Pope Francis and bishops across the country in advance of this week’s summit at the Vatican.

“From my words I hope there’s an understanding of what the victims suffer and what their families suffer,” said Peyton. “It’s not something that you just get over. It’s a different kind of sin that goes at the core of the victim’s heart and their families.”

Life changed for the Peyton family in May, 2018. In her letter, Peyton writes about the night her husband Scott, who is a deacon in the Diocese of Lafayette, awoke her to share horrible news.

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.

KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter

February 21, 2019

By Jason Berry

Editor’s note: Jason Berry was the first to report on clergy sex abuse in any substantial way, beginning with a landmark 1985 report about the Louisiana case involving a priest named Gilbert Gauthe. In 1992, he published Lead Us Not into Temptation: Catholic Priests and the Sexual Abuse of Children, a nationwide investigation after seven years of reporting in various outlets. In the foreword, Fr. Andrew Greeley referred to “what may be the greatest scandal in the history of religion in America and perhaps the greatest problem Catholicism has faced since the Reformation.”

Berry followed the crisis in articles, documentaries, and two other books, Vows of Silence: The Abuse of Power in the Papacy of John Paul II (2004) and Render unto Rome: The Secret Life of Money in the Catholic Church (2011), which won the Investigative Reporters and Editors Best Book Award. Given the current moment and its possibilities and the fact that Berry is singular in his experience covering the scandal from multiple angles, NCR asked if he would write a reflection on the matter as the church’s bishops are about to gather in Rome to consider the issue. Below is the concluding Part 3. Read the previous entries here: Part 1 and Part 2.

The church’s cover-up debacle owes greatly to John Paul II.

In 1979, barely a year after becoming pope, John Paul II visited his native Poland and stood up to the Communist regime with ringing sermons on freedom. Almost overnight, he became a force in global politics in the Cold War era. He played a catalytic role in the collapse of the Soviet empire in 1989 as the Berlin Wall cracked apart.

In November of 1989, with John Paul triumphant on the world stage, the U.S. bishops responded to a rising tide of abuse lawsuits by sending a team of canon lawyers to Rome, seeking the authority for bishops to defrock child predators. American bishops were already sending scores of offenders to church-run treatment facilities; they wanted power to the oust the worst of them. John Paul refused. For years, I wondered why.

Jonathan Kwitny’s 1997 biography Man of the Century: The Life and Times of Pope John Paul II details how as cardinal of Krakow, Karol Wojtyla, backed by a unified church, was the leader of the opposition to the Communist Party. As pope, his long delays in signing papers to release priests from their vows reflected John Paul’s view that a man changes ontologically on becoming a priest, his very being made new. Priests could sin but pick up and carry on. The idea of a criminal sexual underground in clerical life was beyond his ken.

What if U.S. bishops had gotten the power in 1989 to defrock sex criminals without the long delays after sending case files to various Vatican tribunals? If a few bishops had taken the lead, sacking the worst priests, the reliance on treatment tanks as de facto safe houses, or the dishonest tactics to help a Lane Fontenot or Gary Berthiaume, might have ended sooner.

Canon law allows for internal church courts to assess a priest’s guilt before sending the file to Rome, requesting that he be laicized. American bishops were reluctant to use that canonical process without a speedy judgment; the files were increasingly vulnerable to subpoena by plaintiff lawyers. A priest found guilty by a secret church court would raise the financial stakes for a settlement or verdict, particularly if the bishop was waiting to hear from Rome.

I learned more about the standoff on a milky afternoon in Rome in 2002. An influential canon lawyer spoke with me on the condition that he not be identified. We sat in a spartan conference room in a building older than most American states. The Holy See was well aware of the rising lawsuit costs in 1989, he told me. “There was more concern about the scandal undermining the work of the church. In how many cases did they apply the penal procedures [ecclesial courts]? Well, none.”

He leaned forward, eyes flared. “The United States has the largest tribunal system in the world. To say that people were not qualified begs the issue. The U.S. tribunals violated grandly — terribly — the annulments of marriage.”

I was bewildered. “What do marriage annulments have to do with pedophiles?” I asked

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Catholic News Service

February 21, 2019

By Junno Arocho Esteves

“Every time I refused to have sex with him, he would beat me,” an abuse survivor from Africa told Pope Francis and bishops attending the Vatican summit on child protection and the abuse crisis.

The meeting began Feb. 21 with the harrowing stories of survivors of sexual abuse, cover-up and rejection by church officials.

The pre-recorded testimonies of five survivors were broadcast in the synod hall; the Vatican did not disclose their names, but only whether they were male or female and their country of origin.

In the first testimony, a man from Chile expressed the pain he felt when, after reporting his abuse to the church, he was treated “as a liar” and told that “I and others were enemies of the church.”

“You are physicians of the soul and yet, with rare exceptions, you have been transformed — in some cases — into murderers of the soul, into murderers of the faith,” he said.

Comparing the abuse crisis to a cancer in the church, the survivor said that “it is not enough to remove the tumor and that’s it,” but there must be measures to “treat the whole cancer.”

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.

ROME (ITALY)
The Guardian

Feb 21, 2019

By Angela Giuffrida

In early February, Arturo Borrelli handcuffed himself to a pole in front of the Vatican in a desperate plea to the Catholic church to take his allegations of sexual abuse by a priest seriously.

Ten years have passed since Borrelli, 43, opened up about the systematic assaults, including rape, that he says he endured as a child from his religion teacher, who was also a priest at a parish in the Naples district of Ponticelli.

Until now, his battle for justice has mostly been dismissed by senior clergy, who either advised him to “pray away” the trauma experienced between the ages of 13 and 17, or suggested he brought the abuse on himself.

“It was only when I got help from a psychiatrist that I realised it wasn’t my fault,” Borrelli told the Guardian. “He made me understand that I was a child, that what happened to me was wrong, and encouraged me to report the priest.”

Police escorted Borrelli away from the Vatican on the day of his protest and, despite their sympathy over his story, he was charged for wasting their time.

On Thursday Pope France opened an unprecedented summit on clerical sexual abuse, attended by 180 bishops and cardinals.

Francis told the Catholic hierarchy that they had a responsibility to deal effectively with the crimes of priests who rape and molest children. “Listen to the cry of the young who want justice,” he said. “The holy people of God are watching and expect not just simple and obvious condemnations, but efficient and concrete measures to be established,” he warned.

Bishops were urged to meet survivors of sexual abuse in their respective countries ahead of the conference, called by Pope Francis to address a deeply entrenched issue that many believe the church has so far failed to sufficiently act upon.

Borrelli himself had an audience with the pope last June. He claimed the pontiff had pledged to begin a canonical trial against the accused priest, Silverio Mura.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Associated Press

February 21, 2019

By Nicole Winfield

Pope Francis warned church leaders summoned Thursday to a landmark sex abuse prevention summit that the Catholic faithful are demanding more than just condemnation of the crimes of priests but concrete action to respond to the scandal.

Francis opened the four-day summit by telling the Catholic hierarchy that their own responsibility to deal effectively with priests who rape and molest children weighed on the proceedings.

“Listen to the cry of the young, who want justice,” and seize the opportunity to “transform this evil into a chance for understanding and purification,” Francis told the 190 leaders of bishops conferences and religious orders.

“The holy people of God are watching and expect not just simple and obvious condemnations, but efficient and concrete measures to be established,” he warned.

More than 30 years after the scandal first erupted in Ireland and Australia and 20 years after it hit the U.S., bishops and Catholic officials in many parts of Europe, Latin America, Africa and Asia still either deny that clergy sex abuse exists in their regions or downplay the problem.

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.

BOSTON (MA)
New England Cable News

February 21, 2019

By Jeff Saperstone and Karla Rendon-Alvarez

Boston’s Cardinal Sean O’Malley is in Rome to help lead a summit that brings church leaders together to discuss the sexual abuse and cover-up scandal that has rocked the Catholic Church and ignited anger across the country.

Pope Francis is calling on bishops from around the world to the Vatican to end sex abuse in churches. The pope says survivors are standing up and seeking justice for their years of traumatic abuse.

Before O’Malley and three other Massachusetts bishops left to the summit, he sent a letter to parishioners apologizing for the abuse victims experienced.

“The past year has been especially traumatic, and we again apologize to survivors and their families for all they have endured,” he said in the letter.

In mid-September, Pope Francis authorized an investigation into allegations that West Virginia Bishop Michael Bransfield sexually harassed adults. His authorization came after Bransfield resigned from the church and after a Pennsylvania grand jury report detailed decades of abuse in six dioceses.

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.

ROME (ITALY)
Crux

February 21, 2019

By John L. Allen Jr.

As Pope Francis’s high-stakes summit on clerical sexual abuse opens today, perhaps the biggest question pundits and handicappers will be asking is how well the agenda of victims and survivors will fare in the bishops’ deliberations.

The day prior to the opening of the summit, a group of survivors stole the show before the curtain even went up.

Since the beginning of the abuse crisis, bishops and other Church officials seeking to turn things around have often touted their listening sessions with victims, and even popes, beginning with Benedict XVI during his 2008 trip to the United States, have gotten into the act. Critics have charged that those victims were often selected precisely because they were tame, unlikely to push back or do much publicly other than expressing gratitude.

On Wednesday, however, a dozen of the world’s most outspoken survivors of clerical abuse and advocates sat down with the summit organizers. Typically, they didn’t all come out saying the same thing … which, in a way, was probably the point.

Some of those survivors came away ticked off that Francis himself didn’t show up, even though his presence was never part of the plan. Their irritation boiled over when Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta – the “Eliot Ness” of the Catholic Church, who, as a Vatican prosecutor brought down Father Marcial Maciel Degollado, founder of the Legion of Christ – said in response to various suggestions made by the survivors, “Remember, I’m not the pope.”

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.

AUSTIN (TX)
KXAN

February 21, 2019

By Candy Rodriguez

Catholic leaders and survivors are gathered for a historic sex abuse prevention summit. Early Thursday morning, Pope Francis opened the summit by warning bishops there needs to be more than condemnation and concrete action needs to be taken.

Carol Midboe with the Austin chapter of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests is one of many survivors and advocates in attendance.

Midboe said the group is there to demand action. They’ve set out five demands which including the dismissal of clergy involved, the creation of a “zero-tolerance policy,” report abuse directly to law enforcement, release all files, and stop all “lobbying efforts against legislative reform that would benefit survivors.”

On Tuesday, Carol said the group tried to deliver a letter directly to the Pope but were not allowed to.

“They walked up to the Vatican and tried to hand it over to officials and they asked them to place it on the ground and so survivors felt that that was representative of how survivors have been treated overall,” she said, though she understood that when the group wasn’t allowed to, it could have been a matter of security.

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.

WASHINGTON (DC)
Reuters

February 20, 2019

By Katharine Jackson

In the study of his home outside Washington, victims’ advocate Tom Doyle searched a shelf packed with books to find the thick report that led him to stop practicing as a priest and devote himself to helping those who had been sexually abused by clergymen.

The 1985 report was one of the first exposes in a sexual abuse scandal that has plagued the Catholic Church. Pope Francis has called senior bishops to meet for four days starting on Thursday to discuss how to tackle the worsening crisis.

Doyle, 74, who lost his job as a canon lawyer in the Vatican Embassy soon after the report was made public and eventually decided he could not continue working as an active priest, is deeply skeptical that anything of substance will come of this week’s meeting.

“They’re going to pray and they’re going to meditate. But it’s totally useless,” he said. “You shouldn’t have to have something like this in 2019. These men should know right out of the gate that if you have a priest who’s raping children, you don’t allow them to continue.”

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

NEW YORK (NY)
New York Times

February 20, 2019

By Rick Rojas

For years, the Child Victims Act failed again and again. And for years, Margaret Markey continued to push for it in the New York State Legislature.

Several times, the legislation passed in the Assembly by a wide margin. But then it would collide with powerful opposition: the insurance industry, the Roman Catholic Church, the Boy Scouts of America. The Senate never even took it up for a vote.

Ms. Markey, then a member of the State Assembly from Queens, became so attached to the legislation that some took to calling it the “Markey Bill,” especially her critics as they publicly condemned her. But the aim of the bill — extending the statute of limitations for bringing child sexual abuse cases — had become nearly her singular focus.

She did not talk about it, but her devotion was fueled by personal experience: As an adult, one of her sons, Charles, had told her that years earlier he had been sexually abused by a priest at the Catholic parish where their family had worshiped for generations.

“Since so many abused children are not able to come to grips with what has happened to them until much later in life,” Ms. Markey said in 2015 as she renewed her call to pass the bill, “it is the victims who suffer the most as a result of our state’s archaic statute of limitations for these offenses.”

Last week, after 13 years, a version of the legislation became law. Ms. Markey had no involvement in its recent success; a challenger beat her in 2016 as she sought a 10th term. But as officials and advocates celebrated their victory, they repeatedly cited Ms. Markey’s zeal in waging a political fight that was bruising and once seemingly Sisyphean. When Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo signed the bill, Ms. Markey standing behind him, he called her efforts a “profile in courage.”

“She didn’t have an easy time of it, but she went with her convictions,” said Assemblywoman Linda B. Rosenthal, who succeeded Ms. Markey as the bill’s sponsor. “She did a lot of the legwork for this, and she deserves a lot of credit.”

Ms. Markey, a Democrat, first introduced the legislation in 2006, and she continued forcing it back onto the agenda in Albany until she lost her seat in 2016. Her husband had nudged her to retire, her family said, but she insisted on running again, hoping the bill would have better odds the next time around.

Ms. Markey has been diagnosed with a form of dementia, making it harder for her to talk about the legislation. But in recent interviews with The New York Times, family members, including her husband, son and daughter, have publicly discussed for the first time the allegations of abuse that forged her personal connection to the issue.

“I think she knew I was in pain,” her son Charles, now 52, said. Mr. Markey, a retired New York City firefighter, said that after telling his parents, he reported the allegations to the Queens district attorney’s office, but prosecutors told him the statute of limitations prevented them from pursuing his case.

“She decided to do something about it,” he said. “She’s been through so much over the years. I think now she’s satisfied knowing this has finally gotten through.”

A changing political calculus
Some have attributed the change in fortune to the Democrats gaining a majority in the Senate. But others, including Ms. Rosenthal, argued that the new political calculus had grown from a larger cultural shift.

Ms. Rosenthal pointed to the series of events that invigorated the conversation around extending statutes of limitations: the monsoon of sexual assault allegations against Bill Cosby; the child sex abuse scandal at Penn State University; the explosive grand jury report in Pennsylvania that detailed decades of alleged abuse by Catholic clergy.

Suddenly, Ms. Rosenthal said, passing the Child Victims Act seemed inevitable.

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.

TRENTON (NJ)
Asbury Park Press

February 18, 2019

By Andrew Goudsward, Alex N. Gecan and Steph Solis

The Catholic Diocese of Trenton has named 30 former clergymen who stand credibly accused of sexual abuse against children.

All 30 men are either dead or have been removed from their ministries. The list, initially released Feb. 13, has been updated to include the assignments each cleric had during their time in the ministry and whether they have one or multiple accusers.

“This preliminary list will be updated as more information becomes available,” Bishop David M. O’Connell wrote in a statement Feb. 13. “I do this with the greatest sadness and a heavy heart.”

The release of the list, which officials committed to last year, represents a major milestone in New Jersey in the ongoing reckoning with decades of sexual abuse by Catholic clergy and follows a push for greater transparency from the church about what transpired.

The accused include a former assistant superintendent of diocese’s schools, a youth group coordinator and a priest who coordinated a council teaching human sexuality to children.

The Diocese of Trenton is in charge of churches in Burlington, Mercer, Monmouth and Ocean counties.

The accused are:

Romanilo S. Apuro
Ronald R. Becker (deceased)
Richard C. Brietske
Gerard J. Brown (deceased)
Francis D. Bruno
Charles J. Comito (deceased)
Benjamin R. Dino (deceased)
Manuel R. M. Fernandez (deceased)
Thomas J. Frain (deceased)
Gerald J. Griffin (deceased)
Douglas U. Hermansen
Frank J. Iazette (deceased)
Vincent J. Inghilterra
Francis J. C. Janos (deceased)
Leo A. Kelty (deceased)
Patrick F. Magee
Terrance O. McAlinden (deceased)
Francis M. McGrath
Joseph F. McHugh (deceased)
William J. McKeone
Richard R. Milewski
Liam A. Minogue (deceased)
Sebastian L. Muccilli (deceased)
Robert J. Parenti
Joseph J. Prioli
Joseph R. Punderson
Thomas A. Rittenhouse (deceased)
John E. Sullivan (deceased)
Florencio P. Tumang (deceased)
Brendan H. Williams

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.

PITTSBURGH (PA)
Tribune Review

February 20, 2019

By Deb Erdley

Clergy sexual abuse survivors were left waiting for answers Wednesday as an international mix of Catholic Church leaders gathered in Rome to address the child sexual abuse scandal that has rocked parishes around the world — including Western Pennsylvania.

Calls for an apology to survivors, an acknowledgement of their pain, sweeping global policy changes and the ouster of a Pennsylvania bishop some deemed to have been complicit in cover-ups were among the demands survivors took to Rome.

Shaun Dougherty, a 49-year-old Johnstown native, was among 12 survivors invited to meet with church leaders in advance of the official call to order of the four-day summit on clergy sexual abuse, which Pope Francis will convene at the Vatican beginning Thursday. Dougherty was disappointed but not surprised the pope did not attend Wednesday’s meeting with survivors.

“I’m aggravated. This is the CEO of the Roman Catholic Church,” Dougherty told CBS News reporter Nikki Battiste. “We came to his house to meet with him about his abusive priests … and he wasn’t there. He delegated.”

Dougherty and other survivors met for more than two hours with the Vatican’s lead sex abuse investigator and other members of the organizing committee for the summit. The event is taking place amid intense scrutiny after new allegations of abuse and cover-up last year sparked a credibility crisis for the Catholic Church hierarchy.

Phil Saviano, an American who played a crucial role in exposing clergy abuse in the United States decades ago, said after the survivors’ meeting that he argued for the Vatican to release the names of abusive priests around the world along with their case files.

“Do it to launch a new era of transparency,” Saviano said he told the summit committee in a letter and in person. “Do it to break the code of silence. Do it out of respect for the victims of these men, and do it to help prevent these creeps from abusing any more children.”

Dougherty said he hoped for an apology from church leaders and a plan to address the problem with zero tolerance for abuse so no other child will have to face the kind of abuse he faced from a trusted parish priest beginning when he was 10.

He has yet to realize those goals.

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.