ABUSE TRACKER

CANADA
The Globe and Mail

[with videos]

[interim report]

Ottawa, churches withholding documents, residential schools commission says

Tamara Baluja

OTTAWA— Globe and Mail Update
Published Friday, Feb. 24, 2012

Ottawa is restricting access to federal archives and withholding several key documents on church-run residential schooling, says the Truth and Reconciliation Commission charged with exposing the dark legacy of this period in aboriginal education.

The commission’s mandate is to create a comprehensive historical record of residential schooling in Canada with a purpose of helping victims to heal and encourage reconciliation between aboriginal and non-aboriginal Canadians. But in an interim report released Friday in Vancouver, the commission says the federal government and some churches are frustrating their efforts to search through their archives and causing “considerable delay.”

“It is unlikely that the document collection process will be completed without a significant shift in attitude on the part of Canada and those parties who have been reluctant to co-operate,” Mr. Justice Murray Sinclair, chair of the commission, wrote in the report.

The commission was established in 2008 through the court-approved Residential Schools Settlement Agreement that was negotiated among legal counsel for former students, the churches, the Assembly of First Nations and the federal government.

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CANADA
Northumberland View

[interim report]

Includes Statement from the Liberal Party of Canada
OTTAWA, Feb. 24, 2012 /CNW/ – Following a three day national forum on First Nations driving change toward safe and thriving communities, Assembly of First Nations (AFN) National Chief Shawn A-in-chut Atleo welcomed the interim report today released by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC), further calling for a commitment by governments and all Canadians to engage in concrete reconciliation efforts.

“In this interim report, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission draws important conclusions and points to clear steps toward reconciliation,” said AFN National Chief Shawn Atleo. “Real reconciliation, though, is achieved through action and change. We must all work together to ensure these important recommendations are implemented in ways that address the needs of all residential schools survivors and families, and to ensure that from now on education will only be used to support and improve the continued and sustained success of First Nations as an investment in Canada’s collective future.”

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CANADA
YouTube

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada released its interim report in Vancouver today (February 24). Justice Murray Sinclair, the chair of the commission, spoke to reporters about what he said is a need for education on the history and impacts of residential schools.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By John P. Martin
Inquirer Staff Writer

Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua ordered aides to shred a 1994 memo that identified 35 Archdiocese of Philadelphia priests suspected of sexually abusing children, according to a new court filing.

The order, outlined in a handwritten note locked away for years at the archdiocese’s Center City offices, was disclosed Friday by lawyers for Msgr. William J. Lynn, the former church administrator facing trial next month.

They say the shredding directive proves what Lynn has long claimed: that a church conspiracy to conceal clergy sex abuse was orchestrated at levels far above him.

“It is beyond doubt that Msgr. Lynn was completely unaware of this act of obstruction,” attorneys Jeffrey Lindy and Thomas Bergstrom wrote.

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MASSACHUSETTS
Wicked Local Marlboro

By Lee Mendenhall/Guest columnist
The MetroWest Daily News

FRAMINGHAM —
With many far more important issues to address, the Republican right has seized on the Obama Administration’s reasonable requirements for contraceptive coverage in health plans as another club to attack him with, and as usual, rage replaces reason in all the far-right flacks’ fulminations.

It’s taken pages of reading for me to find some of the facts, but I commend the MetroWest Daily News editors for including some calmer writers who have made the following clear: 1) 28 states already have similar requirements in place; 2) the requirements do NOT apply if all the employees share the religion which wishes to exclude the coverage; and 3) the administration has offered to lighten the requirements considerably.

Yet this isn’t enough to satisfy the U.S Conference of Catholic Bishops or the GOP opportunists who, when they think they smell Obama’s blood, are driven to pile on lies and falsifications enough to bury all truth and rational thinking. …

Also greatly disturbing is how the Catholic Church, with such great potential and actual power to do good, risks squandering the opportunity given it by its founding grace and deep material, intellectual, and spiritual resources. Many parish priests are fine, upright men who sacrifice much to help others, but a significant number who rise in the hierarchy seem to have lost their way. The public face of the church as presented by the U.S. Bishops partly seems a cynical program to blame everything else (the sixties, gay culture, birth control) as a way to evade responsibility for enabling rampant child sexual abuse and then trying to cover it up. If misdirected energy hadn’t been spent on demonizing contraception and homosexuality, squabbling for decades over ecumenical liberalization, etc, etc, perhaps better attention to internal affairs could have prevented the horror of priestly pedophilia and the resulting hemorrhage of payouts and parishes.

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VIRGINIA
Washington Post

By Justin Jouvenal

The 30-year-old glared down from the witness stand at the former pastor accused of molesting him as a boy and demanded one thing: “I just want you to say you’re sorry — that’s it.”

The man he addressed, Tommy R. Shelton Jr., sat less than 10 feet away in a Fairfax County courtroom. Shelton, 66, stared past him in stony silence.

Stephanie L. Schwab, 26, who grew up in Manassas, was arraigned in federal court in Alexandria.

“You can pretend you didn’t do this, but you know you did,” said the man in the witness stand Friday. “Look at me.” And then, finally, their gazes met.

Soon after, Fairfax County Circuit Court Judge Brett A. Kassabian sentenced Shelton to six years in prison on charges stemming from allegations of molestation from the mid-’90s, when Shelton was leader of the Community Church of God in Dunn Loring.

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SAVANNAH (GA)
Savannah Morning News

By Jan Skutch

The Catholic Diocese of Savannah and two of its bishops have been sued in South Carolina over alleged sexual abuse of a minor by former priest Wayland Y. Brown.

The suit, filed Nov. 16 in the Court of Common Pleas in Ridgeland, alleged that Brown abused a Savannah youth whom he met through youth programs at Savannah’s St. James Catholic Church and school in the mid-1970s.

According to the suit, the victim, a “devout Catholic” identified as John Doe, was sexually abused by Brown on various church and school properties as well as in various locations in South Carolina.

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Savannah and bishops Raymond Lessard and Gregory Hartmayer are named as defendants in the suit.

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FARGO (ND)
Inforum

By: Forum staff reports, INFORUM

FARGO – A “Service of Healing” for victims of sexual abuse will be held at 7 p.m. Sunday at Recovery Worship, 3910 25th St. S. in Fargo.

Resources from Lost and Found Ministry will be available, along with counselors, pastors and a local priest for those who wish further assistance.

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CALIFORNIA
Monterey Herald

By VIRGINIA HENNESSEY
Herald Salinas Bureaumontereyherald.com

Palma High School in Salinas has been identified as one of the Christian Brothers schools that employed brothers or priests who were accused of child sexual abuse.

The Herald has learned that former Palma students will receive court-ordered notifications that they have until Aug. 1 to make an abuse claim or lose their right to do so in the future. A lawyer for one Palma alumnus said he is readying a claim.

The action rises out of the April bankruptcy filing by the Irish Christian Brothers and the Christian Brothers Institute of New York in the wake of sexual abuse claims.

An attorney representing the plaintiffs in the claims said the court agreed to issue the Christian Brothers a “bar date,” or claim deadline, on the condition they identify all schools where alleged perpetrators were employed.

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CALIFORNIA
Lodi News-Sentinel

Posted: Saturday, February 25, 2012

By Katie Nelson/News-Sentinel Staff Writer

The lawyer for a man who contends he was abused by Father Michael Kelly of Lockeford says the man is a former U.S. Air Force pilot who had to give up his career because he was haunted by repressed memories of the abuse.

The lawyer also contended during opening statements Friday that Kelly has a history of inappropriately touching children dating back to the late 1970s.

Kelly’s lawyer, however, said there is no way the popular parish priest could be guilty of such abuse.

During Friday’s court session, Kelly sat only feet from the plaintiff, who contends the priest began abusing him when he was in the fifth grade at Annunciation School in Stockton. Kelly has vigorously proclaimed his innocence. At least 20 supporters appeared in court on his behalf Friday.

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WILMINGTON (DE)
WDEL

[letter from Bishop Malooly]

[Sexual Abuse and Cover-Up in the Diocese of Wilmington via BishopAccountability.org]

By Amy Cherry

Updated Friday, February 24, 2012

Bishop Francis Malooly says he won’t ask for the resignations of three priests accused of masterminding a cover-up of decades of sexual abuse.

After shocking documents were released last week as part of the Catholic Diocese of Wilmington’s settlement with victims of abuse, survivors of sexual abuse called for Monsignors Cini, Lemon, and Rebman to step down.

In a letter posted on the Dialog, the Diocese’s newspaper, Malooly says the priests have his “full support and gratitude.”

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WILMINGTON (DE)
Roman Catholic Diocese of Wilmington

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

Documents released recently by the Diocese of Wilmington have once again brought to public attention the past criminal misconduct of some clergy and the mistakes made by Bishops in handling these crimes. In coverage of the documents, the media has also reported that certain clergy sexual abuse survivor advocates have called for the resignations of Monsignors Cini, Lemon and Rebman for being what they termed “architects” of a diocesan “concealment strategy” regarding sexual abuse.

None of these three dedicated priests ever engineered a strategy to conceal priest sex abuse. None of these men have ever put children at risk by placing an abusive priest back in ministry nor would they ever have had the authority to do so. What the documents show is that in 1985, within months of Bishop Robert E. Mulvee’s arrival as Bishop of Wilmington, two families reported to the Diocese that their teenage sons had been abused by a diocesan priest. Bishop Mulvee determined that the Diocese had an obligation to report the abuse to civil authorities and the abuse was reported. Following this incident, the Diocese, under the leadership of Bishop Mulvee, developed a diocesan reporting policy. A Policy on Child Abuse and Neglect was adopted in November 1985, making the Diocese of Wilmington one of the
first dioceses to implement a mandatory abuse reporting policy.

Bishop Mulvee implemented a “zero tolerance” approach to clerical sex abuse matters in the mid-1900’s, more than 15 years before this standard was promulgated nationally in the 2002 Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People. Monsigno’s Cini, Lemon and Rebman implemented this approach, and in no case handled by them was an abusive priest ever returned to ministry by the Bishop. In part because of this approach, there have been no reported incidents of abuse by a diocesan priest in ministry in more than 20 years. In saying this I do not overlook the tragic abuse by Francis DeLuca of a family member after his removal from ministry, during his retirement in Syracuse, New York. Additionally, our diocese annually has been found compliant with the Charter since it was adopted nearly a decade ago.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Chicago Tribune

By Dave Warner

PHILADELPHIA, Feb 24 (Reuters) – The highest ranking cleric charged in a Philadelphia pedophilia scandal asked a judge on Friday to dismiss his case because his boss – the late
Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua – ordered a list he made of predator priests be shredded.

Lawyers for Monsignor William Lynn, 61, filed the motion to dismiss conspiracy and child endangerment charges as jury selection in the case was underway in Common Pleas Court.

Lynn, who served the Philadelphia Catholic Archdiocese as secretary of the clergy during Bevilacqua’s time as archbishop from 1987 to 1998, would be the first church official to stand
trial in a child sex abuse case if opening arguments begin as scheduled on March 26.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter

Feb. 24, 2012
By Joshua J. McElwee

KANSAS CITY, MO. — Attorneys who deposed the director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) in January are requesting he be compelled to give more testimony and allege that the group is not covered by confidentiality protections afforded to rape crisis centers, court filings reveal.

The documents, dated Feb. 10 but obtained by NCR on Wednesday, relate to a Kansas City, Mo., court case that made headlines in December when it became the first where lawyers sought the deposition of a SNAP leader and requested that the organization hand over 23 years of internal records, correspondence and email.

Speaking to NCR, David Clohessy, the group’s director and subject of the Jan. 2 deposition, said the continuing legal battle over the case has left the group “basically broke” and “without enough money for the next payroll.”

Clohessy, who said after his deposition that he had refused to answer many of the lawyers’ questions and to submit many of the requested documents, also said the financial struggles led him to release his lawyer. He said he is currently representing himself in the case while he searches for a lawyer willing to serve pro bono.

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CANADA
Digital Journal

[interim report]

OTTAWA, Feb. 24, 2012 /CNW/ – Following a three day national forum on First Nations driving change toward safe and thriving communities, Assembly of First Nations (AFN) National Chief Shawn A-in-chut Atleo welcomed the interim report today released by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC), further calling for a commitment by governments and all Canadians to engage in concrete reconciliation efforts.

“In this interim report, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission draws important conclusions and points to clear steps toward reconciliation,” said AFN National Chief Shawn Atleo. “Real reconciliation, though, is achieved through action and change. We must all work together to ensure these important recommendations are implemented in ways that address the needs of all residential schools survivors and families, and to ensure that from now on education will only be used to support and improve the continued and sustained success of First Nations as an investment in Canada’s collective future.”

In its 30 page report, citing 20 recommendations, the TRC concludes the Indian residential school system constituted an assault on First Nation children, families, culture and communities. The report also highlights the importance of recognizing the unique legal status of First Nations as the original peoples of Canada, encouraging all levels of government to work with First Nations based on this understanding. Specific recommendations include support for health and healing of all survivors, the need for culture and language programming, parenting supports, access to documents, and records as well as restoring funding to the Aboriginal Healing Foundation.

“While we support all survivors and their families on their individual healing journeys, we must at the same time turn the page on this dark chapter of our shared history and work toward a future that unleashes the full potential of our peoples in this country,” said National Chief Atleo. “By acting now in mutual respect, support and partnership we can and will achieve a better day for First Nations in this country – where First Nation education is reflective of our strong languages, cultures and traditions and supports our success at every level.”

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
WSAV

By: MARYCLAIRE DALE | Associated Press
Published: February 24, 2012

PHILADELPHIA (AP) A Philadelphia church official facing trial in the priest abuse scandal says he created a list of problem priests in 1994 but Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua (beh-vih-LAH’-kwah) had it destroyed.

Monsignor William Lynn says the Archdiocese of Philadelphia recently turned over a surviving copy that corroborates his claims.

Lynn asked Friday to have his conspiracy and child endangerment case thrown out based on the new evidence. Jury selection is under way.

Lynn is the first U.S. church official charged for allegedly keeping predator-priests in ministry.

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NEW HAMPSHIRE
TheMediaReport

[*EXCLUSIVE REPORT* Alarming New Evidence May Exonerate Imprisoned Priest]

CHESHIRE, SS SUPERIOR COURT
THE STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE
v.
GORDON MacRAE
#93-S-0218-0228, 1076-1078, 1229-1231, 1554-1557
_____________________________________________
MEMORANDUM OF LAW IN SUPPORT OF A
MOTION FOR A NEW TRIAL
_____________________________________________
ROBERT ROSENTHAL
COUNSELOR AT LAW
523 EAST 14TH STREET, SUITE 8D
NEW YORK, NEW YORK 10009
(212) 353-3752
CATHY J. GREEN, ESQ., BAR #995
GREEN & UTTER, P.A.
764 CHESTNUT STREET
MANCHESTER, NH 03104
(603) 669-8446
ATTORNEYS FOR PETITIONER GORDON MACRAE …

Now comes Defendant-Petitioner, Gordon MacRae, by and through counsel, and hereby
states as follows:

Introduction

In the early 1990s, it was well known in and around Keene, New Hampshire that the local
Catholic diocese was paying huge sums of money to young men claiming to have been abused by their childhood priests. Tom Grover, a drug addict and alcoholic with neither a job nor prospects, looked to his own payday. Grover accused father Gordon MacRae of having molested him as a teenager, and sued the New Hampshire diocese. He won nearly $200,000 dollars for his efforts and his testimony convicted MacRae of terrible crimes.

There was no evidence to support Grover’s claims, other than his testimony. There was not
a single witness to the acts alleged in Grover’s stories of molestation though they were to have happened in busy, populated places. The convictions – and the money – turned on Grover’s performance.

Recently, newly discovered evidence has revealed that before trial, Grover admitted to friends
and family that his accusations were lies manufactured for diocese cash, and that he would, and did commit perjury at MacRae’s trial. Those people have also reported Grover’s conduct after he got his money – conduct that included more admissions of perjury, and that undermines any notion that his stories were anything but lies.

In addition to Grover’s overall fraud on the criminal justice system, review of the record in
the light and context of the new evidence also reveals a trial marked by actions and inaction of defense counsel that not only undermined the defense, but served the state, and assured the conviction.

The conviction here came during a period of time that has since been widely recognized as
fostering a wave in sexual abuse accusations and convictions – often in cases in which the claimed acts were objectively impossible, but also in cases like this, in which accusations were technically possible, but objectively unlikely. As Grover admitted to his friends and family, his efforts toward MacRae’s conviction were based on that wave of false convictions. Thus, as those times largely gone by nourished the prosecution and fostered the conviction, a measured and historically aware review reveals that it was unjust and must be vacated.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By John P. Martin
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua ordered two key aides in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia to shred all copies of a 1994 memo that identified 35 priests suspected of sexually abusing children, according to a new court filing.

The order, outlined in a handwritten note locked away for years in church files, was disclosed for the first time Friday in a motion by lawyers for Mgsr. William J. Lynn, the former church official facing trial for enabling abusive priests.

They contend the shredding directive proves the church conspiracy to conceal clergy sex abuse occurred at levels far above Lynn, and that he has been unjustly accused.

“It is beyond doubt that Monsignor Lynn was completely unaware of this act of obstruction,” attorneys Jeffery Lindy and Thomas Bergstrom wrote.

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UNITED STATES
National Survivor Advocates Coalition

Editorial

Any cursory reader of the news in the last two weeks can’t help but know that Timothy Dolan belongs to the most exclusive men’s club in the world: the Roman Catholic Church’s College of Cardinals.

If you are a New Yorker – or a New Jerseyite — or a traveler to anywhere in the circular range of the New York media you have not been able to escape this traveling show of his pre-consistory trip to the Holy Land, his departure from his Fifth Avenue digs for the trip to Rome, his arrival in Rome, the fact that he took a shower at North American College in Rome before going out for a bowl of pasta, his New York decaled jacket approach to press conferences throughout the week, his restaurant visits with family and traveling band of 1,000 in tow, his chosenness for the pre-consistory speech, his working-the-room jaunt down St. Peter’s aisle, his bounding with skirt hem lifted to Pope Benedict to get his hat and ring, his pasta weight gain that keeps him from taking his ring off his finger to see the coat of arms of the man who put it there, his post consistory receptions, his continuing press conferences, and his bag piped arrival back at his New York Fifth Avenue digs. Not to mention the coverage of his tailor, his ringmaker, and his mother, Whew!

All of that dust, we do believe, is the really the architecture of a Dolan D&C strategy: the diversion and charm offensive in the face of the highest stakes to date in the clergy sexual abuse scandal.

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UNITED STATES
Aljazeera

Rose Aguilar

San Francisco, CA – Forget child abuse. The Catholic Bishops would rather spend their time, money, and resources on birth control and women’s sex lives. The main debate over the past few weeks in the United States has been about birth control. And guess who’s dominating it? The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), the country’s official organisation of the Catholic hierarchy.

The bishops are up in arms over the Obama administration’s rule that would have required health insurance plans, including Catholic-affiliated hospitals and universities, to offer free contraception. Once the bishops took to the airwaves to criticise the decision, the administration modified its policy so that insurance companies, not Catholic hospitals or universities, pay for contraception. But that didn’t appease the bishops – or Republican extremists.

On February 16, House Republicans thought it was necessary, with all the economic problems the US is facing, to hold a hearing on the contraception rule. The panel was comprised of five men – five religious men who without any kind of health background (watch this video, towards the end).

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

by John L Allen Jr on Feb. 24, 2012 All Things Catholic

As a thought exercise, ask yourself what period of time the following paragraph about the Vatican seems to reflect.

“For those who’ve seen the place in better days, the Vatican looks deeply troubled. In the absence of strong leadership, internal tensions seem to be bursting into view. Even at the height of his powers, the pope took scant interest in governance. As he ages and becomes more limited, a sense of drift is mounting — a conviction that hard choices must await a new day, and probably a new pontiff.”

Although it seems perfectly apt in February 2012, in fact, that paragraph was written in late 2004. That’s the irony: Many cardinals who elected Benedict XVI thought they were buying an end to the crisis of governance in the twilight of John Paul’s reign, only to find they’d simply traded it in for a newer model.

In the abstract, Joseph Ratzinger seemed the man to put things right. As the saying went, Ratzinger was in the curia but not of it — he knew where the bodies were buried, but he was never the stereotypical Vatican potentate, forever building empires and hatching schemes. Plus, he’s hardly the extrovert John Paul was, so it seemed reasonable he might invest more energy in internal business.

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America Magazine

From CNS, staff and other sources | MARCH 5, 2012
Catholic bishops should find out what is keeping victims of sexual abuse around the world from coming forward, said Bishop R. Daniel Conlon, right, chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on the Protection of Children and Young People. U.N. statistics have shown “that sex abuse is widespread and crosses all cultures and societies” and is not just a phenomenon plaguing the church or Western nations, he said on Feb. 13. A mandate from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith requires all bishops to establish anti-abuse guidelines by May of this year.

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DEUTSCHLAND
netzwerkB

netzwerkB Positionspapier “Selbsternannte Opfervertreter” Stand 24.02.2012 (als PDF herunter laden)

Position netzwerkB’s zur Bundesinitiative der Betroffenen von sexualisierter Gewalt und Missbrauch im Kindesalter e.V. (http://www.die-bundesinitiative.de/)

Zur Koordination der über 500 Opfervereine gründete sich am 20. August 2011 die Bundesinitiative für Betroffene (BI) und wurde am 2. Dezember 2011 im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichtes Scharlottenburg eingetragen unter: 95 VR 31053 B. Anspruch war es, den aufwändigen Dialog zwischen den Betroffenen zu koordinieren und eine einheitliche Position der verschiedenen Betroffenenverbände für den Runden Tisch zu erfassen. Es dürfte klar sein, dass sich allein aus diesem Anspruch noch kein Alleinvertretungsanspruch der BI für die Betroffenen ergab. Ein halbes Jahr nach Gründung der BI steht die Einlösung des Anspruchs dieser Initiative mehr als in Frage. Gerade fünf Vereine sind noch Mitglied. Dennoch gilt die Initiative der Regierung als repräsentative Stimme der Betroffenen und wird nun mit mehr als 27.000 Euro finanziert.

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NEDERLAND
Reformatorisch Dagblad

Gods Woord bezit wonderlijke helende kracht bij de verwerking van seksueel misbruik, ervoer 
Linda van der Ploeg.

Als slachtoffer van seksueel misbruik ben ik blij met het Movisierapport over huiselijk geweld in orthodox-protestants Nederland en de aandacht die eraan besteed wordt in de krant. Het artikel ”Jarenlang zwijgen over incest” (RD 15-2) raakte me diep. Het lijkt veel op mijn verhaal. Ik werd jarenlang seksueel misbruikt binnen het gezin en de (reformatorische) familie.

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CINCINNATI (OH)
Local 12

[with video]

An Irish family is thanking Cincinnati Police for helping them find peace more than a hundred years after the murder of one of their ancestors. A priest murdered Mary “Mollie” Gilmartin on a Cincinnati street in 1894. The Gilmartin family never knew the details of the murder, until Cincinnati detectives and local historians recently got involved. Local 12’s Deborah Dixon tells us how the Gilmartin family finally got their answers.

The Cincinnati Enquirer headlines screamed “Ghastly.. Father O’Grady Kills.. Pursued the Girl He Had Sworn to Cherish. The girl was Mollie Gilmartin. She was sent to live with relatives here in on Chestnut Street. And near the home is where 20 year old Mollie was killed on April 25th 1894.

She was trying to start a new life without Father Dominick O’Grady, the priest from her hometown parish who left the church to marry Mollie. Her brother, a priest in Chicago, intervened and sent her to Cincinnati to live with family.

That April morning as Mollie walked to her clerking job at Pulvermachers Galvanic Belt Company on East Sixth Street. She saw a glimpse of Father O’Grady and tried to make her way back home. What happened next are in police and newspaper reports. “The lifeless body sank to the ground, face powder burned, auburn hair singed by the flame.”

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MISSOURI
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

BY JENNIFER MANN • jmann@post-dispatch.com > 314-621-5804

ST. LOUIS COUNTY • A former Marianist cleric at the Chaminade College Preparatory School was so well-known for his inappropriate behavior toward showering students that they had a name for it: the “Meinhardt treatment,” according to a lawsuit filed Thursday.

Rev. Louis Meinhardt, a teacher and coach at the Creve Coeur prep school from 1958 to 1982, would allegedly watch juvenile boys shower and grab their genitals, earning several nicknames including “the kissing coach.” He also, according to the suit, used common catch phrases including “come here and give me loving” and “let me pat you on the bo-bo.”

Earlier this month, the leader of the Marianists, Rev. Martin Solma, revealed that more than a dozen former students had come forward with decades-old allegations of verbal and sexual abuse by Meinhardt and another former cleric, Rev. John Woulfe, who was at the school for nine years ending in 1977. Both are now deceased.

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HOUSTON (TX)
Courthouse News Service

By CAMERON LANGFORD

HOUSTON (CN) – A Jane Doe plaintiff claims the United Methodist Church did not protect her from a philandering pastor who adopted and began molesting her when she was 14, and made her get an abortion after impregnating her while she was in high school.

Doe sued Pastor Kendall Graham and trustees of the United Methodist Church’s Texas delegation in Harris County Court, for more than $25 million.

Doe claims the church knew about Graham’s “inappropriate contact and relationships with female members” of his congregations, but rather than get rid of him they moved him to different churches around Texas.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

Prosecutors and defense lawyers Thursday identified about 100 more potential jurors for next month’s child-endangerment and sex-abuse trial of two current Archdiocese of Philadelphia priests and one former archdiocese priest.

By the end of a third day of reviewing juror questionnaires, the lawyers had agreed to call nearly 200 people back for courtroom interviews. The lawyers and Common Pleas Court Judge M. Teresa Sarmina will start those interviews Monday to find 12 jurors and 10 alternates for the trial. The judge also denied a motion by one of the defendants, the Rev. James J. Brennan, for a separate trial.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Inside Ireland

By Olivia Kerr

A court has heard that a former priest and a convicted paedophile was so drunk at one point that he did not remember abusing two young boys.

This is the fourth time that Daniel Curran, 61, of Bryansford Road, Newcastle, has been charged of child abuse.

He pleaded guilty to five charges of indecent assault against two young boys in 1986.

Down Crown Court heard that the incidents took place at Curran’s family holiday home near Tyrella, County Down.

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

[Truth and Reconciliation Commission interim report]

[Compensating native residential school abuse]

Residential-schools commission calls for national awareness campaign

Tamara Baluja AND Gloria Galloway

OTTAWA— From Friday’s Globe and Mail

Published Thursday, Feb. 23, 2012

The commission that was established to reveal the dark legacy of church-run residential schools for aboriginal children says all Canadians should be made more aware of the sorry chapter in their country’s history.

In an interim report from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) to be released on Friday in Vancouver, Mr. Justice Murray Sinclair says comprehensive awareness efforts are needed to ensure that the rest of Canada fully understands the pain of the students who attended the schools and the parents whose children were taken from them.

Judge Sinclair recommends that every province and territory review its public-school curriculum to assess what, if anything, is being taught about the residential schools and to develop age-appropriate educational material. In addition, the TRC would like to work with the governments to develop unique local campaigns to educate the general public on residential schools.

After assessing statements and testimony from thousands of survivors and more than 100 former employees of the schools, Judge Sinclair says “we were reminded afresh that all of this happened to little children who had no control over their lives.”

About 150,000 first nations, Inuit and Métis children were forced to attend the government schools throughout the 1900s. The last one closed outside Regina in 1996.

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CANADA
Canada.com

By Teresa Smith, Postmedia News February 23, 2012

The Indian Residential School system was “not simply a dark chapter from our past,” says a report by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. “It was integral to the making of Canada.”

That a young Canada benefited from an education system designed to assimilate Aboriginal Peoples — by taking away their children and re-educating them — is difficult to swallow.

But, as the report released late Thursday says, the fact that this idea is news to many Canadians is part of the problem.

It goes further, saying the Residential School system was only part of a system designed to gain control of aboriginal land. “The Canadian government signed treaties it did not respect, took over land without making treaties, and unilaterally passed laws that controlled nearly every aspect of aboriginal life.”

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CANADA
Winnipeg Free Press

By: Staff Writer

Posted: 02/24/2012

THE pending report from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission says residential school survivors should have greater access to mental health care and recommends curriculum changes for Canadian public schools that would broaden awareness of the history of residential schools, the CBC reports.

The interim report, which is scheduled for official release in Vancouver today, was leaked to the broadcaster on Thursday.

Residential school information should be available in public schools across the country, the report suggests, with individual schools addressing the implications the residential schools had in specific regions.

The report also advises that the formal apology delivered by the federal government should be framed and distributed to every secondary school in the provinces and territories by Ottawa.

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CANADA
Winnipeg Free Press

By: The Canadian Press

Posted: 02/24/2012

VANCOUVER – A commission set up to help First Nations heal from abuses they suffered in residential schools is about to release an interim report and a new historical publication.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada will release the documents during a presentation this morning at Simon Fraser University’s downtown Vancouver campus.

About 150,000 aboriginal children were forced to attend the schools, the first of which opened in the 1870s and the last of which closed in 1996.

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CANADA
Canada.com

By Postmedia News, Postmedia News February 23, 2012

The pending report from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission says residential school survivors should have greater access to mental health care and recommends curriculum changes for Canadian public schools that would broaden awareness of the history of residential schools, the CBC reports.

The interim report, which is scheduled for official release in Vancouver on Friday, was leaked to the broadcaster on Thursday.

Residential school information should be available in public schools across the country, the report suggests, with individual schools addressing the implications the residential schools had in specific regions.

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CANADA
Winnipeg Free Press

By: Christopher Powell

Posted: 02/24/2012

Justice Murray Sinclair, chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, has declared that Canada’s Indian residential school system was an act of genocide. This statement will disturb many Canadians. Some will say that our collective soul-searching over the Indian residential schools has gone on long enough, or too long, and that indigenous people should just let go of the past and move on.

But Justice Sinclair was right to make this declaration. Acknowledging Canada’s responsibility for genocide is necessary to heal the great harm done by this traumatic historic event. It is necessary both for indigenous peoples, and for non-indigenous Canadians as well.

The Indian residential school system, in both its stated intent and its observable effects, meets the definition of genocide specified in the United Nations Genocide Convention of 1948. Article 2 of that convention defines genocide as certain acts “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such,” and includes in the specified acts, “forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

PAMELA DUNCAN

Archbishop of Dublin Dr Diarmuid Martin has described the Government’s decision to close the Vatican embassy as a “mistake” that he believes will be reversed.

Speaking this evening at the Mater Dei Institute’s Spring Lecture Series, Dr Martin said that he feared that the controversy surrounding the decision had “taken on a life of its own” and was not a debate which was in the best interests of the Church or the Government.

“While I believe that the change in status of the Embassy was a mistake and that it will in time be changed, the current polemic is distracting us from the real challenges of Church State relations and from the real crisis questions facing the Irish Church,” he said.

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POLAND
U.S. Catholic

Thursday, February 23, 2012

By Jonathan Luxmoore Catholic News Service

WARSAW, Poland (CNS) — The spokesman for the Polish bishops’ conference defended its handling of sexual abuse accusations against Catholic clergy as the bishops prepared to adopt guidelines on the issue.

“The church is the only institution in Poland systematically dealing with this — no one else is,” said Father Jozef Kloch, conference spokesman. “Although we’re being used as a whipping boy, we know from data there’s a much lower incidence of pedophilia among Catholic priests than clergy from other denominations, as well as teachers, home care employees, sports coaches and, unfortunately, parents and relatives.”

Father Kloch told Catholic News Service Feb. 22 that, in March, the bishops would vote on new guidelines developed in line with instructions issued by the Vatican last May. The Polish document was prepared by the church’s legal counsel.

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SALEM (MA)
Wicked Local Salem

By Sarah Thomas/sthomas@wickedlocal.com
Salem Gazette

Posted Feb 23, 2012

Salem —

From 1986 to 1990, Salem’s St. James parish was home to Rev. James E. Braley, a pastor who was recently placed in administrative leave after Archdiocese officials received an allegation of sexual abuse of a child.

Braley, who served most recently as the pastor of Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha parish in Plymouth, also served in churches in Lynn and Marblehead. Church officials have said that the abuse was alleged to have happened in the early 1980s, a time when Braley was serving at St. Peter parish in Cambridge and Archbishop Williams High School in Braintree.

Diane Santos, administrator of religious education at St. James, said she started with the church 26 years ago, around the time that Braley arrived in Salem.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
UTV

UTV has won a prestigious Royal Television Society award for a documentary on paedophile priest Brendan Smyth.

Reporter Chris Moore, executive producer Paul Clarke and camera operator Drew Welsh were in London to pick up the award on Wednesday night.

‘The Resurrection of Brendan Smyth’ was aired on UTV in December 2010.

It followed the trail of broken lives left behind by the sex predator who raped and assaulted children in Ireland, Britain and America as the Catholic Church covered up his crimes.

Journalist Chris Moore, who broke the Brendan Smyth child sex abuse story in a UTV documentary in 1994, believes many children were abused by the paedophile priest after allegations first emerged in the 1970s.

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STOCKTON (CA)
Lodi News-Sentinel

By Ross Farrow/News-Sentinel staff writer

STOCKTON — Opening arguments in the sexual abuse lawsuit against Lockeford priest Michael Kelly will begin at 10 a.m. Friday in Department 42 at San Joaquin County Superior Court, 222 E. Weber Ave., fourth floor, Stockton.

Kelly, priest at Lockeford’s St. Joachim’s Catholic Church, is accused by an unnamed plaintiff of sexually assaulting him during the 1980s, when Kelly served at Cathedral of the Annunciation in Stockton. Kelly has not been charged criminally.

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CANADA
The Western Star

Published on February 24, 2012

Cory Hurley
CORNER BROOK — The Roman Catholic priest who turned himself in to police in December after nine alleged victims of sexual abuse came forward against him has again willingly gone into custody following more charges.

George Ansel Smith, 74, appeared in provincial court in Corner Brook Thursday afternoon. Attorney Tom Williams elected, on behalf of the former western Newfoundland priest, to proceed via judge alone in Supreme Court of Newfoundland and Labrador.

There were another 24 sex-related charges before the court against Smith, who was already facing 38 charges — including 13 counts of gross indecency, 11 counts of indecent assault on a male, seven counts of sexual assault, four counts of unlawfully committing a gross indecency and three counts of unlawfully assaulting with intent to commit an indictable offence. Those offences, alleged to have happened between 1969 and 1989 in six different communities, including Port Saunders, Corner Brook, Stephenville, St. Fintan’s, Cape St. George and Deer Lake.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

OPINION: Lay voices who make a living defending the church should see sense on embassy issue, writes PATSY McGARRY

PROTAGONISTS IN the row over the closure of Ireland’s embassy to the Holy See have included some Fine Gael backbenchers not heard from before. Certainly they were silent following the Cloyne report last July, when no one produced a rosary beads at a parliamentary party meeting either.

Recently they’ve had to deal with voters angered at Fine Gael Minister for the Environment Phil Hogan’s stand on septic tanks and household charges. It was a help to have a Labour Minister’s decision to seize on.

The row would not be complete without Fianna Fáil input. On Valentine’s Day Senator Terry Leyden was accused by Fine Gael’s Paul Coghlan of jumping up and down like a jackass on the issue. Leyden is no jackass but would recognise a chance to embarrass political opponents before drawing his first breath of a day, even on Valentine’s Day.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
KSRO

MARYCLAIRE DALE

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A priest charged with raping a teen while on leave from the Philadelphia archdiocese will go on trial next month in a church conspiracy case, despite defense objections.

A judge refused Thursday to give the Rev. James Brennan a separate trial. Brennan, 49, wants a short trial involving a single accuser.

Instead, he will be at the defense table for months while prosecutors seek to build a conspiracy and child-endangerment case against Monsignor William Lynn, the long-time secretary for clergy. Prosecutors plan to air sex-abuse complaints lodged against two dozen priests over several decades to show Lynn kept problem priests around children.

Lynn, for his part, has fought unsuccessfully to sever his case from his two co-defendants, both charged with rape. Brennan, 48, and defrocked priest Edward Avery, 69, are each charged with raping a single victim, accusers who came forward in time to meet newly expanded state time limits for child-sex assault.

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

Corner Brook, Nfld.— The Canadian Press

Published Thursday, Feb. 23, 2012

A Roman Catholic priest is back in custody in western Newfoundland after 24 more sex-related charges were brought against him.

George Ansel Smith consented to returning to prison after being released from jail in December when he faced 38 charges, including gross indecency, sexual assault and indecent assault.

Those charges involved nine complainants who allege they were abused by Mr. Smith between 1969 and 1989 when he was working in Deer Lake, Nfld.,

Mr. Smith has elected to be tried by judge alone in Supreme Court and his arraignment is scheduled for March 5.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
BBC News

A court has heard that a former priest and convicted paedophile was so drunk he could not remember abusing two young boys.

It is the fourth time Daniel Curran, 61, of Bryansford Road, Newcastle, has been charged with child abuse.

He has pleaded guilty to five charges of indecent assault against two young boys dating back to 1986.

Downpatrick Crown Court heard that the offences took place at Curran’s family holiday home near Tyrella in County Down.

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MISSOURI
Berger’s Beat

…Great honor for the guys who have made a living covering breaking news. . .It was a loss for barrister Gerald Noce, who represents the Marianists, a religious order that runs Catholic schools. Noce had sought a writ from an appeals court to stop a civil lawsuit against Brother William Mueller, who worked at Vianney and Chaminade in the 1960s and 1970s. Mueller, who now lives in Texas, has been accused of sexually violating more than 50 students in three states, often drugging them first. Word is that Clayton lawyer Ken Chackes will file the first abuse case this week against Brother Louis Meinhardt, a teacher who spent 30 years at Chaminade. .

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CANADA
CBC News

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission is calling for changes to Canadian public school curriculums and for mental health care for residential school survivors.

The commission’s interim report was leaked Thursday to CBC News, a day before the three commissioners — chair Murray Sinclair, Wilton Littlechild and Marie Wilson — release the report in Vancouver.

Their 20 recommendations address education, health and commemoration, among other issues.

The commission calls for all provinces and territories to develop residential school education materials for public schools. Provinces and territories should hold education campaigns about the history and impact of residential schools in their jurisdictions, the commission says.

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UTAH
NECN

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A Mormon bishop is set for trial June 1 on charges of witness tampering and failing to report a teen girl’s complaint of sexual abuse.

Prosecutors say 43-year-old Gordon Lamont Moon advised the 16-year-old girl last July not to report an alleged assault to authorities.

Utah courts spokeswoman Nancy Volmer says a judge in Duchesne’s 8th District Court set the trial date on Thursday.

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UTAH
The Salt Lake Tribune

By Aaron Falk
The Salt Lake Tribune

A June trial date has been set for a Mormon bishop accused of failing to report allegations of child abuse after meeting with a girl in his Duchesne congregation.

Gordon Lamont Moon, 43, will stand trial June 1 on a third-degree felony count of tampering with a witness and a class B misdemeanor of failure to report child abuse.

According to a court document, the 17-year-old girl was sexually abused by a younger teen in July. The girl’s father later asked Moon to speak with the girl.

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UTAH
Deseret News

By Geoff Liesik, Deseret News

Published: Thursday, Feb. 23 2012

DUCHESNE — A one-day jury trial has been scheduled for an LDS Church bishop accused of telling a teenage girl not to seek a protective order and failing to report the girl’s disclosure that she had been sexually abused by a relative.

Bishop Gordon Moon is charged in 8th District Court with witness tampering, a third-degree felony, and failure to report abuse, a class B misdemeanor. Moon was arraigned on the charges Thursday, entering not guilty pleas to both counts.

His trial is set for June 1.

But Moon’s attorney, David Leavitt, said Thursday that he intends to challenge the constitutionality of the witness tampering charge prior to trial.

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CANADA
The Guardian

Published on February 23, 2012

CORNER BROOK, N.L. — George Ansel Smith, a Roman Catholic priest who’d previously served in P.E.I., consented to going back into custody after 24 more sex-related charges have come before the Newfoundland courts against him.

Smith had been administrator at St. Malachy’s Church in Kinkora when he was suspended as a P.E.I. priest in May 2010 following the allegations that he’d abused nine young males in Newfoundland between 1969 and 1989.

He was released from jail in December, when there were 38 charges in total against him. When he appeared in provincial court in Corner Brook this afternoon, that total had risen to 62.

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MISSOURI
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Barbara Dorris on February 23, 2012

Week after week, month after month, new child sex abuse allegations surface against current and former St. Louis priests, nuns, seminarians, brothers and other Catholic officials. Some are diocesan, some belong to religious orders.

But who signs their paychecks doesn’t really matter. What matters is that some of these predators are still alive and often live and work here in St. Louis (and elsewhere) among unsuspecting families, neighbors and colleagues. What matters is that each revelation brings added pain to Catholic parishioners in St. Louis. And what matters is that some or most of their victims live here in St. Louis.

Recently, victims from Chaminade, a St. Louis Catholic school, have found the courage and strength to speak up. In just three weeks, Catholic officials here admit that they’ve heard from 15 victims of Brother Louis Meinhardt who taught and coached at Chaminade for 30 years.

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CANADA
CBC News

A Roman Catholic priest who worked in Newfoundland and Labrador for many years is facing 24 new sexual abuse charges, bringing the total number of charges against him to 62.

George Ansel Smith was in court Thursday afternoon in Corner Brook.

Smith, who worked in parishes from Newfoundland’s southwest coast to the tip of the Northern Peninsula, was charged in December after a lengthy investigation by the RCMP.

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NEW HAMPSHIRE
Keene Sentinel

Posted: Thursday, February 23, 2012

By Casey Farrar Sentinel Staff

A former Keene priest convicted nearly two decades ago of sexually abusing four boys is seeking a new trial, claiming new statements from people close to one victim show he was after money when he made the accusations.

Gordon J. MacRae, 58, was convicted by a Cheshire County jury in September 1994 of five counts of sexual assault against a 15-year-old boy during the summer of 1983 in the rectory of St. Bernard’s Church in Keene, while MacRae was a Roman Catholic priest there.

A month later, MacRae avoided more slated trials by pleading guilty to three additional counts of sexual assault — one count each involving three other boys, including a boy who said he was 12 years old when MacRae fondled him in the rectory of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal Church in Hampton.

In the Keene trial case, MacRae received the maximum sentence — 331/2 to 67 years in prison — meaning he wouldn’t be eligible to seek release until 2028, when he’d be 74 years old.

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CANADA
The Telegram

Published on February 23, 2012

George Ansel Smith, a Roman Catholic priest, consented to going back into custody after another 24 sex-related charges have come before the courts against him.

He was released from jail in December, when there were 38 charges in total against him that involved nine complainants claiming to have been abused by Smith between 1969 and 1989. When he appeared in provincial court in Corner Brook this afternoon, that total had risen to 62.

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UNITED STATES
Religion Dispatches

By Mary E. Hunt

Anyone who thinks that the much-discussed compromise offered by the Obama administration will end the US Catholic Bishops’ efforts to eradicate contraception and otherwise truncate women’s rights is sadly mistaken. Their show of ecclesial muscle, noticed big time by the White House in an election year, only serves to reinforce and reinscribe a moral authority that many Catholics no longer grant to the hierarchy. We understand ourselves in far more mature, differentiated, and autonomous fashions that vary widely among us. We vote accordingly.

The furor over the provision of contraceptive services focuses attention on the Catholic community, a quarter of the US population. Generalizations are hazardous, and the obvious is not usually what it appears to be. There are not two teams (the bishops and the rest of us), nor are there just conservatives and progressives. As that quarter of the population, we range from Opus Dei to Catholics for Choice, from parish members to base community adherents, from students to seniors, and everyone in the middle.

We do not speak in one voice, and no one speaks for all of us. We each have one vote. Not even the seemingly middle-of-the-road folks, like some media members and lobbyists who claim to be the voice of Catholic reason, represent anyone but themselves. This is the contemporary Catholic situation, and anyone who tries to persuade otherwise has a bridge to sell in Brooklyn.

Nonetheless, the current flap over health care reveals three Catholic realities: it is about birth control, it is not about religious liberty, and it is not over. …

The institutional Roman Catholic Church squandered the political clout it once enjoyed. Clergy sexual abuse cases and their cover-up by bishops are unspeakable crimes that cost more than just the billions of dollars spent to adjudicate cases and compensate victims. They cost credibility. The result is that the institutional Church increasingly relies on very personal issues, like contraception, to feather its nest having relinquished any claim on the death penalty, wars, the economy, and the environment where its moral weight could be so helpful. No one cares what it teaches. This is lamentable, but it opens up space for many Catholic points of view to emerge in the polls. And emerge they have, and emerge they should.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Washington Post

Lawyers seek jurors for Philly priest abuse trial; monsignor charged with endangering children

By Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA — About 150 potential jurors will be questioned next week about their ability to spend several months hearing a landmark priest sex abuse case in Philadelphia.

Lawyers are reviewing jury questionnaires filled out by residents of the heavily Catholic city.

It remains unclear how much they will be asked about their religious beliefs or possible experiences with child sex assault.

Monsignor William Lynn is set to go on trial March 26 on charges he endangered children by keeping predators in ministry.

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Barbara Dorris on February 23, 2012 ·

We’re grateful to this judge for being firm with this dangerous priest. Like so many child molesters, Wenthe seems to believe laws don’t apply to him. We hope he does end up behind bars. That way, kids will be safer.

We call on Archbishop John Nienstedt to publicly disclose Wenthe’s status, residence and current work assignment. Secrecy about proven sex offenders only endangers kids.

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MINNESOTA
Pioneer Press

By Emily Gurnon
egurnon@pioneerpress.comtwincities.com
Posted: 02/23/2012

A former St. Paul priest got a stern dressing-down by a judge this morning for failing to cooperate with his probation officer.

Christopher Wenthe, formerly of Nativity of Our Lord parish in St. Paul, was convicted Nov. 15 of criminal sexual conduct in a case that involved a 21-year-old penitent. He is serving one year in the Ramsey County workhouse.

Ramsey County District Judge Margaret Marrinan summoned the 47-year-old Wenthe to her courtroom after the probation officer contacted her about problems.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
UTV

A court has heard that a former priest and convicted paedophile could not remember abusing two young boys because he had carried out so many offences and had been too drunk.

Daniel Curran has pleaded guilty to five charges of indecent assault against two young boys dating back to 1986.

He appeared at Downpatrick Court for a pre-sentence hearing on Thursday afternoon.

This is the fourth time Curran has been before a court for abusing children.

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HAWAII
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on February 23, 2012

Two Hawaii priests deemed guilty of molesting kids have been dealt setbacks recently.

One sought release from prison but was denied parole, while the other has been permanently ousted from the priesthood by the Vatican.

Fr. Robert Mac Santry, a former priest of the Diocese of Honolulu who is now residing in Georgia, has been “dismissed from the clerical state,” effective immediately. As of this time, it is unknown what infractions caused Santry to be ousted. A priest can be dismissed for a multitude of crimes, including sexual abuse and financial fraud.

“Bishop Clarence Silva owes it to his parishioners, and especially to Santry’s neighbors in Atlanta to disclose what his crime was,” said David Clohessy, Executive Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. Whether it was child abuse or fraud, we call on Bishop Silva to live up to his promise to be open and honest about clergy crimes and make a full accounting of what happened with Santry.”

Fr. Mark Matson, a Catholic priest of the Colorado-based Theatine Fathers order was tried and convicted in 2000 in Hawaii for sexual assaulting a 13-year-old boy. Matson was sentenced to twenty years behind bars. Last week, a Hawaii parole board voted to keep him in jail after Matson applied for release after 12 years.

Matson had been accused of abusing young boys in both Colorado and California before being arrested in Hawaii.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

by Tom Roberts on Feb. 23, 2012 NCR Today

Sandro Magister writes about the continuing changes to the Legion of Christ being arranged by Cardinal Velasio De Paolis, the pontifical delegate to whom Benedict XVI has given full power to remake the scandal-plagued religious order and its associated lay movement Regnum Christi, with its hundreds of consecrated men and women.

It is essential to remember that the Legion, a now failed project built on utterly fraudulent life of its founder, the late Marciel Maciel Degollado, was the ideal expression of Catholic priesthood and lay witness for Pope John Paul II. Maciel and the Legion represents more than a blind spot or a dark chapter in John Paul’s papacy. It represented, more importantly, the model of priesthood, leadership and witness that John Paul advocated.

As I point out in my book, The Emerging Catholic Church: A Community’s Search for Itself : Maciel had protectors in very high places. He traveled with the pope on some of his journeys and, as late as 2004, John Paul honored the Legion by entrusting it with the management of Jerusalem’s Notre Dame Center. John Paul II also praised Maciel that year for 60 years of “intense, generous and fruitful priestly ministry.” In a letter the pope said he wanted to join in the “canticle of praise and thanksgiving” for the great things he has accomplished and said Maciel has always been concerned with the “integral promotion of the person.” The Legion was clearly John Paul II’s idea of what a religious order and what Catholic expression should be.”

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CLEVELAND (OH)
WTAM

(Cleveland) – More than a year after his arrest, a minister from Olmsted Falls is pleading guilty to more than 80 counts of child porn related charges.

Reverend Dr. Mark Griggs was rounded up in “Operation Lake Effect”, a massive child porn sting in December of 2010. Griggs was the pastor at Saint Andrew’s Presbyterian Church.

Griggs plead guilty Wednesday to 43 counts of Pandering Sexually Oriented Matter Involving a Minor, 40 counts of Illegal Use of a Minor in Nudity-Oriented Material, and 1 count of Possessing Criminal Tools.

Griggs was originally charged in a 112 count indictment that included downloading, trading, and possessing child pornography. Between July 2008 and November 2010, Griggs traded child pornography over the internet from his house and church. Prosecutors said Griggs downloaded and saved images of sexually abused children to his computer that depicted children being raped in various ways.

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UNITED STATES
Irish Central

By
Irish Voice Editorial

Published Thursday, February 23, 2012

Newly appointed Cardinal Timothy Dolan certainly grabbed the lion’s share of media attention last week in New York when he received his red hat from Pope Benedict in Rome on Saturday.

The new cardinal is everything his predecessor Cardinal Edward Egan was not — avuncular, brilliant with a quote, hands on and charming.

He is a perfect fit for New York, where big is better and an outside personality is needed to break through the clutter.

Dolan certainly made his name in Italy too last week, with an Italian newspaper ranking him among the “papabile,” the handful of cardinals who could become the next pope.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
Fox4

7:42 am, February 23, 2012, by Sarah Clark

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph faces a new lawsuit alleging sexual abuse by former priest John Tulipana.

Tulipana was forced out of the ministry in 1994. He’s accused of sexually abusing four boys from one family on fishing trips, camping trips and at the boys’ home while serving at St. Catherine of Siene Church in Kansas City.

Tulipana was ordained in 1972. The abuse against the four boys, ages 10 to 16, is alleged to have started in 1976.

According to a statement from SNAP, the Survivor’s Network of those Abused by Priests, two separate complaints had been filed against Tulipana alleging abuse prior to 1993. In 1993 and 1994, Tulipana was ordered to undergo psychological evaluations at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland and at the Servants of the Paraclete in Jimenez, New Mexico. At the conclusion of these evaluations, Tulipana was allowed to return to ministry.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By John P. Martin
Inquirer Staff Writer

By late Wednesday, about 200 people had been disqualified as potential jurors for the child-sex abuse and endangerment trial against three current or former Archdiocese of Philadelphia priests.

That signaled progress. It meant that almost 100 others had made the cut, based on their responses to a questionnaire. Those people will be asked to return next week for courtroom interviews.

Just two days into the selection process, the pool of remaining candidates was large enough that one lawyer wondered if court officials needed to keep calling people to the courthouse.

“We have enough to get a jury now,” attorney Michael Wallace said, though others weren’t as sure.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Colm Kelpie

Thursday February 23 2012

ARCHBISHOP of Dublin Dr Diarmuid Martin yesterday said it was time to “move on” from the row over the closure of Ireland’s embassy to the Vatican.

After an Ash Wednesday Mass on the campus in University College Dublin, Dr Martin said that while he believed it was a mistake to close the embassy at the Villa Spada in the Holy See, it would reopen in time.

“I think it was a mistake to close it, but let’s be realistic, for a moment,” he said. “For some period of time you’ll have a non- resident ambassador, a very competent person, a very committed person, I don’t think the polemic is helping anybody anymore.

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UNITED STATES
The Marquette Tribune

By Andrea Anderson

February 23, 2012

Leaks and conspiracy theories are crossing the tall walls of the Vatican, and the holy city is getting heavy press attention after reports of suspicions of money laundering at the Vatican’s bank, an ailing Pope Benedict XVI and internal conflict with his right-hand-man and Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone.

The rumors come partially as a result of the Jan. 25 broadcast of private letters sent to Bertone and the Pope from Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, former deputy governor of Vatican City and currently the Vatican ambassador in Washington state.

The Vatican has claimed these letters are authentic.

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ITALIA
AgenParl

(AGENPARL) – Roma, 21 feb – “Gli Intoccabili”, il programma di Gianluigi Nuzzi su LA7, torna sui documenti riservati del Vaticano che negli ultimi mesi sono stati pubblicati dai media, prime tra tutte le lettere di Carlo Maria Viganò (nunzio apostolico a Washington) al Santo padre, rese note un mese fa dallo stesso programma. La puntata di domani, in onda alle 21.10, darà voce con un’intervista esclusiva – realizzata dallo stesso Nuzzi in una località segreta – a uno dei cosiddetti ‘corvi’, uno tra coloro che hanno reso pubblici tali documenti. “Lavoro in Vaticano da una ventina d’anni”, racconta in un passaggio. Alla domanda se si senta un ‘corvo’ risponde “assolutamente no” e, sul numero delle ‘talpe’ interne alla Santa Sede afferma che “potrebbero essere una ventina”. Il motivo? “Un rigurgito, un gesto di rabbia”, dice”.

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ITALIA
Davide Maggio

Gli Intoccabili tornano a svelare i segreti dei Sacri Palazzi, infiltrandosi laddove si aggirano falchi, colombe e… corvi. Stasera il programma di La7 condotto da Gianluigi Nuzzi indagherà sui documenti vaticani che hanno delineato una ‘lotta’ interna alle mura leonine. La trasmissione aveva già mostrato alcune lettere inviate al Papa in cui si faceva riferimento a “situazioni di corruzione e prevaricazione“, suscitando l’ira della Santa Sede.

Nella puntata odierna Gli Intoccabili daranno voce a uno dei cosiddetti “corvi” che hanno reso pubbliche quelle scottanti carte. In un’intervista realizzata da Nuzzi, la spia ha dichiarato che le ‘talpe’ in Vaticano “potrebbero essere una ventina“. Il motivo? “Un rigurgito, un gesto di rabbia“. “Forse c’è una sorta di omertà a non fare emergere la verità delle cose” ha aggiunto il delatore.

“Il nostro è un Paese dove si può entrare, fare una strage e andarsene indisturbati e dopo 24 ore nessuno può mettere bocca su quello che è successo. Oppure sparisce una ragazzina e per 30 anni non si riesce a trovare una persona che dica qualcosa su come può essere andata“

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VATICAN CITY
The Telegraph (United Kingdom)

The Vatican is ruled by a climate of fear and an ‘omerta’ code of silence, a whistle-blower has claimed.

By Nick Squires, Rome
6:00AM GMT 23 Feb 2012

The mole claims to be one of more than 20 people within the Holy See who have leaked sensitive documents to the Italian media in the last few weeks, in an affair that has been compared to the WikiLeaks scandal and dubbed “Vati-leaks”.

The unidentified man, who said he had worked in the Vatican for more than 20 years, made the claims in an interview to be aired on Italian television on Wednesday night.

His face was hidden and his voice digitally distorted when he appeared on the TV channel, La7.

According to extracts of the interview, the whistle-blower said the Vatican was engulfed in intrigue, secrecy and a climate of intimidation. …

The whistle-blower said the Vatican is a place where “you can commit a murder and then disappear into the void” – a reference to a murky scandal in the Swiss Guard in 1998, when a young soldier shot dead the corps’ commander and wife before apparently committing suicide.

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ROME
Chiesa

A new man at the top of the congregation: the German Heereman. Meanwhile, however, many consecrated women are leaving. The torment of their leader, Malén Oriol. The silent revolution of Cardinal De Paolis

by Sandro Magister

ROME, February 23, 2012 – For one week, a new man has been at the head of the Legionaries of Christ. He is young, only 36 years old. He is German, from Bavaria. He belongs to the noble lineage of the van Zuydtwyck. He has a brother who is a religious, and a sister who is a consecrated virgin. His parents testified for him in St. Peter’s Square, in the pope’s presence, on the eve of the closing of the Year for Priests, on June 10, 2010.

His name is Sylvester Heereman. He is the new vicar general of the Legion, in the role that previously belonged to Father Luis Garza Medina, the most powerful of the close collaborators and then successors of the infamous founder Marcial Maciel.

The appointment came unexpectedly, on February 16, with a statement from Cardinal Velasio De Paolis, the pontifical delegate to whom Benedict XVI has given full powers in order to avert the downfall of the Legion and of the associated lay movement Regnum Christi, with its hundreds of consecrated men and women.

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OSTERREICH
Anselm van der Linde
Abt von Wettingen-Mehrerau

Abtei Mehrerau: Unabhängige Opferschutzkommission wurde eingerichtet, um auch bei Verjährung Entschädigungszahlungen zu ermöglichen. Keine Haftung des Klosters für vorsätzliche Handlungen von Mitgliedern der Gemeinschaft.

(Bregenz, 21.02.2012) Die Abtei Mehrerau hat gestern, 20.02.2012, fristgerecht die
Beantwortung der Klage eines Opfers von sexuellem Missbrauch bei Gericht eingebracht.
Generell stellt Abt Anselm van der Linde dazu fest: „Um den Opfern des oft jahrzehntelang
zurückliegenden und dadurch juristisch verjährten Missbrauchs auf alle Fälle eine
Entschädigungszahlung zu ermöglichen, wurde von der Bischofskonferenz die
Opferschutzkommission eingerichtet. Dort werden Opfer unabhängig, sensibel und diskret
beraten und unterstützt. Und es werden in möglichst kurzer Zeit Entschädigungen und
Therapiekosten ausbezahlt.“

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CANADA
VOCM

A retired Roman Catholic priest is expected to enter a plea in court today on a variety of sex charges. George Ansel Smith is facing 38 offences including gross indecency, indecent assault and sexual assault. A 16-month investigation by the RCMP revealed the incidents happened over a 20-year period between 1969 and 1989, while Smith was stationed in different communities on the west coast.

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CONNECTICUT
WTNH

[with video]

Erin Logan

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (WTNH) – Two Connecticut men are filing a lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America for sexual assaults they say happened when they were kids.

The men who are filing the lawsuit partnered with Attorney Kelly Clark from Portland, Oregon who has 60 cases in 14-states against the Boy Scouts.

“Why me? Why did you choose me?”

It’s a question the now 41 year-old victim has wanted to ask his alleged abuser David “Dirk” Davenport for over two decades as he’s battled relationship problems, addictions, and shame. However he has been in panic mode since his eight year-old daughter was born. …

Boy Scouts of America issued the following statement:

“The abuse of anyone, and especially children, is abhorrent and intolerable, and the Boy Scouts of America continues to evolve our multi-layered youth protection efforts. In the 25 years since the events described, Scouting has mandated training and education for everyone in our organization and designed policies that prevent one-on-one contact between youth and adults. Today, anyone suspected of abuse is immediately removed from Scouting, reported to law enforcement and Scout executives and added to our Ineligible Volunteer Files.

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CALIFORNIA
Digital Journal

By Yukio Strachan
Feb 22, 2012

Santa Barbara- The Boy Scouts of America has until Friday to produce more than 5,000 records, kept secret for decades, detailing allegations of sexual abuse by scout leaders across the nation.

The attorney for the plaintiff, Santa Barbara attorney Timothy Hale, told the Santa Barbara Independent that the files, which will not be made public on Friday, showed that the Boy Scouts of America has maintained thousands of secret “perversion files” detailing child molestation cases, involving up to 20,000 scouts abused by leaders during 1965-85 alone, and perhaps 100,000 since 1925.

“For 70 years, the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) has concealed from the public the fact that sexual abuse has pervaded the institution,” hiding from parents the fact that their children were and still are at heightened risk of being targets of “pedophilic wolves,” Hale charged in the Superior Court suit.

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NEW MEXICO
KFOX

States marshals in New Mexico added Sergio Luevano, who is accused of child sex abuse, to their district’s Most Wanted listed.

Luevano was indicted by a grand jury on second degree criminal sexual contact of a minor charges April 14, 2011.

Police said that during March 2010, Luevano touched or applied force to the unclothed intimate parts of a child under the age of 12. Luevano is a member of the Jehovah Witness Church and confessed to elders in the church that he did touch the child, police said.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Daily News

BY MENSAH M. DEAN
Philadelphia Daily News
deanm@phillynews.com 215-854-5949

TYPICALLY, it does not take trial attorneys a week to read the questionnaires from prospective jurors before ever interviewing those people.

But that’s going on this week in the largest courtroom at the Criminal Justice Center, as attorneys and Common Pleas Judge M. Teresa Sarmina lay the groundwork to impanel a jury in the trial of three Philadelphia Catholic priests accused of raping and endangering altar boys beginning in the 1990s.

Sarmina has said that the jury-selection process could take a month.

Jury selection rarely takes more than a day or so. But for a trial that will feature the intersection of two emotionally charged issues – religion and child abuse – taking such a long time to pick a jury is understandable and necessary, said Marita Green, chair of Voice of the Faithful of Greater Philadelphia.

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CONNECTICUT
Herald-Tribune

By DAVE COLLINS
Associated Press

HARTFORD, Conn. – Two men in their early 40s sued the Boy Scouts of America on Tuesday, claiming scouting officials failed to protect them from a sexually abusive scoutmaster in Connecticut when they were children in the mid-1980s.

The plaintiffs, identified only as John Roe 1 and John Roe 2, filed a negligence lawsuit in state court in New Haven against the national organization and its Connecticut Yankee Council chapter. They say they were sexually abused on several occasions by David “Dirk” Davenport when he was the leader of Troop 490 in Madison.

The men allege scouting officials knew or should have known that before Davenport came to Connecticut in 1983, he had been accused of molesting boys in Montana, Nebraska and Minnesota in the 1970s and early 1980s, sometimes when he was a scoutmaster in those states.

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FLORIDA
Patch

Dirk Davenport, who pleaded guilty in the 1980’s to sexual assault of nine Boy Scouts, is serving as an associate pastor at a Florida church. His actions in the 1980’s led to a lawsuit filed Tuesday against the Boy Scouts of America.

By Pem McNerney

An Associated Press Report says the man at the center of a lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America involving repeated cases of child sex abuse is serving as an associate in congregational care at SunCoast Cathedral MCC in Venice, Fla.

“Davenport, 74, didn’t return a phone message left Tuesday at the SunCoast Cathedral Metropolitan Community Church in Venice, Fla., where he is an associate pastor. His home phone number is unlisted,” the Associated Press report in The Miami Herald said.

A woman who answered the phone Wednesday morning at the church said Davenport was not in, but that he was expected in later that evening. She said he serves as an associate pastor at the church, helping the senior pastor with the care of the congregation. She said she did not know about the reports of child sex abuse and did not know whether it was the same Davenport and declined to answer further questions.

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

By Eamonn Walsh
BBC News

Years of sexual abuse scandals have hit the image of the Catholic Church and its priests face long hours and modest wages. So what drives the young men who want to be ordained?

Just around the corner from the designer shops and fancy restaurants of London’s Kings Road stands Allen Hall. It is home to a small number of men in the middle of a journey.

The residents of Allen Hall, a Catholic seminary, are spending up to six years preparing to become Roman Catholic priests.

The student priests, known as seminarians, believe they are answering God’s calling in dedicating their lives to the work of the Church.

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CANADA
The Whig-Standard

By Danielle VandenBrink The Whig-Standard

School officials are offering counselling to students at Holy Cross Catholic Secondary School following news of sexual abuse allegations against their former priest.

Father Rene Paul Labelle, 62, of Seeleys Bay was charged with sexual assault, sexual exploitation and invitation to sexual exploitation Monday.

Provincial police say the allegations were brought forward by a man who was a teenager at the time of the incident, alleged to have happened in the summer of 2004.

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NEW HAMPSHIRE
New Hampshire Union Leader

Published Feb 23, 2012

A Catholic priest convicted in 1994 of sexually assaulting boys wants a new trial, claiming new evidence exposes his chief accuser as a manipulative liar intent on making money off the church.

Writing in support of their motion for a new trial for Gordon MacRae, attorney Robert Rosenthal of New York City and Manchester lawyer Cathy J. Green say new evidence reveals the accuser admitted to friends and family “his accusations were lies manufactured for diocese cash.”

MacRae was convicted at trial of sexually assaulting the teenager, then pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting three other boys. He is serving a 33 1/2 to 67 years prison sentence. He maintains his innocence.

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NEW MEXICO
KOB

[with video]

By: Joe Vigil, KOB Eyewitness News 4

Mary McCarthy Stanton, who said she was molested and raped by a priest in the 1960’s, felt compelled to speak out after seeing recent TV coverage of the death of former Santa Fe Archbishop Robert Sanchez.

Sanchez stepped down from his post, in part, after failing to take action against priests accused of sexually abusing children.

Stanton said she was bothered by how easily people were willing to forgive Sanchez when he died. …

Below is a statement released by the Archdiocese of Santa Fe:

“Archbishop Michael J. Sheehan, along with bishops from across the country, have acknowledged a sad reality of modern life: protecting children from sexual predators is not easy and cannot be taken for granted. To address this issue, the Archdiocese of Santa Fe has a Victims Assistance and Safe Environment Coordinator who oversees programs for children and adults to make everyone aware of how serious we are about protecting our children. ”

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WISCONSIN
WXOW

By Kevin Millard

SPARTA, Wisconsin (WXOW) – A pastor of a Sparta church is arrested on allegations he sexually assaulted a 16-year-old girl.

Sparta Police Chief Michael Kass says in a release that James Monson, 41, was taken into custody Monday evening on charges of Sex with a Child Age 16 or Older and Sexual Exploitation by Therapist.

Kass says Monson is the Pastor of the Gaining Ground Community Church, 620 Industrial Drive in Sparta.

Monday, the parent of the girl went to Sparta Police to report what was believed to be inappropriate touching between Monson and her daughter.

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WISCONSIN
SNAP Wisconsin

February 22, 2012

SNAPwisconsin.com
Statement by John Pilmaier, SNAP Wisconsin Director
CONTACT 414.336.8575

The pastor of Gaining Ground Community Church, located in Sparta Wisconsin, was arrested and taken into custody on charges of sex with a child age 16 or older and sexual exploitation by a therapist. Sparta police were notified by the victim’s mother that the pastor, James Monson, had inappropriately touched her daughter. When interviewed by police the victim reported she had sexual contact with Monson on several occasions.

This brave victim and her mother are to be commended for contacting and working with law enforcement officials. The Sparta police department is likewise to be applauded for their diligence in investigating this reported crime. It has been demonstrated time and time again that the sooner law enforcement authorities are involved in a possible child sex crime the better the chances are that predators will be prosecuted and prevented from harming additional youngsters.

The arrest of Pastor Monson is further evidence that the sexual abuse of children is an epidemic in Wisconsin and throughout the country. That is why Wisconsin legislators have introduced the Child Victims Act. State Representative Sandy Pasch (D-Whitefish Bay) who sponsored the legislation remarked “This is a huge issue, the number of children in Wisconsin and this country that are being sexually assaulted by adults. It’s a tragic epidemic and we have to step up and do something about it”.

This important child protection measure would remove the civil statute of limitations for child sexual abuse, the very crime that Monson is reported to have committed. All major law enforcement organizations and agencies have endorsed this important legislation. Citizens in Wisconsin should contact their respective representatives and urge them to pass the Child Victims Act.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
The Kansas City Star

By MARK MORRIS
The Kansas City Star

A former Kansas City-area Catholic priest sexually abused four boys in an Independence family, a lawsuit filed Wednesday in Jackson County Circuit Court alleges.

John Tulipana, who left the ministry in the mid-1990s, purportedly abused four boys while serving at St. Catherine of Siena Church in Kansas City. The suit alleged that the abuse began in 1976 and occurred on camping trips and at the family’s home.

The suit names Tulipana and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph as defendants. It does not identify the plaintiffs.

Tulipana could not be reached for comment Wednesday. A recording on his home phone line said the number had been disconnected.

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ARIZONA
NewsMax

Beleaguered Arizona Sheriff Paul Babeau on Tuesday asked authorities in a neighboring county for a comprehensive, independent investigation into allegations against him and his office.

Babeu asked the Gila County Sheriff’s Office and County Attorney’s Office to “look into allegations of human rights violations, threatening and intimidating, misuse of public resources, theft of property, theft of identity, fraud and impersonation.”

In a one-page letter to Gila County Sheriff John Armor and County Attorney Daisy Flores, Babeu said he had instructed his office and political staff “to fully cooperate with your inquiry in an effort to settle these allegations made against me.”

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ARIZONA
Tucson Citizen

by DA Morales on Feb. 22, 2012

Paul Babeu sues Catholic priest for sexual abuse.

Former Berkshire County Commissioner, Paul Babeu, is suing a former priest, accusing him of sexual abuse.

The suit was recently filed by Babeu who now lives in Arizona. It is the eleventh lawsuit filed this year against the Rev. Richard Lavigne.

Springfield Diocese Bishop Thomas Dupre has begun proceedings to defrock Lavigne, who recently completed a ten-year probation sentence.

from December 18, 2002.

How did that lawsuit turn out?

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NEW HAMPSHIRE
WMUR

KEENE, N.H. — Lawyers for a former Keene priest convicted of sexually abusing three boys are questioning his main accuser’s story and fighting to get him a new trial.

The Rev. Gordon MacRae was convicted in 1994 of sexually abusing boys in the 1980s. He has always maintained his innocence, and his attorneys said new statements from some who knew the main accuser cast doubt on the charges.

“We have information from these people that the church was seen at the time as almost as a cash machine,” said attorney Robert Rosenthal. “You make an accusation and you can get a nice settlement, and the accuser here, as well as his relatives, did just that.”

In the motion for a new trial filed by Rosenthal and attorney Carol Green, they said the accuser “had a reputation — at least among the community of family and friends — as a schemer and liar.”

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WISCONSIN
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on February 22, 2012

We are disappointed that the Diocese of LaCrosse was able to avoid responsibility for covering-up Ray Bornbach’s alleged crimes. Our hearts ache for Ms. Varga and the abuse she suffered.

We hope that despite the ruling yesterday, she is able to find justice by publicly exposing the wrongdoing by this predator and the Diocese. We hope that other victims of Bornbach or any priest from the Diocese of LaCrosse will now come forward and report their abuse.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Newsworks

February 22, 2012
By Elizabeth Fiedler

Today lawyers and a judge continue to plod through jury selection in the Philadelphia Archdiocese abuse case. It could take weeks to pick the 12 jurors and 10 alternates to hear the case of two former parish priests charged with abuse, plus a former, ordained administrator charged with endangering children.

Jury selection in a high-profile, high-stakes case like this clergy abuse trial is “very, very, very hard,” said Edward Ohlbaum, a professor of law at Temple University’s School of Law.

He said it will be a real challenge to find jurors who are unaware of the grand jury investigation into abuse by Catholic clergy that led to these charges, or who don’t have strong feelings about the general topic of abuse by clergy.

“The law doesn’t require that somebody sit on the jury without opinions,” Ohlbaum said. “But the law does say that if somebody has an opinion that favors one side or the other, that the opinion can not be fixed. We want people to be able to set aside their prejudices – because we all have them. And that’s really a hard job to be able to set that aside.”

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
Reuters

By Carey Gillam

KANSAS CITY | Wed Feb 22, 2012

(Reuters) – Catholic leaders in Kansas City covered up years of sexual abuse of several young children by a priest who led a Christian organization for youth, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday by four brothers who say they were victimized as children.

The lawsuit, one of more than two dozen pending in Kansas City alleging abuse by area priests, was filed in Jackson County Circuit Court in Kansas City, Missouri. It names Father John Tulipana and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph as defendants, alleging molestation dating to the 1970s and 1980s.

Tulipana resigned in 1994 after a 22-year career with the church when it became public that the Catholic Church paid his accusers and had them sign confidentiality agreements. Tulipana was not prosecuted criminally. He did not respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
UPI

Published: Feb. 22, 2012

PHILADELPHIA, Feb. 22 (UPI) — Jury selection entered the second day Wednesday in the sex-abuse and child-endangerment trial of three Philadelphia priests, official said.

Six defense attorneys and three prosecutors spent much of the session examining questionnaires filled out by 250 potential jurors.

William Brennan, a defense attorney for the Rev. James J. Brennan, accused of sexually abusing a boy in the 1990s, told The Philadelphia Inquirer the jury selection could take weeks, indicating one potential juror who made the first cut had written on a questionnaire, “As a Catholic, I am disgusted by these allegations.”

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CANADA
Indian Country Today Media Network

First they were abused at residential school. Then they were each charged thousands in fees by the very attorney who was supposed to help them obtain redress.

Fifty-five residential school survivors in Manitoba are getting their due, reimbursed for a total of nearly $1 million in fees that Howard Tennenhouse charged them collectively for negotiating their compensation under the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement.

Tennenhouse was disbarred on Tuesday after he pleaded guilty to charging the survivors $932,501.80 as fees, APTN reported. This was in addition to the 15 percent that the government pays attorneys on each settled claim, and should only have been levied if approved by an adjudicator, according to CBC News.

He was allegedly using the money to buy foreign real estate, APTN 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.

MONTANA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on February 22, 2012

We suspect that there are men in Montana right now who are suffering because they were hurt as kids by Davenport. We hope they’ll find the strength and courage to step forward, call police, protect kids, expose wrongdoing and start healing.

We also hope that every person who has any information or suspicions that could shed light on these allegations will call police so that the full truth might become clear.

If you have knowledge or suspicions – however old, small or seemingly insignificant – about child sex crimes, it’s your moral and civic duty to call police. Please summon the courage to do what’s right, call law enforcement and hopefully prevent more devastated lives.

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

CANADA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Barbara Dorris on February 22, 2012

It’s beyond heartbreaking that anyone would steal from deeply wounded adults who suffered so much as kids.

We hope this disgraceful lawyer will be hit with the most severe consequences possible and that there will be some kind of restitution.

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.

JACKSONVILLE (FL)
Clutch

Tuesday Feb 21, 2012 – by Britni Danielle

A church in Jacksonville, Florida is coming under fire for its controversial decision to ban children from its church services.

According to a local Jacksonville news affilate, Christ Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church has banned children from attending Sunday services because their new pastor, Darrell Gilyard, is a registered sex offender and cannot have contact with children.

In 2009 Gilyard plead guilty to lewd conduct and lewd molestation of two underage girls. While he was the pastor of Shiloh Baptist Church Gilyard molested a 15-year-old girl and sent a lewd text message to another. Under the conditions of his plea agreement, Gilyard cannot have “unsupervised contact with children under 18 years old,” and his new church has taken extraordinary steps to help Gilyard stick to the terms of his deal.

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.

AUSTRIA
Austrian Independent

A vast majority of Austrians approve a controversial group of Catholic priests’ demands.

Pollster Oekonsult said yesterday (Tues) 87 per cent of residents of the country welcome Helmut Schüller’s plan to go international with his Preachers’ Initiative. Schüller, who once headed Caritas Austria, established the initiative around half a year ago. The group says the Roman Catholic Church should allow preachers to ignore celibacy. The preachers also support liberal Catholics’ appeal for women to hold sermons.

Oekonsult also found that 86 per cent of Austrians know the group organised by Schüller. The Probstdorf parish priest claims that 400 Austrian Catholic preachers joined his initiative in past months. He recently appealed to the Conference of Austrian Bishops to stop ordering more parishes to merge.

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 League

The Catholic League’s 2011 Annual Report on Anti-Catholicism is now available. It covers all the major issues that the Catholic League dealt with in 2011, along with many others that came to our attention.

The report covers the following areas: activist organizations; the arts; business/workplace; education; government; and the media.

There are special sections as well: our exposé of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP); our response to a Rolling Stone article and a Philadelphia Inquirer editorial on the Archdiocese of Philadelphia; a reprint of our ads in defense of the Catholic Church that appeared in the New York Times and the Chicago Tribune; a lengthy analysis of the John Jay Report on Sexual Abuse; a detailed account of the attacks on Bishop Robert Finn by SNAP and the Kansas City Star; and a section on the War on Christmas.

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.