ABUSE TRACKER

HURON COUNTY (MI)
WJRT-TV, ABC12 News

September 30, 2019

A former Catholic priest is charged with indecent exposure in Huron County.

Police say Lawrence Ventline of Port Austin exposed himself at Murphy’s Bakery in Bad Axe earlier this summer. He faces up to a year in jail if convicted.

Earlier this year, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel accused Ventline of assaulting an 11-year-old child in the 1980s while he was a priest in the Detroit area. But because of the statute of limitations he hasn’t been charged.

Ventline has threatened to sue Nessel over the accusations.

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

PENNSYLVANIA
ChurchMilitant.com (blog)

September 30, 2019

Vy Martina Moyski

Bp. David Zubik and diocese ‘have not learned from the lessons of the past’

The attorney general of Pennsylvania slammed the bishop of Pittsburgh on Thursday for dragging his feet on implementing the recommendations made in the grand jury report on clergy sex abuse issued over a year ago.

Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro called the response of Bp. David Zubik — and the diocese of Pittsburgh — to the report as lacking in “remorse” and “transparency.”

“Neither Bp. Zubik nor any of his colleagues across Pennsylvania have [responded], and that should be disappointing to all Pennsylvanians,” Shapiro said, adding, “We continue to see the Church throw up roadblocks when it comes to getting those people who were abused the support and assistance that they need.”

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 ORLEANS (LA)
Associated Press via Orlando Sentinel

September 30, 2019

By Jim Mustian

A man who says he was raped by a Roman Catholic deacon four decades ago while serving as an altar boy in New Orleans says he hopes the deacon’s arrest will “send a message to other pedophiles in the church that this should never happen again.”

“There’s no closing the book on this for me and the other people who have been molested,” the man told The Associated Press. “But there would be some reparation, some justice, by him being found guilty.”

The man spoke Thursday as he prepared to meet with local prosecutors about the case of George F. Brignac, a longtime schoolteacher and deacon who has faced a series of sexual abuse allegations amid a scandal that has roiled the Archdiocese of New Orleans. The AP does not usually identify victims of sex crimes.

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.

MELBOURNE (AUSTRALIA)
Australian Associated Press via 7news.com

September 25, 2019

By Marnie Banger

A retired Victorian priest will spend the next 14 months behind bars for molesting five boys decades ago in what has been branded a “monumental breach of trust”.

Peter Waters, 74, abused the boys in the 1970s and ’80s, sometimes after climbing into their beds.

Waters began grooming one boy after he entered the confessional booth to reveal the Catholic sin of masturbation.

When the boy stayed overnight with the priest during the 1980s, Waters molested him as he pretended to sleep.

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.

SYDNEY (AUSTRALIA)
Catholic News Service via CatholicPhilly.com

September 30, 2019

By Michael Sainsbury

[PHOTO: David Ridsdale, who was sexually abused by his uncle, Gerald Ridsdale, then a priest, stands next to fellow sexual abuse survivors in Rome March 3, 2016. Lawyers say the Australian Catholic Church has opened the floodgates for tens of millions dollars in compensation claims after the Diocese of Ballarat admitted, for the first time, it knew of the behavior of the pedophile priest, yet continued to move him around from parish to parish.]

Australia’s Ballarat Diocese will pay up to $3 million (US$2.03 million) in a landmark compensation claim for clerical sexual abuse after a victim, code name JCB, won an out-of-court settlement for abuse during the early 1990s by Gerald Ridsdale, a former priest.

The case was against Bishop Paul Bird of Ballarat, because of actions by two now-deceased bishops: Ronald Mulkearns and James O’Collins. The case was only allowed after the Australian government struck down the so-called Ellis defense, which held that the church was not a legal “person.” Ridsdale, 85, is serving as the latest in a string of multiyear prison sentences after being found guilty of abusing 85 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.

HAYWARD (WI)
Associated Press via Hartford Courant

September 30, 2019

A former priest accused of sexually assaulting young boys in Wisconsin decades ago has been sentenced to 30 years in prison.

The Wausau Daily Herald reports that 72-year-old Thomas Ericksen received the maximum sentence Thursday on two charges of sexually assaulting young boys while stationed at St. Peter’s Catholic Church in Winter in the late 70s and early 80s. He must register as a sex offender for life.

Four men testified Thursday about how the assaults affected their lives. One of the victims went public for the first time.

Ericksen apologized to the victims in court and said he has come to realize the impact the assaults had on victims. At least 11 men claim they were abused by Ericksen during his time in the clergy.

Ericksen was removed from the priesthood in 1988.

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.