Clergy Child Molesters (90) — References/Chronology

• Oahu men who accused priest of sex assault settle lawsuit [1986 De Otero]  U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags Hawaii flag (USA State); Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Monterey Herald, www.montereyherald.com/mld/montereyherald/9220220.htm , Associated Press, Posted on Thu, Jul. 22, 2004
   HONOLULU (HI): Two Oahu men who accused a former Hawaii Catholic priest of sexually abusing them in 1986 when they were altar boys have settled their lawsuit against the Catholic Diocese of Hawaii.
   The men accused the Rev. Roberto de Otero of kissing them and touching their genitals while they were altar boys at St. John the Baptist Church in Kalihi.
   Diocesan records show de Otero left Hawaii in 1987 and lives in California.
   The settlement was filed with Circuit Judge Sabrina McKenna last month but no details will be made public, according to attorneys for both sides.
   "All I can tell you is it has been resolved," said David Gierlach, attorney for Darick Agasiva and Fa'amoana Purcell. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 09:23 PM] (This is the first of the Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse , for Thu July 22, 2004. )
^ ^  CONTENTS 1   14  Translate  Links  Events  Books  HOME  v v
< < Back  ^ ^  SCA-SOS  SOSA  Survivors Network Minnesota  Celibacy Crept  Non-marital  REFERENCES 41   81  Overview  Outreach  Books  "Fathers"  Religion  Submit  v v   Next > >
INTENTION: A challenge to RELIGIONS to PROTECT CHILDREN
Series starts: www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethicscontents.htm   Visit http://www.ncrnews.org/abuse
Sources JavaScript Kit and www.aftinet.org.au/campaigns/signonconfirm.html
   INCOMPLETE LINKS: Refer back to "References 61" for methods of obtaining the URLs.
• Kueng begins papal investigation in St. Poelten [Krenn] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   Die Presse, www.diepresse.at/Artikel.aspx?channel=&ressort=ee&id=434103 , Printed Edition, 22.July.2004
   ST. POELTEN, Austria: St. Poelten Bishop Kurt Krenn, who has faced repeated calls to resign since reports of a child porn scandal at a priests' training college emerged in his jurisdiction, met on Tuesday evening with Bishop Klaus Kueng, who has been sent by the Vatican as a papal investigator or apostolic visitor in the case.
   Bishop Kueng will be staying at a monastery near Herzogenburg while he conducts his investigation, a place he described as a "calm workplace" in conversation with journalists.
• Attorney: Confession will clear priest -- someone else downloaded porn. U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   KATC 3, http://katc.com/Global/story.asp?S=2075784&nav=EyAzP4tK , July 22, 2004
   ARNAUDVILLE, La. (AP) - The lawyer for a priest who has been suspended pending an Internet pornography probe says someone else has confessed to downloading the images onto a church computer.
   The Rev. Jules Arceneaux, pastor of St. Francis Regis Catholic Church in Arnaudville, was placed on administrative leave last weekend by the Diocese of Lafayette after federal investigators, acting on a tip from an informant, seized a church computer.
   Richard Greene, diocese spokesman, declined to comment Thursday on statements by Arceneaux's attorney, William Goode, that there had been a confession.
   Goode said Thursday he knows for "an absolute fact that somebody else has confessed ... to downloading the offensive material on the computer."
• Former youth pastor gets six months in jail for abuse charge [Broberg] -- Baptist
   Duluth News Tribune, www.duluthsuperior.com/mld/duluthsuperior/9219406.htm , Associated Press, Thu, Jul. 22, 2004
   OWATONNA, Minn. - A former youth pastor who pleaded guilty to having sex with a 16-year-old girl he counseled was sentenced Thursday to six months in jail.
   Scott Alan Broberg, 36, of Pine Springs, also was placed on 15 years probation and fined $5,000.
   Broberg was employed by Bethel Baptist Church of Owatonna in June of 2002, when the alleged incident happened.
• In depositions, bishop defends hesitation to act on abuse allegations [Urrutigoity] U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Switzerland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   Grand Forks Herald, www.grandforks.com/mld/grandforks/news/state/9219186.htm , By DAVID B. CARUSO, Associated Press, Thu, Jul. 22, 2004
   PHILADELPHIA (PA) The Diocese of Scranton learned in early 1999 that it might have a problem with a young priest who had been living at a Catholic boarding school for boys.
   In a letter marked "Confidential," a senior church official in Switzerland warned that the Rev. Carlos Urrutigoity had twice been accused of sexual misconduct before transferring to northeast Pennsylvania.
   The first allegation had gotten Urrutigoity thrown out of a seminary in Argentina. The second complaint had been made by a seminarian in Minnesota, who accused Urrutigoity of twice trying to grope him in his sleep.
   But after investigating, Scranton Bishop James Timlin decided not to take action. Urrutigoity insisted - and continues to maintain - that he was innocent, and a diocesan review board couldn't decide whether the charges were true.
   "There was nothing that I could do at that point," the now-retired Timlin explained in a legal deposition. "There was no way I could inflict any penalty or all of that because he hasn't been proven guilty. And so that was the end of that ... We felt we did all we could."
   Timlin's account of his handling of the case, included in hundreds of pages of records made public this month as part of a civil lawsuit, portray the diocese as willing to investigate allegations of sexual impropriety, but hesitant to take action against accused priests.
   Urrutigoity remained in an active ministry until 2002, when a man filed a lawsuit alleging that Urrutigoity and another priest had pressured him into sex while he was a teenage student at St. Gregory's Academy, a boarding school in Elmhurst.
• Three men file suits against priest [1980s Sicoli] -- repeated transfers.
   Monterey Herald, www.montereyherald.com/mld/montereyherald/news/nation/9219295.htm , BY RON GOLDWYN, Knight Ridder Newspapers, Thu, Jul. 22, 2004
   PHILADELPHIA (PA) (KRT) - The Rev. David C. Sicoli's Sea Isle City beach house was the lair for the priest to sexually molest teenage boys, three Levittown men charge in suits filed Thursday.
   The molesting, fueled by alcohol the priest bought for the youths at a nearby Wildwood bar, occurred in the early 1980s, the suits in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court allege.
   At the time, Sicoli served at Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Church in Levittown, where the teens had been altar boys and students.
   The suits claim that Sicoli's abuse of boys in the parish was known and reported to the Archdiocese of Philadelphia by the principal or other Immaculate Conception officials but that no parents or children were ever warned about it. The suit said Sicoli repeatedly was transferred from parish to parish after his ordination in 1975.
• All Aboard the Pedo-Train! [1980s Krumm, McFarland] - RCC.
   Orange County Weekly, http://www.ocweekly.com/ink/04/46/news-arellano.php , by Gustavo Arellano, ~ July 22, 2004
   CALIFORNIA: Father Gus Krumm officiated over Mass at St. Simon and Jude from 1988 to 1998. He arrived at the Huntington Beach parish thanks to a previous association with then-Bishop Norman McFarland, who oversaw Krumm at the Diocese of Reno when McFarland was bishop there during the early 1980s. McFarland accepted Krumm into the Reno diocese shortly after Krumm sexually molested a boy in California.
   If this scenario sounds familiar, it's because it is. A recent Weekly investigation has identified Krumm as the second pedo-priest whom McFarland allowed to serve in county parishes despite knowing of the molester's crimes while both served in Reno in the early 1980s.
   In 1982, McFarland-then the bishop of the Diocese of Reno-accepted Krumm from St. Anthony's Seminary in Santa Barbara shortly after Krumm was accused of molesting a boy there. McFarland had Krumm placed at St. James the Apostle Church in Las Vegas, where he stayed until 1985. Krumm wasn't associated with a parish again until 1988, when McFarland - by now bishop at the Orange Diocese-shuffled Krumm over to St. Simon and Jude.
• Healing is a step-by-step process
   The Catholic Telegraph, www.catholiccincinnati.org/tct/july2304/072304stepprocess.html , By Eileen Connelly, OSU, July 23, 2004
   CINCINNATI (OH): Archdiocese - All of us have times in our lives when we need to heal, forgive and move forward. Sandy Keiser, a community education specialist and consultant with Catholic Social Services of Southwestern Ohio, who presents workshops on these and other topics, shared her insights on the healing process with The Catholic Telegraph.
   The first step toward healing, said Keiser, a licensed social worker, is for people to identify the losses that are connected to whatever issue they are struggling with. "It's important to name what the loss is, determine its meaning and ask, 'how does this affect my relationship with God and the church?' "
   She stressed that it is perfectly acceptable for Catholics to feel anger and sadness about not only personal issues but regarding the church as a whole. What is essential for people to remember, Keiser said, is that the church is a human organization, made up of people who make mistakes.
   By keeping this in mind, she explained, Catholics can examine how to forgive the mistakes that have been made.
   Because grieving, healing and forgiveness don't happen overnight, besides identifying the source of the hurt, it is also critical for people to be patient with the process, discuss the issue with others and seek support in working toward resolution, Keiser added. Also necessary, she said is for people to take a step back and try to look at the issues objectively.
   In her ministry, Keiser said she has seen the ripple effects caused by the sexual abuse crisis. Whether people have impacted the crisis directly or indirectly, she has found it has brought other old hurts to the surface that have caused Catholics to question their faith. Keiser has found one meaningful and effective way to respond to those in this position is simply to say, "I'll keep you in my prayers.' " People have been really appreciative of this," she said
• Foster parent arrested on sexual abuse charges [2004 Schaper] -- Mormon
   KATU 2, http://www.katu.com/news/story.asp?ID=69440 , ~ July 22, 2004
   ALOHA, ORE. - An Aloha man is under arrest on charges he sexually abused three foster children that he and his wife were caring for.
   Police arrested 31-year-old David Schaper on multiple charges in the case, which involves three girls ranging in ages from two years old to nine years old.
   The girls, who are siblings, have since been placed in another foster home.
   While detectives say they have no reason to believe there are additional victims, they are concerned because Schaper had unsupervised contact with a number of children.
   Not only was he the leader of a Cub Scout troop, but he was also a youth pastor with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints [Mormon].
• Diocese OKs $7 million clergy abuse settlement -- RCC. Two properties to be sold. 46 victims.
   Republican, www.masslive.com/metrowest/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-0/1090533817256980.xml , By BILL ZAJAC, wzajac@repub.com , Thursday, July 22, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): Concluding more than two years of legal wrangling, a more than $7 million settlement was struck between 46 alleged clergy sexual abuse victims and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield today.
   A memorandum of understanding, outlining the settlement, was signed by lawyers representing both sides this afternoon.
   The deal, which includes $7 million in cash and proceeds from future sale of two diocesan properties, has a variety of non-monetary provisions.
   The 46 alleged victims, all of whom are represented by Greenfield lawyer John J. Stobierski, have 14 days to decide whether to enter into binding arbitration that will determine individual settlement amounts, according to a diocesan statement issued last night. If they choose not to enter the binding arbitration, they could pursue individual suits in court.
• Reaching out to Catholics who left church
   The Catholic Telegraph http://www.catholiccincinnati.org/tct/july2304/072304reaching.html , By Eileen Connelly, OSU, July 23, 2004
   CINCINNATI, Ohio: Archdiocese - Although the sexual abuse crisis has certainly caused some Catholics to question their faith, others say their issues with the church also have to do with past hurts, misunderstandings and frustrations.
   Christy Brown is one example. The mother of two teenagers, Brown was baptized and raised Catholic. Her husband is Jewish. At one time, Brown was extremely active in her parish, teaching CCD and assisting with the annual festival.
   She last attended Mass in 2003, after Archbishop Daniel E. Pilarczyk pleaded no contest on behalf of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati to charges of failing to tell authorities about sex abuse allegations.
   That incident, along with other issues Brown felt were relevant, including the city's racial tensions, were never addressed at her parish. She feels they should have been.
   "I left in the middle of Mass," Brown recalled. "It was the straw that broke the camel's back."
• New Catholics say their faith is holding
   The Catholic Telegraph http://www.catholiccincinnati.org/tct/july2304/072304catholics.html , By Eileen Connelly, OSU, July 23, 2004
   CINCINNATI, Ohio: Archdiocese - Catholics who are new to the church say their faith has not been deterred by the sexual abuse crisis. Rather, they are enthusiastic about the journey that led them to Catholicism and open to the possibilities that lie ahead.
   Although she was raised in the Evangelical Church of God, Heidi Miller had the opportunity to attend Mass several times as a child, courtesy of her Catholic father. Her call to Catholicism came, said Miller, directly over the radio, as the then-bedridden young woman listened to programming on Sacred Heart Radio. "Sometimes God has a funny way of calling," said Miller, who is coping with a congenital abnormality of her spine.
   After listening to Sacred Heart Radio and hearing about the history and teachings of the church, Miller was inclined to learn more. She began attending Mass at St. Monica-St. George Parish in Clifton Heights and, after a year and convincing her Protestant husband it was the right thing to do, she took the next step and began the RCIA process. Miller was received into the church at Easter Vigil.
• Ex-priest named in suit [O'Brien]
   Examiner http://www.examiner.net/stories/072204/new_072204017.shtml , By Cherryh Cluckey, July 22, 2004
   MISSOURI: Two Missouri men have filed a civil suit against a former Independence priest and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, saying they were sexually abused when they were 12.
   The men claim Monsignor Thomas J. O'Brien, Kansas City, molested them when they were members of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin parish in Independence.
   The suit alleges O'Brien gave the boys alcohol, while drinking himself, and that he groped, molested, skinny dipped and propositioned them in Independence and on a weekend trip to Lake Viking in Danes County.
   Other defendants named are Bishop Raymond Boland, a representative of the diocese, and Vicar General Father Patrick Rush, who is responsible for investigating allegations of sexual abuse by priests.
• Civil, church law may come in conflict in church's bankruptcy filing
   Catholic News Service http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0404046.htm , By Ed Langlois, ~ July 22, 2004
   PORTLAND, Ore. (CNS) -- The bankruptcy filing by the Archdiocese of Portland is almost certain to place church law and civic law in conflict.
   The two legal systems have met before in Oregon, and churches have often prevailed.
   In one instance, Catholic hospitals worked for the right to opt out of physician-assisted suicide, which was legalized in Oregon in 1997. In another, after Lane County officials tape recorded a murder suspect's sacramental confession in the mid-1990s, the courts eventually ruled the act an undue state intrusion.
   The debate even goes back to the 1920s, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned an Oregon law that would have closed down Catholic schools.
   Judges dealing with the first bankruptcy filing in history by a U.S. Catholic diocese will need to consider canon law against bankruptcy law and First Amendment rights of freedom of religion.
• Austrian Catholics welcome apostolic visitation [2004] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   Catholic World News, http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=31014 , Jul. 22, 2004
   VIENNA, Austria (CWNews.com) - Austrian Catholics are welcoming the announcement of an apostolic visitation to the St. Pölten diocese.
   "The decision by John Paul II has been received with great satisfaction," said Archbishop Georg Zur, the apostolic nuncio in Austria. "This measure is an important step toward cleaning up the problem."
   Erich Leitenberger, a spokesman for the Austrian bishops, added that the Pope's move has been applauded both by Church leaders (led by the country's most prominent prelate, Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna) and by public opinion generally. Leitenberger observed that the call for an apostolic visitation, a move that is "very rare in the universal Church," showed that the Vatican is determined to address the problem energetically.
   Bishop Kurt Krenn, the embattled head of the Austrian diocese, has posted an announcement on the diocesan web site "welcoming the appointment of an apostolic visitor." The diocesan site says that the apostolic visitor, Bishop Klaus Kung, "commissioned by the Pope, will submit the diocese and the seminary to a full, diligent, and objective test."
• RICO suit filed against Tucson diocese, Lavender Mafia [Keeler] -- RCC. Whistleblower prevented from being ordained.
   Cruxnews, http://www.cruxnews.com/rose/rose-23july04.html, July 23, 2004
   TUCSON, Arizona -- A former Catholic seminarian is suing the Diocese of Tucson, its bishops, and Bishop Wilton Gregory, the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops among other high-ranking American prelates. The suit alleges a pattern of racketeering activity exemplified by fraud and obstruction of justice.
   Attorney Ivan Abrams filed the case under provisions of federal RICO - Racketeering Influence and Corrupt Organizations - statutes. The federal RICO law is a set of statutes that was initially directed at shutting down organized crime. Over the past two years, however, RICO has been used by some plaintiffs who argue that the Church cover-up of the clergy abuse crisis falls under RICO's provisions.
   Philip A. Hower was studying at the Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus, Ohio, when he was ousted from the Diocese of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania by now-Cardinal William Keeler of Baltimore. Hower claims he was essentially 'fired' and later blackballed from ordination in other dioceses because he 'blew the whistle' on the homosexual activities of priests with whom he resided as a priest candidate.
   According to the federal lawsuit, filed in Tucson on July 16, Hower had satisfactorily fulfilled all seminary requirements to be ordained a transitional deacon, the final step on the path to ordination to the Catholic priesthood. In the summer of 1985, prior to completion of his Master of Divinity degree, Keeler assigned Hower to a parish in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania to complete his required pastoral internship under the supervision of Father John G. Allen.
• Vatican 'complicit in abuse cover-up' -- secrecy ordered 40 years ago U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Vatican City flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.
   The Australian, www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,10219144% 255E2702,00.html By Peter Shadbolt, Religious affairs writer, July 23, 2004
   AUSTRALIA: US lawyers claim a 40-year-old secret Vatican document offers explosive evidence the Vatican sanctioned the relocation of church workers accused of sexual abuse and promoted a culture of secrecy in dealing with the cases.
   The papal instruction, a process critics allege the Salesian order followed closely to move alleged pedophiles from post to post, was issued in 1962.
   But Houston-based lawyer Daniel Shea, who is acting for church abuse victims there, believes the order was still in force as recently as 2001.
   Mr Shea said a May 2001 letter to bishops from Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger - one of the most powerful figures in the Vatican after the Pope - clearly states the document was still church law.
   Tasmanian-based child abuse campaigner Denise Cripps saw the Vatican document earlier this month.
   "I was absolutely, incredibly shocked when I read it -- that after all these years the victims are still not being consulted and that it has been going on for so long," said Ms Cripps, of the Hobart-based group Survivors Investigating Child Sexual Abuse. [Emphasis added]
   [COMMENT: Search Engines would have revealed at http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/crimineextracts.htm and at other websites' previous webpages that the 1962 secrecy Instructio or Instruction was revealed on or around August 11, 2003. It is named Crimen Sollicitationis, Crime of Solicitation, dated March 16, 1962, approved by Pope John XXIII. The Vatican incorrectly claimed on August 7, 2003 that it had been superseded after the Second Vatican Council. The fact that it was quoted in 2001 as still binding is in the Papal Epistula or Letter, probably referred to in the above article, Epistula Graviora Delicta of May 18, 2001, which was revealed by an Irish newspaper on August 27, 2003. The Latin wording of this Letter and links to original webpages are at http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/crimineepistula.htm .
   Further proof that the 1962 Instruction still stands was given in the CLSA December 2002 Newsletter www.clsa.org/news/dec02/dec02.htm , of the Canon Law Society of America. There it was stated that on February 7, 2002 the 1962 document was included in the discussions about child abuse, held by the US visitors at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in Rome. ( By courtesy of: www.laurencesweeney.com/visit.htm .) The relevant paragraph is copied at http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethicscontents7.htm .
   Well might all who read this be "absolutely, incredibly shocked". The pity is that the majority of the public couldn't care less! COMMENT ENDS.]
• The Vatican's big secret -- the 1962 secrecy order was leaked (but 'heresy' documents are missing)
   The Australian, www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,10215795^28737,00.html , By Peter Shadbolt, July 23, 2004
   AUSTRALIA: The Vatican has never been ashamed about keeping secrets - after all, its repository of confidential documents is called the Vatican Secret Archive.
   Housing almost the entire history of the Western church - with the exception of pre-8th century heretical texts that at some point mysteriously disappeared, Name of the Rose-style - the library has 50km of shelves with more than 35,000 volumes on an incomplete catalogue.
   Its name is largely historical and it has been guardedly open to accredited scholars since the 19th century, but there's no browsing in this library. Researchers have to know in advance which document they want to see and even whether it exists at all. Many volumes are simply lost.
   But, as secrets tend to do, some come bobbing to the surface like corks.
   In August last year, a German-based chaplain with close ties to the Vatican found and leaked a 42-year-old papal instruction to US lawyers who say it is explosive evidence of a Vatican "ratline" to shield accused child abusers.
   "This document really shows that nothing has changed," says Tasmanian child abuse campaigner Denise Cripps. It also proves, she says, that there is a strong case for instituting the "zero-tolerance" policies of US dioceses in Australia and mandatory reporting of church abuse.
• Church's awareness of sex abuse examined -- Brothers knew in the 1930s Ireland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   One in Four organisation, http://oneinfour.org/news/news2004/aware , by Patsy McGarry, Religious Affairs Correspondent - Irish Times, ~ July 22, 2004
   IRELAND: The investigation committee of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse was asked yesterday to investigate when the Catholic Church first became aware of child sex abuse involving members in the current module of its hearings. The committee is now inquiring into how abuse emerged as an issue.
   Mr Colm O'Gorman of the One in Four agency, which supports people sexually abused as children, said international research indicated the church had such awareness, and had structures in place to deal with it, long before secular institutions.
   He later said evidence by the Christian Brothers to the committee indicated they were aware of the issue at least since the 1930s, and that already then Canon Law structures were in place to deal with it.
   He recalled that evidence to the committee by Government officials indicated the State first became aware of child sex abuse in institutions, in 1977.
   Mr Justice Ryan said the committee would be happy to conduct such an inquiry if it came within its terms of reference.
• Priest gets 5 years' probation [Kuhn]
   Cincinnati Enquirer, http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2004/07/22/loc_priestsentence22.html , By Sharon Coolidge, July 22, 2004
   DAYTON, Ohio - Saying she saw no remorse, no acknowledgement that he had done anything wrong, a judge sentenced the Rev. Thomas Kuhn to spend five years on probation and pay a $10,500 fine.
   Kuhn, 63, was convicted last month for providing alcohol to minors and engaging in public indecency at his home in suburban Dayton.
   Probation was better than the alternative sentence - a maximum of 18 months in jail - because authorities could keep a closer eye on Kuhn and force him to seek treatment, Montgomery County Common Pleas Judge Mary Katherine Huffman said.
   "You just don't get this," Huffman told Kuhn, a former principal at Elder High School in Price Hill. "You impacted a huge community at Incarnation (Catholic Church in Dayton), St. Henry (Church in Dayton) and Elder (High School). You sent those communities into turmoil, yet it's all about you.
   "That is a great concern to me."
• Parishioners Petition For Priest [Arceneaux]
   KATC, http://katc.com/Global/story.asp?S=2072790&nav=EyAzP3OT
   ARNAUDVILLE (LA): Church members in Arnaudville are standing behind their priest. The Lafayette Diocese removed Father Jules Arceneaux while the FBI investigates pornography found on a church computer. Members at St. Francis Regis Catholic Church are petitioning to get Father Arceneaux back.
   Despite the investigation, Chester Broussard and so far at least 90 other petitioners are signing their names asking the bishop to bring their priest back. "He's a man of God, he would not do anything like that," Velma Blanchard says.
   Broussard walked door-to-door collecting signatures. Deacon Davis, at neighboring St. Catherine Church signed right away. "Knowing him, I don't think he is culpable of anything," Davis says.
   They believe when the investigation reveals what really happened, Father Arceneaux will not be at fault. Broussard says there are several church computers many people, besides the priest, use. "Not only him, because other people have access too," Broussard says. It's torn us apart. Arnaudville didn't need this," he says.
• Diocese wins ruling in lawsuit [Trautman, Murphy] -- alleged defamation
   GoErie.com ; www.goerie.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040722/NEWS02/107220397 , By Ed Palattella, ed.palattella@timesnews.com , July 22, 2004
   ERIE (PA): The Catholic Diocese of Erie has won a second straight court ruling in a defamation suit filed against Bishop Donald W. Trautman and retired Bishop Michael J. Murphy.
   The state Superior Court upheld a previous dismissal of the suit, which also named the 13-county diocese as a defendant.
   The ruling by a three-judge panel of the intermediate appeals court means that the three women who filed the suit have one last chance to keep it alive: They need to win an appeal before the state Supreme Court.
   The three women, all from Erie County, claimed Trautman and Murphy defamed them in comments the bishops made in the Erie Times-News in April 2002 in a controversy over a diocesan priest arrested on charges that he possessed child pornography.
   Erie County President Judge William R. Cunningham dismissed the women's suit in September, saying that the statements of Murphy and Trautman did not rise to the level of defamation, though he also said Trautman's statements were "unnecessarily harsh."
   The women - Anna Caro, Helen Rusnak and Sally Beres - claimed that the bishops' statements characterized them as liars.
• Vatican Names Austrian Seminary Inspector -- he's a bishop. [2004] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   The Mercury-News, www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/9215307.htm?ERIGHTS=- 7604291314962306005mercurynews::kashaw@peoplepc.com&KRD_RM= 4nrnolomtsptrnrkkkkkkkkloo|Kathleen|Y ; By WILLIAM J. KOLE, Associated Press
   VIENNA, Austria - Moving to contain a scandal that has deeply embarrassed the Roman Catholic Church, Pope John Paul II appointed a special inspector Tuesday to investigate a seminary where authorities uncovered 40,000 pornographic photos, including child porn.
   The pope named Austrian Bishop Klaus Kueng as an "apostolic visitor" for the embattled diocese of St. Poelten and its seminary.
   Austrian authorities have launched a separate criminal investigation into the recent discovery of some 40,000 photographs and numerous videos at the seminary about 50 miles west of Vienna.
   Kueng will have "comprehensive authority" to review all operations at the seminary and within the St. Poelten diocese, and will report directly to the pope, the Archdiocese of Vienna said. He was to begin his inquiry Wednesday.
• Honolulu diocese settles abuse suit  U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Hawaii flag (USA State); Mooney's MiniFlags
   Honolulu Star-Bulletin, http://starbulletin.com/2004/07/22/news/story2.html , By Mary Adamski, madamski@starbulletin.com , July 22, 2004
   HAWAII: Two Oahu men who claimed a priest sexually abused them when they were altar boys in 1986 have reached a settlement agreement with the Honolulu Catholic diocese.
   No information will be made public about the settlement, which was filed with Circuit Judge Sabrina McKenna last month, attorneys from both sides said yesterday.
   "All I can tell you is it has been resolved," said David Gierlach, attorney for Darick Agasiva and Fa'amoana Purcell.
   "The settlement is confidential at the request of plaintiffs," said Stephen Dyer, attorney for the diocese.
   He said the civil suit was dismissed with prejudice, meaning it cannot be filed again.
   "If it were the diocese's choice, you would know everything," said local church spokesman Patrick Downes.
• Man guilty in sex assault on 2 girls [1999 Hendrickson] -- stopped when joined a Church
   The Journal News, www.thejournalnews.com/newsroom/072204/b0322hendrickson.html , By JONATHAN BANDLER, July 22, 2004
   NEW YORK: A Yonkers man was convicted yesterday of sexually assaulting two girls in a case that developed from allegations that child members of a storefront church were beaten when they violated church tenets.
   Theodore Hendrickson, 37, watched with no obvious emotion as the jury forewoman pronounced him guilty on all charges related to the rape of a teenage girl and the sodomy of an 11-year-old girl.
   Westchester County Judge Lester Adler ordered him held at the county jail to await sentencing on Sept. 13, when he faces up to 25 years in state prison on each of the four top counts of first-degree rape and sodomy.
   The girls testified that the abuse occurred in 1999 and that Hendrickson never abused them again after he joined God's Healing Cathedral at the end of that year and they told the church pastor, his wife, Hendrickson's wife and other church members of the abuse.
• Alleged 'past activities' detailed [Peckham] -- Methodist and other sects
   The Joplin Globe, www.joplinglobe.com/story.php?story_id=122487 , by Jeff Lehr, July/22/04
   MISSOURI: The Rev. Donald Peckham opened the envelope that had arrived by mail at his home in Sarcoxie in January 2001, according to the man who wrote it.
   Perhaps he sensed the anger and the anguish of the letter it contained in its opening words. Perhaps he did not.
   Peckham, then 68, was the much-respected pastor of the Jubilee Christian Fellowship Church in Sarcoxie and the married father of three adult daughters.
   He was a man of the cloth who had served at numerous churches of multiple denominations in Missouri and Kansas. He was a man another Sarcoxie pastor has described as the kind of guy who would buy groceries for members of his congregation, help them pay their bills and find them jobs.
   The missive addressed to him said: "My name is Buddy Hollis (Walter O. Hollis). I live in Wichita, Kansas. I am age 53. "When you were pastor at the Towanda United Methodist Church in Towanda, Kansas, I was a member of that church, too. My stepfather's name was Harold Hull.
   "I set up an appointment with you, as did two other boys who were scouts in Troop 232. We were working on our 'God and Country Award' and each of us had appointments to discuss obtaining this award with your help. We were each 11 years old. [Can't get the next part, due to Internet problems - 23 July 2004]
• Former pastor signs plea agreement to sexual exploitation [Hollingsworth] -- Baptist
   WQAD www.wqad.com/Global/story.asp?S=2073342
   BURLINGTON, Iowa: A former pastor of Danville's First Baptist Church has agreed to plead guilty to an aggravated misdemeanor charge of sexual exploitation by a counselor, but the alleged victim says the offer is too lenient.
   Harry Hollingsworth was arrested March 23rd on a felony warrant for sexual abuse by a counselor or therapist. District Judge Cynthia Danielson has reset a pretrial conference for August 23rd and scheduled a sentencing for that date.
   The 57-year-old Hollingsworth faces up to two years in prison and a 5-thousand dollar fine on the aggravated misdemeanor charge, but the plea agreement calls for the prosecution to recommend two years probation and not resist if Hollingsworth requests a deferred judgment.
• Springfield Diocese settles lawsuit on sexual abuse [1973-80 Weerts]
   Belleville News-Democrat, www.belleville.com/mld/newsdemocrat/9211108.htm , From staff and wire reports
   SPRINGFIELD (IL): The Catholic Diocese of Springfield recently settled a lawsuit brought by eight men who said they were sexually abused, some at a Granite City apartment, by a former priest in the 1970s.
   Diocese spokeswoman Kathie Sass said Wednesday the men will share $1.2 million.
   Five of the men filed suit against the diocese in Edwardsville in September. The lawsuit alleged abuse by former priest Walter Weerts between 1973 and 1980 when he was pastor of Sacred Heart Parish in Villa Grove. Three other men were added during the mediation process.
   The five men alleged in the original lawsuit that Weerts took them on weekend getaways from their parish in Villa Grove, about 25 miles south of Champaign, to an apartment he owned in Granite City. It was there that Weerts abused them, they alleged.
   Weerts, ordained in 1960, was known for his lavish lifestyle. The former priest drove a Mercedes and used a private plane to fly boys in his parishes on trips throughout Southern Illinois and around the country, according to the plaintiff's attorney, Jeffrey Anderson.
• More Allegations In Priest Abuse Case -- of girls [1950s-60s MacArthur]
   Keloland.com ; www.keloland.com/NewsDetail2817.cfm?Id=22,33478
   SIOUX FALLS (SD): A former Sioux Falls priest is accused of abusing half a dozen children. Now, a lawyer representing the alleged victims says at least ten more South Dakota women have come forward with claims that Father Bruce MacArthur sexually abused them.
   Court papers show MacArthur lead several churches South Dakota between 1959 and 1967, including Milbank, Platte, Yankton, Mellette, Ramona, Britton, Gettysburg, Seneca and McKennan Hospital in Sioux Falls.
   The Florida woman who was first to accuse Father Bruce MacArthur says she can sympathize with new victims who've recently come forward.
   Judy DeLonga says MacArthur used family's respect for the Catholic Church to gain control of their children, "He was part of our family, came to our home daily and ate dinner with us."
• $1.2 million will be paid in abuse suit [16 years, impregnated 1977, Niebrugge; 1973-80 Weerts]
   SJ-R.com ; www.sj-r.com/sections/news/stories/30663.asp , By LISA KERNEK
   SPRINGFIELD (IL): The Catholic Diocese of Springfield has agreed to pay $1.2 million to eight men who alleged that a priest sexually abused them as youths in the 1970s.
   And in a separate case involving the diocese, a Madison County judge last month dismissed a lawsuit in which a Georgia woman accused a priest of abusing her as a child. The woman, Virginia Galloway, filed court papers last week indicating she will appeal.
   Neither of the priests serves in the diocese any longer. The Rev. Richard Niebrugge, Galloway's alleged abuser, died in 1983. The lawsuit claimed that Niebrugge sexually abused her for 16 years and made her pregnant in 1977.
   The eight men who settled with the diocese accused the Rev. Walter Weerts of abusing them between 1973 and 1980.
• Suit raises new allegations of sex abuse by priest [Urrutigoity, Ensey]
   Scranton Times, www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=12433853&BRD=2185&PAG=461&dept_id= 416046&rfi=6 By Chris Birk, TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER, July/22/2004
   SCRANTON (PA): Additional accounts of sexual abuse by the Rev. Carlos Urrutigoity, one of two Society of St. John priests accused of misconduct in a John Doe lawsuit, appear in court documents filed this week.
   Father Urrutigoity and the Rev. Eric Ensey are set to face trial in September for allegedly molesting a former St. Gregory Academy student between 1997 and 2000. The Diocese of Scranton, then Bishop James C. Timlin, the society and two other groups are also named in the suit.
   The former student's attorney, James Bendell, has accused Bishop Timlin and the diocese with negligence regarding the two priests, their backgrounds and the investigations into alleged abuse.
   In a sworn statement from July 9, another former St. Gregory's student -- now living in Virginia -- claims that while sleeping in the same bed with Father Urrutigoity, he woke up to find the priest's hand on his abdomen. Father Urrutigoity, the student said, then worked his hand down and grabbed his penis.
• Confession may clear accused Arnaudville priest [Arceneaux] -- another person confessed to porn download.
   The Opelousas Daily World, www.dailyworld.com/html/9E8510B9-CF43-4D6A-AD63-CB6A1EB1E17B.shtml , by Stephanie Kirk, Posted on July 22, 2004
   ARNAUDVILLE (LA): The attorney for the Rev. Jules Arceneaux made a statement on KLFY TV 10 that may clear the priest's name.
   Attorney William Goode of Lafayette said Wednesday someone else confessed to downloading images on the church's computer.
   Arceneaux, pastor of St. Francis Regis Catholic Church in Arnaudville, was placed on administrative leave pending a federal investigation into pornography discovered on a church computer just days ago.
   Kenneth Wyatt, a longtime member of St. Francis Regis Catholic Church of Arnaudville, said he knew that was not in the character of the priest at his church.
   The priest's administrative leave was announced to church members at a Saturday Mass. According to a July 18 Daily World article, officials with the Diocese of Lafayette said a computer was seized July 13 from the church rectory on Pine Street by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
   Diocese officials said the move was made to protect the flock from the possibility of any inappropriate behavior, in keeping in line with the diocese's policy established by Bishop Michael Jarrell.
• Local Pastor Charged With Raping Daughter [1980s for 11 years Melton] -- Baptist
   NBC 13, www.nbc13.com/news/3562148/detail.html , POSTED: 7:22 pm CDT, July 21, 2004
   WESTOVER, Ala. -- A local pastor charged with raping his daughter went before a Chilton County judge Wednesday morning for a preliminary hearing.
   Ralph Randall Melton faces sexual assault allegations that go back 20 years. His daughter, now in her 30s, is the alleged victim.
   She claims Melton raped her over an 11-year period beginning when she was 4 years old.
   Melton was not a minister during that time. He's now the pastor of the Prospect Baptist Church in Westover.
• Court upholds dismissal of defamation lawsuit against Erie bishop, diocese by whistleblowers [1999 Bower]
   Times Leader, www.timesleader.com/mld/timesleader/news/local/9211173.htm , Associated Press
   ERIE, Pa. - The state Superior Court has upheld the dismissal of a defamation lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Erie, Bishop Donald Trautman and retired Bishop Michael Murphy.
   Three women - former diocesan secretary Sally Beres, Ann Caro and Helen Rusnak - alleged that church officials began a defamation campaign against them when they complained about former priest Robert F. Bower.
   Bower resigned in 2002 after a newspaper report that he had been arrested for possession of child pornography in 1999. Those charges were dropped, prosecutors said, because police mishandled evidence and it could not be used at trial.
   In their lawsuit, the women said Trautman, who replaced Murphy, directed some priests to sermonize against them from the pulpit and characterized the women as liars in a letter he released to the public in 2002.
   In September 2003, Erie County President Judge William R. Cunningham dismissed the women's suit, saying that while Trautman's letter was "unnecessarily harsh," his statements and those of Murphy didn't rise to the level of defamation.
• Tri-State Priest Sentenced For Serving Alcohol To Minors [Kuhn]
   ChannelCincinnati.com ; www.channelcincinnati.com/news/3560923/detail.html
   CINCINNATI (OH): A local priest was sentenced Wednesday on 11 charges involving public indecency and serving alcohol to minors.
   The Rev. Thomas Kuhn faced a possible 18 months in prison, but was sentenced to five years of probation instead, WLWT Eyewitness News 5's Courtis Fuller reported Wednesday.
   Kuhn's probation carries the following requirements:
* Daily Alcoholics Anonymous meetings
* Gambling addiction counseling
* Sexual abuse counseling
* 500 hours of community service
   Another stipulation forbids Kuhn from working in any capacity with anyone 20 years old or younger, Fuller reported. Kuhn, 63, also was fined $10,250. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 01:36 AM]
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Thu July 22, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
• Priest who made Christ comparison avoids accusers by transfer overseas and to Rome. [Fox] Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.
   The Age (Melbourne), "Priest criticised for Christ comparison," http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/07/21/1090089223757.html?oneclick=true , By Martin Daly, July 22, 2004
   MELBOURNE (Victoria), Australia: A mother who attributes her son's drug-related serious illness and life punctuated by imprisonment to sex abuse by a Salesian priest criticised the accused Catholic cleric yesterday for comparing his case to that of a wrongly accused Jesus Christ.
   "It is an insult to God, never mind Catholics," said the woman, who asked not to be identified.
   Her son received a $35,600 settlement from the Salesians in 2000, with denial of liability, over alleged abuse at the Salesians' Rupertswood college in Sunbury during 1978 and 1979.
   "How dare he compare himself to Jesus . . . I find the whole thing extraordinary," she said.
   The woman said all Christians should be outraged by the use of Christ's name in the abuse scandal.
   She also condemned the Salesians in Rome for giving the accused priest, Father Julian Fox, a job at their headquarters.
   "He obviously has delusions of greatness," she said, accusing Salesians in Rome of protecting the priest.
   "It is mind boggling," she said, particularly as the head of the order in Australia, Father Ian Murdoch, had done so much to combat abuse and had made a stand against Father Fox returning to Australia as a priest unless he agreed to adhere to certain conditions.
   Father Fox, who for six years was head of the 115-member Salesian order in Australia and the Pacific, and was rector of the Salesians in Fiji, was reported in The Age yesterday as denying any abuse. He said he could not recall the alleged victims when the names were told to him.
   Asked why he would have become the target of false allegations, he said Jesus was probably asking himself the same question on the cross. "It is the same situation . . . to be falsely accused," he said.
   Father Fox's job in Rome as a member of the executive of the Salesian World Commission for Social Communication and secretary to the commission's general counsellor has been welcomed elsewhere. A website containing a Salesian bulletin describes Father Fox's appointment as a loss for the Australian province but "the worldwide society's gain".
   The alleged abuse victim whose mother spoke out yesterday first went to Rupertswood in 1978. The boy did not tell his Catholic parents about any abuse.
   Later, he rebelled against adult authority and engaged in anti-social and self-damaging activities, according to sources familiar with the case.
   The alleged victim became addicted to drugs and was jailed. The details of the alleged abuse emerged after he had confided to a counsellor, who took the matter up with the Salesians.
   But he was not believed, a response described as "tragic" by Father Murdoch, who later signed the out-of-court settlement with the alleged victim and flew to Fiji to confront Father Fox. (By courtesy of Broken Rites, Australia) [Jul 22, 04]
• Speedy response to Austrian sex scandal reflects seriousness. Vatican City flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.  Fiji flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   CathNews, http://www.cathnews.com/news/407/121.php , July 22, 2004
   VATICAN CITY: An official has revealed that the seriousness of the circumstances are reflected in the unusual haste with which the Vatican appointed an apostolic visitor (or investigator) to go to the Austrian seminary where prosecutors charged a 27-year-old Polish seminarian with possession and distribution of child pornography.
   Catholic News Service quotes an unnamed official who said the seized photographs "show widespread corruption within the seminary," and that the Holy Father must have been horrified"
   The agency reports that the appointment of the apostolic visitor came less than a week after Bishop Krenn announced he had established a commission to investigate what had occurred at the seminary and only one day after Austrian prosecutors charged a 27-year-old Polish seminarian with possession and distribution of child pornography.
   Pope John Paul II's speed in ordering a special investigation into an Austrian diocese and its seminary reflects the seriousness of the allegations of sexual misconduct there as well as the formal request of the Austrian bishops' conference, Vatican officials said.
   "There was an internal investigation, and both the investigator appointed by the local bishop and the Austrian bishops' conference requested the nomination of an apostolic visitor," said Passionist Fr Ciro Benedettini, Vatican spokesman.
   The Vatican announced on Tuesday that Pope John Paul had named Austrian Bishop Klaus Kung of Feldkirch to conduct an apostolic visitation of the diocese and, particularly, the seminary. Earlier, a spokesman said Bishop Kurt Krenn of Sankt Polten had begun his own investigation of the situation.
   Earlier an an Austrian magazine published pictures of priests and students kissing and fondling each other. Austrian authorities said the images had been found along with more than 40,000 photos and videos -- including child pornography -- on seminary computers.
   A Vatican official, who asked not to be named, said the publication of photographs showing members of the seminary staff and students engaged in inappropriate sexual behavior "is scandalous in the most literal sense."
   Meanwhile in ongoing publicity associated with revelations of alleged sex abuse by members of the Salesian order, The Age reports today that a mother who attributes her son's drug-related serious illness to sex abuse by a former Salesian Provincial yesterday criticised the priest for comparing himself publicly with the wrongly accused Jesus Christ.
   "It is an insult to God, never mind Catholics," said the woman, who asked not to be identified.
   Her son received a $35,600 settlement from the Salesians in 2000, with denial of liability, over alleged abuse at the Salesians' Rupertswood college in Sunbury during 1978 and 1979.
   "How dare he compare himself to Jesus . . . I find the whole thing extraordinary," she said, praising the actions of current Provincial Fr Ian Murdoch.
   "It is mind boggling," she said, particularly as the head of the order in Australia, Fr Ian Murdoch, had done so much to combat abuse and had made a stand against Fr Fox returning to Australia as a priest unless he agreed to adhere to certain conditions.
   Fr Fox, who for six years was head of the 115-member Salesian order in Australia and the Pacific, and was rector of the Salesians in Fiji, was reported in The Age yesterday as denying any abuse. He said he could not recall the alleged victims when the names were told to him.
   Asked why he would have become the target of false allegations, he said Jesus was probably asking himself the same question on the cross. "It is the same situation . . . to be falsely accused," he said.
   Fr Fox's job in Rome as a member of the executive of the Salesian World Commission for Social Communication and secretary to the commission's general counsellor has been welcomed elsewhere. A website containing a Salesian bulletin describes Fr Fox's appointment as a loss for the Australian province but "the worldwide society's gain".
   SOURCES:
Vatican: Speedy response to Austrian sex scandal reflects seriousness (Catholic News Service 21/7/04)
Priest criticised for Christ comparison (The Age 22/7/04)
   LINKS:
Pope names bishop to look into scandal at Austrian seminary (CathNews 21/7/04)
Other Pontifical Acts (Vatican Information Service 20/7/04)
Vatican sends investigator to Austrian diocese (Catholic World News 20/7/04)
Pope Names Investigator for Austrian Sex Scandal (Reuters 20/7/04)
Vatican Enters Austria Seminary Dispute (The Guardian/Associated Press 20/7/04)
Austrian chancellor incensed by priest sex scandal (Reuters 17/7/04)
Austrian bishops await Vatican move on scandal (Catholic World News 16/7/04)
St. Pölten and Gomorrah? (Weinerzeitung.at 20/7/04)
Vatican investigates Austrian child porn scandal (Associated Press/MSNBC 20/7/04)
Austria probes seminary sex claims (CathNews 13/7/04)
Priests 'In Orgy' at Seminary (The Scotsman 12/7/04)

Another top Salesian speaks to The Age (CathNews 21/7/04)
Salesians ponder big picture (The Age 20/7/04)
Salesian provincial speaks on sex-abuse scandal (Catholic World News 19/7/04)
Mission to defrock sex abuser (The Age 19/7/04)
Salesian Provincial breaks silence on sex abuse (CathNews 19/7/04)
Salesian principal faces abuse claim (CathNews 15/7/04)
Allegation causes principal to stand aside (ABC North & West SA 14/7/04)
Salesian priest leaves Samoa (CathNews 9/7/04)
Salesian Works in Samoa: Moamoa Theological College
Convicted priest continues direct contact with children (Samoa News/Tala Nei News)
Shelter for the shamed? (The Australian 6/7/04)
Abuser 'not moved to avoid police' (CathNews 1/7/04)
Priest warned students of perils ahead (The Age 1/7/04)
Probe into sex abuse of wards (Daily Telegraph 1/7/04)
Samoa considers deporting priests (The Age 30/6/04)
Salesians 'knew of Klep allegations' (CathNews 29/6/04)
Salesian arrested at Melbourne Airport (CathNews 28/6/04)
Counting the cost of a priest's bad faith (The Age 26/6/04)
Father Klep refused bail (ABC Radio PM 25/6/04)
Father Klep back in Australia (ABC Radio The World Today 25/6/04)
Priest charged with sex offences (AAP/The Age 25/6/04)
Paedophile priest refused bail (Herald-Sun 25/6/04)
  HAVE YOUR SAY">Click here    [Emphasis added] [Jul 22, 04]
#### Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse, Fri July 23, 2004 edition follows:-
• Brazil's child sex abusers feel the heat [Filho] Brazil flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Aljazeera, http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/979854FF-D028-4958-A7CE-FBDEAFC0C288.htm , By Gibby Zobel in Sao Paulo, 17:27 Makka Time, 14:27 GMT, Saturday 17 July 2004,
   BRAZIL: More than 250 members of the Brazilian elite - politicians, judges, priests and businessmen among others - have been put on notice by an extraordinary national investigation into child sex rings.
   The inquiry accuses 20 serving politicians, including a federal deputy, two state deputies and three city mayors. Thirty businessmen are implicated, as are five priests.
   "Sexual exploitation in Brazil is a crime which has reached epidemic proportions," says federal deputy Maria do Rosario, the author of the parliamentary inquiry report. ...
   Another important point, according to Senator Saboya, "is that a lot of religious leaders, of the Catholic church, Evangelical and Afro-Brazilian religions, are using their power in the community to sexually exploit children".
   One of the accused is the evangelical pastor Davi Moreira Filho of the God and Love Church in Sao Paulo. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 10:32 PM]
• Pastor hides in tree  South Africa flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   News 24, www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,,2-7-1442_1561046,00.html , by Riot Hlatshwayo, 15:18 - (SA), 21/July/2004
   BURGERSFORT, South Africa - A Limpopo pastor hid in a tree when police arrived at his house on Tuesday night to charge him with raping a 13-year-old girl.
   The 57-year-old pastor from Bothashoek village near Burgersfort jumped out of the tree when he thought the police had left, but they saw him and arrested him.
   "The girl said she'd been raped in a ditch about 17:00 that day while on her way to fetch relish for her mother," said investigating officer, Inspector Mahlathini Ngele on Wednesday.
   He said the girl knew the pastor well as he'd previously prayed with her and her friends.
• Diocese reaches tentative agreement with 46 alleged abuse victims [Lavigne, Meehan, Lavelle, Welch, Huller; $US7m 'global' offer]
   iobserve, www.iobserve.org/rn0723a.html , By Father Bill Pomerleau, Observer staff,
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): The Diocese of Springfield has reached a tentative agreement with 46 individuals who say that they were sexually abused by five diocesan priests.
   According to a memorandum of understanding signed the afternoon of July 22, the diocese has offered a global amount of $7 million, plus the proceeds from the eventual sale of two diocesan properties, to a pool that that would settle claims by the clients of Attorney John Stobierski.
   The agreement also guarantees lifetime, outside counseling to those bringing accusations, and access to other outreach services provided through the diocese.
   The agreement covers allegations of abuse by former priest Richard Lavigne, Fathers Richard F. Meehan and Francis P. Lavelle, the late Msgr. David P. Welch, and the late Father E. Karl Huller.
• 3 Bucks men sue priest, allege abuse [1978-83 Sicoli]
   Bucks County Courier Times www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/111-07232004-336103.html , By HARRY YANOSHAK, July 23, 2004
   PENNSYLVANIA: Three Bucks County men filed separate lawsuits alleging they were sexually abused by a former assistant pastor at Immaculate Conception BVM Church in Bristol Township.
   Filed in Philadelphia Thursday, the lawsuits seek not only damages from the accused priest, the Rev. David Sicoli, but also from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, Cardinal Justin Rigali and/or Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua.
   Attorneys for the men on Wednesday filed lawsuits in Lehigh and Schuylkill counties on behalf of a woman and two men who alleged sexual abuse by priests in the Diocese of Allentown.
   In the Bucks County cases, Matthew Woodruff, 39, of Middletown and two unnamed Levittown men, both 38, each claim that Sicoli supplied alcohol and molested them several times during sleepovers at his beach house in Sea Isle City, N.J.
   The priest also allegedly took them to a bar in Wildwood, where they were served alcohol.
   The reported abuse occurred between 1978 and 1983, while Sicoli served as an assistant pastor at Immaculate Conception. The men were 14 or 15 when the abuse started to occur, the lawsuits claim.
• Lawyer predicts most claimants will accept proposed settlement with diocese [1971; $US7m]
   Gainesville Sun, www.gainesvillesun.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040723/APN/407230597 , By TRUDY TYNAN, Associated Press Writer, July 23, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD, Mass.: The lawyer for 46 alleged victims of abusive priests said Friday that he expects the "vast majority" of them will accept a proposed settlement of more than $7 million with the Diocese of Springfield.
   "It does justice," John Stobierski said outside the county courthouse. "It gives credit to what these survivors have gone through and we applaud the diocese for coming to the table in this matter."
   Under the proposed deal, each of the claimants would receive a minimum of $80,000, with the individual awards to be determined by an arbitration panel.
   The amount they receive will depend on the type of abuse - ranging from fondling to rape - and how long the abuse lasted, with an average award expected to be around $165,000.
   Several of Stobierski's clients said money alone would not heal the wounds.
   "You can't put a price tag on what my family and I went through, but I do think this is an acknowledgment by the diocese of what happened," said Marty Bono, a Chicopee man who said he was molested by a priest in 1971.
   "It doesn't make you happy," said Tom Martin of Springfield, another alleged victim. "It doesn't take away the pain. It doesn't bring back your childhood. It is really only one step on the healing process."
• Attorneys Fear About Church Insurers -- could delay 700 settlements
   philly.com ; www.philly.com/mld/philly/news/9228156.htm? ERIGHTS=-8519421270616297823philly::kashaw@ peoplepc.com&KRD_RM= 1impqpknppohhhhhhhhhholjmp|Kathleen|Y ; By GILLIAN FLACCUS, Associated Press
   LOS ANGELES (CA): Attorneys for both alleged victims and Roman Catholic dioceses in Southern California say they're increasingly concerned that insurance companies could hold up settlements in nearly 700 lawsuits that accuse clergy of sexual molestation.
   Plaintiffs attorneys and church officials say insurers are the main obstacle to settling nearly 100 Orange County claims, despite intense negotiations recently in the Diocese of Orange. Attorneys fear the same thing could happen in the Los Angeles Archdiocese and the dioceses of San Diego and San Bernardino, where talks are not as far along.
   "The carrier is essentially saying ... you can't settle these cases and if you settle these cases we're going to argue that we're not bound by any settlement you agree to," said Ray Boucher, a plaintiffs' attorney. "That's the threat that's being held over the head of Orange County and to a lesser extent over the head of Los Angeles."
   The role of insurers has been an important one throughout the U.S. clergy abuse crisis, now in its third year. The insurers often argue that by shielding employees accused of criminal activity, dioceses have breached their contract and are therefore not eligible for reimbursement. Many dioceses have blamed insurers for defense tactics that victims have called unfair and hurtful; insurers choose the lawyers and require dioceses to aggressively defend themselves or forgo coverage. [Emphasis added]
• Attorney asks judge to force disclosure of Diocese documents
   WHO, www.whotv.com/Global/story.asp?S=2082464
   IOWA CITY, Iowa: Plaintiffs suing the Roman Catholic Diocese of Davenport over sexual abuse charges want a state judge to force the release of documents church officials have fought to keep private for more than a year.
   The plaintiffs, citing growing impatience and frustration, requested that District Judge C.H. Pelton require the diocese to hand over priest files and documents. That's according to a motion filed this week in Scott County District Court.
   The request marks the third time attorneys for the plaintiffs have sought judicial leverage in obtaining the papers. Pelton initially ordered the documents released to the plaintiffs last fall and an appeal of that ruling by the diocese was denied by the Iowa Supreme Court.
• Federal Complaint Alleges Racketeering By Roman Catholic Church
   KOLD, www.kold.com/Global/story.asp?S=2082806&nav=14RTP8T2 , By Jim Becker, KOLD News 13 Reporter, Posted July-23-04
   TUCSON (AZ): It's a new take in the sexual abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church. A Tucson man is suing the Catholic Church claiming it's involved in racketeering.
   As a seminarian, Philip Hower claims he spurned a priests sexual advances.
   "He made two passes at me sexually. He's known among his brethren as a homosexual and a pedophile priest," said Hower.
   He claims he was forced to leave the seminary, and he alleges the Church covered up for the offending priest, something Hower and his attorney say is part of a pattern within the Church, worldwide.
   An expert on criminal law at the University of Arizona, Jack Chin, says Churches cannot use the first amendment to protect themselves from racketeering laws. In other words Churches can't sell drugs and expect to be protected.
• Abuse charges settled, Springfield Diocese agrees to pay $7M [1960s-70s]
   Daily Hampshire Gazette, www.dailyhampshiregazette.com/cspstory.cfm?id_no=7230177
   SPRINGFIELD (MA)(AP) - No amount of money ever will heal the pain Andre Tessier feels.
   He says he was abused by a Catholic priest growing up in Springfield in the late 1960s and early 1970s, abuse that has caused him 30 years of "guilt and shame," made him feel abandoned by the religion he was raised in and almost cost him his marriage.
   But in an effort to move on, the Connecticut man said Thursday, he will accept his slice of a more than $7 million settlement agreed on between the Springfield Diocese and 46 people who accused priests of molesting them.
   "I can't deal with them anymore. I don't care if I get $10," said Tessier, 45, who said he no longer is a Catholic.
• Austrian bishop silenced during apostolic visitation [Krenn] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Catholic World Report, www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=31045 , Jul. 23, 2004
   VIENNA, Austria Vienna, (CWNews.com) - During an apostolic visitation of his St. Pölten diocese, the embattled Bishop Kurt Krenn has been ordered to refrain from public statements, and to obtain approval of the Vatican's investigator, Bishop Klaus Kung, for any significant pastoral decisions, Austrian media reports have disclosed.
   The restrictions on Bishop Krenn will remain in place for the length of the apostolic visitation-- which, according to a spokesman for Vienna's Cardinal Christoph Schønborn, is expected to last 6-8 weeks.
• Foster father faces sexual abuse charges -- Mormon (?), also, leader of Church-sponsored Cub Scouts
   The Oregonian, www.oregonlive.com/metrowest/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/metro_west_news/ 1090584166164360. xml ; By JOHN SNELL and MELISSA NAVAS, Friday, July 23, 2004
   ALOHA (OR): A foster father to three sisters ages 2 to 9 will be in court today to face charges that he sexually abused the girls while they lived in his Aloha home.
   In addition to his role as a foster parent, David Henry Schaper had extensive contact with children as leader of a church-sponsored Cub Scout troop and through a day-care center that his wife, Michelle, operated in their home.
   Schaper, 31, was arrested July 16 on charges of sodomy, sex abuse, sexual penetration and criminal mistreatment -- all felonies. He is being held in Washington County Jail in lieu of $1.25 million bail. ...
   David Schaper also worked with children at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Aloha. James said he was a youth pastor at the church.
   However, Steven Dalton, president of the Beaverton Oregon West Stake of the Mormon church, said the church has no such position.
• Priest used drink on boys: victim -- settlement to keep it secret Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn. 
   The Age, www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/07/23/1090464864785.html?oneclick=true , By Martin Daly, July 24, 2004
   AUSTRALIA: Boys at a school run by the Catholic Salesian order were allegedly given drugs, alcohol and cigarettes and shown pornographic movies by a pedophile priest who was later jailed.
   The account comes from a victim of David Rapson, a priest who earlier this year was defrocked by the Pope for what the Australian superior of the order, Father Ian Murdoch, has described as horrible offences.
   The Tasmanian victim, who was 14 and 15 at the time of the abuse, was paid $80,000 by the Salesians in connection with repeated abuse during 1983 and 1984 by Rapson at the Salesians' St Dominic's College in Hobart.
   He alleges the Salesians wanted to settle to keep the abuse secret and later protected Rapson from him by declining to provide contact details.
   Former clerical brothers with the order and many former students have confirmed to The Age a culture of extreme physical violence and some sexual abuse at a number of Salesian institutions in the past and say that, in cases, young boys were given alcohol by sexual predators. [More details given below]
• Band director charged with soliciting boy [Meagher]
   The Patriot-News, www.pennlive.com/news/patriotnews/index.ssf?/base/news/1090574462232020.xml , BY THEODORE DECKER, Friday, July 23, 2004
   PENNSYLVANIA: As Bishop McDevitt High School band director Randall Meagher described it to detectives, the "stages" were the steps needed to ready a marching band for a performance, police said.
   Derry Twp. police charge that when it came to one 14-year-old male student, Meagher's "stages" were steps on the path toward child molestation.
   After a monthlong investigation, police have charged Meagher, 43, of Lemoyne with six criminal counts, ranging from corruption of a minor to criminal solicitation to commit involuntary deviate sexual intercourse.
   He was arraigned before District Justice Dominic Pelino yesterday and released on $5,000 unsecured bail. He will remain free until a September hearing as long as he abides by the conditions of his release, including having no contact with children other than his own, Pelino said.
   Phone messages left for Meagher yesterday were not returned. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 08:46 AM]
• Talks with diocese stalled -- 50 victims
   The Orange County Register, www.ocregister.com/ocr/2004/07/23/sections/local/local/article_177150.php , By ANN PEPPER and RACHANEE SRISAVASDI, July 23, 2004
   CALIFORNIA: Year-long settlement talks between attorneys for the Diocese of Orange and those representing approximately 60 victims of sexual abuse by clergy appear to have broken down, lawyers said Thursday.
   But a Diocesan spokesman said a mediated settlement remains a possibility.
   Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Peter Lichtman could recommend next week that attorneys start taking depositions - a step that sets the stage for trial, said plaintiff's attorney Raymond P. Boucher.
   "As far as I'm concerned we're at an impasse," he said. "The insurance carriers are continuing to refuse to participate in good faith and the diocese is not coming up with the kind of money ... to compensate the victims."
   The Rev. Joseph Fenton said the diocese was continuing to evaluate what financial settlement it could offer. "We are still hoping to settle this through mediation," he said.
• Pastor resigns after being in car with prostitute [2004 Lisowski] U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   Daily Southtown, www.dailysouthtown.com/southtown/yrtwn/south/231syt7.htm , By Allison Hantschel, Friday, July 23, 2004
   CHICAGO (IL): The pastor of St. Bede the Venerable Catholic Church resigned last week after Chicago police found him in his car with a prostitute.
   The Rev. Brian Lisowski was questioned by Chicago police but not arrested, according to the Archdiocese of Chicago. Officers saw him on the West Side of the city conversing with a woman known to have a warrant for her arrest.
   "There was no evidence that he did anything illegal," archdiocese spokesman Jim Dwyer said. "However, it was inappropriate behavior for a priest, and he offered his resignation. The cardinal accepted it."
   Retired auxiliary Bishop John Gorman informed the Scottsdale neighborhood parish Sunday. A new pastor has not been named.
   Dwyer said Lisowski was driving his personal vehicle, not a parish car, and he was not aware of any prior incidents of inappropriate conduct.
   Lisowski, who also acknowledged to the archdiocese that he had an alcohol abuse problem, is now living away from the parish, Dwyer said.
   "He admitted that he had fallen back into the pattern of abuse and that he couldn't continue like this," he said. "He said that he had hurt his credibility as a priest."
   Lisowski was named pastor of St. Bede, which has more than 2,000 families, in 1999 after the illness and death of longtime parish leader the Rev. Jeremiah Duggan. Lisowski was ordained in 1981. #
• Aretakis sues Fox 23 for negligence
   Capital News 9, www.capitalnews9.com/content/your_news/capital_region/default.asp?ArID=85496 , 3:24 PM, July/22/2004, By: Capital News 9 web staff
   ALBANY (NY): Attorney John Aretakis has made his name by representing alleged victims of clergy sexual abuse, but now a client of his is suing local TV-news station Fox 23 and its parent company, Clear Channel Communications.
   Aretakis alleged, in a series of stories aired in 2002, the station acted negligently by allowing one of its reporters to show the face and name of one his clients without Aretakis' permission.
   "This suit is about a reporter's aggressive pursuit of a victim of clergy sexual abuse. So aggressive, in fact, that the reporter lied to the victim and followed the victim, and then exposed that victim's name, face and story on television despite an agreement to the contrary," he said.
• Lawyer talks of case against TV station
   Albany Times Union, www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=268983& category=REGIONOTHER &BCC ode=&newsdate=7/23/2004 ; By BRIAN NEARING, Friday, July 23, 2004
   ALBANY (NY): A lawyer engaged in a long-running battle with the Albany Roman Catholic Diocese over clergy sexual abuse went public Thursday over a long-simmering dispute with a local television news program for allegedly outing the identity of a victim.
   John Aretakis said he sued WXXA Ch. 23 and its corporate owners, Clear Channel Inc., in June 2003 for duping his client Peter F. Murphy into giving an on-air interview after earlier agreeing to keep Murphy's identity secret.
   The lawsuit seeks $3 million in damages. Aretakis, who has been engaged in a high-profile fight for the last two years with the Albany Diocese over clergy abuse, said he hadn't publicized the lawsuit earlier out of concern for Murphy.
   But this month, lawyers for Clear Channel got the case moved out of state Supreme Court in New York City and into U.S. District Court in Albany, making eventual media coverage inevitable, Aretakis said.
• Diocese settles sex-abuse suit, but details remain confidential   U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Hawaii flag (USA State); Mooney's MiniFlags
   Honolulu Advertiser, http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2004/Jul/23/ln/ln20a.html , By Mike Gordon, Friday, July 23, 2004
   HONOLULU (HI): The Catholic Diocese of Hawai'i has settled a sex-abuse lawsuit that said two boys were molested by a priest.
   Details of the settlement, filed in Circuit Court in June, will not be made public, however.
   "The settlement agreement specifically says that the parties can only state that the case was settled and that the lawsuit will be dismissed with prejudice," said Stephen Dyer, attorney for the diocese.
   The suit had been filed in May 2002 on behalf of Darick Agasiva and Fa'amoana Purcell, who said that the Rev. Roberto de Otero sexually molested them in the mid-to-late 1980s in the rectory at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church.
   Attorney David Gierlach, who represents the two Hawai'i men, would not say if his clients were happy with the settlement.
• Priest will not be reinstated during investigation [2004 Arceneaux]
   The Advertiser, www.theadvertiser.com/news/html/4B054170-1886-4F5A-9A85-D011C7466149.shtml , Richard Burgess, rburgess@theadvertiser.com , July 23, 2004
   LAFAYETTE (LA): Church officials said Thursday that an Arnaudville priest removed during an Internet pornography investigation will not be reinstated while federal officials review the case, despite a petition from parishioners and a statement from the priest's attorney that someone else has admitted to downloading images found on a church computer.
   The Rev. Jules Arceneaux, pastor of St. Francis Regis Church in Arnaudville, was removed from his post last week pending an investigation of alleged pornography found on a computer in the church's rectory.
   Parishioners in the heavily Catholic community began circulating a petition to reinstate Arceneaux after they were informed of his removal at a Saturday Mass. They have garnered more than 100 signatures in support of the priest.
   Monsignor Richard Greene, a diocese spokesman, said the church has no plans to consider reinstating Arceneaux until the federal investigation is complete.
• Sex crime task force targets commune -- polygamous Mormon breakaways Canada flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   Calgary Sun, www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/CalgarySun/News/2004/07/23/553569.html , Fri, July 23, 2004
   VANCOUVER, Canada -- Police are putting together a team to investigate allegations of crimes against children at the polygamous Bountiful commune near Creston, B.C. Attorney General Geoff Plant announced yesterday. "There are allegations of child abuse, there are allegations of forcible marriage, of sexual exploitation," Plant said.
   The commune is part of the Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints, a Mormon breakaway sect.
   Debbie Palmer, who at 15 was assigned to be the sixth Bountiful bride of a 55-year-old man, called Plant's announcement overdue.
• Minister pleads innocent [1958-72, 1996 Peckham] -- Methodist, Christian Fellowship
   The Joplin Globe, www.joplinglobe.com/story.php?story_id=122562 , by Mike Pound, July/23/04
   MISSOURI: A Sarcoxie minister pleaded innocent Thursday in Jasper County Associate Circuit Court to a charge of second-degree statutory sodomy.
   Donald Peckham, 71, the pastor of the Jubilee Christian Fellowship, was accompanied by an attorney from the public defender's office. He appeared before Associate Judge Richard Copeland, waived a formal arraignment and entered the plea. His next court appearance is set for Aug. 4.
   Prosecutors allege that Peckham molested a 14-year-old boy in 1996. Since his arrest, leaders of the United Methodist Church in Kansas have said they investigated allegations that Peckham sexually abused children while serving at four Kansas churches from 1958 to 1972.
   The Jasper County prosecutor's office said earlier this week that it is looking into allegations that Peckham may have sexually abused others in Missouri.
• O.C. Talks on Abuse Settlement Collapse
   Los Angeles Times, www.latimes.com/news/local/orange/la-me-priests23jul23,1,1673169.story?coll=la-editions-orange ; By Jean Guccione and William Lobdell, July 23, 2004
   CALIFORNIA: The Orange County bishop's effort to negotiate a multimillion-dollar settlement with people who say they were molested as children by Roman Catholic priests broke down Thursday, possibly ending 19 months of mediation between the parties, according to lawyers for both sides.
   After a day of closed-door talks, lawyers for the 60 plaintiffs asked Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Peter D. Lichtman to let them begin preparing to take those cases to trial.
   "We didn't get anywhere," said Raymond P. Boucher, the court-appointed liaison for attorneys representing more than 700 alleged victims of priestly abuse in Southern California. "It doesn't look like we're going to get anywhere short of … litigation."
   The mediation involved cases brought last year by people who alleged they were sexually abused by priests in Orange County since the Diocese of Orange was created in 1976. The collapse is not expected to affect settlement talks involving more than 500 claims against the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.
   The breakdown comes a month after lawyers for both sides were openly optimistic that a settlement was near.
• Ex-youth leader faces abuse charges [White] -- Episcopal
   Morning Sentinel, http://morningsentinel.mainetoday.com/news/local/840025.shtml , By BETTY JESPERSEN, Friday, July 23, 2004
   RANGELEY (ME): A former youth leader at the Good Shepherd Episcopal Church in Rangeley who was accused of having a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old girl from the church was arrested Tuesday after he turned himself in to police.
   Kenneth E. White, 58, of Rangeley was arraigned in Rumford District Court Thursday on three counts of sexual abuse of a minor, a felony. The charge carries a maximum sentence of five years on each count and is a felony because the girl is younger than 16 and White was more than 10 years older than her.
   Assistant District Attorney James Andrews had requested $1,000 cash bail with conditions that White not be allowed to return to Rangeley and have no contact with the victim or anyone under 18, which White had agreed to.
   The prosecutor told Judge John McElwee that said since Rangeley is a small, close-knit community, he was concerned there could be incidental or third party contacts between White and the girl.
• Ex-principal gets house arrest over teen sex [1997-2000 Smith]
   Times Leader, www.timesleader.com/mld/timesleader/9220925.htm , By KEVIN OWEN KEARNEY, kkearney@leader.net , Fri, Jul. 23, 2004
   WILKES-BARRE (PA): The former Bishop Hafey High School athletic director and one-time principal was sentenced to six months of house arrest and two years of probation after pleading guilty Thursday to sexually assaulting a student.
   Richard Gregory Smith, 37, of Wilson Drive, pleaded guilty to a single count of statutory sexual assault. The sentence was handed down by Luzerne County Court of Common Pleas Senior Judge Gifford Cappellini, who also ordered Smith to undergo counseling.
   Prosecutors said Smith had sexual intercourse with a 15-year-old sophomore girl in his principal's office as well as in his home and vehicle. The incidents happened more than a dozen times between 1997 and 2000.
   Smith, who had friends and family in the courtroom, acknowledged his wrongdoing prior to being sentenced, said Assistant District Attorney Ingrid Cronin, who handled the case.
   Smith's lawyer, Frank Nocito, said he believes the sentence was appropriate and his client cooperated with investigators from the onset.
• Plaintiffs' lawyers unhappy with talks in OC priest abuse cases -- < 100 cases
   The Tribune (San Luis Obispo), www.sanluisobispo.com/mld/sanluisobispo/news/politics/9220509.htm , Bu GILLIAN FLACCUS, Associated Press, Thu, Jul. 22, 2004
   LOS ANGELES (CA): Lawyers representing alleged victims of clergy sexual abuse on Thursday asked a judge overseeing settlement negotiations to allow them to start moving toward trial in nearly 100 cases against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange, a lead attorney said.
   The move came amid an apparent setback in negotiations that have been under way for nearly two years. The plaintiffs' attorneys claimed that there was an impasse precipitated by the diocese's insurers, but a diocesan spokesman said they were not aware of any breakdown in talks and were ready to continue.
   Raymond Boucher, lead attorney for the plaintiffs, said they asked Judge Peter Lichtman to be allowed to proceed to the process of discovery, hoping it would put pressure on the diocese and its insurers.
   "The feeling is right now it doesn't make sense to have discussions short of discovery," Boucher said in a telephone interview. "It's at that point they have to fish or cut bait."
   Diocesan spokesman Rev. Joe Fenton said in an interview that the diocese expected plaintiffs to ask for discovery and weren't surprised at the development.
   Fenton said, however, that the diocese would continue to negotiate in good faith.
• Former priest faces new abuse lawsuit [1982 O'Brien]
   The Wichita Eagle, www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/state/9221411.htm , Associated Press, Fri, Jul. 23, 2004
   KANSAS CITY, Mo. - A former Kansas City priest is the target of another civil lawsuit alleging that he molested two young boys in the 1980s.
   Two Independence men filed the lawsuit Thursday against Thomas J. O'Brien, alleging that he abused them on a summer trip in 1982. The lawsuit also names the Roman Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Bishop Raymond J. Boland and Vicar General Patrick Rush.
   O'Brien, who retired from the priesthood in 2002, already faces three lawsuits in Jackson County, each alleging that he abused boys.
   Darren Wahwassuck, 36, of Independence, said that he and a childhood friend filed the lawsuit because the church did not seem to be taking the allegations seriously. The friend decided to remain anonymous, Wahwassuck said.
   Wahwassuck knew O'Brien while the priest served at Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Independence in 1982 and 1983.
   O'Brien's attorney, Gerald F. McGonagle, said O'Brien "categorically and strongly" denies the allegations.
• Order reaches out to accusers [Lammers] [Mary Camilla Donahue, Mary Ann Powers ] -- Sisters of Charity.
   The Courier-Journal, www.courier-journal.com/localnews/2004/07/23ky/B1-sisters07230-6840.html , By Peter Smith, psmith@courier-journal.com
   LOUISVILLE (KY): In their mission statement, the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth say they want "to help people all over the world who are oppressed," working on behalf of battered women, the homeless, runaway teens and others.
   So to be accused of committing the very acts of oppression they try to prevent has been "heartbreaking," their American leader said yesterday.
   "Justice and peace are integral to our life," said Sister Susan Gatz, leader of the order's Western (or American) Province, based outside Bardstown, Ky. "...As we are moving through this situation, which is very new for us, we are trying to be faithful to who we are."
   Her comments came in the order's most extensive response yet to a growing lawsuit accusing the order of tolerating sexual and physical abuse in its operations.
   The dozen plaintiffs in the lawsuit, which expanded yesterday with new allegations, allege abuse by nuns and a resident priest decades ago at the now-closed St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage in Anchorage, and at two schools.
   "We are making every effort to seek the truth with regard to the allegations in front of us, and to treat everyone involved with great reverence," Gatz said at a news conference yesterday.
   Gatz said the sisters are struggling to reconcile the allegations with their own positive memories of accused nuns.
   "Our values and our policies call us to respond with compassion to those who are accusing, while at the same time remembering that those who are accused are innocent until proven guilty," she said.
   Gatz offered to help any people who believe they suffered abuse at the orphanage. That could include meeting with the order's leaders and receiving help from a counselor, she said. "If recourse to law is not a process that would be healing for you, please know that the Sisters of Charity are open to having you contact us, and we will walk with you and work with you," she said, giving the order's office phone number: (502) 348-1510.
   Gatz, speaking before yesterday's filings, said the order had no record of complaints against any of the three nuns named up to that point, although the archdiocese informed the order in recent weeks that it had heard from some accusers.
   She acknowledged that the order's records from the orphanage are limited mainly to the personnel files of nuns who lived there because the order did not own the orphanage at the time.
   The order administered and staffed the orphanage, but it was owned by the Archdiocese of Louisville through its Catholic Charities agency.
   The longtime head of Catholic Charities, Monsignor Herman J. Lammers, lived at the orphanage and worked as its chaplain, Gatz said. Nine of the women in the lawsuit alleged they were sexually abused by Lammers, who died in 1983.
   Gatz said the recent allegations have been especially difficult for longtime nuns who worked at the orphanage.
   "That's a ministry that for years was extremely special to us," she said.
   Many children have reported "that their experiences there were very influential and very positive to them," she said. "To hear that there are people who had traumatic experiences, painful experiences, that is hard for us to hear. We very much want to be a part of whatever healing can happen."
   Gatz oversees about 450 nuns working in 16 states from Massachusetts to California.
   The sisters' work with the orphanage dates back to 1832, when Mother Catherine Spalding established the St. Vincent Orphan Asylum. The St. Vincent girls' orphanage merged with the St. Thomas boys' home in Anchorage in 1952, where it stayed until its closing in 1982, according to the Sisters of Charity.
   Attorney William McMurry, representing the plaintiffs, amended the lawsuits yesterday with several new allegations.
   Two plaintiffs, Deborah Ferguson, 47, and Monica Aubrey, 55, said they were sexually molested by Lammers and by nuns.
   Aubrey accused two nuns who were previously named in the lawsuit - Mary Camilla Donahue and Mary Ann Powers - and are now deceased.
   Ferguson also accused a "Sister Mary." Sisters of Charity spokeswoman Barbara Qualls said the name was common for nuns and she couldn't identify her. Ferguson also alleged that she reported to the "Mother Superior" that she witnessed Lammers rape a young girl, and that the superior called her a liar and locked her in a closet.
   Another plaintiff, Phyllis Kelly, 49, said she was molested by nuns working at two schools in the 1960s and 1970s.
   She said she was abused by a Sister Caroline Mary Schneider, who worked at Most Blessed Sacrament, a parish school. She also alleged she was abused by a Sister Mary Jane and a Sister Jean, who worked at Presentation Academy.
   Qualls confirmed that there were nuns with these names at the schools at the time. Schneider has died, while the other two are still living, she said. #
• Sisters offer to help accusers -- Sisters of Charity of Nazareth
   Lexington Herald-Leader, www.kentucky.com/mld/kentucky/news/state/9222528.htm , Associated Press, Fri Jul 23, 2004
   LOUISVILLE, Ky. - The American leader of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth is offering to help anyone who believes they were abused at a now-closed orphanage in Anchorage.
   Sister Susan Gatz, leader of the order's Western (or American) Province, based outside Bardstown, said the sisters are struggling to reconcile allegations with their own positive memories of accused nuns.
   "Our values and our policies call us to respond with compassion to those who are accusing, while at the same time remembering that those who are accused are innocent until proven guilty," she said Thursday.
   A lawsuit accuses the order of tolerating sexual and physical abuse in its operations. The dozen plaintiffs in the lawsuit, which expanded Thursday with new allegations, allege abuse by nuns and a resident priest decades ago at the St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage in Anchorage, and at two schools.
   The offer to help accusers could include meeting with the order's leaders and receiving help from a counselor, Gatz said.
• More sexual abuse lawsuits filed against Allentown Diocese [McNelis, Fromholzer, Graff; diocese total 13 suits, 9 priests]
   The Morning Call, www.mcall.com/news/local/all-b5_5diocese- rjul23,0,6236388.story?coll=all-newslocal-hed ; By Kathleen Parrish, Jul 23, 2004
   ALLENTOWN (PA): The Allentown Catholic Diocese is the target of three new lawsuits alleging sexual abuse by priests, two of whom were accused in previous actions and one who has died in a Texas prison.
   The new suits - two filed in Lehigh County and one in Schuylkill County - bring the total number of lawsuits against the diocese to 13, involving nine priests.
   Named in the suits are the Rev. Francis J. McNelis, who retired in 2002 and is residing in Holy Family Villa in Bethlehem; the Rev. Francis Fromholzer, who taught at Allentown Central Catholic High School; and the Rev. Edward R. Graff, who left the Allentown Diocese in 1988 and was jailed in Texas in October 2002 on charges of molesting a teenage boy.
   Graff died in jail a month later.
   The plaintiffs are represented by attorneys Jay Abramowitch of Wyomissing, near Reading, and Richard Serbin of Altoona, who also filed four new suits against the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. All the new suits were filed Wednesday. The two represent about 75 people across the state in similar complaints.
• Diocese, accusers OK deal [$US 7m +]
   Republican, www.masslive.com/hampfrank/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-1/109057096097141.xml , By BILL ZAJAC, wzajac@repub.com , Friday, July 23, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): Concluding more than two years of legal wrangling, 46 alleged clergy sexual abuse victims and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield struck a more than $7 million deal yesterday to settle claims.
   A memorandum of understanding, outlining the settlement, was signed by lawyers representing both sides late yesterday afternoon.
   The deal includes $7 million in cash, proceeds from the future sale of two diocesan properties worth at least an estimated $585,000 and non-monetary provisions for the alleged victims.
   The alleged victims will be provided lifetime counseling and continue to have access to other services provided through the diocese. An alleged victim will be named to the Diocesan Review Board.
   Alleged victims will be required to sign waivers that prevent direct relatives from filing claims against the diocese except in cases that the relative was sexually abused themselves by a member of the clergy.
• Suit claims Diocese of Allentown covered up abuse [Graff, Fromholzer, McNelis]
   The Express-Times, www.nj.com/news/expresstimes/pa/index.ssf?/base/news-12/109057356110560.xml , By PRECIOUS PETTY, Friday, July 23, 2004
   ALLENTOWN (PA): Three victims of alleged sexual abuse filed lawsuits Thursday against the Diocese of Allentown in Lehigh and Schuylkill County courts.
   One woman and two men claim three former priests sexually assaulted them between 1965 and 1978.
   All three clergymen accused -- Edward Graff, Francis Fromholzer and Francis McNelis -- have been accused of molesting children before and served in Northampton County and Lehigh County parishes during their careers.
   The lawsuits also claim the diocese and its top clergymen concealed ongoing sexual abuse of children by priests.
   Bishops Edward P. Cullen and Thomas J. Welsh reassigned the priests to positions where they'd have access to children, despite evidence the men were pedophiles, according to the lawsuits.
   The lawsuits don't call for a specific amount of compensation from the diocese, and the plaintiffs' attorney, Jay N. Abramowitch, said his clients aren't interested in money. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 06:19 AM]
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Fri July 23, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
• Tasmanian Marists plead not guilty to sex offences; Catholic schoolboy charged with sex abuse. [Ferguson, Bellemore] Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.  Tasmania (Australia) flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.  New South Wales (Australia) flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.
   CathNews, "Marist Fathers plead not guilty to sex offences," http://www.cathnews.com/news/407/131.php , Jul 23, 2004
   TASMANIA, Australia: Two priests formerly from Burnie's Marist Catholic College in Tasmania's north-west have pleaded not guilty to alleged sex offences.
   ABC Tasmania reports that Gregory Lawrence Ferguson, 66, and Roger Michael Bellemore, 68, both now live in Sydney and were not required to appear in the Burnie Magistrates Court this morning.
   Pleas of not guilty were entered on their behalf by defence counsel Greg Walsh.
   Bellemore is charged with three counts of maintaining a sexual relationship with a young person and one of indecent assault, while Ferguson is charged with five counts of indecent assault, one of attempted indecent assault and one of maintaining a sexual relationship with a young person.
   The charges date back to the late 1960s and early 1970s.
   The cases were adjourned for committal proceedings in November.
   Meanwhile a Catholic schoolboy was remanded in custody yesterday charged with sexually assaulting a five-year-old boy in a shopping centre.
   The 16-year-old Year 11 student, who cannot be named, went to police on Wednesday night.
   Hours earlier, police released closed-circuit TV footage of a child being led away at Big W in Chullora Marketplace, in Sydney, before being sexually assaulted in a public toilet.
   The court heard that the accused should not be released as he may re-offend.
   SOURCES
Former priests plead not guilty to sex offences (ABC Tasmania 22/7/04)
Boy sex attacker 'may re-offend' (The Courier Mail 23/7/04)
   LINKS:
The Vatican's big secret (The Australian 23/7/04)
Schoolboy denied bail (Daily Telegraph 23/7/04)
Vatican 'complicit in abuse cover-up' (The Australian 23/7/04)
Austrian Catholics welcome apostolic visitation (Catholic Weekly 22/7/04)
Survey finds Catholics skeptical of bishops' handling of sex abuse (Catholic News Service 21/7/04)
Church source: Austrian investigation could last through September (Catholic News Service 21/7/04)
Austria Grateful for Papal Action for Sankt Poelten (Zenit 21/7/04)
Speedy response to Austrian sex scandal reflects seriousness (CathNews 22/7/04)
Marist priests front court over alleged sexual offences (CathNews 12/5/04)
Marist Regional College
Marist Fathers
  HAVE YOUR SAY   Click here    [Jul 23, 04]
#### Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse, Sat July 24, 2004 edition follows:-
• Sheriff's Department Joins Daycare Investigation -- Baptist U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   WLBT 3, www.wlbt.com/Global/story.asp?S=2082909&nav=2CSfP8YI , By Gene Adams, gene@wlbt.net , July/23/04
   MISSISSIPPI: There are new developments Friday night in the investigation of possible accusations of child abuse at the First Baptist Church of Byram Daycare. The Hinds County Sheriff's Department is now involved in the investigation, at the request of the health department.
   The sheriff's department met Friday afternoon with church officials, although no details about the investigation have been released. Pastor Carl Prewitt refused to comment on the issue, except to say the church is cooperating fully with the sheriff's office.
   The Department of Human Services received a complaint about the daycare and forwarded the investigation to the Department of Health, which began its investigation at the church Wednesday. Four employees at the daycare are now on paid leave. Neither the health department nor the sheriff's office would discuss details of the accusations or the ongoing investigation. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 09:34 PM]
• Allegations of abuse at day care investigated -- Baptist
   The Clarion-Ledger, www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040724/NEWS01/407240340/1002 , July 24, 2004
   MISSISSIPPI: The Hinds County Sheriff's Department is investigating allegations of child abuse at a Byram day care center, Sheriff Malcolm McMillin said Friday.
   The state Department of Human Services day care licensure division contacted Hinds County authorities and asked for assistance in investigating the First Baptist Church of Byram day care center, McMillin said.
   It is the second church day care in Hinds County to receive abuse allegations this month. The Raymond First Baptist Church Child Development Center was placed on probation after workers were accused of slapping children, locking them in closets and forcing them to clean toilets. Three workers there also were relieved of child-care duties, officials said.
   Four employees have been placed on leave at the Byram church, said Lt. Steve Pickett. McMillin did not detail specifics about the allegations but said a parent made allegations of abuse to state officials, who contacted his office.
• Politicians support resigned seminary head [2004 Kuechl] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Die Presse, www.diepresse.at/Artikel.aspx?channel=&ressort=ee&id=434339 , 23.July.2004
   VIENNA, Austria: Lower Austrian politicians from both sides of the political spectrum have come out in support of Ulrich Kuechl, the former head of the priests' training college in St. Poelten that is at the heart of a child porn scandal.
   Kuechl had asked people to sign a statement of support in an effort to "re-establish my reputation and standing" and the document reveals signatures from Lower Austrian Financial Councillor Wolfgang Sobotka of the conservative People's Party and opposition Social Democrat (SP) member Siegfried Nasko.
   Sobotka's spokesman Christian Raedler said, "The two have been friends for over 20 years."
• Lawsuit hits former S.A. priest [2002 Earley] -- Discalced Carmelite
   San Antonio Express-News, www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA072404.1R.RELBaldwin.5e55bb.html , by J. Michael Parker, Express-News Religion Writer, Web Posted: July/24/2004
   SAN ANTONIO (TX): An unidentified woman is suing the Archdiocese of San Antonio, a Carmelite priest and the Discalced Carmelite religious order for an undetermined amount, alleging inappropriate touching and conversation.
   The suit alleges that priest Jerome Earley kissed the woman on the mouth and neck, rubbed his chest against her breasts, showed her his unbuttoned pants and made sexually suggestive comments to her, beginning July 10 and throughout the rest of the summer of 2002.
   The suit filed in 224th District Court identifies the plaintiff only as Jane Doe, an adult woman and a highly respected member of the Catholic community in San Antonio.
   She claims that both the Archdiocese of San Antonio and the Order of Discalced Carmelites either knew or should have known that Earley was a sexual predator and should not have allowed him to minister.
   The lawsuit says Earley was pastor of the Little Flower Shrine parish, superior of the Carmelite Friars in the parish and spiritual director of the Secular Carmelites in San Antonio.
• Judge ends mediation in lawsuits against Diocese of Orange -- 60 lawsuits
   Modesto Bee, www.modbee.com/state_wire/story/8893576p-9783857c.html , The Associated Press, July 24, 2004
   LOS ANGELES (CA) (AP) - A judge ended mediation talks in 60 lawsuits against the Diocese of Orange alleging sexual abuse by clergy and recommended that plaintiffs' lawyers should be allowed to take sworn testimony from Bishop Tod D. Brown and other top church officials.
   Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Peter D. Lichtman said in the decision Friday that further talks under confidentiality rules governing mediation "would be counterproductive and would actually serve as an impediment to further settlement discussions."
   As the mediator in the Diocese of Orange cases, Lichtman does not have authority to order church officials to give sworn testimony. His recommendation goes to the trial judge.
   The ruling ended 19 months of efforts to resolve the lawsuits without going to trial. Lichtman said he would seek to negotiate a settlement under less restrictive rules than the ones for mediation.
• AFM pastor accused of rape and abuse -- Apostolic Faith Mission -- "holy charter" is above South African law South Africa flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   News 24, www.news24.com/City_Press/City_Press_News/0,,186-187_1562778,00.html , By RIOT HLATSHWAYO and VICTOR HLUNGWANE
   SOUTH AFRICA: A sordid sex scandal has exploded within the Limpopo arm of the international Apostolic Faith Mission (AFM) after a group of women and children accused their pastor of rape and sexual abuse.
   The 41-year-old pastor from the evangelical church's Siyandhani congregation has been suspended pending a high-level internal probe by Limpopo legislature member and regional AFM leader, Reverend Moses Shipalana.
   "The charges include the alleged rape of at least three young girls, and sexual abuse of two more elderly women. This is all obviously very serious and we are therefore conducting a thorough investigation," said Shipalana.
   "It is unfortunate that the matter has reached the ears of the media. I would like to stress that all of us, from presidents to pastors, are human and therefore fallible."
   Shipalana stressed that none of the cases have been reported to the police because the AFM believes its own "holy charter" is above South African law.
• Ex-priest up for parole [Larson]
   Newton Kansan, www.thekansan.com/stories/072404/fro_0724040014.shtml , By Chris Strunk, July 24 2004
   KANSAS: Janet Patterson will spend the rest of her life advocating for the rights of sex abuse victims. And she hopes a former Catholic priest who, she said, drove her son to suicide will spend the next two years behind bars.
   Robert Larson, convicted in 2001 of fondling altar boys at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Newton 20 years ago, is eligible for parole in September.
   The Kansas Parole Board will have a public comment hearing from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Friday at the Finney State Office Building in Wichita before making its decision next month.
   "He will always be a danger, and he needs to serve the full sentence," Patterson said. "It was as harsh of a sentence as it could be for what he pled to and what he was held accountable for. But compared to the accumulative effect his actions had, this is minimal."
• Mexican police arrest 21-year-old man in priest's slaying [Quirino] Mexico flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Houston Chronicle, www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/world/2675345 , Associated Press
   CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico -- Police in this border city arrested on Friday a 21-year-old man in the stabbing death of Roman Catholic priest. The suspect told authorities he carried out the killing after the priest had sexually harassed him, but police said the apparent motive was robbery.
   Suspect Jesus Antonio Sanchez Quirino, a fast food employee, told police he had been drinking with Rev. Ramon Navarrete Islas, 56, at the priest's home on Monday, when Navarrete Islas purportedly made sexual advances at him. According to Sanchez Quirino's confession, he then stabbed the priest to death and fled.
   "I was sorry about it when I realized he was a priest," Sanchez Quirino told reporters during a brief jailhouse interview. He said Navarrete Islas had introduced himself as a furniture salesman, and he didn't find out the victim's true identity until the crime was reported in the newspapers.
   The suspect said the victim hung around him and fondled him on several occasions over the last two years.
   Navarrete Islas' body was found Tuesday at his home in Ciudad Juarez with stab wounds to the neck and chest.
• Emergence of clerical sex abuse as issue due to media, commission told  Ireland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   One in Four organisation, http://oneinfour.org/news/news2004/emergence , by Patsy McGarry - Irish Times
   IRELAND: The investigation committee of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse was told yesterday that the emergence of clerical child sex abuse as an issue had been due to "the media and the constant publicity of those religious found guilty in the courts".
   Mr Tom Hayes, of the Alliance Victims' Support group, said this confused quite a lot of people who had been in institutions. They came to believe that when dealing with Government bodies "they had to say they were sexually abused as opposed to other forms of abuse. That is what we found on the ground," he said.
   "We know sex abuse did occur in the institutions," he said, but that the abuse was perpetrated by peers. "Religious abuse was new to my ears."
   His group was different from other support groups in that it believed all services to victims should be on a professional basis only, he said. Alliance lobbied officials and acted in an advisory role to victims. It had no offices but had a website, and advertised meetings around the country which were "not successful" in attendances.
   [COMMENT: Is this group a rear action by devotees of the "spotless" Church theory who brook nothing to protect its reputation, or do they have a point? COMMENT ENDS.]
• Merced pastor's ouster a real mess [Lastiri]
   Modesto Bee, www.modbee.com/columnists/jardine/story/8882577p-9772633c.html , By JEFF JARDINE, BEE LOCAL COLUMNIST, July 22, 2004
   MERCED (CA): What we have here, folks, might be termed a spiritual mess: A Merced priest visited a Web site where men try to arrange dates with other men.
   A small group of Roman Catholic parishioners at his church, using methods akin to the Spanish Inquisition, went after him like a pack of roaming pit bulls pouncing on a cat.
   Neither acted in ways that might be construed as godly, Christian or Catholic.
   In reality, the downfall of St. Patrick's Catholic Church pastor Jean-Michael Lastiri is as much political as parochial. It's conservative vs. liberal, Republican vs. Democrat and no different from the smear tactics seen in a campaign.
   A conservative group called the Roman Catholic Faithful posted documents on its Web site recently that, its members claim, prove Lastiri is gay. And some local parishioners involved in taking him down provided the media with CDs containing roughly 300 pages of e-mails, letters and other documents.
   This info trail is supposed to explain the history of what led to Lastiri's ouster last week. It appears to be factual, citing court documents and his Web entries looking for dates.
   But it reads like a jet stream of invective and growing hatred under the guise of Christianity, by a group of vigilantes who set out to get rid of Lastiri because of his liberal teachings in the church.
   [COMMENT: If a clergyman saying he is following Divine advice to have no sex is seeking "dates", isn't it high time someone tracked him down? "Am I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth?" (Galatians 4:16) COMMENT ENDS.]
• Priest criticised for Christ comparison [Fox] Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn. 
   The Age, www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/07/21/1090089223757.html?oneclick=true , By Martin Daly, July 22, 2004
   MELBOURNE (Victoria), Australia: A mother who attributes her son's drug-related serious illness and life punctuated by imprisonment to sex abuse by a Salesian priest criticised the accused Catholic cleric yesterday for comparing his case to that of a wrongly accused Jesus Christ.
   "It is an insult to God, never mind Catholics," said the woman, who asked not to be identified.
   Her son received a $35,600 settlement from the Salesians in 2000, with denial of liability, over alleged abuse at the Salesians' Rupertswood college in Sunbury during 1978 and 1979.
   "How dare he compare himself to Jesus . . . I find the whole thing extraordinary," she said. [More of this article is shown elsewhere]
• Vatican probe into porn scandal -- St Poelten seminary exposed Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Sydney Morning Herald www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/07/24/1090464897532.html?oneclick=true ,
   July 24, 2004 - 12:49PM
   AUSTRIA: A Vatican investigation into the discovery of a vast cache of child pornography at a Roman Catholic seminary in Austria could take all summer, the Archdiocese of Vienna has said.
   The church probe, which also is examining photos of candidates for the priesthood kissing and fondling each other and their older religious instructors, is likely to last another six weeks, said Erich Leitenberger, a spokesman for Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn.
   Austrian Bishop Klaus Kueng began his inquiry on Wednesday, a day after Pope John Paul II appointed him as an "apostolic visitor" to deal with a scandal that has deeply embarrassed the Roman Catholic Church.
   Kueng has been interviewing students, teachers and diocesan officials in St Poelten, about 80 kilometres west of Vienna, where authorities uncovered some 40,000 lurid photos and numerous videos, including child pornography.
   He will report his findings directly to the pope.
• Former priest faces new abuse lawsuit [1970-82 O'Brien]
   The Kansas City Star, www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/local/9220878.htm?ERIGHTS=- 4808417534925189982kansascity::kashaw@peoplepc.com&KRD_RM= 9ppppvquvyvyxpsysyqqpppppp|Kathleen|Y ; By MARK MORRIS
   KANSAS CITY (MO): A former Kansas City priest again was the target of a civil lawsuit Thursday, alleging that he molested two Independence boys on a summer trip in 1982.
   Thomas J. O'Brien, who retired from the priesthood in 2002, faces three lawsuits in Jackson County, each alleging that he abused boys as far back as 1970.
   The lawsuit also names the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Bishop Raymond J. Boland and Vicar General Patrick Rush.
   Darren Wahwassuck, 36, of Independence, said that he and a childhood friend decided to file the lawsuit because the church must take a harder line with priests who abuse children. Wahwassuck knew O'Brien while the priest served at Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Independence in 1982 and 1983.
   "It almost seems to me like the church isn't taking this seriously," Wahwassuck said at a news conference. "If I had done this, I'd still be in jail."
• Sex abuse allegations spur probe by RCMP -- Fundamentalist Mormons Canada flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   Toronto Star www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer? pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1090620613221&call_pageid= 968332188774&col=968350116467 ; By DANIEL GIRARD, WESTERN CANADA BUREAU
   VANCOUVER, Canada - A new RCMP team is being established to investigate allegations of child abuse at the polygamist commune of Bountiful in the British Columbia Interior.
   "The groundswell of public concern has reached a point where government and the police, in my view, have an obligation to act," Attorney-General Geoff Plant said in an interview yesterday. "It's a priority to investigate the many allegations being made."
   Bountiful, a community of about 1,000 people near Cranbrook in southeastern B.C., has long been the subject of allegations of sexual abuse and of teenaged girls being made concubines or "celestial wives" of men who are much older and already have several other wives.
   Although polygamy is illegal in Canada, the B.C. government has been reluctant to act. It has obtained two legal opinions that said the group, a breakaway sect of the Mormon Church known as the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, could likely successfully argue the law violates a person's right to freedom of religion.
• Appeals court says pastor can sue church [Ackles] -- Calvin Presbyterian
   The Seattle Times, http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2001987516_pastor24m.html , By GENE JOHNSON, The Associated Press
   WASHINGTON: A federal appeals court drew a fine line between church and state yesterday, ruling that a female pastor can sue her church for sexual harassment without violating the church's right to govern itself.
   The decision by the three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals means Monica L. McDowell Elvig can pursue her claim against the Rev. Will Ackles and Calvin Presbyterian Church in Shoreline.
   The judges returned the case to federal court in Seattle, where a judge had dismissed it.
   Elvig joined Calvin Presbyterian as an associate pastor in December 2000. She claimed Ackles began harassing her and created a hostile work environment. When she complained, she said, she was verbally harassed and eventually fired.
   Calvin Presbyterian, which determined Elvig's claims were unsubstantiated, argued that her lawsuit violated the church's First Amendment rights. The U.S. Supreme Court previously has held government must not meddle in church personnel decisions, the appellate judges noted.
• Attorney attacks diocese actions -- 14 months delaying, strategy
   Quad-City Times, www.qctimes.com/internal.php?story_id=1031719&t=Local+News&c=2,1031719 , By Todd Ruger
   DAVENPORT (IA): The attorney for 18 men claiming sexual abuse by priests in the Catholic Diocese of Davenport has asked a judge to compel church leaders to turn over specific documents as part of the civil lawsuit proceedings, court records show.
   Citing 14 months of "ongoing and unjustified delays," a court filing made by Davenport attorney Craig Levien claims the diocese wrongfully has withheld documents that the court previously ordered it to turn over to his plaintiffs.
   "It is clear the legal strategy of the diocese is also designed to hide and conceal relevant and material information from the plaintiffs in this case," he wrote, alluding to previous testimony by an expert witness of his that the Roman Catholic Church historically practiced secrecy in the cover-up of sexual abuse by priests.
   But diocese attorneys say they are following court orders and have turned over documents to District Judge C.H. Pelton for his review regarding privacy concerns.
   "We're not trying to hide this information. We're submitting it to the judge to determine if the information is relevant," diocese attorney Robert McMonagle said.
• Four will leave Catholic board in orderly replacement
   Courier & Press, www.courierpress.com/ecp/religion/article/0,1626,ECP_782_3059685,00.html , By PHILIP ELLIOTT, 461-0783 or elliottp@courierpress.com , July 24, 2004
   UNITED STATES: Four members of the board investigating sexual abuse by Catholic priests have agreed to step down from their posts, part of a staggered replacement process.
   A third of the 12 members will leave the National Review Board by November, including former E.W. Scripps Co. CEO and former Evansville Press Editor William Burleigh. Illinois Appellate Judge Anne Burke, former White House chief of staff Leon Panetta and Washington attorney Bob Bennett also have announced they will leave the board. Former University of San Diego President Alice Bourke Hayes also is expected to resign in November.
   The National Review Board was assembled after instances of sexual abuse by priests became widely known. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the organization that coordinates Catholic activities in this country, recruited lay Catholics to investigate the scope, causes and costs of the abuse scandal.
   Because the bishops appointed the National Review Board, they will replace its members. The original appointments did not include specific term lengths.
   The review board has submitted its suggestions to the bishops, who have a list of their own. They have collaborated on the lists, but the ultimate decision will come from Bishop Wilton Gregory, president of the bishops conference, said Kathleen McChesney, executive director of the bishops' Office for Child and Youth Protection.
• Ruling Ends Abuse Mediation Efforts
   Los Angeles Times, www.latimes.com/news/local/orange/la-me-priests24jul24,1,2131923.story?coll=la-editions-orange ; By Jean Guccione
   CALIFORNIA: Efforts to mediate 60 lawsuits against the Diocese of Orange alleging sexual abuse by clergy ended Friday when a judge ruled that plaintiffs' lawyers should be allowed to take sworn testimony from Bishop Tod D. Brown and other top church officials.
   In a five-page order, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Peter D. Lichtman said further talks under the strict confidentiality rules that govern mediation "would be counterproductive and would actually serve as an impediment to further settlement discussions."
   The order ends 19 months of closed-door mediation between lawyers for the diocese and plaintiffs to resolve the lawsuits without going to trial. Lichtman, however, said he would continue efforts to negotiate a settlement between the parties but under a less restrictive forum.
   A recent state Supreme Court ruling aimed at encouraging open mediation prohibits documents prepared for those closed-door talks to be used at trial.
   "It means that the court is frustrated," said Raymond P. Boucher, lead counsel for the hundreds of cases against the Roman Catholic Church in Southern California. Lichtman's new approach to negotiating a settlement, he said, "gives the parties an opportunity to more fully and more publicly" discuss the issues.
• Attorneys fear church insurers could tangle SoCal settlements -- < 700 lawsuits
   Monterey Herald, www.montereyherald.com/mld/montereyherald/news/9234692.htm , By GILLIAN FLACCUS, Associated Press
   LOS ANGELES (CA): Attorneys for both alleged victims and dioceses of the Roman Catholic Church in Southern California say they're increasingly concerned that insurance companies could hold up settlements in nearly 700 lawsuits that accuse clergy of sexual molestation.
   Plaintiffs attorneys and church officials say insurers are the main obstacle to settling nearly 100 Orange County claims, despite intense negotiations recently in the Diocese of Orange. Attorneys fear the same thing could happen in the Los Angeles archdiocese and the dioceses of San Diego and San Bernardino, where talks are not as far along.
   "The carrier is essentially saying ... you can't settle these cases and if you settle these cases we're going to argue that we're not bound by any settlement you agree to," said Ray Boucher, a plaintiffs' attorney. (and so on, as the philly.com newsitem above.)
• Ariz. man sues church using racketeer statute [O'Brien] -- whistleblowers penalised, offenders transferred
   The Arizona Republic, www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/0724church24.html , by Michael Kiefer, Jul. 24, 2004
   TUCSON (AZ): A Tucson man with dashed hopes of becoming a priest filed a civil racketeering lawsuit against the Catholic Church in federal court last week.
   Philip Hower alleges racketeering, negligence, discrimination, defamation and fraud, among other charges, naming the Archdiocese in Santa Fe; the dioceses of Tucson, Phoenix, Boston and Los Angeles; and several bishops, including Bishop Thomas J. O'Brien.
   He is asking for $5 million in compensatory damages and hopes for $45 million in punitive damages, said Hower's attorney, Ivan Safyan Abrams.
   According to the complaint, all of the individuals and institutions named are part of a pattern of cover-up and conspiracy.
   In the suit, Hower alleges that he was sexually assaulted by two Arizona priests and that he was denied ordination as a priest because he blew the whistle. Hower's case starts with his own experience and places it in what he sees as a national pattern of covering up sex scandals.
   His attorney stated that the offending priests are transferred all over the country to keep them from being apprehended.
• Nuns offer aid to alleged abuse victims [12 complainants] -- Sisters of Charity of Nazareth
   Lexington Herald-Leader, www.kentucky.com/mld/heraldleader/news/state/9232356.htm , ASSOCIATED PRESS
   LOUISVILLE (KY): The American leader of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth is offering to help anyone who thinks they were abused at a now-closed orphanage in Anchorage.
   Sister Susan Gatz, leader of the order's Western (or American) Province, based outside Bards-town, said the sisters are struggling to reconcile allegations with their own positive memories of accused nuns.
   "Our values and our policies call us to respond with compassion to those who are accusing, while at the same time remembering that those who are accused are innocent until proven guilty," she said Thursday.
   A lawsuit accuses the order of tolerating sexual and physical abuse in its operations. The dozen plaintiffs in the lawsuit, which expanded Thursday with new allegations, allege abuse by nuns and a resident priest decades ago at the St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage in Anchorage, and at two schools.
• Priest who served locally is on archdiocese list of banned clerics [Adamsky]
   The Journal Times, www.journaltimes.com/articles/2004/07/24/local/iq_3006267.txt , By Jeff Wilford, July 24, 2004
   RACINE (WI): A Catholic priest who was one of 43 named by Milwaukee Archbishop Timothy Dolan two weeks ago as having sexually abused minors, served two assignments in Racine.
   Raymond A. Adamsky served six years at St. Joseph's Parish, 1532 N. Wisconsin Ave., from 1986 to 1992, said Jerry Topcziewski, a spokesman for the Milwaukee Archdiocese. He served another year at St. Monica's Senior Citizen Home, 3920 N. Green Bay Road, from 1992-93.
   Adamsky, who was ordained in 1958, is on the list as retired, and barred by the church from functioning like a priest.
   "What it would mean is they can serve in no capacity as a priest," Topcziewski said. It also means Adamsky is not allowed to wear clerical garb or identify himself as a priest.
   The list where Adamsky appeared comprised priests who had substantiated allegations of sexually abusing minors. Topcziewski could not say when Adamsky was banned from functioning like a priest, and would not say when, or where, the sexual abuse happened.
   Topcziewski said the archdiocese wouldn't release that information because it could indirectly identify the victim or victims.
• Archdiocese clears priest [1980-94 Reilly, DeJonghe]
   The Leader www.latimes.com/news/local/burbank/news/la-blr-reilly24jul24,1,1514522.story?coll=la- tcn-burbank-news By Jackson Bell, July 24, 2004
   HILLSIDE DISTRICT, LOS ANGELES (CA) - An Archdiocese of Los Angeles investigation has dismissed allegations that a retired Burbank priest molested a boy more than two decades ago.
   The archdiocese's Clergy Misconduct Oversight Board, in a follow-up review, closed the case against Msgr. Patrick Reilly, said archdiocese spokesman Tod Tamberg. Reilly is pastor emeritus at St. Robert Bellarmine Parish in Burbank.
   "The board found that no substantial evidence of the allegation had been arrived at, and that Msgr. Reilly's good name should be upheld," Tamberg said. "That means he will remain a functioning priest in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles."
   Reilly was one of two priests named in a lawsuit alleging that he sexually abused Michael Matthew Gallardo, now 31, between 1980 and 1984, when Gallardo was a student at Sacred Heart School in Covina. Reilly was a priest at the parish for 13 years before being transferred to St. Robert Bellarmine, 133 N. 5th St., in 1987. The other priest was Harold DeJonghe, who died in October 1998.
   The civil case is ongoing, Tamberg said.
• Unity Church to host convicted priest [Arko] -- marijuana priest
   Beacon Journal, www.ohio.com/mld/ohio/news/9233299.htm?1c , By Colette M. Jenkins, Beacon Journal religion writer
   TALLMADGE (OH): The Rev. Kathleen McKenna is willing to risk criticism and controversy to help someone build a stronger relationship with God.
   That's why she didn't hesitate to invite the Rev. Richard Arko -- a Roman Catholic priest convicted of growing marijuana in his church rectory -- to preach to her congregation.
   "It is a little bit risky, but I don't judge him. I can't," said McKenna, pastor of Unity Chapel of Light in Tallmadge. "I have never had a feeling of doubt about him coming to speak. I believe only good will come from it."
   Arko, who will speak at 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. Sunday at the church, was arrested in January after Norton police searched the Prince of Peace rectory and seized 35 marijuana plants. Arko contends the plants were being grown for medical use. In April, he received two years probation on convictions of illegally cultivating marijuana and possession of criminal tools used to grow the plants.
   Prosecutors and a review board of the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland are also investigating sexual abuse allegations against Arko, who could not be reached for comment. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 07:33 AM]
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Sat July 24, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
• Salesian priest used drink, porn films, on boys; tricks about current address. [1972-84; Rapson] Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.  Tasmania (Australia) flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.  Victoria (Australia) flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.  New South Wales (Australia) flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.
   The Age (Melbourne), "Priest used drink on boys: victim," www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/07/23/1090464864785.html? oneclick=true , By Martin Daly, July 24, 2004
   AUSTRALIA: Boys at a school run by the Catholic Salesian order were allegedly given drugs, alcohol and cigarettes and shown pornographic movies by a pedophile priest who was later jailed.
   The account comes from a victim of David Rapson, a priest who earlier this year was defrocked by the Pope for what the Australian superior of the order, Father Ian Murdoch, has described as horrible offences.
   The Tasmanian victim, who was 14 and 15 at the time of the abuse, was paid $80,000 by the Salesians in connection with repeated abuse during 1983 and 1984 by Rapson at the Salesians' St Dominic's College in Hobart.
   He alleges the Salesians wanted to settle to keep the abuse secret and later protected Rapson from him by declining to provide contact details.
   Former clerical brothers with the order and many former students have confirmed to The Age a culture of extreme physical violence and some sexual abuse at a number of Salesian institutions in the past and say that, in cases, young boys were given alcohol by sexual predators.
   Alcohol was also allegedly supplied in the private rooms of some priests and brothers to boys at the Salesian college, Rupertswood, in Sunbury, Victoria, where sexual abuse by priests and brothers took place over decades.
   The Tasmanian victim said Rapson would go away with boys from the Tasmanian college at weekends to a Salesian-owned house at Swansea, Tasmania.
   "(Rapson) would get you boozed up . . . He would put porn on and he would go outside to look through the window."
   Rapson would go away at weekends and the victim would go with him, and Rapson "would molest me".
   The abuse happened between 1983 and 1984 and has left the victim a broken man. "It has ruined his life," a relative said.
   The Salesians say Rapson has disappeared and could not be found to sign papers confirming his expulsion.Rapson left Tasmania for a teaching job at Rupertswood about 1986 and was later sentenced to two years' jail for sex offences against boys at the Sunbury college.
   The Tasmanian victim says he has telephoned Rapson asking him "why he did it". He said when Rapson got out of jail about 1992, he telephoned the Salesians in Melbourne seeking Rapson's address but they said they did not know where he was.
   But the victim says he then pretended to be a friend of Rapson and was given his telephone number in Sydney. "He told me he had been abused as a child. He never apologised to me."
   The Salesians say Rapson has disappeared and could not be found in February to sign papers from the Vatican confirming his expulsion from the priesthood.
   The victim's account has been confirmed by a close relative who told The Age that the Archbishop of Tasmania, Adrian Doyle, had visited him a number of times and gave him a letter of apology from the church.
   Melbourne psychologist Domenic Greco, at Rupertswood from 1972 to 1977, says boys feared going to rooms because of reports about homosexual sex, and that he was beaten viciously many times. (By courtesy of Broken Rites) [Jul 24, 04]
• Priests Who Prey.
   The Herald Sun, http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au , by Russell Robinson, pp. 24-25, July 24, 2004
   AUSTRALIA: (The Herald Sun story by Russell Robinson is a double-page feature on pp. 24-25, entitled "Priests Who Prey". It is the inside story of "Ken" (not his real name), whose mother sent him to the Salesians' Rupertswood boarding school in Melbourne after his father died. After being sexually abused there (and being unable to tell his devout mother), "Ken" became rebellious and, during his teens, developed an addiction to alcohol and then drugs. He now has hepatitis C and cirrhosis of the liver and is expected to die within months or even weeks. The article relates how "Ken" finally consulted the Broken Rites victim support group.) (Summary from Broken Rites)
   Broken Rites, in consultation with victims such as "Ken", has now taken steps to expose the Salesian cover-up. [Jul 24, 04]
• Salesian sex-abuse, reported without avail to national superior, and now runs a "Boys' Town". [["He went to Samoa for somemore."]] [1970s Bertagnolli, Connors] Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn.  Samoa flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   The Weekend Australian, "Salesian sex-abuse scandal spreads: Another cover-up alleged," by Daniel Hoare and Rory Callinan, p 2, July 24-25, 2004
   SYDNEY (NSW) Australia: A Catholic priest recently appointed to head one of Sydney's largest boys homes has been accused of failing to alert police to sexual assault allegations by one of his priests when he was head of the Salesians in the 1980s.
   The revelations, which date back to Father Frank Bertagnolli's time as head of the Salesian order in Australia between 1982 and 1987, back up growing evidence that senior Church personnel received numerous complaints about the priest yet allowed him to continue his religious duties and travel to Samoa, where he was in close contact with children.
   But Father Bertagnolli, the chairman of BoysTown at Engadine in Sydney's south, has defended his decision not to alert police about the allegations, which involve a priest at the Rupertswood Salesian school in Melbourne.
   Father Bertagnolli confirmed he met with a group of parents in 1986 to discuss sex abuse allegations against the priest dating back to the mid to late 70s, but said they were not strong enough to warrant police involvement.
   The priest has since been convicted of sexually assaulting another student.
   Father Bertagnolli strongly defended his actions, saying there were limited procedures within the Church at the time to deal with such allegations.
   "The parents had the option of going to the police and they didn't," he said.
   "The matter didn't come from the students themselves, but the parents. I spoke to the families. They had a chance to put their views to me. Half of the parents were against me moving (the priest)."
   He said that within three months of hearing the complaints from six different groups of parents, he removed the priest from his position at the school, at Sunbury in Melbourne's north.
   But one of the parents who attended the meeting said Father Bertagnolli was informed about her son's allegations as well as those of another student and did not act. "Nothing was done about it," she said.
   The same woman and her husband had also complained to the then vicar-general of the Melbourne archdiocese, Peter Connors, who is not the Bishop of Ballarat, in central Victoria.
   She accused Bishop Connors of also failing to act and said it was only after she approached then Bishop of Wagga Wagga, William Brennan, that action was taken.
   The women's son said another parent had complained to the school about their child being raped by the priest in the school's infirmary.
   "It was common knowledge. The parents knew. They had discussed it among themselves. They knew that it was going on." # [Emphasis added]
   [COMMENT: Read again: "... there were limited procedures within the Church at the time ..." But, isn't it true that Christianity has known how to deal with pederasts since its first days, starting with Jesus' condemnation of leading others astray in his "millstone around the neck" saying? (Matthew 18:6, Mark 9:42, Luke 17:2) Who is to provide the punishment? The civil power is suggested in 1 Peter 2:13-14 and Romans 13:3-4. Should serious sinners be forgiven? The early Church imposed long-term separation and penances, possibly influenced by Hebrews 6:4-6, 1 John 5:16, 18, and Luke 9:62. Should they be forgiven again, and again, and again ... ? COMMENT ENDS.] [Article Jul 24-25, 04]
#### Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse, Sun July 25, 2004 edition follows:-
• Apostolic Visitors' Reconnaissance Role  Vatican City flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Zenit, http://zenit.org/english , JULY 25, 2004
   ROME (Zenit.org) - John Paul II's decision to send special inspectors to solve problems in an Austrian diocese and in the Syrian Catholic Patriarchate of Antioch has highlighted the role of these little-known figures.
   But, what do these inspectors, these apostolic visitors, do?
   Monsignor Joaquín Llobell answered the question in an interview with the television agency "Rome Reports." The priest, who sits on the Apostolic Signature, is a judge of the Court of Appeal of Vatican City State and a professor of canon law at the University of the Holy Cross.
   "When, like now, there is a problem, the visit is particularly necessary and the aim of the visit is to get to know the problem well, to get firsthand information which would not be influenced by different interests, in order to make a fair decision," Monsignor Llobell said. "The main problem is to get to know the situation well, to give it a solution."
   On July 20, John Paul II appointed Austrian Bishop Klaus Küng of Feldkirch as apostolic visitor of the Diocese of Sankt Poelten, and in particular of its seminary which has been linked to a child pornography scandal.
   The next day, the Vatican press office announced that the Pope appointed the apostolic nuncio in Turkey, Archbishop Edmond Farhat, to conduct a "visitation" of the Syrian Catholic Patriarchate of Antioch, located in Beirut, Lebanon.
   The archbishop has been entrusted with finding a way to reconcile the different points of view between the patriarchate and the Synod of Bishops of the Syrian Catholic Church. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 06:39 PM]
• New claims of sex abuse
   The Advertiser, www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,10246584%255E2682,00.html ; By MILES KEMP, July 26 2004
   AUSTRALIA: Port Pirie's prestigious St Mark's College is under investigation over allegations of a sex-abuse cover-up.
   Catholic Education South Australia is conducting the inquiry into the college with final results due to be given to Bishop Eugene Hurley within weeks.
   The investigation surrounds allegations of sex-abuse by a former teacher of up to four students who were aged 15 to 16 at the time.
   A letter from Catholic Education SA to the parents of students involved states it is also investigating "the procedures applied in dealing with this incident by St Mark's College".
   Former St Mark's education support officer Jenny Christall revealed details of the inquiry yesterday, complaining it had taken the school almost two years to tell parents their children were involved.
   "They have crucified me and they have destroyed these poor girls," she said. Mrs Christall welcomed the Catholic Education investigation and said it should be given to police when completed.
• New claims of sex abuse from South Australia [St Mark's College]
   Catholic News. www.cathnews.com/news/407/141.php
   AUSTRALIA: St Mark's College, Port Pirie, in South Australia, is under investigation over allegations of a sex-abuse cover-up.
   The Advertiser reports today that Catholic Education South Australia is conducting the inquiry into the college with final results due to be given to Bishop Eugene Hurley within weeks.
   The investigation surrounds allegations of sex-abuse by a former teacher of up to four students who were aged 15 to 16 at the time.
   A letter from Catholic Education SA to the parents of students involved states it is also investigating "the procedures applied in dealing with this incident by St Mark's College".
   Director of Port Pirie Catholic Education Kathy McEvoy said police had already been involved in the matter. [A fuller version is later on this webpage]
• The ultimate betrayal  Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   The Tablet (RC newspaper), www.thetablet.co.uk/cgi-bin/register.cgi/tablet-00920 , by Helmut Schüller, July 24 2004
   AUSTRIA: The credibility of the Church in Austria is at stake after being rocked by a sex scandal. In this devastating critique, Vienna's former vicar-general warns that an institution under threat protects itself, not the victims
   By far the biggest shortcoming of many high-ranking churchmen, as well as a not inconsiderable number of the faithful, in their handling of priestly sexual abuse, is their lack of sympathy for victims. When priests are found guilty of such abuse, the senior figures' first reaction is usually concern for the Church's image and for priests who may have been wrongly accused.
   But putting such concerns first is treacherous. As a church office for victims of sexual abuse by priests, we encounter this attitude every day and it is devastating. It is particularly so because solidarity with the weak and the exploited must always be the Church's foremost concern and never more so than when those who have exploited and humiliated their victims are church representatives and employees.
   The foundation stone of the Church, the Gospel of Jesus, leaves the Church no other choice. And yet all too often a kind of negative "corporate identity" prevails. Rather than care for the victims, the priority is to ensure that the Church as an institution gets away with the least possible damage.
   It was typical of this attitude that, after the breaking of the scandal at the St Pölten seminary in Austria two weeks ago, when talks on the homosexual contacts between the rector, his assistants and the seminarians were held, for days Church representatives never mentioned the fact that the relationship of seminarians to the priests in charge is a dependent one, and so the priests responsible are guilty of gravely abusing their power and authority.
   And when the subject arose of seminarians downloading child pornography on to their computers - a criminal offence which occurred at the seminary and has since been confirmed by the police - hardly anyone mentioned that child pornography involves exploiting, destroying, even killing, children.
   Yet the Church continues to pretend that sexual abuse is chiefly a personal failure, a weakness of character and a moral embarrassment rather than above anything else a crime against human beings which does lifelong damage, perhaps destroys the victims psychologically, and sometimes destroys them physically. When the perpetrators are priests or Church employees, it is spiritually devastating as well. The crowning point of this lack of sympathy with the victims of sexual abuse is that the tables are sometimes turned. When victims fail to report the abuse for a considerable period of time, they are accused of merely wanting to get their names in the media or of wanting to make money. This shows how little people in the Church concern themselves with the complexities of sexual abuse, with the often hopeless situation in which the victims, who have no outside witnesses to call on, find themselves, especially when the perpetrators are so often held in high regard in society. People in the Church seldom give thought to how victims often feel: they share a sense of guilt because the perpetrators are only too expert at instilling this feeling in them, or they often try to suppress all memory of what has happened for a very long time.
   What also frequently prevents the Church from clearing up cases of priestly sexual abuse appropriately is the widespread feeling that the Church is being persecuted by the media. In certain Church circles right up to and including individual bishops, people are particularly fond of claiming betrayal. They maintain that the whole subject of sexual abuse is merely part of the Zeitgeist, and a campaign of accusation is being conducted by the Church's enemies.
   There is of course no denying that some of the mass media, above all in the Anglo-Saxon world, know no limits when it comes to media campaigns. In the German-speaking world, however, media campaigns have been far less aggressive. This defensive attitude frequently goes hand in hand with a refusal to accept the truth about scandal in the Church.
   But the Church's actions, which are hardly transparent, positively provoke this media onslaught and encourage damaging speculation about possible church scandals. As long as the Church finds it so difficult to face the truth about itself, and tends only to proclaim that truth liberates in the sense of St John's gospel, rather than to live that truth itself, the media and the society that consumes it will strive to uncover the truth about the Church.
   The Church also refuses to accept the criticisms of a democratic society which believes in a separation of powers. That a bishop directs the legislature, executive and judiciary of a local church, that he chairs all diocesan bodies in which the priests and faithful of his diocese are represented, that he has a decisive influence on how these bodies are made up, and on who belongs to them, has many people asking, quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Who actually controls those who are in a position of authority in the Church? Citing the Pope or the Vatican authorities is of little help here, particularly when as a rule the Pope and the Vatican prefer to wait and would rather leave entire local bishops' conferences standing in the rain than give the impression that they are giving in to any kind of expectations "from below".
   It is then that the media, that very same media that is so maligned in certain church circles, is most likely to succeed in initiating change by putting pressure on the church. This brings us to one of the key issues facing the Church: that the faithful have the right to expect those who are in positions of authority in the Church to be controlled, and to know how they are controlled.
   It is also imperative to call attention to the often uncontrolled handling of spiritual authority which plays an especially important role in more ways than one in church sexual abuse cases. Vulnerable people often submit totally to the Church, and this enables their spiritual leaders to have great power over them. But it is a power they are not always up to handling, and it can make them arrogant and even brutal.
   When a spiritual leader has a disturbed personality this then causes grave damage to the person in his trust. A child protection office for victims of sex abuse by priests is repeatedly faced with such difficulties. It is also confronted with the fact that new spiritual movements are often allowed to operate without being controlled. Not only are those in authority in these new movements not controlled, but the inner structures of the movements aren't either. There is often no separation between the internal and external forums in the structure of such movements, and there is no internal appeal tribunal affecting the decisions of those in authority. Again and again victims of sexual abuse are vilified, declared "intolerable" and excluded.
   Spiritual authority also plays a role in intimidating victims. The effect of this sort of intimidation goes particularly deep, lasts for a very long time and makes uncovering the abuse especially difficult. Particular emphasis must therefore be put on the selection and formation of candidates who aspire to positions of spiritual authority and to controlling those who are in such positions.
   The problems caused by the shortage of priests and of other Church employees are probably also among the reasons for the often irresponsible way sexual abuse cases are handled in the Church. Priests who have been accused of sexual abuse are often left in their positions for far too long after the first suspicions about them emerge. Information is ignored, put aside or dismissed as malicious intrigue for far too long. The perpetrator's version of the story is believed for far too long as well. The way the offenders are dealt with after they have been found out and removed from their posts is also irresponsible. Often the whole problem is "privatised". The perpetrators are not given therapeutic help and no one continues to observe them.
   Finally, the irresponsible way in which the offenders are dealt with is also reflected in the debate on what should be done with them and what sort of positions they should subsequently hold. Since the American bishops announced a policy of "zero tolerance", it seems that the pendulum in Europe - and perhaps in Rome - is swinging back to a more lenient approach, with claims that it is possible to cure problematic personality structures, and that compassion must be shown to perpetrators. Some of the conclusions that were reached at a meeting on this issue in Rome last year would seem to substantiate this impression.
   And all the time, there is far too little talk of our responsibility for people who entrust themselves to the Church, and that this responsibility must carry the most weight. There is a risk that someone who, as an adult, has had problems controlling their impulses and keeping within the limits of generally accepted behaviour will become a repeat offender. This risk the Church underestimates. Overtaxing people who have abusive inclinations, and endangering people who have entrusted themselves to the Church has nothing whatsoever to do with compassion.
   What is absolutely crucial is closer co-operation between diocesan bishops and the heads of religious orders when they admit people into church service, as well as the drawing up of common standards of admission, formation and procedures to deal with suspected cases of sexual abuse and procedures for uncovering them.
   To reiterate my initial point about the Church's priorities: unless it is made quite clear that the Church must first and foremost protect human beings who entrust themselves or who are entrusted to its care, sexual abuse by priests or Church employees will not be prevented, nor will the Church win back its credibility. Moreover, it will be impossible for the Church to fulfil the Gospel message which commits us to showing particular solidarity with the weak and those who need our protection.
   Mgr Helmut Schüller is the former head of the Austrian Catholic aid association, Caritas Austria, and a former vicar-general of the Vienna Archdiocese. He now heads the Catholic Office for the Protection of Children and Vulnerable Adults in the Archdiocese.
Translated by Christa Pongratz-Lippitt. #
• Recovery under the Marshall plan
   The Age, www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/07/25/1090693831338.html , July 25 2004
An Australian-born Canadian is leading the way in dealing with deviant sexual behaviour, writes Ian Munro.
   AUSTRALIA: While it took years of victims' protests to force churches to acknowledge sexual abuse by their clergy, the appointment last year of Professor Bill Marshall as a consultant to the Vatican was a significant marker of change.
   Over the past 36 years Marshall has become one of the world's most prominent authorities on sexual deviance and treatment of offenders. So what is distinctive about clerical child molesters? Not much, he says. "A child molester is a child molester is a child molester."
   Except that sexually abusive priests are notably more narcissistic, more self-obsessed. "They have a very strong need to have people treat them with awe and respect. That inevitably comes with being a priest, I assume, but these guys are different from other priests. That really is cranked up in volume.
   "That's kind of handy. It's one of the things we suggested to the Vatican . . . as a policy recommendation for selection to the seminary. They might want to select out those guys."
   Something similar may be occurring with elite sportspeople, Marshall suggests. In the context of the Australian Football League encouraging women to come forward if they have been sexually abused by players, consider the adulation with which top level footballers are greeted, and the extra licence that can accompany it. [...]
   A diminutive 68-year-old with generous wisps of pure white hair crowning his head, Marshall neatly fits the otherwise over-used tag of "spritely". And, as the author of 16 books and hundreds of journal articles on sexual behaviour, deviance and treatment, he can also be described as prolific.
   They include the mysteriously titled The Clinical Value of Boredom. Its full title is only slightly more informative: A procedure for reducing inappropriate sexual interests.
   The procedure, pioneered by Marshall in the 1970s and now used widely around the world, deals with people consumed with deviant thoughts, such as being sexually attracted to children.
   "A lot of these fellows are fairly obsessed . . . and they masturbate to fantasies," Marshall says. "When a man ejaculates he goes into a refractory state where he is unresponsive to the kinds of things that would be sexually stimulating, and that state persists . . . for at least 10 minutes.
   "So what we do in that 10-minute period is get them to rehearse their deviant fantasies over and over again. They don't want to do it; they get bored with it because they are thinking about their fantasies under conditions where they are not being rewarded. I call that procedure satiation, and it's used in every program around the world because it works." 
• Victims' fury as child abuse records altered Britain flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Scotland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   Sunday Mail (UK), www.sundaymail.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=14459002&method=full&siteid=86024&headline=stop-the-censor-name_page.html ; By Marion Scott
   SCOTLAND: Child abuse victims are taking the Scottish Executive to court to stop them removing the names of alleged abusers from care files. Government officials have spent six months deleting information from records of children abused at five List D Schools run by the De La Salle monks.
   They also claim First Minister Jack McConnell and the Executive are removing the damning details before the introduction of Scotland's Freedom of Information Act in January.
   The law will make information held by government bodies available to the public. Thousands of children were sent to schools and homes.
   Government agencies will have to account for failures to protect them from abuse.
   Victims pursuing civil actions against their alleged abusers will now require court orders to have the blanked out details of their files revealed.
• Trial date delayed in charter school fraud case against Maynard
   Opelousas Daily World (serving St Landry Parish), by Jacqueline Cochran, Posted on July 25, 2004
   OPELOUSAS (LA): The public contract fraud trial on former St. Landry Charter School Board president the Rev. Willie Maynard Jr. has been pushed back for a third time.
   St. Landry Parish District Attorney Earl Taylor said Friday the trial date will be reset for sometime in December as Maynard is attending a religious conference.
   Mayard was scheduled to go to trial the week of August 6.
   Taylor said 27th Judicial District Judge Donald Hebert granted the continuance upon a request by Maynard.
   Taylor said had he known when the request was being made, he would have instructed prosecuting attorney Donald Richard to object. "I can't go back now and ask," he said.
   The 63-year-old pastor of St. Paul Baptist Church of Opelousas was charged by state police in March 2003 with 58 counts of contract fraud. Taylor's office is prosecuting eight of those counts.
   Maynard is accused of funneling more than $66,000 in school funding into bank accounts belonging to himself and to his church.
• Empty seat at reunion where friend belonged [1970s-80s Hanley]
   Star-Ledger, BY PAUL NELSON, Sunday, July 25, 2004
   MENDHAM (NJ): James Kelly didn't belong to any cliques during his four years at Mendham High School but kept a wide circle of friends that included brainy students, athletes and musicians.
   Perhaps, his friends say, it was his dimpled smile and sunny disposition, or his self-deprecating humor, that endeared the young man called Jimmy to a diverse group of classmates.
   People would have loved to see Jimmy at this weekend's reunion of the Class of 1984. But he wasn't there. Nine months ago, an hour before sunrise on a Sunday, Kelly lay down on the train tracks in Morristown and was killed by an eastbound train.
   Despite his death, his classmates have not forgotten the joy he brought to their lives. Yesterday, next to the fields at Mendham Borough Park where Jimmy played ball as a Little Leaguer, his classmates were to dedicate a newly built bench and landscaped area in Kelly's memory. ...
   He was among 16 people, including three of his brothers, who said they were sexually abused as children by the Rev. James Hanley, pastor of St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church in Mendham. James Kelly said his abuse occurred in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
   Hanley served in five North Jersey parishes from 1962 to 1986. At least one parishioner from all but one of those churches has said they were abused by Hanley.
• Case filed in S.D. sparks countersuit, L.A. filing -- avalanche of lawsuits
   Union-Tribune, By Greg Moran, July 25, 2004
   CALIFORNIA: Already fighting against a surge of lawsuits that could result in multimillion-dollar payouts, the Roman Catholic Church in California has opened a new front, quietly going on the offensive and attacking the very law that put it in legal and financial jeopardy.
   Lawyers representing scores of plaintiffs who have sued dioceses across the state say the move has little chance of succeeding.
   Still the offensive - led by the giant Archdiocese of Los Angeles - has opened a small window into some of the critical issues facing dioceses as they move forward, especially the key issue of how the church's insurers are reacting. Since all the cases have been tied up in court-ordered, secret mediation, little has been revealed about these issues.
   Some plaintiffs' lawyers say the legal maneuver is the latest indicator of a tougher, sharper-edged approach to the avalanche of litigation threatening the dioceses.
   "My perception is there has been a shift in strategy, and that strategy is consistent across the state," said Larry Drivon, who represents 450 plaintiffs suing dioceses up and down California. "Up until seven or eight months ago, cases were settling. But there's been a change in strategy, and because of that no cases have settled."
• D.A.: Did church put kids at risk?
   Philadelphia Inquirer, By Nancy Phillips and Maria Panaritis, Posted on Sun, Jul. 25, 2004
   PHILADELPHIA (PA): Prosecutors investigating sexual abuse by priests in Philadelphia believe that Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua and his top aides put children at risk by treating abusive priests with leniency and lax oversight.
   As District Attorney Lynne M. Abraham weighs whether to proceed with criminal charges, her staff has unearthed a number of disturbing abuse cases that have never been made public.
   According to people familiar with the two-year-old grand jury inquiry, law-enforcement officials contend that these cases reveal an institutional breakdown. Prosecutors, the sources say, cite these failings:
   Church officials returned some abusive priests to ministry after therapy, but did not alert parishioners - or even fellow priests - about their past behavior.
   In at least one case, church higher-ups instructed that a priest be kept "on a short leash" on his return to a parish from a psychiatric hospital, but never told his pastor.
   In some instances, the church conducted little or no investigation until a succession of complaints forced action. Some abusers remained in ministry for years, if not decades, after victims came forward.
   Prosecutors apparently have documented no cases in which reassigned abusers assaulted again.
• Abuse survivor pens story
   Boston Herald, By Eric Convey, Sunday, July 25, 2004
   BOSTON (MA): Gary Bergeron was one of the most articulate voices for fellow clergy-sex-abuse plaintiffs.
   Then at the height of the crisis, he stepped forward as an unofficial liaison to the Roman Catholic church for abuse survivors who wanted to preserve or re-establish ties to their faith.
   Now the Lowell resident has written a book about his experience titled "Don't Call Me a Victim" (Arcagelpublishing.com).
   Throughout the crisis in 2002 and 2003, the 42-year-old took notes.
   "It started more or less as a diary or a log. It was very therapeutic for me," he said. "I'd go into a meeting. Some of the meetings were very, very frustrating. It became a way for me to vent." [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 06:22 AM]
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Sun July 25, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
#### Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse, Mon July 26, 2004 edition follows:-
• Woman files another suit against religious order [Lammers, Powers, Gish, Anthony, Charles, Arthur] -- Sisters of Charity of Nazareth.
   WKYT (Kentucky television), www.wkyt.com/Global/story.asp?S=2091280 , ~ July 26, 2004
   LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- A woman who claims she was sexually abused at an orphanage in Anchorage has filed a lawsuit against the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth.
   Nine others have filed suit against the Nelson County-based charity. Six women and one man sued two weeks ago, accusing the order of negligence for abuse they say they suffered from a priest and three nuns at the St. Thomas St. Vincent Orphanage. Two other women joined that lawsuit last week.
   The new plaintiff, Barbara Moseley, claims she was abused in the 1960s and 1970s at the orphanage by Monsignor Herman J. Lammers and five nuns _ Sisters Mary Ann Powers, Jean Gish, Joseph Anthony, Charles, Arthur.
   Her attorney, Victor Tackett, filed the lawsuit Monday in Jefferson Circuit Court.
   Lammers, a now-deceased chaplain, has been accused of abuse by seven other women in a lawsuit. On Monday, two more women joined that lawsuit. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 05:58 PM]
• Two men settle abuse cases against bishop [O'Connell] -- seminary molestation.
   Grand Forks Herald, By BETSY TAYLOR, Associated Press, ~ July 26, 2004
   ST. LOUIS (MO): Two ex-seminarians said Monday that they settled sex abuse lawsuits against the Rev. Anthony O'Connell, a former Florida bishop accused of molesting them as teens while they attended a Missouri seminary.
   Matthew Cosby, 36, of St. Louis, and Michael Wegs, 51, of Minneapolis, each will receive $5,000 from O'Connell. In addition, the Diocese of Jefferson City, where O'Connell worked as a priest, agreed to pay $27,000 to Cosby and $20,000 to Wegs.
   O'Connell was the longtime rector at St. Thomas Aquinas in Hannibal, a northeast Missouri seminary for high school-aged boys. O'Connell left St. Thomas in 1988 to serve as bishop in Knoxville, Tenn.
   He went on to become the bishop of the Diocese of Palm Beach, Fla., but resigned in March 2002, after admitting to the abuse of an underage student at the Missouri seminary he led, which closed in 2002.
   There was no admission of any wrongdoing in the settlement agreement, lawyers said Monday.
   David Clohessy, director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests [SNAP], said O'Connell should be prosecuted and removed from the priesthood. "At a bare minimum, O'Connell should not be allowed to wear the Roman collar," he said.
• Crisis meeting decides uniform training for priests  Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Die Presse, http://diepresse.at/Artikel.aspx?channel=&ressort=ee&id=434623 , July 24, 2004
   ST. POELTEN, Austria: An unusual meeting between Austria's bishops on Thursday night called for an end to special training practises at a seminary in Lower Austria at the heart of a child porn scandal. Trainee priests in St. Poelten had previously been exempted from participating in a propaedeutic year but will now be required to take part in the preparatory course, which is taught in all other religious districts in Austria. The bishops have thereby taken action on one of the two main criticisms brought against the seminary and St. Poelten Bishop Kurt Krenn.
• Austrian bishop says controversy overblown  [Krenn]
   Catholic World News, http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=31085 , Jul. 26 2004
   VIENNA, Austria: (CWNews.com) - The Austrian bishop whose seminary is at the center of a pornography and homosexuality scandal said in an interview published on Monday that the controversy was overblown.
   Bishop Kurt Krenn of St. Polten told the newspaper Neues Volksblatt, "It is portrayed as if we have a giant saga to come to grips with, and that's not the case. What has been found is a student who had done something."
   A Polish seminarian at the school was arrested by Austrian police this month and charged with distributing child pornography using computers at the seminary.
   In the course of the investigation, the police also uncovered photos taken by the seminarian that reportedly show priests and seminarians engaged in homosexual activity. Some of those photos were published in Austrian media.
   The Vatican has dispatched a special envoy to the diocese to undertake an investigation into the scandal. Meanwhile, Krenn has been under pressure from Catholics throughout Austria to step down, mainly for his comments dismissing the activity shown in the photos as "boyish pranks."
   [COMMENT: The bishop is still "in denial" although the public have seen the photographs of priests in passionate activity with the youngsters supposed to be training for the sexless priesthood! No wonder a Vatican official has ordered him to stop talking to the news media. COMMENT ENDS.]
• Clergy sex-abuse survivor shares his story of 'hope' - RCC. United States of America flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Lowell Sun, By MATT MURPHY, Monday, July 26, 2004
   LOWELL (MA): In his first interview three years ago, after going public with news that he had been sexually abused by a Catholic priest in Lowell, Gary Bergeron cautioned a Sun reporter not to call him a victim.
   "I hate that term," said Bergeron, 42, an outspoken "survivor" of the sexual-abuse scandal. "A victim is what I was for the last 30 years. I don't use that as a crutch anymore."
   Bergeron is now publishing a book titled Don't Call Me a Victim detailing his life, his abuse and the process of fighting the Catholic Church that brought him to the steps of the Vatican and led to a landmark $85 million court settlement with the Boston Archdiocese.
   Publishing the book himself under the name Arc Angel Publishing, Bergeron will release the 340-page memoir Sept. 9 a year to the day from when the archdiocese settled the civil suit with Bergeron and about 550 sexual-abuse survivors.
   "I think the public will be interested in knowing what a couple of guys from Lowell accomplished," Bergeron said sitting down for an interview. "There's a lot of questions that still haven't been answered."
• Akaboha seduces woman & two daughters [Jehu-Appiah] -- Musama Disco Christo Church former head Ghana flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Ghanaian Chronicle, http://db.ghanaian-chronicle.com/thestory.asp?id=2633 , By Dominic Jale, Posted Monday, July 26, 2004
   GHANA: The Agona Swedru High Court was last Thursday told how the de-frocked Prophet Miritiah Jonah Jehu-Appiah, Akaboha III, of the Musama Disco Christo Church (MDCC) seduced two daughters of a woman with whom he had been in sexual relationship.
   The woman (name withheld) made this revelation when she gave evidence at the hearing of a suit brought against the former Akaboha by the leadership of the church.
   In the suit, filed in March 2003, the church is seeking, among other things, a declaration that the defendant had been lawfully and permanently removed from office as the leader and General Head Prophet of the MDCC on February 2003.
   Narrating her story, witness who is married to one of the senior pastors of the church, told the court that she considered what the prophet did to her and her two daughters by having sexual affair with them as a taboo and inhumane.
   She said that she and the Akaboha were in a relationship for six years but when everything was pointing to a marriage he left her in the lurch and married another woman.
   She told the court that she later got married to her current husband and she could not believe it when it was discovered that her two daughters had fallen victim to Akaboha's seduction. She said she had since been going through pains over what the Prophet had done to them.
• Priest in Lackawanna County Admits to Sexual Misconduct [1970s Shoback]
   WNEP, Monday, July 26, 2004
   PENNSYLVANIA: A Roman Catholic priest in Lackawanna County was removed from his post after admitting he sexually abused a minor more than 20 years ago. It happened in Luzerne County.
   Reverend Edward Shoback, a long-time priest at Saints Peter and Paul Church in west Scranton admitted responsibility to the allegations after he was confronted. According to Maria Orzel, spokesperson for the Diocese of Scranton, an allegation about the incident recently made its way to the diocese. Orzel would not say when the diocese learned of the allegation or when Father Shoback was removed from his post. An announcement was read at a Mass over the weekend.
   Church officials are asking anyone else who may have been abused by Fr. Shoback to come forward. Shoback was a pastor or assistant pastor at eight different parishes in several counties in the diocese. He was ordained in 1967.
• Mixed Blessing
   Boston Magazine, www.boston magazine.com/ ArticleDisplay. php?id=408 , by Matt Kelly, July 2004 issue.
   BOSTON (MA): Archbishop Sean O'Malley was brought in to clean up the mess after the sex abuse scandal. He has, but many Catholics are looking askew at what else he's doing.
   Sean Patrick O'Malley considers his followers a people in exile. Which is a funny way of looking at things when you're the Roman Catholic archbishop of Boston. After all, this city is full of Catholics -- more than two million at last count. We see them on Beacon Hill, in the business world, on the evening news. Catholics have been running the show here since Honey Fitz was elected mayor nearly 100 years ago.
   Yet Archbishop O'Malley insists his large flock has been cast out in the wilderness. "To me, one of the best metaphors to describe the reality of the church in the United States is the biblical notion of exile," he has said. "For today's world, the central claims of the faith are increasingly unwelcomed and they are received if not with hostility,  at best with the yawn of indifference."
   O'Malley uttered those words during the notorious "culture of death" homily he delivered on Holy Tuesday, when he said baby boomers were religious illiterates lost in limbo thanks to the sexual revolution, feminism, and divorce, among other things. That part of the speech is what people remember, rather than O'Malley's dismay over how an indifferent world ignores what good Catholics believe.
   That's unfortunate, because his point about being ignored is an important one. It's precisely the treatment many Catholics believe they're getting from O'Malley.
   Since his installation one year ago this month as the sixth archbishop of Boston, the 60-year-old Franciscan friar has proved not quite a disappointment, but certainly not the healing savior Catholics expected.
   O'Malley arrived here with one immediate goal laid out before him: to salvage the archdiocese before clergy sexual abuse lawsuits left it both financially and morally bankrupt. While he seems to have averted financial disaster, some in Boston's Catholic community say they wanted a change in leadership and in the way in which the archdiocese deals with the laity. That's not what they got. And it's over those deeper, lingering tensions -- about empowerment of laity, control of money, parish closings, sexual morality -- that O'Malley has left many local Catholics almost as disillusioned as his predecessors did.
   While activist groups like Voice of the Faithful want a say in how their church operates, O'Malley comes from another perspective: the theologically conservative hierarchy assembled and presided over by Pope John Paul II. In that world, the hierarchy delivers the church to its people, not vice versa.
   How Archbishop O'Malley expects to balance these two warring points of view -- or, indeed, if he does expect to -- is unclear. In the year since he arrived, he has never granted an interview to the Boston media. True to form, he declined to comment for this story. Most often, he presents his views in columns in the archdiocese's weekly newspaper, the Pilot, and otherwise zigzags between popular gestures of Christian charity and grating examples of righteousness.
   Catholics far and wide have embraced O'Malley for his acts of humility, from his selling of the lavish cardinal's mansion in Brighton to pay for the abuse scandal settlements to his begging forgiveness during his installation ceremony for church cover-ups. But they also cringe over several of his decisions, such as his exclusion of women from the ritual of washing parishioners' feet at Holy Thursday Mass and his clumsy use of the word "feminism" to denounce secular society. He remains surrounded by some of the same men who worked with his disgraced predecessor, Cardinal Bernard Law. And his announcement that 65 parishes will be closed in order to make up for financial shortfalls has provoked an emotional backlash.
   After his gaffes on Holy Tuesday and Holy Thursday, O'Malley tried to improve his image in an apologetic column in the Pilot. He promised to consult with Pope John Paul II next month in Rome about the washing of women's feet. But the damage had been done.
   "He has to wait until August and a trip to Rome to decide what to do with respect to washing women's feet?" asks John Hynes, who chairs the steering committee of the Boston Voice of the Faithful Council. "It seems a bit un-leaderlike to me. But maybe that's the way it has to be in the church."
   What Hynes leaves unsaid (though others state it frankly) is this: To the concerned parishioners, Archbishop O'Malley is just another conservative administrator imposed on Boston Catholics by the Vatican, the latest in a long line of men who just don't get it.
   Physically, O'Malley does not cut a terribly intimidating figure. He stands about six feet tall. He has an average frame with sloping shoulders. In public appearances, he tends to walk with his arms against his sides, adding to the impression he gives that he is just a humble monk. With his long white beard and friendly expression, he looks every bit the pastoral priest.
   His voice is another matter. It is surprisingly deep, rich, and sonorous. It rolls out from the lectern, washing over his audience. It jumps instantly from a whisper to a full-volume shout. He does not talk so much as let loose a well-oiled series of words. He rarely stumbles on a phrase or gropes for the right word. Franciscans believe in preaching, and in O'Malley, it shows.
   He has been steeped in Catholicism all his life. He was an altar boy in his hometown of Lakewood, Ohio, and had dreams of becoming a foreign missionary. He enrolled in parochial school and, later, at the St. Fidelis seminary in Pennsylvania, both run by the Capuchin order. He studied Spanish and Portuguese literature (he speaks both languages, as well as Creole, fluently) at the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC, and was ordained in 1970.
   O'Malley entered the Franciscan Capuchin order in 1965. He is well known for appearing around town clad in monks' robes and sandals, the traditional garb of Franciscan friars. Less visible is the rope O'Malley uses as a belt: a simple cord with three knots, representing the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience that he accepts as a Capuchin. Those vows are at the core of his religious beliefs. In one form or another, his Capuchin values surface in nearly every action O'Malley takes or position he supports.
   "He's not at all attached to the trappings of power," says Thomas Groome, a professor of religious education at Boston College who has met O'Malley. "In that sense, he's a true Franciscan."
   O'Malley is a man sincere in his faith, and that faith tells him to embrace poverty and humility. As a result, he resides in the unremarkable rectory behind Holy Cross Cathedral. He spent his first Christmas in Boston tending to the homeless at the Pine Street Inn.
   Thirty years ago, O'Malley was assigned to work at the Centro Catolico Hispano, a community center in the Washington slums. In 1977, he helped a group of mostly impoverished immigrants organize a rent strike against their neglectful landlords. O'Malley moved into their drug-saturated neighborhood himself and lived there for more than a year, chasing away rats and standing guard at night against drug dealers. That is enthusiastic Franciscan faith in action.
   O'Malley attacked the clergy abuse crisis with similar vigor and sounded all the right tones of apology and contrition. He dropped all legal wranglings and offered settlements within six weeks of his installation. He met privately with dozens of victims.
   "It was very positive. From the first moment, the tone he set there was just right," says Reverend Robert Bullock, one of the founders of the Boston Priests' Forum, which was formed just before the abuse scandal.
   O'Malley's humility, compassion, and insistence on social justice resonate with lay Catholics. But don't forget the other tenets of his faith: chastity and obedience to church teachings. Those two drive his opposition to gay marriage and to Catholic politicians who support abortion rights. O'Malley believes such hard-line stances must be followed no matter how unpopular they may be in a secular world. It's his job as an archbishop to sound a strong moral tone for his flock, and he does so with the same enthusiasm he has for ministering to individuals -- even when, as Groome says, "how that is being done is challenging for many of us."
   Of course, O'Malley's strict views are not shocking to everyone. Many local Catholics welcome their substance. When he stood in front of the State House in bitter February cold to rail against gay marriage, thousands stood with him.
   "He brings a very important quality to Boston that is really lacking in terms of the moral climate in our city and state," says Raymond Flynn, former mayor of Boston and now president of the socially conservative Catholic Alliance. "He's saying things and will continue to say things that won't be high up in the polls, but they're a moral point of view that needs to be said."
   How O'Malley says these things -- unilaterally -- is what leaves many Catholics frustrated. More than anything else, rank-and-file Catholics worry that their points of view are not taken seriously. Early in his tenure, O'Malley celebrated Mass in a parish that had been led by an allegedly abusive priest. He met with activist groups. But some worry that those gestures were simply intended to give the appearance that he was open to new ideas. This may be one reason many Catholics seem to be deserting the church; estimates vary, but most no longer attend Mass regularly.
   Members of the Boston Priests' Forum had to write O'Malley twice before he finally met with them -- a full seven months after his arrival. The archbishop met with members of Voice of the Faithful in October, but entreaties to meet again about parish closings, clergy abuse, and other concerns have gone unanswered, according to Hynes.
   "The PR that comes from the chancery would lead you to believe there is an ongoing dialogue," Hynes says, "but there was one meeting seven months ago. That's been the only one. The number of hours we have spent trying to craft communications to Archbishop O'Malley only to be ignored is just mind-boggling."
   Bullock is more diplomatic, but no less disenchanted. "It's not a personality issue," he says. "You can say that a wonderful new person has come in, that there's fresh air, that the person has a spiritual center. But nothing has changed."
   Then there are the chancery personnel. The same coterie that worked with Law -- chancellor David Smith, legal counsel Wilson Rogers Jr., auxiliary bishop Richard Lennon -- still surrounds O'Malley. Bishops who worked closely with Law in the 1980s and 1990s, when the cardinal was shuffling abusive priests from one parish to another, now run various dioceses around the Northeast.
   Anne Barrett Doyle, cofounder of a victims' advocacy group called the Coalition of Catholics and Survivors, calls priests suspended for alleged sexual misconduct "a long list of unregistered sex offenders." Unless O'Malley listens to the laity and victims rather than the church hierarchy, she says, "he's another secret keeper. He's just better at it."
   Notes Bullock: "People who have been complicit in the former cover-ups are still now making policy. There's a lot of concern about that."
   But O'Malley is part of the hierarchy. He works in the executive branch of the Roman Catholic Church. While organizations like Voice of the Faithful and victim support groups try to style themselves as a sort of legislative branch, the Vatican does not recognize any authority parallel to its own. Pope John Paul II believes in orderly administration, and O'Malley the administrator answers to him. And there's that vow of obedience again.
   At the same time, many of the archbishop's actions have a thoughtful logic to them. O'Malley took care of the abuse lawsuits and sold the cardinal's residence to pay for them. He is closing dozens of parishes in order to reign in an archdiocese budget painfully out of balance. (The Catholic Appeal, a fundraising campaign that is the archdiocese's main source of revenue, fell from around $17 million a year before the abuse scandal to just $7.63 million last year. Even before settling with the abuse victims, the archdiocese ran a net operating deficit last year of $14.9 million.) O'Malley's administrative demeanor may be authoritarian, but his actions are often shrewd and necessary.
   Trace it back to his spiritual side: Here is a friar who believes in carrying the cross God puts before him. O'Malley's particular cross is a dysfunctional archdiocese desperately in need of repair, so he has taken up the challenge with gusto. He sees Catholicism as a community and expects the laity to view it the same way.
   It's a lot to ask of an archdiocese so violated by its past and so uncertain of its future.
   "He certainly has the spirituality to carry it off and sustain him," Groome says. But of O'Malley's flock, he adds "let's hope his people can." #
• Moreno's Admission -- former bishop [Ziemann, Trupia, Barmasse, Guillen]
   Tucson Weekly, www.tucsonweekly.com/gbase/Currents/Content?oid=oid:58451 , By GUSTAVO ARELLANO, JULY 15, 2004:
   TUCSON (AZ): He's one of the most notorious pedophilic-priest shufflers in American Catholic history: Manuel D. Moreno, former bishop of the Diocese of Tucson.
   Moreno resigned last year after serving Southern Arizona for 21 years, a period during which Moreno settled 11 lawsuits alleging child molestation by Tucsonan priests for $14 million. During his tenure, Moreno also offered refuge to seminary classmates accused of sexual misconduct, like Patrick Ziemann (former bishop of Santa Rosa, Calif., who resigned in 1999 after accusations arose that he kept a priest as his personal sex toy) and Robert Trupia (nicknamed "Chicken Hawk" by his fellow priests).
   At the time of Moreno's resignation, 17 more sex-abuse lawsuits awaited Tucson-area parishioners, inching the current Tucson Catholic hierarchy toward the once-unimaginable brink of bankruptcy.
   Moreno is in failing health, preparing to meet his maker. Perhaps that explains why Moreno is now openly admitting his complicity in the Tucson sex-abuse scandal. In an extraordinary June 2 deposition taken by Costa Mesa, Calif.-based attorney John Manly, who's currently representing alleged sex-abuse victims in Tucson, Moreno acknowledged rumors that have been whispered about by sex-abuse victims for years but had been studiously ignored by Tucson-area Catholics.
   In the course of the two-hour deposition, held in Pima County Superior Court, Moreno acknowledged, among other things, that he'd allowed priests he knew were child molesters to take kids on trips to Disneyland, where priests would then molest them.
   This shocking revelation involved Kevin Barmasse and Juan Guillen, two priests who are listed as sex molesters on the Tucson diocese's Web site. In the case of the former, Manly asked Moreno if he remembered a Los Angeles archdiocesan official pleading the following: "Manny, We've this problem with this new priest, Kevin Barmasse. He got picked up by the sheriff (for an incident with a boy in Long Beach). The attorney general wants him out of town. We'll pay his stipend, but would you please take him?"
• Franciscan Brother's victim to get six-figure sum from state [Hannon] - RCC. Boy, 3 girls. Government department and senior clergy had known. Ireland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   One in Four, http://oneinfour.org/news/news2004/franciscan , By Paul Melia - Irish Independent, ~ July 26, 2004
   IRELAND: The State has agreed to pay a six-figure settlement to a man who suffered serious sexual abuse at the hands of a Franciscan brother despite fighting liability and attempting to block the compensation for six years. Livinius Devine (41) will be paid the compensation for being abused by Brother John Hannon, who is now in jail for his crimes.
   The offer of settlement came after it emerged that Department of Education officials knew Brother Hannon had been transferred to Mr. Devine's school in Clara, Co Offaly, following a scandal at Corofin in Co Galway where the brother had been accused of sexually abusing three young girls.
   This evidence was produced two years after the courts ordered discovery of all documents relating to Brother Hannon's employment in Corofin and Clara. The offer of compensation was made on the morning of Mr. Divine's case the day after the department presented documents outlining Hannon's employment history.
   These documents include correspondence between a department official and the school's inspector showing close involvement in crisis management talks in Corofin. They also showed that Mr. Devine's abuse came about following a cover up known about by department officials and senior members of the clergy.
• Scranton Priest Accused of Sexual Misconduct [1980s Shoback]
   WBRE 28 News, http://www.wbre.com/news/default.asp?mode=shownews&id=322 , ~ July 26, 2004
   SCRANTON (PA): A Scranton pastor has been removed from his priestly duties after he admits to sexual misconduct.
   Reverand Edward Shoback, from St. Peter and Paul church, said 20 years ago he was involved in sexual misconduct with a young person.
   In response to his confession, the Diocese of Scranton has taken immediate and permanent action. They say.. "Father Shoback may no longer celebrate mass publicly, administer sacraments, wear clerical garb or present himself publicly as a priest."
• Sex Scandal Inspires 'Sinful Seminary' Pub Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  India flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Star of Mysore (India), www.starofmysore.com/main.asp?type=sparklers&item=1577 July 26, 2004
   VIENNA, Austria: Allegations of sexual impropriety and child pornography at a Roman Catholic seminary in Austria has inspired a local pub-owner to rename his beer hall "Pub at the Sign of the Sinful Seminary."
   Formerly called "Otzi's Venison House" after owner Juergen Otzelberger, an employee at the pub in St. Poelten said the new name was in response to a scandal sparked by the publication of photographs of priests kissing and groping seminarians.
   Earlier this week, an investigator appointed by Pope John Paul arrived in St. Poelten to launch an inquiry in the scandal that has rocked Austria.
• Bishop helps draw new members -- Episcopalians
   Portsmouth Herald, www.seacoastonline.com/news/07262004/news/28804.htm , By Associated Press, July 26, 2004
   CONCORD, New Hampshire - Unable to accept their bishop's homosexuality, some Episcopalians have left their church. To others, Gene Robinson's consecration last year served as a powerful magnet.
   "It was a very strong symbol to us of the inclusiveness of the Episcopal Church, and that is important to us," said Martha McCabe.
   McCabe of Bow said she left the Catholic Church over the priest sex abuse scandal. She and her husband, who was raised a Methodist, had started looking at other denominations for a church their family could attend.
   Robinson's consecration drew them in as it did Maria Easton of Hillsboro.
• City priest removed; admitted to sex misconduct [1980s Shoback]
   Scranton Times, www.scrantontimes.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=12480839&BRD=2185& PAG=461&dept_id=415898 &rfi=6 ; By Chris Birk, TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER, July/26/2004
   SCRANTON (PA): The Diocese of Scranton has removed a longtime priest at SS. Peter and Paul Church in West Scranton after he admitted engaging in sexual misconduct with a minor about 20 years ago in Luzerne County.
   The Very Rev. Edward J. Shoback, 62, is now in treatment after almost 15 years as spiritual head of the Polish parish. The diocese offered few details about the removal.
   An allegation about the incident "recently" made its way to the diocese, according to spokeswoman Maria Orzel. When confronted, Father Shoback admitted responsibility and faced immediate removal from the ministry, according to a diocesan statement.
   Ms. Orzel would not specify when the diocese received the allegation or when Father Shoback was officially removed. She said he was gone before the Most Rev. Bishop John M. Dougherty, auxiliary bishop, addressed the congregation during Saturday Mass.
   She had no information about the incident.
• A difference of words [Graham]
   Post-Dispatch, www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/News/St.+Louis+City+/ +County/0F94C1B7AFA02306 86256EDD001C8762?OpenDocument&Headline=A+difference+of+words ; By Adam Jadhav, ajadhav@post-dispatch.com , Phone: 314-608-3665, July/25/2004
   ST. LOUIS (MO): As the nation awoke to headlines two years ago of sex abuse by priests, many prosecutors scrambled to go after the sometimes decades-old crimes.
   The public learned of sex acts performed in cloisters, rectories and schools. Articles pointed to cover-up and coercion.
   In some cases, the crimes happened so long ago that criminal charges were out of the question. Statutes of limitations - time limits for prosecution - were a roadblock to many attorneys wanting jail-time for abusive priests.
   But some attorneys - among them St. Louis Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce - began to look for ways to file charges. Earlier this month, a three-judge panel of the Missouri Court of Appeals Eastern District ruled that no statute of limitations existed to bar Joyce's prosecution of a priest accused of child sex abuse in the late 1970s.
   Though Joyce's office and the defense for accused priest Thomas Graham argued fine points of law - the meaning of the words "or" and "during" - lawyers and legal scholars have mixed opinions about the ruling, which says no statute of limitations exists for sodomy cases before 1979.
   For one, they debate whether this will open the door to a wave of charges in old Missouri cases. They also can't agree on whether having no limit is fair. And they differ on whether the ruling would be upheld on appeal.
   The only thing they can agree on: This issue is not going away.
   "It's something that every state is dealing with," said Washington University law professor Peter Joy.
   And though the panel ruling affects only Missouri courts, Illinois also has grappled with this issue. In 2003, the Legislature passed a law allowing child sex abuse cases to be prosecuted until the victim turns 28.
   Additionally, if the offender in a child abuse case has a "professional relationship" with the victim, Illinois law allows charges to be brought within one year of discovery of the crime.
   In 2002, Joyce charged Graham under a 1969 law that says anyone convicted of "the detestable and abominable crime against nature" can be given two years to life in prison. Because the code does not specify a time limit on prosecution, Joyce argued that the statute of limitations must be determined by the sentencing options.
   Until crime code changes in 1979, Missouri law explicitly gave no statute of limitations for crimes punishable by "death or by imprisonment in the penitentiary during life." Most at issue in the code are the words "during" and "or."
   The panel's July 6 opinion found that "during life" meant a life sentence. And "or" meant the crime did not have to have both the death penalty and life imprisonment as a sentencing option.
   Thus, sodomy, for which an offender could receive two years to life in prison, has the same statute of limitations as does murder, which allows for both a life sentence or the death penalty.
   "The ruling in this case is this is what the law is," said Ed Postawko, the prosecuting St. Louis attorney in the case. "(Justices) are not making any political statement or political opinion."
   But Graham's defense argued that "or" meant only crimes that have punishments of both the death penalty and life imprisonment should have no limit on prosecution.
   "Suspending the statute of limitations - meaning there would be none - only applies for offenses that are punishable by either death or, in the alternative, life imprisonment," said Art Margulis, an attorney representing Graham who planned to ask the full court to rehear the case.
A wave of charges
   In the meantime, some defense lawyers worry - and advocates hope - that a deluge of charges in old cases could be brought.
   "My understanding is that there are cases in St. Louis city, St. Louis County, Springfield, Mo., and in Jackson County waiting to see what the ruling is in this case," Margulis said. "I think it's possible that there could be a very significant number of criminal cases going forward."
   Although Joyce has recently declined to comment on any additional charges, in April 2003, she told Post-Dispatch reporters that her office was looking at as many as 10 cases that could be re-opened by a favorable ruling. She had said her office has received more than 100 credible complaints against 61 priests since the scandal broke in 2002.
   "It could impact one other case. It could impact 10. It could impact thousands," Postawko said Tuesday.
   A spokesman for the Jackson County prosecutor said attorneys were reviewing cases but had no specific plans yet. An assistant to the St. Louis County prosecutor said the ruling could affect at least two allegations.
   Jeff Anderson, a Minnesota lawyer whose office has handled more than 800 sex-abuse cases - many civil lawsuits - including some in Missouri, dismissed any fears of opening a "floodgate."
   "The reality is that survivors are starting to come forward already and have been for a while," Anderson said.
   The Missouri Court of Appeals decision drew praise from advocates and victims, who called it a "huge opportunity."
   "It is very, very tough for victims to come forward, and very, very tough for prosecutors to bring cases," said David Clohessy, national director of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, whose own priest-abuse case from the early 1970s potentially could be re-opened.
Fair prosecution
   Still, some legal scholars blanch at the idea of prosecuting a case that is older than potential jurors. What happens to witnesses? Is evidence still around?
   Can anyone be expected to produce an alibi?
   In describing a hypothetical case, Steve Beckett, a law professor and director of trial advocacy at the University of Illinois' Urbana-Champaign campus, said: "It's 25 years later. The kid who was allegedly abused is probably in his 30s. The priest is barely alive. There are no other witnesses. It's his word against his word."
   Beckett's hypothetical isn't that far off the mark. Graham is accused of performing oral sex on a teenage boy sometime between January 1975 and the end of 1978.
   The liaison allegedly occurred in the rectory of the Old Cathedral, a St. Louis landmark on the riverfront believed to be the oldest Catholic cathedral west of the Mississippi.
   Margulis said the housekeeper of the rectory at the time has dementia and the bishop of the church is dead.
   "Memories fade. Documents are lost. People disappear," Margulis said.
   That argument is the very reason for statutes of limitation, some experts said. The older a crime is, the more likely it will devolve into a "he said, she said" fight.
   But Clohessy and Anderson both argue that victims frequently sit in silence. They are often convinced that the abuse isn't actually abuse. Sometimes they block out the incidents altogether.
   "They don't understand first that it's abuse, second that they're being harmed," Anderson said. "It takes them time to come forward to report it, to take legal action."
No end to debate
   But whether the panel opinion will withstand appeals is anyone's guess.
   One trial judge stood by Joyce's argument. A second dismissed the case.
   Beckett called the appellate panel's ruling "strained" and said he would expect it to be overturned. Joy said he could see either side's interpretation was plausible.
   And public opinion could play a role. "We (as a society) have mixed feelings about statutes of limitations," said Steve Easton, an associate law professor at the University of Missouri at Columbia. "We have them for good reasons, but in an individual case, it often feels like an unjust result to some people when a prosecution is thrown out."
   Frank Zimring, law professor at the University of California's at Berkeley, said the ruling is another sign that America is leaning toward more aggressive prosecution - including lengthening statutes of limitation.
   That attitude is already evident in Missouri. In June, Gov. Bob Holden signed a law that lengthens the statute of limitations for sex abuse of a minor from 10 years after turning 18 to 20 years.
   "If you're interested in which direction the wind is blowing, I think you got it from the court of appeals," Zimring said. #
• Not Going to Give Up [Arceneaux]
   KATC, http://katc.com/Global/story.asp?S=2087048&nav=EyAzPARl , ~ July 26, 2004
   ARNAUDVILLE (LA): Catholics in Arnaudville are standing behind their priest. Father Jules Arceneaux was removed from St. Francis Regis Catholic Church last week, after pornography was found on a Church computer.
   Sunday, St. Francis Regis parishioners told KATC they're not giving up until their priest is back in Arnaudville. Signs of support are everywhere in Arnaudville, and Sunday the parishioners met to vocalize that message at a rally in support of Fr. Arceneaux. "We are waiting for him to come back and we hope as soon as the investigation is over he'll be back," says parishioner Pam Doucet. Parishioner Tyler Mallett said, "I'm just here to be one of those people that's showing my support."
   White ribbons and stickers saying 'we want him back' show how dedicated some parishioners are. Their emotions were running high at the rally. "We wanted to show that the devil doesn't stand here - Satan is going to be going and we want Fr. Jules back and we want to show our spirit," Janice Robin tells TV-3. Darla Olivier grew close to Fr. Arceneaux when he was a pastor in Eunice. "We feel it's the devil trying to wreck our churches."
• More tea, Cardinal?  Britain flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Independent, http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/story.jsp?story=544846 , By John Walsh, 26 July 2004
   What happens when you've lost your religion, and the most senior figure in Britain's Roman Catholic Church invites you round for a chat? In a rare and candid conversation, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor defends the faith to one of the unfaithful
   BRITAIN: Archbishop's House, the intellectual engine-room of English Catholicism, sited a rosary's throw from Westminster Cathedral, is not a jolly place. You approach it with slightly drooping spirits. Perhaps you'd expected a whiff of high-church, bells-and-smells papist extravagance? Forget it. A touch of the Mediterranean/Gothic spikiness and sentimentality you find in Spanish or Italian church buildings? Nada and niente. You're looking at a large, cold, off-puttingly bricky edifice in London's Victoria, that could easily pass for town-planning offices in Birmingham. Inside, you go through a glass lobby with a resident anchorite eyeing you suspiciously, and wait at the foot of an echoing marble staircase to meet your fate.
   Well, actually, to meet Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, Archbishop of Westminster, but there's something decidedly fateful about our encounter today. It was well over a year ago that I received a letter from this distinguished House, and I remember sitting at my desk and looking at the envelope with apprehension. It was evidently a reply to a piece I'd written in these pages last year. I'd criticised the Roman Catholic Church for its smug assurances about how they'd minimised the risk of child abuse; I'd presented an unpleasant image of the modern Catholic priest as a sexually stunted emotional maverick; I'd brought up my own schooldays, at the hands of excessively tactile Jesuits...
   It was a short but furious anti-Catholic rant, about which I soon felt remorse. Now, here was a reply from the Cardinal's office, and I felt worse. Obviously, it couldn't be from the Cardinal; he'd be too busy to tick off gadfly attacks from lapsed Catholics in the media. It was probably from some hatchet-faced, episcopal hit man in rimless spectacles, someone employed to harangue ex-believers who dared to attack the church of their forefathers. "You grubby little sinner," it would read. "You vicious little traitor. I'll teach you to undermine the One True Church. Hold out your hand..." [...]
   He was sent away with his brothers to a Christian Brothers school in Bath. The Brothers have an unrivalled reputation in scholastic circles for casual brutality, and, admits the Cardinal, "I felt I could have had a better education. I didn't like the strap, I felt they relied on it far too much." [...]
   At 40, Murphy-O'Connor was sent back to his beloved Rome to become rector of the English College for seven years.[...]
   Is he in favour of abolishing the requirement that priests be celibate? "My view * * is that there's a strong case for the ordination of married men - but they have to have been married and brought up a family before they're ordained. If the Church were to change its law, that's how it would change it. But I don't believe that's the answer to declining vocations. Priesthood comes from having a really strong community of the faithful. Where you get a really lively faith lived out, you'll get priests. It's not a matter of celibacy."  ... [The whole article is recommended. At the foot is a list of Roman Catholic facts and figures]
• Woman attorney implores Fr. Andrew Greeley to expose "ring of predators"
   OpinionEditorials.com , www.opinioneditorials.com/guestcontributors/mabbott_20040726.html , by Matt Abbott, ~ July 26, 2004
   CHICAGO (IL): The following is a recent e-mail letter sent by attorney Sheila Schreiber-Parkhill of Bismarck, North Dakota, to sociologist and author Father Andrew Greeley (I wrote a commentary on this very subject some time back; but Sheila has acquired a few additional details that I find very interesting.):
   "Dear Father Greeley:
   "I have followed your career and writings for many years now, reading the many stories you've written about the sexual abuse crisis in our Church, the problems, the solutions, stories you have written denouncing the bishops and their cover-ups. 'Are the bishops sorry at all?', you asked 8/3/2003. They all sound so right, so self-righteous and yet, when it comes to your personal life, doing the right thing yourself, your silence is deafening!
   "I had to laugh when I read that Bishop Wilton Gregory said: 'I can assure you, known offenders are not in the ministry.' Yet you and I both know that is not true. We both know of at least six. While I do not yet have the proof in my hands, you do.
   "For over a year now I have been investigating the Boys Club in Chicago.
   "In light of the arrest of Father Gerald Robinson of Toledo, isn't it time you do something about the Chicago Boys Club, including the priest, now bishop, whose name has been included with it? They are still in the ministry, active in parishes. Some of those parishes have schools. They have not yet been exposed. You have made it clear to all that you know who they are. Knowingly allowing evil conduct to evade justice is to cooperate with evil. [...]
   "You say: "'There is no evidence against them because no one has complained about them and none of their fellow priests have denounced them.'
   "You are one of their fellow priests. You were in Chicago at the time. You know who they are.
   "If you don't denounce them, do you think you are any different from the bishops you denounce? Are you not even worse because you hide the proof of evil predators' guilt in safekeeping? Who is being kept safe? You? Remember these are satanic ritual abusers. Do you not think about the potential for other victims, children whose violation you have the power to prevent? As for those who have already been violated, you have the power to bring these predators to justice.  ...
• Deposition Transcripts Acknowledge Hidden Files Contained Sexual Abuse Information. [2003-04 Sullivan; Teczar] - RCC.
   Worcester Voice, http://worcestervoice.com/transcripts_from_deposition1.htm , ~ July 26, 2004
   WORCESTER (MA): Monsignor Thomas Sullivan, liaison to District Attorney John Conte's office, has been exposed in a May 2004 deposition as keeping a secret set of secondary records. The admission came in a deposition of Bishop Daniel P. Reilly in a lawsuit ongoing in the Texas courts that named the Diocese of Worcester and Father Thomas Teczar as defendants.
   Attorneys representing the plaintiffs - who are unnamed alleged victims of Father Teczar - are seeking to bring Monsignor Sullivan and the Worcester Diocese before a Texas Judge to be sanctioned. This case again illustrates that the Diocese of Worcester has been withholding evidence and keeping secret files during the past two years. [...]
   So this Diocese of Worcester has been on notice since June of 1998 that it has been acting according to the same pattern found by a Superior Court Judge. The pattern is to withhold files from lawyers for the victims and then to claim it was inadvertent when they files are located.
   Shockingly, Bishop Robert McManus has taken no action to see that the faithful are informed that the Diocese of Worcester has been exposed for committing these actions. Additionally there is no known action to change the legal practice of Reardon and Reardon. These actions could cost the Diocese of Worcester in the form of legal sanctions that are presently being sought before a Texas Judge and an extensive amount of legal fees. Deplorably, we see now that Bishop Daniel Reilly wile Bishop of Worcester, allowed the diocese to continue its practice of keeping secret second files and allowed the production of sanitized files, all in an effort to hide their past actions to protect young children from sexual abuse.
   Worcester District Attorney John Conte and ADA Christopher Hodgens, who was directed by DA Conte to review the clergy case files, failed the people of Worcester miserably in their investigation of clergy sexual abuse in the Worcester Diocese. These failures and the belief that no real investigation into the dioceses ever occurred, will be brought to Massachusetts state authorities to seek legal remedies against District Attorney Conte and his employees for their failure in what now has become obvious to reflect a conspiracy that has allowed the dioceses to hide information from plaintiffs lawyers in respect to clergy sexual abuse for many years, with no fear of prosecution from the legal system.  ... [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 08:28 AM]
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Mon July 26, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
• New claims of sex abuse from South Australia. [St Mark's College; Salesians; Rapson] Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn. 
   CathNews, www.cathnews. com/news/407/ 141.php , Jul 26, 2004
   ADELAIDE, S. Australia: St Mark's College, Port Pirie, in South Australia, is under investigation over allegations of a sex-abuse cover-up.
   The Advertiser reports today that Catholic Education South Australia is conducting the inquiry into the college with final results due to be given to Bishop Eugene Hurley within weeks.
   The investigation surrounds allegations of sex-abuse by a former teacher of up to four students who were aged 15 to 16 at the time.
   A letter from Catholic Education SA to the parents of students involved states it is also investigating "the procedures applied in dealing with this incident by St Mark's College".
   Director of Port Pirie Catholic Education Kathy McEvoy said police had already been involved in the matter.
   "Other than saying yes, there is a review, and that we will take seriously the recommendations, I don't want to say anything," she said.
   Meanwhile boys at a school run by the Salesian order were allegedly given drugs, alcohol and cigarettes and shown pornographic movies by a pedophile priest who was later jailed.
   The account, published in The Age on Saturday, comes from a victim of David Rapson, a priest who earlier this year was defrocked by the Pope for what the Australian superior of the order, Fr Ian Murdoch, has described as horrible offences.
   The Age continues its coverage of the sex abuse issue today with a feature on the visit to Melbourne of Australian-born Vatican consultant Canadian Professor Bill Marshall to conduct workshops on how to deal with sexual offenders.
   The paper says that "while it took years of victims' protests to force churches to acknowledge sexual abuse by their clergy, the appointment last year of Professor Bill Marshall as a consultant to the Vatican was a significant marker of change".
   It says that over the past 36 years, Marshall has become one of the world's most prominent authorities on sexual deviance and treatment of offenders.
   SOURCES:
New claims of sex abuse (The Advertiser 26/7/04)
Priest used drink on boys: victim (The Age 24/7/04)
Recovery under the Marshall plan (The Age 26/7/04)
   LINKS
Workers trained to treat sex offenders (ABC 24/7/04)
New Catholics not detracted by abuse crisis, say their faith is holding strong (Catholic News Agency 23/7/04)
Stop the censor: Victims' fury as child abuse records altered (London Sunday Mail 25/7/04)
Another top Salesian speaks to The Age (CathNews 21/7/04)
  HAVE YOUR SAY   Click here    [Emphasis added] [Jul 26, 04]
#### Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse, Tue July 27, 2004 edition follows:-
• Bankruptcy filing sets dangerous precedent -- 'cover-ups, incompetence and malevolence' in the past U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   National Catholic Reporter Editorial, http://natcath.com/NCR_Online/archives2/2004c/073004/073004z.htm , Issue Date July 30, 2004
   PORTLAND (OR): By filing for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11 earlier this month, the Portland, Ore., archdiocese effectively placed ultimate authority for every significant aspect of its business affairs with a federal bankruptcy court. In other words, with the government. This is a dangerous and unwelcome precedent, though not totally unexpected or unwarranted.
   The consequences of this unprecedented step started to become clear at a July 14 hearing. The archdiocese had to petition the court for the right to pay its employees. The benevolent federal bankruptcy judge said they could, demonstrating that this northwestern church now relies on such munificence to manage even its most routine administrative affairs.
   One other consequence of the filing could be the public release of documents that would give Catholics a fuller look at the conduct of church officials in handling the sex abuse crisis.
   Archbishop John Vlazny said he had no choice but to seek protection from creditors. In the short term, the archdiocese faced two lawsuits totaling $155 million from alleged clergy sex abuse victims. In the long term, the church faces unknown potential liabilities. Sixty other claims are pending.
   The archdiocese, largely through its insurers, had already paid more than $50 million to more than 100 sex abuse victims. The insurers -- claiming the management of the archdiocese should have done more to prevent the abuse -- now balk at paying additional settlements and judgments.
   Vlazny considered a host of bad choices and, by his lights, chose the least bad one. He may yet be proved correct. But few doubt that he has taken an enormous gamble, one that will reverberate around the country as cash-strapped dioceses grapple with the consequences of clergy sex abuse and their inept and potentially criminal response to that evil.
   The risks are evident. In a July 6 letter to Portland's 300,000 Catholics, Vlazny said that under canon law he has "no authority to seize parish property" or to use the faithful's earmarked donations to pay judgments or settlements. That may be true, but it's also irrelevant.
   Canon law has no more standing in a federal bankruptcy proceeding than the bylaws of any corporation, which is to say none.
   "The operation of our parishes and schools will continue as usual," Vlazny wrote. Well, maybe.
   In fact, by requesting protection from creditors under Chapter 11, the archdiocese risks every piece of property it owns or controls and every dollar in its investment and banking accounts. Its 124 parishes, nine hospitals, eight homes for the aged, three high schools, 41 elementary schools, and least $150 million in liquid assets can be thrown into a mix that will ultimately result in a court-sanctioned settlement with creditors.
   One of the court's first tasks will be to evaluate the value of these holdings and, given the sometimes complicated legal arrangements, who actually "owns" them. But everything is fair game and the ultimate outcome is both unknown and unknowable.
   Chapter 11 proceedings are court-supervised negotiations. They bring coherence to a litigious process that, from the archdiocese's perspective, was spinning out of control. Those with claims against the archdiocese must now come forward and state them, which will define the extent of the archdiocese's exposure.
   There's also an element of fairness to the process. Those with "like claims" -- victims of clergy sex abuse for example -- will receive similar compensation. These awards will be less than a single abuse victim might have received prior to the bankruptcy filing, but the result will be that all victims will be compensated.
   Claimants and the archdiocese will come up with restructuring plans, which the court will examine, adjust and ultimately approve. It will be a lengthy and contentious process subject to appeal all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
   Further, Chapter 11 is a transparent process. In bankruptcy proceedings, there are no "confidentiality clauses" of the kind some dioceses have used in civil case settlements to hide their culpability. Here, again, everything is at the discretion of the court. If the judge wants to examine the merits of the outstanding claims against the archdiocese (and it's hard to see how she wouldn't, given how central they are to the archdiocese's fiscal condition), the court has an unmitigated right to review the documents underlying the claims. Those documents will be made public.
   Consequently, the bankruptcy case in Portland may offer the public the opportunity to examine documents related to church handling of the sex abuse crisis. Not since a Massachusetts court ordered documents related to the Boston archdiocese's clergy abuse malfeasance unsealed has the public had a comparable chance to examine how church leaders acted toward the priest predators in its ranks and the victims who sought compensation.
   In the meantime, the court leaves day-to-day control of the archdiocese's affairs to the archbishop and his staff, though any significant financial decisions (including whether to pay the archdiocese's employees) must first be approved by the bankruptcy judge. But if the court finds fault with the archdiocese's response to its inquiries or its administration of church assets, the court could appoint a trustee to oversee the business operations of the church.
   Given the history of cover-ups, incompetence and malevolence demonstrated by bishops around the country in their management of the sex abuse crisis, it's tempting to question the motivations behind Vlazny's decision. But it hardly seems likely that seeking federal bankruptcy protection was, in his judgment, anything other than the best option among some very bad choices.
   Yet to voluntarily relinquish matters of church governance to the government -- a dangerous and disturbing practice that risks the independence religion needs to be truly free -- is an ominous decision. The implications, particularly if other dioceses follow suit, are potentially grave for both church and state.
   National Catholic Reporter, July 30, 2004 # [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 06:51 PM]
• Seminary bishop didn't listen to other bishops: The Word From Rome [Krenn] Vatican City flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   National Catholic Reporter, "The Word From Rome," www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/word , By JOHN L. ALLEN JR., July 23, 2004
   ROME: In response to the widening sex abuse crisis in Austria's Sankt Pölten diocese, the Holy See appointed July 20 Bishop Klaus Küng of Feldkirch as an apostolic investigator. His mandate will be to establish all the facts surrounding revelations that some 40,000 images of child pornography were discovered in the seminary in Sankt Pölten, along with explicit photos of seminarians and priests.
   The man at the center of the storm is Bishop Kurt Krenn, 68, who faces calls for his resignation. So far, Krenn is refusing to give in, insisting that the pictures of priests and seminarians amount to a "prank."
   Since Krenn is widely considered Austria's most conservative bishop, the choice of Küng, a member of Opus Dei, as the investigator is generally considered a way of ensuring that the results of his inquest cannot be dismissed as ideologically motivated.
   In a sign that the Catholic church has absorbed at least some of the lessons of the recent sex abuse scandals, Küng is not wasting time. He received his appointment July 20, and arrived in Sankt Pölten to begin work the morning of July 21. He told Austrian television the night before that he intended to take a comprehensive look at the situation in the diocese, not just the recently discovered images.
   Many observers believe that the handwriting is on the wall for Krenn. In one sign of eroding support, Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna said on Austrian television that the country's bishops have long warned Krenn that he should not accept seminary candidates rejected by other dioceses, but that he did not listen. Schönborn also expressed regret that Rome had not acted earlier against Krenn, since, he said, the Vatican had been "well informed" of the bishops' concerns.
   Küng has not said how long he expects his investigation to take, but some Austrian sources have suggested that it could last three to four weeks.
   A Gallup poll released July 22 found that 79 percent of Austrians find Krenn "untrustworthy" and 71 percent want him to resign. #
• Altar Boy Slaying Papers Ordered Open [1972 Lavigne]
   Guardian (Britain), www.guardian.co.uk/uslatest/story/0,1282,-4358073,00.html , By TRUDY TYNAN, Associated Press Writer, Tuesday July 27, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (AP) - Autopsy results in the 1972 bludgeoning death of a 13-year-old altar boy, unsealed Tuesday by the state's highest court, showed the teen had large amounts of alcohol in his bloodstream before he was killed.
   The Supreme Judicial Court upheld a lower court ruling ordering the documents unsealed in the state police investigation of the unsolved death of Danny Croteau. A defrocked pedophile priest, Richard Lavigne, was the only publicly identified suspect in the boy's slaying, but he was never charged.
   The Republican newspaper in Springfield and John Stobierski, an attorney for 46 alleged clergy abuse victims, including 24 who said they were molested by Lavigne, had sued for the release of the documents.
   The autopsy report was immediately released to the newspaper by Hampden County District Attorney William Bennett. It shows Danny had a blood alcohol level of 0.18, or more than twice the legal limit for driving, when he was bludgeoned to death. His body was found on the banks of the Chicopee River.
   It was not immediately clear when the remaining files would be made public. The high court said the names and addresses of witnesses should be stricken before the papers are released.
• Bishops permitted by Rome to defy US RC abuse crackdown: Editor's Desk U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Vatican City flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   National Catholic Reporter, "From the Editor's Desk," http://ncronline.org/NCR_Online/archives2/2004c/073004/ 073004b.htm , by Tom Roberts, for July 30, 2004
   UNITED STATES: One hesitates to keep getting caught up in the muck of the clergy sex abuse crisis for fear that it becomes the only perspective through which the church is viewed. That said, each month seems to bring some new chapter and yet another indication from church leaders of why it won't go away. Most recently it is the scandal in Austria (see John Allen's story on Page 11) and the comments of Bishop Kurt Krenn that what was photographed at his seminary amounted to nothing more than a "schoolboy prank."
   Closer to home, the Times Leader newspaper, which covers Scranton, Pa., quoted former Scranton Bishop James Timlin in a testy exchange with the lawyer of an alleged sex abuse victim. Referring to the guidelines for dealing with clergy sex abuse promulgated by the U.S. bishops in 2002, Timlin said under oath in a deposition last October, "I know there are some bishops in the country who refuse to have anything to do with it and they have permission from Rome to do this." The full story might be found on the paper's Web site.
   The bankruptcy in Portland is symbolic of more than fiscal distress. [Emphasis added]
• Aloha man faces charges of molestation [2003-04 Schaper] -- foster father accused
   Hillsboro Argus, www.oregonlive.com/news/argus/index.ssf?/base/news/1090963949123690.xml , Tuesday, July 27, 2004
   ALOHA (OR): An Aloha man, who with his wife had foster-parent custody of three young girls, now faces charges that he molested all three of them.
   The girls lived with David Henry Schaper, 31, and his wife in their home in the 180000 block of Southwest Longacre Street. Schaper is accused of sexually abusing the girls, who range in age from 2 to 9, between December 2003 and June.
   He faces six charges of sex abuse, sodomy, sexual penetration with a foreign object and criminal mistreatment -- all first-degree.
   Schaper was also a leader of Cub Scout Troop #875, sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 17140 SW Bany Road in Aloha. He was also involved with youth ministries at that church, but detectives don't believe he has other alleged victims through the church or scout troop. [Emphasis added]
• Lawsuits alleging abuse at Catholic orphanage reaches 16 [1950s-60s Lammers, Michael]
   WKYT, www.wkyt.com/Global/story.asp?S=2095897 , July 27, 2004
   LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- The number of claims alleging sexual abuse at an orphanage run by Roman Catholic nuns has risen to 19 this week.
   The suits, filed in Jefferson County Circuit Court, allege sexual and physical abuse at the now-closed St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage in Anchorage. The suits claim the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth committed abuse and tolerated abuse by others from the 1950s through the 1970s. The Sisters of Charity operated the orphanage, which was owned by the Archdiocese of Louisville.
   Four women joined a pending lawsuit Tuesday, echoing allegations made by 14 other plaintiffs already a part of the proceedings. Another woman filed a separate lawsuit on Monday.
   Four women came forward with new allegations Tuesday -- three were added to an already pending lawsuit and another filed suit separately. The four women, Cynthia Sadler, Gail Miller, Veronica Aubrey and Theresa Elzy, claim they were abused by Monsignor Herman J. Lammers, who was resident chaplain at the orphanage, and a Sister Joseph Michael, during the 1950s and 1960s.
• Priest says case lacks due process [2002 Egan, 1980s Kavanagh]
   National Catholic Reporter, http://ncronline.org/NCR_Online/archives2/2004c/073004/073004m.htm , By DICK RYAN, New York, July 27, 2004
   NEW YORK: In May 2002, New York Cardinal Edward Egan suspended Msgr. Charles Kavanagh as a priest of the archdiocese and pastor of St. Raymond's Parish in the Bronx. The action was based on an allegation by a former seminarian, Daniel Donahue, that Kavanagh had been guilty of "improper conduct" 20 years ago.
   According to Kavanagh, however, there was no investigation, which in itself violated his right to due process under canon law. Neither he nor his lawyers have been told what the specific allegations were, nor have they ever received any formal evidence from the archdiocese, he said. Repeated written requests for documentation on any decisions have been refused, according to Kavanagh, and neither he nor his lawyers have ever been informed that his case has been sent to Rome.
   In Donahue's four years at Cathedral Prep Seminary, Kavanagh had been his counselor and spiritual director. In his testimony about "improper conduct" before the archdiocese's Advisory Board on sexual abuse cases, Donahue said that there was never any sexual contact of any kind between them.
   In his review of the case, Martin P. Kafka, a psychiatrist and a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, focused on the relationship between Kavanagh and Donahue while at the seminary. In 2003, Kafka had been invited to Rome at the request of the Vatican's Pontificia Academia Pro Vita as an international expert to help the church address the abuse of children and adolescents by Catholic priests.
• New Battle Sparked Over Priest Abuse Claims [Brouillette] -- Christian Brother
   NBC 5, www.nbc5.com/news/3583311/detail.html?z=dp&dpswid=2265994&dppid=65193 , UPDATED 2:53 pm CDT, July 27, 2004
   CHICAGO (IL): Advocates for those who were sexually abused by Roman Catholic priests criticized church leaders Tuesday for what they called "using legal technicalities" to overturn a new state law that adjusts the time victims have to claim injury.
   Attorneys representing dozens of alleged victims of sexual abuse and lawyers for the accused priests, several Catholic orders, and the Archdiocese of Chicago went before Cook County Circuit Court Judge Diane J. Larsen to argue on the constitutionality of the new state law.
   In the hourlong hearing, plaintiff attorneys argued that the law clearly allowed it to be retroactively applied to abuse cases prior to the law's signing of July 24, 2003.
   Defense attorneys stated the new law should not be applied retroactively and would effectively wipe out the statute of limitations in abuse cases.
   The judge did not rule on the matter, but said she would release a written opinion at a later date. Her ruling would affect dozens of pending and future abuse cases before the court.
   Larsen is personally only hearing a small number of sexual abuse suits, including two against Robert Brouillette, a former Catholic priest of the Christian Brothers Order who served as a counselor at St. Laurence High School in Burbank, and was accused of repeatedly molesting two male teenagers, officials said.
• Court opens Croteau murder files [1972, 1992 Lavigne] -- 32 complainants
   The Republican www.masslive.com/hampfrank/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-0/109096470071941.xml , By BILL ZAJAC, wzajac@repub.com , Tuesday, July 27, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): A Springfield altar boy found murdered 32 years ago had a blood alcohol level of more than twice the current legal limit, according to autopsy and lab results released today under a Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruling.
   Justices of the state's highest court ruled today that the investigative files in the 1972 murder of 13-year-old altar boy Daniel Croteau of Springfield must be opened to the public.
   The unanimous decision of the five Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court justices who heard the case concludes a 17-month court battle in which The Republican and a Greenfield lawyer representing more than 46 alleged clergy sexual abuse victims fought Hampden County District Attorney William M. Bennett's office and the murder's only suspect to end a 1996 impoundment order.
   Bennett's office released some of the documents to The Republican hours after the ruling. Tests conducted on the dead boy at the time showed his blood alcohol level was .18.
   Richard R. Lavigne of Chicopee, a defrocked priest, is the only publicly identified suspect in the killing. Other alleged victims have told The Republican he plied boys with liquor before molesting them.
   Lavigne admitted in 1992 to sexually assaulting two boys and was given 10 years probation. He has been accused by more than 30 others of sexually assaulting them.
• The Supreme Judicial Court decision -- clergy sexual abuse mentioned in ruling to open the files
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): The Republican, www.masslive.com/chicopeeholyoke/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-0/109096470071940.xml ; Tuesday, July 27, 2004
   REPUBLICAN COMPANY vs. APPEALS COURT & others. SJC-09209 May 6, 2004. - July 27, 2004. Public Records. Search and Seizure, Affidavit, Warrant. Constitutional Law, Impoundment order. Uniform Rules on Impoundment Procedure. Privacy. ...
   In brief summary, the Superior Court judge, after conducting a meticulous in camera inspection of the impounded material, found that in light of Lavigne's long-known status as a suspect in the investigation into Croteau's death, the three decades of investigation that have passed, the privacy protection available to individual witnesses through redaction of identifying names and addresses, the climate of broad public disclosure of sexual abuse by members of the clergy, the publication of details of the investigation into Croteau's death that already has occurred, and the mechanisms of voir dire and change of venue that are available to protect Lavigne's right to a fair trial, [FN13] the district attorney's and Lavigne's interests in continued impoundment, though legitimate, were weakened. Balancing this weakened interest in impoundment against John Doe's and the public's interests in learning of Lavigne's alleged patterns of sexual abuse, of Lavigne's superiors' knowledge of and actions with regard to Lavigne's abuse, and of the government's thus-far unsuccessful investigative efforts into the circumstances of Croteau's death, the judge then concluded that good cause sufficient to justify further impoundment no longer existed. We cannot say that the judge erred in any respect. We therefore affirm the judgment of the Superior Court.
• Church to defrock disgraced bishop [1950s Shearman] -- Anglican Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn. 
   The Mercury, www.themercury.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,10266394%255E421,00.html By Greg Roberts, July 28 2004
   AUSTRALIA: The Anglican bishop at the centre of the child sex abuse controversy that forced the resignation of Peter Hollingworth as governor-general is to be formally stripped of his holy orders.
   A church tribunal headed by Queensland Supreme Court judge Debra Mullins has unanimously resolved that Donald Shearman, 77, be defrocked for seducing a teenage schoolgirl boarding at an Anglican hostel at Forbes in western NSW in the mid-1950s.
   Church sources said the unprecedented defrocking will be performed by Brisbane Archbishop Phillip Aspinall in the Darnell Room of St Martin's House - part of the St John's Cathedral complex in central Brisbane - on August 25.
   In a parallel development, NSW police have begun investigating the first formal complaint against Mr Shearman by his victim. Religious historian and head of religious studies at the University of Queensland, Philip Almond, said he had not heard of a bishop being defrocked in comparable circumstances anywhere.
• Two men settle abuse cases against bishop [? 1960s, 1980s O'Connell] U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   News Tribune, www.newstribune.com/articles/2004/07/27/news_local/0072704004.txt , By The Associated Press, July 27, 2004
   MISSOURI: Two ex-seminarians said Monday that they settled sex abuse lawsuits against the Rev. Anthony O'Connell, a former Florida bishop accused of molesting them as teens while they attended a Missouri seminary.
   Matthew Cosby, 36, of St. Louis and Michael Wegs, 51, of Minneapolis each will receive $5,000 from O'Connell. In addition, the Diocese of Jefferson City, where O'Connell worked as a priest, agreed to pay $27,000 to Cosby and $20,000 to Wegs.
   O'Connell was the longtime rector at St. Thomas Aquinas in Hannibal, a northeast Missouri seminary for high school-aged boys. O'Connell left St. Thomas in 1988 to serve as bishop in Knoxville, Tenn.
   He went on to become the bishop of the Diocese of Palm Beach, Fla., but resigned in March 2002, after admitting to the abuse of an underage student at the Missouri seminary he led, which closed in 2002.
   There was no admission of any wrongdoing in the settlement agreement, lawyers said Monday.
   David Clohessy, director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said O'Connell should be prosecuted and removed from the priesthood. "At a bare minimum, O'Connell should not be allowed to wear the Roman collar," he said.
• Ex-seminarians settle abuse suit [O'Connell]
   Pioneer Press, www.twincities. com/mld/twin cities/9249494. htm? ERIGHTS=- 245915 700946 2504twincities:: kashaw@peoplepc. com&KRD_RM=9ppqsy rtwyxs sqwurs tvpppppp| Kathleen|Y , July 27, 2004
   MISSOURI: Two ex-seminarians said Monday that they settled sex abuse lawsuits against the Rev. Anthony O'Connell, a former Florida bishop accused of molesting them as teens while they attended a Missouri seminary.
   Matthew Cosby, 36, of St. Louis, and Michael Wegs, 51, of Minneapolis, each will receive $5,000 from O'Connell. In addition, the Diocese of Jefferson City, where O'Connell worked as a priest, agreed to pay $27,000 to Cosby and $20,000 to Wegs.
   O'Connell was the longtime rector at St. Thomas Aquinas in Hannibal, a northeast Missouri seminary for high school-aged boys. O'Connell left St. Thomas in 1988 to serve as bishop in Knoxville, Tenn.
• Wanted in Canada, friar lives quietly in U.S. mission and the Church helps him elude the law. Canada flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   The Globe and Mail, www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20040727/PRIEST27/?query=chumik By KIM LUNMAN, Page A8, Tuesday, July 27, 2004
   CALIFORNIA: At first glance, Brother Gerald Chumik would not seem out of place at the Santa Barbara Franciscan mission. The elderly friar tends to his herb garden and prays constantly.
   But the ailing 69-year-old never leaves the historic Catholic mission alone. He's essentially under house arrest, according to church officials, and is wanted in Canada on charges of molesting a teen three decades ago in Newfoundland.
   The case of Brother Chumik has sparked angry calls on both sides of the border for his return to Canada, where he is wanted on a warrant for two charges of gross indecency against a teenage boy dating back to the 1970s.
   But church officials say Brother Gerald, who has cancer and diabetes and lives in the mission's 25-bed infirmary, is not a threat to anyone.
   "He's confined," said Rev. Mel Jurisich, who heads the Franciscan order's western U.S. region. "He cannot leave the grounds without someone accompanying him."
• When a pope is not a pontiff Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Vatican City flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   National Catholic Reporter, http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/todaystake, By Thomas C. Fox, NCR publisher, July 27, 2004
   AUSTRIA; You cannot help but feel sorry for Austria's Catholics. Their local church has been plagued by a number incompetent bishops. They call themselves conservatives, but betray Christian traditions for the sake of ecclesial power.
   In the name of what they call orthodoxy they betray core Christian values of human dignity, compassion and service. Far from being shepherds, they have engaged in actions viewed as criminal by the faithful and wider community
   Austria's Catholics -- those who have not altogether given up on the church in disgust -- are outraged. Yet they remain largely impotent to effect change and rescue their church.
   The most recent outrage focuses on Bishop Kurt Krenn of Sankt Pölten, a man who is emblematic of failed leadership. It was in Krenn's seminary two weeks ago that some 40,000 images of child pornography were uncovered in computer files. Among the pictures were some of seminarians and priests in sexually explicit poses. They revealed a stunning misuse of authority and criminal abuse of minors. (The story is in NCR's July 30 issue, which will be available on the Web site, July 28.)
• High court orders some documents from altar boy's murder made public [1972 Lavigne] U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Boston Globe, www.boston.com/dailynews/209/region/High_court_orders_ some_documen:.shtml , By Trudy Tynan, Associated Press, July/27/2004
   SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (AP) The state's highest court on Tuesday lifted an order keeping the investigative files closed in the unsolved 1972 murder of a 13-year-old altar boy.
   The Supreme Judicial Court said a lower court judge was right to order the records made public from a state police investigation into the death of Danny Croteau. Defrocked pedophile priest Richard Lavigne was the only publicly identified suspect in the boy's slaying, but he was never charged.
   "The public's right of access to judicial records, including transcripts, evidence, memoranda, and court orders, may be restricted, but only on a showing of good cause," the justices wrote in their decision. "Good cause sufficient to justify further impoundment no longer exists."
   Croteau's bludgeoned body was found on the banks of the Chicopee River on April 15, 1972. But Lavigne did not emerge as a suspect until the 1990s, after he pleaded guilty to molesting two other children.
   Documents in the case were impounded in 1996 after Hampden District Attorney William M. Bennett closed the case when blood tests failed to conclusively link Lavigne to the crime. The records include a 1993 search warrant authorizing taking a sample of Lavigne's blood to test against blood found along the river bank where Croteau's body was found.
• 'Missing' pastor charged with sodomy: Missouri Update [1996 Peckham]
   Team Amber Alert News, www.teamamberalert.net/news/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2861
   MISSOURI: A twist in a missing person case has led to charges against Sarcoxie minister Donald D. Peckham, 71.Sheriff Archie Dunn hosted a press conference Thursday at the Jasper County Jail and said a task force learned "his disappearance was deliberate and calculated and may involve criminal activity."
   Ironically, Peckham's disappearance led to the uncovering of information, which led to charges of Class C felony statutory sodomy. A statement of probable cause filed Wednesday alleged that Peckham had sexual relations with a 14-year-old minor "on or about May through July, 1996."
   "We've had contact with the victim and that's what led to the charge," said Prosecuting Attorney Dean Dankelson. He said the victim was a Jasper County resident and the acts were performed at Peckham's residence.
• Couple Sues Church and Religious Therapist [? 2001] -- Presbyterian
   KGBT, www.team4news.com/Global/story.asp?S=2091537&nav=0w0vPCbb . Reported by Roxanne Lerma, JULY 26, 2004
   CALIFORNIA: A valley couple has filed suit against a prominent McAllen church and one of its former employees.
   The pair sought counseling with a guest preacher -- but instead say he took advantage of the woman sexually, in her time of need.
   And it isn't the first time he's been embroiled in this kind of controversy.
   Instead of solace and healing, the couple - on the verge of divorce, say the First Presbyterian Church of McAllen handed them more heartache.
   "Our clients have really obviously been damaged by this whole situation," said John Millin, the couple's attorney.
   In 2001, the woman sought help from the church -- for marital problems and depression.
• Bishop says porn scandal overblown [2004 Krenn] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Poland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   Chicago Sun-Times, www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-porn27.html , July 27, 2004
   VIENNA, Austria -- A bishop who oversees a Roman Catholic seminary where a vast cache of child pornography was discovered argued that the scandal had been overblown in comments published Monday.
   "It is portrayed as if we have a giant saga to come to grips with, and that's not the case," the Upper Austria daily Neues Volksblatt quoted Bishop Kurt Krenn as saying. "What has been found is a student who had done something."
   The Vatican has sent a special inspector to investigate the St. Poelten diocese, where authorities found about 40,000 photos and numerous videos, including child pornography, on seminary computers. Photos of candidates for the priesthood kissing and fondling each other also have been found, and some were published in Austrian media.
   Authorities investigating the child pornography aspect of the case have charged a 27-year-old former seminary student from Poland with possessing and distributing illicit material, a federal offense punishable by up to two years in prison.
• Scrutinising Krenn Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags [2004 Küchl, Krenn]
   Wiener Zeitung, www.wienerzeitung.at/frameless/eng_news.htm?ID=Eng&Menu=7507
   AUSTRIA: Nearly three weeks after the head of the seminary in St. Pölten, Ulrich Küchl, stepped down and over a year after the first allegations of crimes relating to child pornography were brought up against priests in the Lower Austrian capital, Pope John Paul II now wants a closer investigation.
   He dispatched the Vorarlberg bishop Klaus Küng as "apostolic visitor" - a step that has not been taken by the Vatican in years. Bishop Kurt Krenn of St. Pölten, meanwhile, still plays down the affair.
   Küng is to look into all affairs of the diocese in St. Pölten. During the six-week investigation Krenn has to report every decision to Küng and ask his permission.
   Critics argue that Küng is too conservative to judge a like-minded bishop. He is also a member of the controversial church group Opus Dei, whom Krenn is said to support.
   Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Archbishop of Vienna, said the Pope had taken an "exceptional" step by appointing an investigator to scrutinise the whole diocese, comprising over 400 parishes. However, he stressed that more could have been done earlier.
   While more and more Austrian Catholics are considering leaving the church because of the porn- and child abuse- scandal in St. Pölten, Krenn still is convinced that "there is nothing to it". On the other hand, he conceded yesterday, that he might lose his position as bishop in St. Pölten because of the affair.
• Bishop accused of improper sexual contact settles lawsuits [1977 O'Connell]
   Sun-Sentinel, www.sun- sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sfl-pbishop27jul27,0,5841130.story?coll=sfla-news- palm ; Staff and wire reports, Posted July 27 2004
   PALM BEACH (FL): Former Palm Beach Diocese Bishop Anthony J. O'Connell, who left in disgrace in 2002 after admitting to improper sexual contact with young seminarians years earlier, has settled two lawsuits in Missouri.
   Two former seminarians accused O'Connell of molesting them as teens while they attended a Missouri seminary. Matthew Cosby, 36, of St. Louis, and Michael Wegs, 51, of Minneapolis, each will receive $5,000 from O'Connell. There was no admission of any wrongdoing in the settlement agreement, lawyers said Monday.
   In 1999, O'Connell arrived at the Palm Beach Catholic Diocese to heal a diocese reeling from a sex scandal that forced its first trusted bishop from the pulpit. But three years later, describing what he called a misguided attempt to counsel a troubled seminary student, O'Connell acknowledged he had inappropriately touched a boy about 25 years ago while a rector in Missouri -- and had a similar relationship with another teen. All the allegations took place years ago in Missouri.
• Diocese seeking to appeal ruling
   The Morning Call, www.mcall.com/news/local/all-b1_5diocese- rjul27,0,2042084.story?coll=all-newslocal-hed ; By Kathleen Parrish
   ALLENTOWN (PA): Hoping to avoid a lengthy and costly county trial, the Allentown Catholic Diocese wants a higher court to settle once and for all whether the statute of limitations involving allegations of sexual abuse by priests can be stretched beyond two years.
   In court papers filed last week, the diocese asked permission from Lehigh County Court and the state Superior Court to appeal a recent decision by a three-judge county panel that allowed six cases against the diocese to proceed, even though the alleged abuse occurred decades ago.
   In civil cases seeking monetary awards, a plaintiff has two years after the abuse occurred to file a lawsuit. In these cases the plaintiffs believe the two-year clock should have started when they learned the diocese knew of the abuse.
   Under the appeals procedure, the diocese must get permission from both the Lehigh County and Superior courts to seek a ruling.
   But attorney Jay Abramowitch, who is representing the alleged victims, said the proposed appeal is nothing more than an attempt to avoid discovery, a process that would force the diocese to turn over documents that could reveal the diocese was aware of the abuse and what it did about it.
• Sect greets abuse probe -- polygamist sect Canada flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Calgary Sun, www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/CalgarySun/News/2004/07/27/558440.html , By MIKE D'AMOUR, July 27, 2004
   CRESTON, B.C., Canada -- Stating he has nothing to hide, the spiritual leader of a polygamist sect says he will not hamper an investigation into alleged acts of sexual exploitation, forced marriage and child abuse by his group. In a rare interview, Winston Blackmore told the Calgary Sun he welcomes a just-announced investigation by B.C.'s attorney general into the sexual and marriage practices of the Mormon fundamentalist church.
   Blackmore, while admitting he has up to 20 wives, says his community -- part of a breakaway sect of the Mormon Church -- is doing nothing wrong.
   "I urge the attorney general to come see us and (he) will find co-operation in the investigation," said Blackmore, who is leader to about half the roughly 1,000 residents of Bountiful, just outside Creston, about 520 km southwest of Calgary.
   B.C.'s attorney general, Geoff Plant, announced last week a special police task force made up of Mounties, a social worker and a dedicated prosecutor will look into the allegations.
• In our view: Healing steps [1996 Peckham] -- Christian Fellowship, Methodist
   The Joplin Globe, www.joplinglobe.com/story.php?story_id=123273&c=96
   MISSOURI: The United Methodist Church of Kansas has set a good example to follow for other organizations rocked by the most heinous of allegations - sexual abuse involving children.
   Allegations continue to mount against Donald Peckham, a Sarcoxie minister who by all appearances was a pillar of the community. Those appearances may have been deceiving, and they may not have been.
   Peckham, pastor of the Jubilee Christian Fellowship Church, is facing a single count of statutory sodomy in connection with an allegation that he sexually abused a 14-year-old boy in 1996.
   Investigators say they have identified more possible victims in the area, though no additional charges have been filed.
   The newest revelation is from Kansas, where United Methodist Church leaders say they investigated Peckham three years ago on allegations he abused boys while leading four different churches between 1958 and 1972.
   Peckham's guilt or innocence will be decided in court.
• 4 more women claim sex abuse [1950s-70s Lammers, nuns]
   The Courier-Journal, www.courier-journal.com/localnews/2004/07/27ky/B1-abuse0727-5390.html , By Peter Smith, psmith@courier-journal.com , July 27, 2004
   LOUISVILLE (KY): Four more women brought accusations yesterday against the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth, alleging they were sexually abused by a priest at an Anchorage orphanage run by the order of Roman Catholic nuns.
   One of the women also alleges physical abuse by several nuns at the orphanage and two schools.
   The actions bring to 16 the number of adults who have sued the order this month in Jefferson Circuit Court, alleging that nuns committed abuse and tolerated abuse by others from the 1950s through the 1970s.
   Three of the plaintiffs, Deborah Hager and Rebecca Wathen, both 46, and Janet Zaepfel, 61, alleged that they were sexually abused by Monsignor Herman J. Lammers, who was resident chaplain at the now-closed St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage.
• Background checks aim to protect kids
   The Detroit News, www.detnews.com/2004/metro/0407/27/a01-223854.htm , By Doug Guthrie, July 27, 2004
   TROY (MI): Dennis Nicholas figured most of the 6,000 regulars attending Sunday services at Kensington Community Church knew and trusted him.
   As a member of the Troy church's executive staff, a grandfather of six and a retired veteran of the Detroit Police Department, he never imagined someone would suggest he wasn't to be trusted alone in the church nursery. But his clean record notwithstanding, he was subjected to a new practice being used to protect children: background checks.
   "That stung a tad," said Nicholas, 53. "I've been a parent. I spent my professional life trying to make people feel safe. But, the blow to the ego only lasted a minute. I feel pretty good about our system. Even I can't break it."
   Churches everywhere have reacted to nationwide revelations of sexual abuse of children by implementing background screening and increased training for volunteers and workers - even if their direct contact with children may be minimal.
• Priest relieved of duties [Shoback]
   Times Leader, www.timesleader.com/mld/timesleader/news/9248876.htm , By MARK GUYDISH, markg@leader.net
   SCRANTON (PA): A priest who recently admitted to sexual misconduct with a minor served in Luzerne County for two decades in churches in Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne and West Hazleton during the time of the misconduct.
   The Very Rev. Edward J. Shoback was relieved of all ministerial duties after the misconduct was alleged. The misconduct occurred "more than 20 years ago," said Diocese of Scranton spokeswoman Maria Orzel. Shoback cannot publicly wear priestly garb, celebrate Mass or administer sacraments.
   Because Shoback, 62, admitted to the misconduct, the ban is permanent. Orzel would not give any details of the incident. The matter has been turned over to the Luzerne County District Attorney's Office. Late Monday afternoon, the office's spokeswoman, Carol Crane, said detectives had just started looking into the incident and no information was available.
   Orzel did provide Shoback's history since his ordination in 1967. Though he was pastor at SS. Peter and Paul Church in West Scranton since 1989, he served at Luzerne County churches through almost all of his earlier career.
   Shoback initially was made assistant pastor at St. Ann's in Shohola, Pike County, but moved a few months later to an assistant pastor post at St. Stephen's in Plymouth. A year later he went to Holy Rosary in Ashley.
• Man says 2 priests abused him as a boy [1972-77 Beever, Amsden]
   Indianapolis Star, www.indystar.com/articles/8/165688-4938-009.html , By Fred Kelly, fred.kelly@indystar.com , July 27, 2004
   INDIANAPOLIS (IN): A man is suing the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Indianapolis, alleging that two priests sexually abused him when he was a child.
   He is the second person to file a lawsuit against the archdiocese since it reported in February that 20 priests and 12 laypersons had been credibly accused of sexual misconduct from 1950 to 2002.
   The lawsuit filed Monday in Marion Superior Court claims that the Rev. Carlton J. Beever and former Rev. Thomas J. Amsden sexually abused the plaintiff when he was an altar boy at St. Mary Parish in Greensburg between 1972 and 1977.
   The alleged victim, identified only as Joseph S. S. in court records, suffered psychological damage and emotional distress, and underwent therapy, the suit says. The only other information the lawsuit divulges about him is that he was born in 1967.
   Beever, 56, is pastor of St. Philip Neri Catholic Church, a congregation of 355 households on Indianapolis' Eastside.
• Church to fight new law's time limit [Brouillette] -- Christian Brother
   Chicago Tribune, www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chicago/chi-0407270071jul27,1,7374467.story? coll=chi-newslocalchicago-hed ; By Manya A. Brachear, Published July 27, 2004
   CHICAGO (IL): The Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago plans to argue in court Tuesday that the state's recently extended statute of limitations on childhood sexual abuse allegations should not apply to suits filed before the law was changed.
   The tactic has infuriated abuse survivors who feel the archdiocese has betrayed victims of sexual abuse by withdrawing its outspoken support of the law and invoking statutes of limitations to avoid liability.
   "It just feels as though they're trying to use a legal technicality to dodge accountability and responsibility," said David Clohessy, executive director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. "We think that bishops need to act as moral leaders, not as hardball defense lawyers."
   Officials from the archdiocese and the Congregation of Christian Brothers, also named as a defendant in two lawsuits before the Cook County Circuit Court, said they still would support the law if it is applied fairly.
   "We're only challenging the aspect of how it's administered," said Jim Dwyer, an archdiocese spokesman. "We're not in the habit of using statute of limitations. ... We could have on many cases we have already settled."
   The legal argument is an effort to dismiss two separate civil suits that accuse Robert Brouillette, a former Christian Brother who served as a counselor at St. Laurence High School in Burbank, of repeatedly molesting two male teenagers. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 07:56 AM]
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Tue July 27, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
#### Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse, Wed July 28, 2004 edition follows:-
• Priest pleads not guilty to sex assault of minor [2000 Conroy] -- girl complainant Ireland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Peru flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
  One in Four organisation, http://oneinfour.org/news/news2004/notguilty , Irish Times, http://www.ireland.com , 28/July/2004
   IRELAND: A well-known Irish priest who worked as a missionary in Peru has pleaded not guilty to two charges of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl four years ago. Father Christopher Conroy, Rocky Road, Wicklow, appeared before Judge Joseph Mathews at Wicklow Circuit Court yesterday.
   He is charged with two counts of sexual assault contrary to Section 2 of the Criminal Law (Rape Amendment) Act, 1990. The two incidents are alleged to have taken place between May 1st and September 28th, 2000, at Glen of the Downs, Co Wicklow. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 08:35 PM]
• Prosecutors reopen suicide file as St. Poelten scandal thickens [2003] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Die Presse, www.diepresse.at/Artikel.aspx?channel=&ressort=ee&id=434982 , (Die Presse - Printed Edition) 28.July.2004
   ST. POELTEN, Austria: Public prosecutors have reopened investigations into the mysterious death of a trainee priest from the seminary in St. Poelten at the heart of a recent child porn scandal. The body of 53-year-old Ewald S. was recovered from the Old Danube lake in Vienna in October 2003.
   The dead man was a former student from the seminary in St. Poelten but at the time police excluded possible foul play and closed the file as a suicide case. The head of the seminary at the time Ulrich Kuechl spoke of an "accident."
   The case was reopened in February as a possible murder investigation after new evidence emerged.
   Public prosecutor spokesman Otto Schneider told Die Presse that foul play had not been 100-per-cent ruled out in the initial investigation and so the case had not been closed, but deferred. The discovery of the body led to the first Vatican inspection of the trainee college. After a few days at the school, investigators returned to Rome, finding everything to be in order. #
• Accuser watches trials closely [1970s Clark] U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Tri-Valley Herald, www.trivalleyherald.com/Stories/0,1413,86~10671~2299201,00.html , By Melissa Evans, Wednesday, July 28, 2004
   FREMONT (CA): He may not see the inside of a courtroom for more than a year, but a man suing the Diocese of Oakland alleging he was abused by a Fremont priest is pleased that other cases finally are being heard.
   Across the state, people who say they were abused, and their lawyers, are closely watching the outcome of four Northern California priest abuse cases that many agree will set the ground rules for hundreds of other cases.
   Former Fremont resident Dan McNevin says he is encouraged by Alameda County Superior Court Judge Ronald Sabraw's willingness to begin the lengthy process of deciding on decades-old abuse claims.
   "None of these issues have moved forward (in Southern California)," said McNevin, who said he was abused in the 1970s by the late Rev. James Clark of Corpus Christi Parish in Fremont. "This judge is trying to get these cases off his plate. I do see it as progress, but there's still a long way to go."
• Abuse counselor resigns after 2 years with diocese
   Bangor Daily News www.bangornews.com/editorialnews/article.cfm?ID=426362 , ~ July 28, 2004
   PORTLAND (ME): The Roman Catholic Diocese announced Tuesday the resignation of the counselor hired two years ago to assist survivors of sexual abuse and parishes in crisis. Susanne Sturm of Bangor resigned effective Aug. 1 from the Support and Assistance Ministry for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, according to Sue Bernard, spokeswoman for the diocese.
   Bernard said the diocese "is in the process of contracting with a professional to provide this ministry and, in the interim, will continue to make assistance available."
   Requests for assistance "have diminished significantly in recent months," according to the diocese. Sturm decided to seek a position that "more consistently and broadly utilizes her professional skills," Bernard said.
   Sturm, whose background is as a trauma specialist, was hired in July 2002 to provide support to victims, direct them to professional counseling when needed and assist in setting up support groups for those wanting to participate. She did not counsel them herself.
• Church trauma specialist resigns
   Sun Journal, www.sunjournal.com/news/maine/20040728038.php , Wednesday, July 28,2004
   PORTLAND (ME) (AP) - An outreach professional hired to help victims of sex abuse by Roman Catholic priests in Maine has resigned as requests for assistance dropped, officials said Tuesday.
   Susanne Sturm of Bangor, whose background is as a trauma specialist, was hired for the part-time position two years ago to offer pastoral support to victims, to direct them to professional counseling when needed and to assist in setting up support groups for those who are willing to go that route. Sturm indicated to church officials that she intended to seek a position that more consistently utilizes her skills, said Sue Bernard, diocese spokeswoman.
   "This ministry, which has its up and downs, was really not enough to hold her," Bernard said.
   The diocese is in the process of contracting with a professional to continue the ministry, she said.
   The resignation takes effect Sunday. If there is a lag before the appointment of a replacement, then Sister Rita-Mae Bissonette, co-chancellor of the diocese, will fill the role.
• Delay Sought in Priests' Trial due to RCC's delaying tactics [Ensey, Urrutigoity]
   Scranton Times, www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=12513820&BRD=2185&PAG=461&dept_id=416046&rfi=6 , TIMES STAFF REPORT, July/28/2004
   SCRANTON (PA): An attorney for a former student who filed a molestation suit against the Diocese of Scranton and two Society of St. John priests wants a federal judge to postpone the trial in the case.
   Attorney James Bendell, who represents the former St. Gregory's Academy student identified in court papers as John Doe, sought the continuance Tuesday in U.S. District Court. The case is scheduled to go to trial Sept. 7 before Judge John E. Jones III.
   In his motion, Mr. Bendell maintains it would be "extremely prejudicial" to his client to proceed to trial without the psychological records of the Revs. Eric Ensey and Carlos Urrutigoity, the accused priests.
   In March, Judge Jones ruled Mr. Bendell could review a diocesan-ordered psychological evaluation of the Rev. Urrutigoity, but the decision is under appeal. In the meantime, the facility that evaluated the two priests has refused to release the Rev. Ensey's records.
• Church may offer compo to sex victim [1950s Shearman] -- Anglican Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn. 
   The Courier-Mail, www.thecouriermail.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,10275314%255E953,00.html , by Renee Viellaris, July 29, 2004
   AUSTRALIA: A woman who says she was sexually abused by an Anglican bishop is likely to receive compensation and witness his defrocking.
   The woman, who does not want to be named, will travel to Brisbane when Donald Shearman, 77, is stripped of his holy orders at St John's Cathedral on August 25.
   Brisbane Archbishop Phillip Aspinall will perform the service, but Shearman is not expected to be there.
   Recently a church tribunal headed by Queensland Supreme Court judge Debra Mullins found that Shearman should be defrocked for seducing a teenage schoolgirl.
   The woman, now 64, said she was 15 when Shearman sexually abused her at an Anglican hostel in Forbes, western NSW.
   Shearman, who lives with his wife at Deception Bay, north of Brisbane, has admitted a relationship with a teenage schoolgirl during the 1950s.
   It allegedly stopped when she was expelled from the hostel at 16.
• SNAP backs brothers in case against Jackson Catholic Diocese whose lawyers claim court has no right to documents
   Sun Herald, www.sunherald.com/mld/thesunherald/9263622.htm , By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS, Associated Press, ~ July 28, 2004
   JACKSON, Miss. - A national group has filed legal papers to support three Mississippi brothers in their lawsuit over alleged sexual abuse in the Jackson Diocese of the Catholic Church.
   Barbara Blaine of Chicago is national president of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP. She said Wednesday that she hopes the group's involvement will bring attention to the case.
   SNAP filed what is called a "friend of the court brief" in which SNAP, although not a party to the lawsuit, says it believes the court's decision may affect its interest.
   The case is a $48 million sex abuse lawsuit brought by Kenneth, Thomas and Francis Morrison. A trial in Hinds County is on hold while the Supreme Court considers a motion by the diocese to have the case dismissed.
   The diocese argues that the separation of church and state makes the church autonomous and that certain church documents are privileged.
   In a written statement Wednesday, the diocese said the Morrisons' lawsuit demands "that the diocese surrender some, if not all, of its defenses."
• Testimony sought on priest conduct
   Albuquerque Tribune, www.abqtrib.com/archives/news04/072804_news_priest.shtml , By Joline Gutierrez Krueger, July 28 2004
   NEW MEXICO: Archbishop Michael Sheehan could be forced to testify about allegations of sexual misconduct against a longtime Albuquerque priest if the judge in a lawsuit against the archdiocese so orders.
   But Sheehan said the allegations are not "sufficiently credible" and have no relevance to the lawsuit, which was filed by parents over counseling advice given their daughter.
   An attorney for the accused priest says the new motion should be sealed to protect the identity of an innocent man.
   "It's one thing to raise this as part of a lawsuit without bringing names into it; it's another to defame someone," lawyer Don Bruckner said.
   "All it takes is putting his name out there once, and his reputation of 40 years is destroyed."
   Because no criminal charges have been filed, The Tribune is not naming the priest or the parish with which he is affiliated.
• Statement Regarding SNAP News Conference -- attack on SNAP [1969s-80s]
   TheJacksonChannel.com ; www.thejacksonchannel.com/news/3588188/detail.html , UPDATED 3:19 pm CDT, July 28, 2004
   JACKSON (MS): SNAP is a national organization funded in part by plaintiffs' trial lawyers representing the victims of abuse by priests. Members of the local SNAP chapter have sued the Diocese of Jackson, its Bishop and local parishes seeking millions of dollars in damages. The two leaders of SNAP in Mississippi are plaintiffs in these lawsuits. The SNAP lawsuits threaten diocesan services that are provided to needy people throughout Mississippi.
   The most recent allegations of abuse contained in the lawsuits filed by SNAP members allegedly occurred in the early 1980s, and one lawsuit alleges misconduct dating back to the early 1960s. In their lawsuits, the plaintiffs demand that the Diocese surrender some, if not all, of its defenses. Among other things, the plaintiffs have demanded the disclosure of the names of wrongfully accused priests, of victims who have requested anonymity, and of information protected from disclosure by the seal of confession and the priest/penitent privilege.
   The Diocese has defended this inquisition by availing itself of all available constitutional and statutory defenses. An appeal in the Morrison case has been granted by the Mississippi Supreme Court. The legal defenses at issue in the Morrison case will be decided by the Court and not by the members of SNAP. The appeal will be decided on the facts, the law, and the briefing of all parties. The Diocese anticipates that a number of religious institutions will file "amicus" or friend of the court briefs supporting the Diocese's constitutional and religious defenses.
   SNAP and its members have a history of twisting facts in a light most favorable to their "quest for truth." Most recently, SNAP has sent unsolicited mailings containing false and misleading statements to parents of school children at St. Joseph High School and St. Richard Elementary School. In addition, they ran an advertisement stating that 22 priests were accused of abusing children. However, that statement failed to mention that the list includes priests wrongfully accused.
   More importantly, the advertisement neglected to inform the public that the list includes events over a 60 year period and that all of these priests and religious brothers are either deceased, left the priesthood, or are no longer in active ministry within the Catholic Diocese of Jackson. Currently, no priests or religious brothers with credible accusations of abuse are in active ministry within the Diocese.
• Pending sexual abuse lawsuits against Tucson diocese now at 20 -- and whistleblower says he was refused for priesthood
   The Arizona Republic, www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0728churchabuse-suits-ON.html , Associated Press, 08:15 AM, Jul. 28, 2004
   TUCSON (AZ): As the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tucson considers filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection because of mounting legal costs, the number of pending lawsuits against the diocese over alleged clergy sexual abuse is up to 20.
   The diocese has named 28 priests, two deacons and one nun on a public list of clerics with credible accusations of sexually abusing minors against them.
   In one of the four new lawsuits, Philip A. Hower re-filed his suit in federal court rather than Pima County Superior Court.
   Hower claims he was a victim of employment discrimination because he was a whistle-blower about clergy abuse and was turned down for the priesthood by the diocese.
   Meanwhile, a Tucson-area woman and her son who were both former parishioners at Our Mother of Sorrows Catholic Church claim in their lawsuit that the diocese lied to them about an accused molester.
• Diocese reaches tentative agreement with 46 alleged abuse victims [Lavigne, Meehan, Lavelle, Welch, Huller; $US 7m]
   Observer, www.iobserve.org/rn0723a.html , By Father Bill Pomerleau, ~ July 28, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): The Diocese of Springfield has reached a tentative agreement with 46 individuals who say that they were sexually abused by five diocesan priests.
   According to a memorandum of understanding signed the afternoon of July 22, the diocese has offered a global amount of $7 million, plus the proceeds from the eventual sale of two diocesan properties, to a pool that that would settle claims by the clients of Attorney John Stobierski.
   The agreement also guarantees lifetime, outside counseling to those bringing accusations, and access to other outreach services provided through the diocese.
   The agreement covers allegations of abuse by former priest Richard Lavigne, Fathers Richard F. Meehan and Francis P. Lavelle, the late Msgr. David P. Welch, and the late Father E. Karl Huller.
   Fathers Meehan and Lavelle have been removed from active ministry, and cannot present themselves as priests in public.
   Accusations against Msgr. Welch, the former editor of The Catholic Observer, and Father Huller were brought to the diocese after their deaths.
• State Supreme Court orders release of Croteau murder documents [1972 Lavigne]
   Observer, http://www.iobserve.org/rn0727a.html , By Father Bill Pomerleau, ~ July 28, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA) Ruling on a case that it said "has its roots in suspicions -- some proven, some charged, and some more privately held," the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled July 27 that most of the court records connected to the police investigation of the 1972 murder of Daniel Croteau should be released to the public.
   Reversing a ruling by a state Appeals Court judge, the court ruled that Hampden Superior Court Judge Peter A. Velis was correct when he lifted a longstanding impoundment order on some of the murder investigation documents.
   The materials in question were submitted to the courts in 1993 when Hampden County District Attorney William Bennett sought a search warrant to take a sample of then-Father Richard R. Lavigne's blood.
   Bennett has tried to link Lavigne's blood to blood found along the Chicopee river bank where Croteau's body was found.
   Documents in the case were impounded in 1996, after Bennett closed the murder case when DNA tests failed to link Lavigne to the crime.
• Priest who admitted abuse up for release [1980s Larson]
   The Kansas City Star, www.kansascity. com/mld/kansascity/ news/local/9259237 .htm?ERIGHTS=- 56226754 67161117330 kansascity:: kashaw@peoplepc.com& KRD_RM= 9ppppvquvyv yxpsysyqqpppppp| Kathleen|Y ; Associated Press, ~ July 28, 2004
   WICHITA, Kan. - Victims of a defrocked Catholic priest who pleaded guilty to molesting four young men vowed to fight his release from prison.
   On Thursday, Robert Larson is scheduled to go before the Kansas Parole Board - the same body that refused him early release from Lansing Correctional Facility nearly two years ago.
   Larson was a priest in the Diocese of Wichita for 30 years before being removed in 1998 under allegations of misconduct. Three years ago, he admitted molesting three altar boys and a teenage boy at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Newton. He was sentenced to three to 10 years in prison.
   "I think the guy needs to stay in jail," said Paul Schwartz, 34, one of the former altar boys Larson admitted molesting. "The day he gets out of prison, he's going to go back to what he's always doing: trying to abuse kids."
   When Larson was last up for parole two years ago, his supporters urged the board for mercy. But Janet Patterson of Conway Springs, a member of the national board of directors for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests [SNAP], said the board must look at the crimes Larson committed.
• Files on ex-priest ordered unsealed [Lavigne] -- victory for public's right to know
   Boston Globe, www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2004/07/28/files_on_ex_priest_ordered_unsealed , By Kevin Cullen, July 28, 2004
   BOSTON (MA): In what some lawyers described as a victory for the media and the public interest, the Supreme Judicial Court yesterday ended a long legal tug of war by ordering the release of documents prosecutors filed in an attempt to link a defrocked priest to the 1972 murder of a Springfield altar boy.
   The SJC overruled the state Appeals Court and upheld a decision by Superior Court Judge Peter A. Velis, who last October ordered the release of documents filed in the investigation of the former priest, Richard R. Lavigne, in the slaying of 13-year-old Daniel Croteau.
   Some lawyers said the SJC ruling sets a precedent that will open sealed files in unsolved murders and other criminal cases that are no longer under active investigation. But others said the ruling was narrow in scope, and they attributed the ruling to the amount of time that has passed since the murder and widespread publicity surrounding Lavigne's 1992 conviction for molesting boys. He was publicly identified in 1991 as a suspect in Croteau's slaying.
   "This is a huge victory for the press and the public," said John J. Stobierski, a Greenfield lawyer who represents 24 people who say that Lavigne sexually abused them.
   Stobierski, who was joined in his effort to open the files by The Republican newspaper of Springfield, said he hopes the unsealed documents will show that the Catholic Diocese of Springfield kept Lavigne in a position where he could abuse children long after diocesan officials knew he had molested boys, including Croteau and several of his brothers.
   Prosecutors say that Croteau was bludgeoned to death, probably with a rock, and that his body was dumped in the Chicopee River. The boy's family thinks he was killed because he had threatened to disclose that Lavigne had abused him. Lavigne was defrocked last year.
• Claims alleging sex abuse rise to 19 [1950s-70s Lammers, Michael] -- Sisters of Charity of Nazareth
   Cincinnati Enquirer, www.enquirer.com/editions/2004/07/28/loc_loc2kychurch.html , The Associated Press, July 28, 2004
   LOUISVILLE (KY): The number of claims alleging sexual abuse at an orphanage run by Roman Catholic nuns has risen to 19 this week.
   The suits, filed in Jefferson County Circuit Court, allege sexual and physical abuse at the now-closed St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage in Anchorage. The suits claim the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth committed abuse and tolerated abuse by others from the 1950s through the 1970s. The Sisters of Charity operated the orphanage, which was owned by the Archdiocese of Louisville.
   Four women joined a pending suit Tuesday, echoing allegations made by 14 other plaintiffs already a part of the proceedings. Another woman filed a separate suit Monday.
   Four women came forward with new allegations Tuesday - three were added to a pending suit and another filed suit separately. The four women, Cynthia Sadler, Gail Miller, Veronica Aubrey and Theresa Elzy, claim they were abused by Monsignor Herman J. Lammers, who was resident chaplain at the orphanage, and a Sister Joseph Michael, during the 1950s and 1960s.
• Sex abuse attorneys grapple over statute of limitations [Jesuits, Augustinians, Christian Brothers]
   Chicago Sun-Times, www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-cath28.html , BY CATHLEEN FALSANI Religion Reporter, July 28, 2004
   CHICAGO (IL): In a Chicago courtroom Tuesday, 15 attorneys took turns arguing the use and misuse of a year-old Illinois law that has extended the statute of limitations for civil lawsuits involving childhood sexual abuse.
   Among the gaggle of lawyers were representatives of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago, and the Jesuit, Augustinian and Christian Brothers religious orders who are all defendants in civil lawsuits over alleged clergy sex abuse of minors.
   Attorneys for the archdiocese and religious orders argued that the new law -- which changed the previous statute of limitations for filing a lawsuit in a sex abuse case from two years to 10 years after the victim's 18th birthday, or five years after the victim realizes they were harmed by an abuser -- is being misused when it is applied to lawsuits that were filed before the law took effect July 24, 2003.
   Jeanine Stevens, an attorney for two men who have accused Robert Brouillette, a former Christian Brother and counselor at Burbank's St. Laurence High School, of sexually abusing them in the 1990s, told Cook County Judge Diane Joan Larsen that legislators intended the law to apply to past and future cases.
• Judge sets ruling in sex-abuse law -- extension of time dispute
   Chicago Tribune, www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chicago/chi-0407280367jul28,1,3568788.story? coll=chi-newslocalchicago-hed , July 28, 2004
   CHICAGO (IL): A Cook County judge said Tuesday she will decide in the next 28 days whether an extension of time limits on childhood-sexual-abuse claims can apply to lawsuits still pending when the law was revised.
   Lawyers for the Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago, the Jesuits, Christian Brothers and Augustinians told Cook County Circuit Court Judge Diane J. Larsen that retroactive application of the law, signed by Gov. Rod Blagojevich last year, would violate due process.
   The law gives victims 10 years from their 18th birthday to sue their abusers or five years from the time they realize the abuse or injuries resulting from it.
   "No one is challenging the constitutionality of the statute but the legislative intent of reviving" cases, said Larry Smith, an attorney for the archdiocese.
   Meanwhile, lawyers for at least seven people alleging sexual abuse argued the law was clear in its intent.
• Retired bishop to be defrocked over sex abuse allegations [1950s Shearman] -- Anglican Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn. 
   ABC, www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2004/s1163915.htm , Reporter Michael Vincent, ~ July 28, 2004
   AUSTRALIA: A retired Anglican bishop is to be defrocked over allegations of child sex abuse.
   Bishop Donald Norman Shearman has been accused of having a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old girl who was in his care while he was the head of a boarding school at Forbes in New South Wales in the 1950s.
   The allegations and the Church's handling of them were at the centre of the public furore, which led to the resignation of governor-general, Dr Peter Hollingworth, last year.
   Now, as Michael Vincent reports, an Anglican Church tribunal's findings on Bishop Shearman have been handed to police to determine if a criminal investigation is warranted.
   MICHAEL VINCENT: Charged with disgraceful behaviour, the Church tribunal of two lay people, two clergy and chaired over by a Supreme Court judge has recommended retired Bishop Donald Shearman should be defrocked.
• Principal to lead diocese review board
   Norwich Bulletin, www.norwichbulletin.com/news/stories/20040728/localnews/929207.html , By Brian Lyman, July 28 2004
   NORWICH (CT): Donald Macrino knows he'll have to strike a delicate balance as the chairman of the Norwich Diocesan Review Board.
   "As a high school principal, I'm used to dealing with facts, and uncovering facts before making judgments," said Macrino, principal of Waterford High School. "We're dealing with things in the immediate past (in high school). I have learned some of the cases we're going to look at are decades old. The principals in some are deceased."
   Macrino was appointed chairman of the board July 20. The committee reviews the diocese's sexual misconduct policies and the bishop's responses to sexual misconduct allegations.
   "Our tendency is to move very quickly to protect a victim, as it always will be," Macrino said. "However, facts will have to be examined very, very carefully."
   Macrino, who has been a teacher for 32 years and principal of Waterford High School for eight, is the first layman to lead the board, created by the diocese in 1990. The Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, approved by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, requires review boards to have a majority of lay people not employed by the diocese.
   Msgr. Thomas Bride, vicar general of the diocese, said Macrino's educational experience made him the best choice.
• Attorney: Lawsuit alleging priest abuse filed too late [1980-82]
   The Tribune-Review, www.pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/trib/westmoreland/s_205471.html , By Guy Junker, FOR THE TRIBUNE-REVIEW, Wednesday, July 28, 2004
   PENNSYLVANIA: An attorney representing the St. Vincent Archabbey in a lawsuit alleging decades-old abuse of a Centre County youth by a priest told a Westmoreland County judge Tuesday that the suit was filed too late and should be dismissed.
   John Morrison, of State College, filed suit in February, alleging sexual abuse between 1980 and 1982 at the hands of a parish priest who took him to St. Vincent on retreats.
   Eric Anderson, who represents the Benedictine society and other defendants, asked that the case be thrown out on the grounds that Morrison filed suit well past the two-year limit for lawsuits in Pennsylvania.
   "The ... limitation exists to protect defendants from being sued many, many years later so that (they) have no access to evidence after the case is so stale," Anderson said.
• SJC: Release records on priest's slay probe [1972 Lavigne]
   Boston Herald, http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=37525 , By David Weber, Wednesday, July 28, 2004
   BOSTON (MA): The state's highest court ordered a Hampden County judge to release records pertaining to a police probe of whether a 13-year-old Springfield boy was murdered by a priest who has since been defrocked for molesting other boys.
   The Supreme Judicial Court sided with the Springfield Republican newspaper, which had argued there no longer was any valid reason to impound records pertaining to the murder of Daniel Croteau, whose bludgeoned body was found by a bank of the Chicopee River in 1972.
   Richard R. Lavigne, who was thrown out of the Roman Catholic priesthood after he pleaded guilty in 1992 to molesting two boys, has been a prime suspect in the Croteau murder for years.
   The records will not be released until next week when Superior Court Judge Peter Velis, who is overseeing the case, returns from vacation.
   "In light of Lavigne's long-known status as a suspect in the investigation into Croteau's death, the three decades of investigation that have passed, the privacy protection available to individual witnesses through redaction of identifying names and addresses, the climate of broad public disclosure of sexual abuse by members of the clergy, the publication of details into Croteau's death that already has occurred, and the mechanisms of voir dire and change of venue available to protect Lavigne's right to a fair trial, the district attorney's and Lavigne's interests in continued impoundment were weakened," the court wrote.
• Four more women sue Sisters of Charity -- girls [1950s-60s Lammers, Michael]
   The Courier-Journal, www.courier-journal.com/localnews/2004/07/28ky/B8-abuse0728-3333.html , By Peter Smith, psmith@courier-journal.com , July 28, 2004
   LOUISVILLE (KY): A lawsuit against a local order of Roman Catholic nuns grew again yesterday when four women accused the order of failing to protect them as children from sexual abuse by a priest and a nun.
   All four of the women said they lived at an Anchorage orphanage operated by the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth in the 1950s and 1960s. They alleged that Monsignor Herman J. Lammers sexually abused them in episodes ranging from fondling to forced intercourse.
   One of the women also accuses a nun, identified only as "Sister Joseph Michael," of performing oral sex on her.
   The lawsuit said the Sisters of Charity failed to properly supervise Lammers and nuns working at the St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage, which closed in 1983.
   Lammers, who died in 1986, was resident chaplain at the orphanage for decades and was also the longtime director of Catholic Charities for the Archdiocese of Louisville, which owned the orphanage.
• Victim implores: Don't parole priest [Larson]
   The Wichita Eagle, www.kansas.com/mld/eagle/news/local/9257978.htm , BY STAN FINGER, ~ July 28, 2004
   WICHITA (KS): Paul Schwartz has a good job, a nice house, a solid marriage and a 3-year-old daughter who is the light of his life.
   Thursday morning, he will drive from his suburban Kansas City home to Wichita and implore the Kansas Parole Board to keep a former Catholic priest -- the priest who molested him when he was an altar boy -- in prison.
   Robert Larson spent 30 years as a priest in the Diocese of Wichita before being suddenly and quietly removed in 1988 from the pulpit of St. Mary's Catholic Church in Newton.
   Larson pleaded guilty in 2001 to molesting three altar boys and a teenager while he served at St. Mary's. He was sentenced to three to 10 years at Lansing Correctional Facility and was denied parole in 2002.
   "I think the guy needs to stay in jail," said Schwartz, 34, one of the boys Larson admitted molesting. "He's still a sexual predator as well as a pedophile.
• Commune leader slammed by priest -- polygamy group man was expelled Canada flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Calgary Sun, www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/CalgarySun/News/2004/07/28/559606.html , By MIKE D'AMOUR, July 28, 2004
   CRESTON, B.C., Canada -- Winston Blackmore may be the spiritual leader of a group of polygamists, but he is no part of a legitimate religion, says a high priest of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
   "(Blackmore) has false and foolish notions about polygamy," Wayne Bourne said, referring to the man in a Sun story yesterday who has at least 20 wives and numerous children.
   "Winston Blackmore's religion has as much to do with the Church of Latter-day Saints as Martin Luther has to do with Catholicism."
   Polygamy was outlawed by the Mormon church in the late 1800s and Blackmore's grandfather, John Blackmore, was kicked out of the church for refusing to bow to the rule.
• Croteau files to be opened [1972 Lavigne]
   The Republican, www.masslive.com/chicopeeholyoke/republican/index.ssf?/base/news- 1/1091004713240821.xml , By BILL ZAJAC, wzajac@repub.com , Wednesday, July 28, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): Lifting a veil of secrecy that spans three decades, the state's highest court yesterday ruled that investigative files in the 1972 murder of 13-year-old Springfield altar boy Daniel Croteau must be opened to the public.
   With a 5-0 vote, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court upheld an October 2003 ruling by Hampden Superior Court Judge Peter A. Velis to terminate a 1996 impoundment order that has kept portions of the murder files off limits to public inspection.
   Velis ordered all impounded documents to be released upon the removal of names and addresses of witnesses.
   The decision concludes a 17-month legal battle in which The Republican and a Greenfield lawyer representing more than 46 alleged clergy sexual abuse victims fought Hampden County District Attorney William M. Bennett's office and the only suspect in the murder to open the files.
   Richard R. Lavigne of Chicopee, a defrocked priest, has been the only publicly identified suspect in the killing.
   Bernice B. Croteau, mother of the slain boy, said she hopes the released files will help clergy sexual abuse victims.
• Autopsy revealed alcohol, but no sign of sexual abuse [1972 Lavigne]
   The Republican www.masslive.com/hampfrank/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1091004602240820.xml ; By BILL ZAJAC, wzajac@repub.com ; Wednesday, July 28, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): Thirteen-year-old altar boy Daniel Croteau of Springfield had a blood alcohol level twice the legal limit at the time of his death in 1972, according to an autopsy report.
   The autopsy found no evidence of sexual assault on the body of Croteau, who was found bludgeoned to death in the Chicopee River.
   The autopsy was among several of the items that Hampden County District Attorney William M. Bennett released yesterday to The Republican after a Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court decision ordered the release of impounded files in the Croteau murder investigation.
   Bennett also released a laboratory report and a 1958 Chicopee city termination notice of Richard R. Lavigne, a defrocked priest who is the only publicly identified suspect in the unsolved murder. The notice stated Lavigne is an "undesirable person to be around children."
   Additional materials, including investigators' reports and witness statements will be released, possibly as soon as next week.
   Two Hampden County Superior Court clerk officials said yesterday the release of documents would have to wait at least until Aug. 4, when Judge Peter A. Velis returns from vacation. It was Velis' October 2003 decision to end the impoundment order on the files that was upheld by the state's top court.
• Croteau case ruling: An end to the secrecy [1972 Lavigne]
   The Republican, www.masslive.com/editorials/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1091004458240820.xml , Wednesday, July 28, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): The state's highest court ruled yesterday that files in the investigation of a Springfield altar boy's murder in 1972 must be made public.
   That ends this newspaper's 17-month legal battle on behalf of the public to win the release of files related to the investigation. This is a victory for our readers.
   Hampden District Attorney William M. Bennett argued that the files should remain sealed to protect the integrity of his on-going murder investigation.
   The newspaper argued that release of the files would not compromise the investigation or the legal rights of the only publicly identified suspect in the case, defrocked priest Richard R. Lavigne of Chicopee.
   The Supreme Judicial Court agreed with the newspaper yesterday, saying three decades had passed and there was no legitimate reason to keep the files closed.
   Despite our differences in this case, the district attorney's office and this newspaper agree on one thing: We both take our roles as public servants very seriously. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 07:18 AM]
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Wed July 28, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
#### Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Thu July 29, 2004 edition follows:-
• I'll become a healer and protect students [Mountford] Australia flag; Aust. Nat. Flag Assn. 
   News.com.au ; http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,10276686%255E2682,00.html , By Education Reporter JEMMA CHAPMAN, July 29, 2004
   AUSTRALIA: The new headmaster of St Peter's College has pledged to become a "healer" in the school's sex-abuse scandal.
   In his first interview, Philip Grutzner yesterday vowed to ensure measures were put in place to fully protect students from sex abuse.
   Mr Grutzner, 40, who will start at St Peter's next year, said the college needed to be proactive, compassionate and forthcoming to heal the wounds and move forward from the John Mountford sex abuse case.
   "There's no point in shoving it under the carpet but (rather) to make sure we put in place measures to ensure that this sort of thing doesn't happen again," Mr Grutzner said. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 07:59 PM]
• Vatican gags sex scandal bishop [2004 Krenn] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   BBC News, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3937203.stm , ~ July 28, 2004
   AUSTRIA: An investigator sent by the Vatican to look into a sex scandal at seminary in Austria has banned the local bishop from talking to the media.
   Bishop Klaus Kueng, who was named as investigator by Pope John Paul II, said the gagging order was necessary to halt the damage being done by the scandal.
   Photographs have appeared in Austrian media of clerics at St Poelten seminary kissing and fondling student priests.
   Local bishop Kurt Krenn caused outrage by describing the incidents as pranks.
• Ex-Brother gets court order preventing trial [1964-66] Ireland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags
   One in Four organisation, http://oneinfour.org/news/news2004/exbrother , ~ July 28, 2004
   IRELAND: A former Christian Brother has secured a Supreme Court order preventing his trial on two charges of sexual assault against a boy in an industrial school on dates between 1964 and 1966.
   The Supreme Court order comes after the DPP decided in 2001 not to proceed with a prosecution of the same Brother on 19 charges of indecent and sexual assault against another boy (Boy A).
   Mr Justice McCracken commented yesterday that the DPP abandoned the prosecution regarding Boy A some time after the applicant Brother took legal proceedings challenging that prosecution.
   The only reasonable inference from what had occurred was that the DPP had considered that the evidence of Boy A was not reliable, the judge remarked.
   [COMMENT: Your Worship, the reliability level of Boy A's evidence is NOT the "only reasonable inference". For ages the Churches have had friends at every level of society, including prosecutors and judges, who want to "wink the eye" at clergy sex abuse. In your own country, Ireland, the governing Cabinet hid clergy child abuse, but was afterwards forced to resign over it some years ago. COMMENT ENDS.]
• Land behind abuse action - counsel [2000 Conroy] Ireland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Peru flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   One in Four organisation, http://oneinfour.org/news/news2004/land , ~ July 28, 2004
   IRELAND: A woman who alleges she was sexually abused at the age of 14 by a local priest was told her real motivation for taking the case to Wicklow Circuit Court yesterday was a dispute over land between her family and the priest, Father Chris Conroy, writes Tim O'Brien for the Irish Times in Wicklow.
   Father Conroy (72), a Carmelite and retired Peruvian missionary, faces two charges of sexual assault contrary to section 2 of the Criminal Law Rape Amendment Act 1990. These are alleged to have taken place in the Glen of the Downs and the priest's home, both in Co Wicklow, between May and September 2000.
   Responding to Mr Paul Murray SC, for the Director of Public Prosecutions, the woman, now 18, said she had formed a habit of visiting the priest in his home from the time she turned 11 and was in junior school.
• Krenn forbidden from giving interviews [2004] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Die Presse, http://diepresse.at/Artikel.aspx?channel=&ressort=ee&id=435152 , 29.July.2004
   ST. POELTEN, Austria - Pope John Paul II's envoy in the St. Poelten sex scandal case Bishop Klaus Kueng has asked St. Poelten Bishop Kurt Krenn to refrain from giving interviews after the controversial church leader made public comments that had not first been cleared with the "apostolic visitor."
   Krenn, who has faced repeated calls to step down since allegations of child pornography and homosexual activities at a priests training college in his district emerged, had earlier agreed to consult with Kueng before making public statements.
   Kueng said that the ban on interviews reflected the Pope's as well as his own wishes after Krenn gave a number of uncoordinated interviews to newspapers and the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation ORF.
• Gagging order on Austrian sex scandal bishop [2004 Krenn] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Business Day, www.bday.net/detail.asp?id=48586 , ~ July 28, 2004
   VIENNA, Austria- An Austrian bishop who has been accused of trying to cover up sex offences at a seminary near Vienna has been banned from talking to the press, the cleric charged with probing the scandal told the Austrian news agency APA on Thursday.
   "This business has done immense damage, not only to the diocese but much further afield," Vatican-appointed investigator Klaus Kueng said.
   He said the gagging order on Kurt Krenn, the bishop of St Poelten, where the seminary is located, had come from Pope John Paul II.
• Christ Our Non-Saver -- multimillion dollar cathedral plan. [> 100 complainants]
   Orange County Weekly, www.ocweekly.com/ink/04/47/news-arellano2.php , by Gustavo Arellano, ~ July 28, 2004
   CALIFORNIA: You'd think Orange Bishop Tod D. Brown would order his hierarchy to begin scrimping and saving - a little less holy wine, the elimination of Brown's private chef, the sale of his million-dollar Tustin residence. After all, negotiations between the Church and lawyers for more than 100 alleged Orange County priest-molestation victims acrimoniously broke off on July 22, meaning the plaintiffs can now begin suing the Church individually. The ensuing trials could take years and push the Orange diocese-which reported assets of $126 million in 2003-toward the brink of bankruptcy.
   It sure seemed as if Brown was planning for the worst financially back in May, when he approved the elimination of 11 lay workers and diocesan programs and justified his actions to the Los Angeles Times by stressing, "The major concern is the settlement question. That has to be behind us before we can refocus on another project."
   But, apparently, happy days are here again! Even with the looming financial crisis, Brown is moving forward with plans to build a multimillion-dollar cathedral on a Santa Ana soybean farm. The Santa Ana City Council on July 19 unanimously approved a development agreement between the city and the Orange diocese that clears the way for construction on a 16-acre lot located at 2001 W. Macarthur Blvd.
   A representative from the diocese's construction board presented council members with Brown's vision for the vacant field: a 2,650-seat cathedral (to be named Christ Our Savior Cathedral), a state-of-the-art parish hall, apartments for clergy both active and retired, and parochial offices that will allow the diocese to relocate its operations there from its current headquarters high in the Orange hills.
• Editor's Desk: The Cruelest Blow
   Catholic Herald, www.catholicherald.com/eddesk/04ed/ed040729.htm , By Michael F. Flach, Herald Editor, From the issue of July/29/04
   PHILADELPHIA (PA): Kids grew up quickly in the Olney section of Philadelphia during the 1960s and 1970s long before the advent of the Internet, MTV and daycare. Olney was a typical working-class neighborhood found in any big city - street after street of tiny row homes and at least one bar on every corner (sometimes two or more).
   In the summer we played outside all day on the street or at the playground. The sports changed with the season - baseball and basketball in the spring and summer, football and soccer in the fall, more basketball and indoor hockey in the winter.
   The time we spent on the streets and playgrounds was survival of the fittest. Any weakness, either athletically or psychologically, was exposed quickly by older companions. You didn't last long if you weren't street-smart at a young age. You had to make the right friends and the right choices to survive.
   I can remember playing Little League baseball as a 12-year-old and seeing teammates - perhaps emulating older siblings or friends - smoking cigarettes and drinking beer. Most families felt the impact of drugs, especially LSD, amphetamines and heroin. Older siblings returning from Vietnam were especially prone to this scourge. The loss of life and/or mental stability due to drug abuse was staggering. Jail time was commonplace. Rehab and AA are now ways of life for many of the people I grew up with.
   Every neighborhood had its share of "suspicious characters," namely those adults who you instinctively knew were giving you too much attention. Most kids were mature enough to police themselves, whether in school or at the playground. When friends were approached with a sordid proposition they threatened the perpetrator with physical violence. No lawsuits or parents were involved. No police reports were filed.
   Nearly everyone was Catholic and the church was within easy walking distance for thousands of children. Parents viewed the Church as an oasis of safety and security amidst an otherwise dangerous and troubled world.
   So it is with a sad heart that I read Sunday's Philadelphia Inquirer, which details an investigation by the Philadelphia district attorney into the misconduct of archdiocesan priests and officials. The most public and graphic accusations are directed toward a priest who taught at my high school. The charges were made by a woman who graduated from school with my younger sister.
   It remains to be seen whether the investigation will lead to criminal charges. The legal system will decide the priest's guilt or innocence. A Higher Authority will sort it all out in the end.
• Story of 'Voice of the Faithful' told by its founder
   Wellesley Townsman, http://www2.townonline.com/wellesley/artsLifestyle/view.bg?articleid=55509 , By Anne-Marie Smolski, Thursday, July 29, 2004
   WELLESLEY (MA): A little over two years ago, Voice of the Faithful, a Catholic organization that came together in response to the revelations of sexual abuse in the church and the ensuing cover-up by the hierarchy, began meeting in the basement of St. John the Evangelist Church in Wellesley.
   What began as a group of about 40 wounded Catholics who still loved their church and couldn't begin to think about leaving it, despite feeling disenfranchised, has turned into a world movement, according to Voice of the Faithful's founding president, James E. Muller, M.D.
   Muller, a cardiologist, along with Charles Kenney, author, former reporter for the Boston Globe and a communications consultant, have written a book together called "Keep the Faith, Change the Church," to tell the story of Voice of the Faithful. The book is being sold throughout the country in book stores and on Amazon.com, according to Muller.
   "I believe it's a very important message about how to improve the Catholic Church, and I wish more people would read it," said Muller.
• Former pastor convicted in sex-abuse case involving teen -- girl [1999-1003 Taylor] -- Harvest of Faith and Love Church
   Kalamazoo Gazette, www.mlive.com/news/kzgazette/index.ssf?/base/news-0/1091116325155530.xml , jmack@kalamazoogazette.com , 388-8598, Thursday, July 29, 2004
   MICHIGAN: A former Martin pastor has been convicted of criminal sexual conduct with a teenage girl, less than a year after he was released from jail on a similar charge.
   Clinton Taylor, 39, of Otsego, a father of five who once headed the Harvest of Faith and Love Church in Martin, was found guilty Wednesday in Allegan County Circuit Court on two counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct and one count of second-degree CSC.
   The case involved a juvenile who said she was molested over a four-year period beginning at age 13. The young woman is now 18.
   Andrew Marks, Taylor's attorney, said his client still maintains his innocence and that the young woman has given authorities contradictory accounts of whether she was molested.
   The girl was questioned two years ago when Taylor was investigated in another case, Marks said, and the girl at that time denied any abuse. She has made similar denials since, although she testified this week that she was abused by Taylor, Marks said.
   The prosecution told the jury that young victims of sexual abuse often deny that events took place, especially when they know their abusers.
• Catholic diocese agrees to settle in sex abuse lawsuit [1994 Feliciano] U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Hawaii flag (USA State); Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Star-Bulletin, http://starbulletin.com/2004/07/29/news/story7.html , By Mary Adamski, madamski@starbulletin.com , July 29 2004
   HONOLULU (HI): The Hawaii Catholic diocese has agreed to an undisclosed settlement of a lawsuit filed by the mother of a boy who was sexually abused 10 years ago by a Honolulu parish employee.
   Besides the diocese, the lawsuit named Manuel Feliciano, a former sacristan at Sts. Peter and Paul Church, who pleaded guilty to six sexual assault charges involving the 10-year-old child. He was sentenced in November 2000 to one year in prison and five years' probation in the case.
   Details of the settlement are confidential at the choice of the plaintiffs, who now live on the mainland.
   It is the second time this year that the diocese has agreed to confidential terms in settling a sex abuse suit, despite a commitment to openness by American bishops in response to the national scandal of abusive priests and cover-up by bishops.
   "The family opted to keep the financial issues confidential for their own personal reasons," said their attorney, Mark Davis. "All claims were resolved to the satisfaction of the family."
• Judge shifts roles in alleged SoCal clergy abuse lawsuits [> 500 cases]
   Union-Tribune, www.signonsandiego.com/news/state/20040728-2300-ca-calchurchabuse.html , ASSOCIATED PRESS, July 28, 2004
   LOS ANGELES (CA): A judge who had served as court-appointed mediator will instead act as a settlement judge for hundreds of alleged Roman Catholic clergy molestation cases in Southern California.
   Judge Peter Lichtman requested the role shift a week ago and it was approved Wednesday by Superior Court Judge Haley J. Fomholz, who is presiding over more than 500 lawsuits.
   Attorneys say the judge will now have more power to issue public orders and sanction or compel attorneys. Some also say those involved in the long-running talks will no longer be bound by the total confidentiality required during mediation.
   J. Michael Hennigan, attorney for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, called the change from mediation to settlement "a step along the way and a step toward the right direction."
   "The problem with mediation under the statute is everything that happens in the mediation is completely confidential," he said. "In a mandatory settlement conference, I think there's an opportunity for flexibility."
• Three claim sexual harassment at Norfolk church school -- women -- Revival Church
   WVEC, www.wvec.com/ news/norfolk/ stories/wvec_inv_ 072904_calvary_ church_lawsuit. 26006327.html , ~ July 29, 2004
   NORFOLK (VA): Three women have filed sexual harassment lawsuits against Calvary Revival Church in Norfolk and several employees of its Christian school system.
   The women - one a volunteer and two paid employees - worked in the school cafeteria. They claim they were victims of sexually explicit remarks and gestures. They also claim they were fired after saying something.
   In lawsuits filed this week, Ruby Pagan claims her manager and supervisor made lewd gestures and inappropriately touched her.
   She says she initially tried to ignore the comments, but they kept on. She says he tried to discuss the comments with her supervisors, even writing several letters. But one of the responses, a letter from the school principal, told Pagan to never return. It says, "If these instructions are not followed, the appropriate authorities will be notified."
• Document sealed on priest -- RCC secrecy move finds another ally [1970s-80s, 2004 Baca]
   Albuquerque Tribune, www.abqtrib.com/archives/news04/072904_news_priest.shtml , By Joline Gutierrez Krueger, July 29, 2004
   The judge sided with the priest's attorney, who argued that naming the man was not relevant and would defame him.
   ALBUQUERQUE (NM): A legal document that names a prominent Albuquerque priest accused of sexual misconduct and questions the credibility of Archbishop Michael Sheehan was ordered sealed - five days after it had become public.
   State District Judge Ted Baca in an emergency hearing late Wednesday ordered that a "motion to compel" filed Friday by Albuquerque attorney Sam Bregman be sealed temporarily until the presiding judge on the case can make a more permanent decision.
   "Sealing" is a relatively rare order that denies the public right to a court document because the information included in the document must, in the court's view, be protected.
   The presiding judge, Robert Thompson, was unavailable for Wednesday's last-minute hearing called by Don Bruckner, attorney for the Roman Catholic priest named in Bregman's motion.
   That motion includes six letters written in 1995 by men who accuse the priest of misconduct when they were middle school students in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
   The documents had already been in the possession of at least two Albuquerque news organizations, including The Tribune, before Baca's ruling Wednesday.
• Church pair caught in the act -- priest and nun Malawi flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Zambia flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Iol, www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=84&art_id=qw1091118242354B235 , 06:24PM, July 29 2004
   BLANTYRE, MALAWI, Africa: A Malawian court convicted a Catholic priest and a nun of disorderly conduct on Thursday after they were caught engaged in a sexual act in a parked car with tinted windows.
   The Malawian priest, 43, and the 26-year-old nun from neighbouring Zambia spent the night in police cells after being caught in the act on Wednesday, police said.
   A court in the capital Lilongwe handed down suspended jail sentences of six months with hard labour after the pair pleaded guilty to charges of disorderly conduct.
   "These people were caught in a sex act," Assistant Superintendent Kelvin Maigwa told Reuters.
• Man sues diocese, alleging sex abuse [1950s-60s Molloy, Dennehy]
   NorthJersey.com , www.northjersey.com/page.php? qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjcxN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkyJmZnYmVsN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXk2NTYxNzAy ; By MAYA KREMEN, HERALD NEWS, Thursday, July 29, 2004
   PATERSON (NJ): A 56-year-old man is suing the Diocese of Paterson and the estates of two deceased priests, claiming he was sexually abused at a Passaic parish more than 40 years ago.
   In a lawsuit filed in late June, Steve Rabi, now of Albuquerque, N.M., alleges that the abuse occurred during the 1950s and 1960s at St. Nicholas Roman Catholic Church. The men he claims abused him, Joseph William Molloy and Francis X. Dennehy, were assistant priests at the church at that time.
   Dennehy, who served in eight parishes and was the chaplain of St. Joseph's Regional Medical Center in Paterson, died in 1995.
   Molloy, who served in three parishes, left the priesthood in 1978, married, and had six children. He died in 2000.
   Diocesan spokeswoman Marianna Thompson said she had no knowledge of the whereabouts of the families of the two priests.
• Should the Fraternity of St. Peter shoulder some of the blame for the Society of St. John scandal?
   Cruxnews, Straight Guy With The Catholic Eye column, www.cruxnews.com/abbott/abbott-30july04.html , Matt C. Abbott, 30 July 2004
   From Dr. Jeffrey M. Bond:
   SCRANTON (PA): "Those who continue to insist on the complete innocence of the Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP) with respect to the Society of St. John scandal need to read attorney James Bendell's latest brief in opposition to the FSSP's request to be dismissed from the federal lawsuit. (This brief is posted on the PACER web site, but I will be happy to forward it to anyone who does not know how to navigate PACER and who does not mind receiving an email with adobe attachments.)
   "Just one of the many pieces of evidence presented in Mr. Bendell's brief is an email letter that I received from a priest of the Fraternity of St. Peter, Fr. Daniel Oppenheimer. (Although Oppenheimer has apparently been given permission by the FSSP to work on a project of his own, he is still a FSSP priest.)
• State Supreme Court orders release of Croteau murder documents
   iobserve , www.iobserve.org/rn0727a.html , By Father Bill Pomerleau, Observer staff, ~ July 29, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): -- Ruling on a case that it said "has its roots in suspicions -- some proven, some charged, and some more privately held," the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled July 27 that most of the court records connected to the police investigation of the 1972 murder of Daniel Croteau should be released to the public. [Already linked above]
• Malawi clerics caught canoodling
   BBC News, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3936007.stm , By Raphael Tenthani, BBC correspondent in Blantyre, ~ July 29, 2004
   MALAWI: A Catholic priest and nun have been arrested in Malawi for making love in an airport car park.
   The 43-year-old priest and 26-year-old nun were caught "in the act" in a tinted saloon car parked at Lilongwe International Airport.
   "It was a bizarre spectacle, the public alerted airport police after noticing the car shaking in a funny way," police spokesman Kelvin Maigwa told the BBC.
   The pair is due before a magistrate in the capital, Lilongwe, on Thursday.
• Law to preside at high-profile Mass in Rome [2004]
   Boston Herald, http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=37669 , By Eric Convey, Thursday, July 29, 2004
   ROME: Bernard Cardinal Law is about to step into the public eye in the most significant capacity since he left Boston 19 months ago.
   On Aug. 5, Boston's archbishop emeritus is scheduled to preside over a highly publicized Mass at Rome's Basilica of St. Mary Major, where he was recently installed as archpriest.
   Next week's ceremony, rich in pomp, marks the hot August night in 358 when, according to tradition, snow fell on the site that became home to the church.
   Pope Liberius traced the outline of the church in the snow, the story goes. The resulting building has been expanded many times.
• Catholic priest, nun caught having sex
   Nation Online, www.nationmalawi.com/articles.asp?articleID=8610 , by George Ntonya, 09:17:25, 29 July 2004
   MALAWI: A Catholic priest and nun on Wednesday threw the vow of celibacy to the wind and decided to have sex in the car park at Lilongwe International Airport (Lia).
   But they might not have completed the act because police officers rushed to the scene and arrested them, according to officials at the airport.
   "They were found naked. The woman had hidden her official attire in a bag," said a worker at the airport who refused to be identified.
   The police confiscated the car and took the two into the airport police office, half naked to record their statement.
   "The woman was only allowed to wear a piece of cloth. Her breasts were bare," reported the source, adding that tens of people thronged the car park as the police took the two out of their tinted vehicle.
   Officials at the airport confirmed having received reports that the "people of God" were using the car park for "ungodly" things.
• Group tells Calvert Hall memorials must go [1940s Langan]
   North East Reporter http://news.mywebpal.com/news_tool_v2.cfm? pnpID=808&NewsID=563071&CategoryID=5815&show=localnews&om=1 ; by Jennifer Przydzial, July/28/04
   MARYLAND: Francis Bacon said the sexual abuse he suffered as a high school student was horrific enough.
   Honoring the man he alleges was responsible adds insult to injury.
   So Bacon, a member of the Calvert Hall College High School Class of 1948, joined a group of about 20 protesters in front of his alma mater July 14 and again July 20.
   The group of men and women, members and supporters of Abused by Calvert Hall Educators (ACHE) and the local chapter of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), want the school to stop memorializing Brother Xavier Langan, whom Bacon and another man both say abused them while they were students at the school.
• A man of his words
   Boston Globe, www.boston.com/ae/celebrity/articles/2004/07/29/a_man_of_his_words , By Irene Sege, July 29, 2004
   BOSTON (MA): Maybe if she were from New York, the young woman at the front desk of the Millennium Bostonian Hotel would recognize Jimmy Breslin's name when a visitor asks to see him.
   Maybe she'd know that the dapper white-haired gentleman in the royal blue shirt and dark blazer who emerges from the elevator a few minutes later has for decades been one of America's most colorful and controversial newspaper columnists. Maybe she'd lean forward to hear that thick Queens accent and blunt tongue at work.
   But she doesn't, so Breslin, who is 75, and his visitor stroll unnoticed across the street to Quincy Market to sit outdoors and talk about Breslin's new book, "The Church That Forgot Christ," and politics and journalism and other things, too.
   "In the news business," Breslin says, "if you have the column, and you have the freedom, and every day it's up to you, it's terrific."
   For more than 40 years it's been up to him. In November of 1963, Breslin covered the funeral of John F. Kennedy for the now-defunct New York Herald Tribune and found Clifton Pollard, the $3.01-an-hour gravedigger who considered it an honor to open the earth for a slain president's casket.
   In 1977, David Berkowitz, the notorious -- and, at the time, elusive -- Son of Sam killer wrote to Breslin.
   In 1986, Breslin, then at New York's Daily News, won a Pulitzer Prize "for columns," the citation notes, "which consistently champion ordinary citizens."
   This summer, one reader wrote to Newsday, Breslin's home since 1988, to praise his "great wit and deep compassion," and another dismissed his work as "sob sister drivel."
   Breslin's target in his 14th book is the Catholic Church, which he left after the sexual abuse scandal broke. "Why should I be in a church like this?" he asks. "The answer is I'm not."
   That wasn't easy for a man who'd always been a regular churchgoer. "Your whole life," he quips, "was based on beer after church on Sundays." The church, he says, "was a vaccination that took. All of a sudden to get rid of it is hard, but they made it impossible."
   In his book, Breslin interviews victims of abuse. He rails against a church that battles abortion but transferred pedophile priests from parish to parish.
   "And they're living with this crazy idea that they're going to have this institution without women," he says. "And they don't have married priests. They're not going to last."
• Sect wives defend lives Canada flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Calgary Sun, www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/CalgarySun/News/2004/07/29/561063.html , By MIKE D'AMOUR, July 29 2004
   CRESTON, B.C., CANADA -- They said they've been silent long enough -- and now, in an exclusive interview, the polygamist women of Bountiful are defending their marriages and lives. "We want to speak out about the (government) allegations here," Marlene Palmer, 45, told the Sun.
   "We also want people to know we are not forced into our relationships and the women here are not moronic or uneducated."
   As many as 80 women of Bountiful -- a more than half-century old polygamist community of about 1,000 just south of Creston, some 520 km southwest of Calgary -- said they plan to hold a massive press conference next week to talk about their lives.
   But Palmer, who is acting spokeswoman for the wives of Bountiful, agreed to talk to the Sun first.
   The unprecedented move was prompted by B.C. Attorney General Geoff Plant's announcement he intends to form a special law enforcement task force comprised of Mounties, a special prosecutor and a social worker.
• Diocese moves ahead on child protection policy
   Pittsburgh Catholic, www.pittsburghcatholic.org/newsarticles_more.phtml?id=1208 , by Chuck Moody, ~ July 29, 2004
   PITTSBURGH (PA): The Diocese of Pittsburgh recently promulgated the policy "Safe Environments for Children."
   This Safe Environments Policy became particular law and normative in all parishes and institutions as of July 1, 2004, and it is to be faithfully observed. Bishop Donald Wuerl approved the policy and directed that it be promulgated by Father Paul Bradley, diocesan general secretary, who has responsibility for its implementation.
   The purpose of the policy, according to the general secretariat, "is to take reasonable measures to assure that church personnel who have regular contact with minors are committed to providing a safe environment for children and youth, are capable of identifying and preventing abuse of children and have no personal history of criminal abuse of children."
• They see open churches but find closed doors -- VOTF to be homeless as healthy parish is closed down
   Boston Globe, www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2004/07/29/they_see_open_churches_but_find_closed_doors ; By Bella English, July 29, 2004
   WEYMOUTH (MA): There's a lot of white hair and polyester in the parish hall at St. Albert the Great on a recent night. They've baked brownies and brewed coffee. They open and close their meeting with a prayer. They describe themselves as devout Catholics, the ones who fill the pews and the plates. But a month from now they may have no Catholic church in which to meet.
   The Weymouth Voice of the Faithful chapter, which meets at St. Albert's, will be without a home as of Sept. 1, when the church's doors are scheduled to close for good. The other four Weymouth parishes have so far refused to adopt the group, despite the archdiocese's promise that all activities of churches that close will be offered a home in neighboring parishes.
   Last spring, St. Albert's was selected by the other four churches as the one in Weymouth to close in a controversial reconfiguration plan promulgated by the Archdiocese of Boston. It is among 65 churches that will be shuttered by year's end. Archbishop Sean O'Malley has deemed the closings necessary because of declining church attendance, financial problems, the poor condition of many buildings, and a shortage of priests.
   Although St. Albert's is a healthy church by any measure -- high attendance, no debt, impeccable building and grounds -- it was selected by its brethren, and O'Malley upheld the choice, saying Weymouth can no longer support five churches.
   Although O'Malley has said all the activities of a closing parish will be transferred to another church, there seems to be a silent "but" clause. Yes, religious education classes, a health ministry, and the softball and hockey teams will be welcomed at other Weymouth parishes. But not Voice of the Faithful, at least not for now.
• Ex-Palm Beach Diocese bishop settles two lawsuits [O'Connell $US 57,000 to two, seven other accusers]
   Palm Beach Post, www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/auto/epaper/editions/thursday/local_news_ 1480766745 bdb09b00e8.html ; by Sonja Isger, Thursday, July 29, 2004
   FLORIDA: Former Bishop Anthony J. O'Connell will pay $5,000 each to settle lawsuits with two men who say O'Connell had sexual relations with them decades ago when they were teenagers studying at a seminary in Missouri, attorneys for all parties said Wednesday.
   The men, Michael Wegs, 51, of Minneapolis, and Matthew Cosby, 36, of St. Louis, also received $20,000 and $27,000 respectively from the Jefferson City Diocese, where the abuse took place, said Patrick Noaker, the lawyer who represented both men.
   "It was very healthy for these two men to get some money from Bishop O'Connell," Noaker said. "It was small, but it was something and there was very much a need for them to have their allegations acknowledged."
   O'Connell came to the five-county Palm Beach Diocese in 1999 in the wake of a sex scandal that unseated the previous bishop. But on March 8, 2002, he resigned, admitting that he had improperly touched a young man in an effort to counsel him. He also said another might come forward.
   By July of this year, O'Connell stood accused of different forms of sexual abuse of at least nine men -- three of whom, including Wegs and Cosby, filed suit in Missouri. Another settled out of court.
• Tucson diocese suits pending now at 20 [31 credibly suspected]
   The Arizona Republic, www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/0729churchsuits29.html , Associated Press, Jul. 29, 2004
   TUCSON (AZ): As the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tucson considers filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection because of mounting legal costs, the number of pending lawsuits against the diocese over alleged clergy sexual abuse is up to 20.
   The diocese has named 28 priests, two deacons and one nun on a public list of clerics with credible accusations against them of sexually abusing minors.
   In one of the four new lawsuits, Philip A. Hower refiled his suit in federal court rather than Pima County Superior Court.
   Hower claims he was a victim of employment discrimination because he was a whistle-blower about clergy abuse and was turned down for the priesthood by the diocese.
• Catholic schools stay on track
   The Oregonian, www.oregonlive.com/metrosouthwest/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/metro_southwest_news/10906 70553 144450.xml ; By LUCIANA LOPEZ, Thursday, July 29, 2004
   PORTLAND (OR): As a school principal, Joan Codd's mind is on planning for the fall.
   Because Codd heads Our Lady of the Lake School, a Catholic school in Lake Oswego, preparations this summer also include dealing with the bankruptcy filing earlier this month by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Portland.
   The school's funding isn't necessarily a looming worry. Codd's school, which serves kindergarten through eighth grade, draws financial support mainly from tuition, its parish and through fund raising.
   She has other reasons for concern: Will parents be worried? Will there be any long-term effects? Will people be less willing to give to the endowment fund that pays for student scholarships?
   While keeping an eye on the bankruptcy proceedings, many local Catholic schools say they remain on target to meet educational goals for the coming years. School officials say their communities, though surprised at the filing, have been supportive emotionally and financially.
   "My guess is that there will be lots of conversation about that as people come back from vacation and school starts," Codd said. She could have a pastor available to answer questions at the first parent meeting this fall, she said.
   Long-term financial concerns revolve around the school's endowment fund. Donors "may be concerned about contributing," Codd said
• DNA does not link Lavigne to scene of boy's '72 slaying
   Republican, www.masslive.com/chicopeeholyoke/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1091092708251500.xml ; By BILL ZAJAC, wzajac@repub.com , Thursday, July 29, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): New DNA tests on evidence in the 1972 unsolved murder of Daniel Croteau have not yielded any results that would link the only suspect to the crime, according to the region's top law enforcement official.
   A day after the state's top court ordered the release of all impounded Croteau murder files, Hampden County District Attorney William M. Bennett said yesterday DNA tests in the last 16 months have not linked defrocked priest Richard R. Lavigne with the murder scene of Croteau, a 13-year-old altar boy from Springfield.
   However, Bennett refused comment when asked what evidence was submitted for tests, whether further testing would be done and if there are any new leads in the investigation.
   Five members of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court unanimously decided to uphold an October 2003 ruling by Hampden Superior Court Judge Peter A. Velis to terminate a 1996 impoundment order that has kept portions of the murder files off limits to public inspection.
   The Republican and Greenfield lawyer John Stobierski, who represents clergy sexual abuse plaintiffs, had appealed to the high court after Bennett and Lavigne successfully appealed the Velis ruling to the state's Appeals Court.
   In the mid-1990s, after Bennett won a long legal battle to obtain a sample of Lavigne's blood, DNA testing did not link Lavigne to the murder scene.
   The tests were done on a drinking straw and a piece of rope, both of which were found on the banks of the Chicopee River where Croteau's body was found floating face down.
• Miss. brothers gain help of national group in abuse suit -- $US48m claim
   The Clarion-Ledger, www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040729/NEWS01/407290379/1002/ NEWS01 ; By Emily Wagster Pettus, The Associated Press, July 29, 2004
   JACKSON (MS): A national group has filed legal papers to support three Mississippi brothers in their lawsuit over alleged sexual abuse in the Jackson Diocese of the Catholic Church.
   Barbara Blaine of Chicago, national president of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests [SNAP], said Wednesday that she hopes the group's involvement will bring attention to the case.
   SNAP filed a "friend of the court brief" in which SNAP, although not a party to the lawsuit, says the court's decision may affect its interest.
   Kenneth, Thomas and Francis Morrison filed the $48 million sex abuse lawsuit. A trial in Hinds County is on hold while the Supreme Court considers the diocese's motion to have the case dismissed.
   The diocese argues certain church documents are privileged.
• Priest sex abuse case delayed [Urrutigoity]
   Scranton Times www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=12527773&BRD=2185&PAG=461&dept_id=416046&rfi=6 , ~ July 29, 2004
   SCRANTON (PA): A sexual abuse suit filed by a former St. Gregory's Academy student against the Society of St. John and the Diocese of Scranton will not head to trial in September.
   The trial, scheduled for Sept. 7, is in limbo until the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals renders a decision regarding the psychological evaluations of one of the accused priests, the Rev. Carlos Urrutigoity, according to an order handed down Wednesday by Judge John E. Jones III.
   In March, Judge Jones ruled James Bendell, the attorney for the John Doe plaintiff, could review a diocesan-ordered psychological evaluation of Father Urrutigoity, but the decision is under appeal. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 08:15 AM]
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Thu July 29, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
• American hierarchy seals its fate. [Grammond]
   National Catholic Reporter, http://ncronline.org/ , http://natcath.org/Online/archives2/2004c/073004/073004w.php , By A. W. Richard Sipe, online July 29, 2004
   UNITED STATES: The announcement July 5 that the Portland, Ore., archdiocese was filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection came as a surprise for those who were prepared for the trial of Fr. Maurice Grammond, a notorious predator, and the archdiocese for sexual abuse of a minor.
   The move was well planned and calculated to test a new means to counter the effects of the crisis caused by sex offending priests and complicit bishops. [Subscribers only to read more online.]
#### Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse, Fri July 30, 2004 edition follows:-
• Flora's War -- polygamy religion U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Los Angeles Times, www.latimes.com/features/printedition/magazine/la-tm-jessop31aug01,1,7826759.story?coll=la-home-magazine ; By Matthew Heller, Special to The Times, ~ July 30, 2004
   UNITED STATES: You have to go out of your way to find the place Flora Jessop once called home. Colorado City, Ariz., and the adjoining, indistinguishable town of Hildale, Utah, are perched in a remote valley divided by the dry wash of Short Creek. The towering vermilion edifice of Canaan Mountain is just to the north, the gaping abyss of the Grand Canyon to the south. The only way into this valley is a lonely two-lane blacktop.
   Getting out, some say, is even harder to do. Almost all of Short Creek Valley's residents are members of a fundamentalist Mormon church that controls how they live and where they believe they'll go after they die. As a key tenet of its faith, and a means of control, the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints enforces the practice of polygamy, marrying off girls as young as 15 to adult males for whom multiple, or plural, wives are considered a passport to salvation.
   Polygamy is illegal in every state and has been condemned for more than 100 years by the mainstream Mormon Church. But the fundamentalist church here has gone largely undisturbed by law enforcement for 50 years, growing into the largest concentration of polygamists in the nation, a theocracy of more than 5,800 people now ruled from a secure Hildale compound by Prophet Warren Jeffs, who teaches: "A man can go with his wives to be a god in his own right. No man can become a god unless he has more wives than one." [Posted by Kathy Shawat 09:43 PM]
• Details emerge in child sex case [? 2004 Ford] -- Victory Chapel Church
   Rapid City Journal www.rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2004/07/30/news/local/news03a.txt , By Heidi Bell Gease, Friday, July 30, 2004
   RAPID CITY (SD): Investigators say a Rapid City man accused of rape and sexual contact with a child once had sex with his 13-year-old victim inside the church where he worked as a youth pastor.
   Glenn Ford, 39, was indicted by a Pennington County grand jury on two counts of third-degree rape and one count of sexual contact with a child under 16.
   Ford was youth pastor at Victory Chapel church on La Crosse Street for two years. He was arrested in June.
   According to a probable cause affidavit signed by Pennington County Sheriff's Investigator Edwin Schulz, a 13-year-old girl told investigators she was a friend of Ford's daughter and often spent the night at Ford's Michigan Avenue home, where many of the alleged incidents happened over a three-month time span.
• Woman files new suit against Catholic orphanage [1950s-60s Sister Camilla] -- Sisters of Charity of Nazareth
   WHAS, www.whas11.com/topstories/stories/WHAS11_TOP_NunSuits.2ad8e969.html , 04:32 PM EDT, Friday, July 30, 2004
   LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) -- A 50-year-old woman has filed the latest lawsuit alleging sexual abuse against a defunct orphanage run by Roman Catholic nuns.
   Charlotte Marie Bailey’s suit, filed today in Jefferson Circuit Court, is the 20th complaint alleging abuse at the now-closed Saint Thomas-Saint Vincent Orphanage at Anchorage.
   The suits claim the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth committed abuse and tolerated abuse by others from the 1950s through the 1970s. The Sisters of Charity operated the orphanage, which was owned by the Archdiocese of Louisville.
   The suit says Bailey alleges she was forcibly sexually molested, abused, battered and assaulted in the 1950s and 1960s by a nun at the orphanage known as "Sister Camilla." In a separate suit against the Sisters of Charity, plaintiffs Deborah Ferguson and Monica Aubrey have also alleged abuse by the same nun.
• Victims say Larson should serve the rest of his prison sentence [1980s Larson]
   Newton Kansan, www.thekansan.com/stories/073004/fro_0730040009.shtml , By Chris Strunk, July 30, 2004
   WICHITA (KS): Victims of Robert Larson's sexual abuse said the former Catholic priest should serve more time in prison. Larson's supporters said he has been punished enough.
   Former altar boys and retired priests talked to the Kansas Parole Board Thursday in Wichita, less than a month before the board will decide whether Larson will get out of prison.
   Larson has been in Lansing Correctional Facility since March 2001 for fondling four kids about 20 years ago.
   Serving a 3- to 10-year sentence, Larson is eligible for parole in September. The board will make a decision two to three weeks after it meets with Larson next week. Part of the board's decision-making was Thursday's public comment hearing.
• Court dismisses church sex abuse claims [1960-80 Nuedling]
   Duluth News Tribune, www.duluthsuperior.com/mld/duluthsuperior/news/politics/9284650.htm , By TODD RICHMOND, Associated Press, Fri, Jul. 30, 2004
   MADISON, Wis. - A group of people who claim a Milwaukee priest sexually assaulted them decades ago filed civil complaints against the church too late, a state appeals court ruled Friday.
   The 1st District Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 that the statute of limitations had expired and the First Amendment bans negligence claims against churches. The ruling mirrors similar state Supreme Court decisions from the late 1990s.
   "The victims of clergy abuse in Wisconsin are uniquely denied access to justice," said Jim Smith, an attorney for the group.
   Matthew Flynn, an attorney for the archdiocese, didn't return a message The Associated Press left at his office Friday morning. Archdiocese officials also didn't return a message.
   The group of 10 people filed civil complaints that alleged the Rev. George Nuedling, who is now dead, abused them between 1960 and 1980. Members of the group filed their first complaints in 2002, according to court records and the appeals court decision.
• Reviewer's Choice: The Priestly Sins, by Andrew Greeley
   The Dallas Morning News, www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/religion/arts/stories/073104dnrechoice.a3b9c.html , ~ July 30, 2004
   The Priestly Sins, a novel, by Andrew Greeley, Forge Books, 304 pages, $24.95
   UNITED STATES: It's been more than 20 years since The Cardinal Sins sold millions of copies, sharing with readers the sexual exploits of two young Chicago priests in training. Father Greeley, a Catholic priest and sociologist, takes aim at the church's recent sex abuse scandal in this novel.
   Father Greeley writes books that make some faithful Catholics cringe. In Priestly Sins, he writes about Herman Hoffman, a young idealistic priest assigned to a parish in fictitious Plains City.
   Father Hoffman witnesses a horrendous sexual attack on a young boy by a fellow priest in a parish rectory, then blows the whistle. His life as a priest is shattered by a diocesan hierarchy that is more interested in silencing Father Hoffman than seeking justice and a solution to the problem.
• Judge hears arguments in diocese sexual abuse lawsuits -- 14-month delay
   Quad-City Times, www.qctimes.com/internal.php?story_id=1032145&t=Local+News&c=2,1032145 , By Todd Ruger, Friday, July 30th, 2004
   DAVENPORT (IA): The attorney for men alleging sexual abuse by priests in the Catholic Diocese of Davenport more than 20 years ago demanded that church leaders turn over priest personnel files and other records Friday as trial dates for their lawsuits loom four months away.
   The diocese holdup is preventing the men from preparing for trials and expanding the required pre-trial work by attorneys, attorney Craig Levien told District Court Judge C.H. Pelton on Friday.
   "When do these men who have been injured get to see this information," Levien said, calling for sanctions against the diocese for a 14-month delay. "Perhaps we’ve been too patient."
   Pelton, who cited the separation of church and state in being "very reluctant" to sanction the diocese, will rule at a later date on Levien’s motion to force the diocese to turn over the documents.
   Diocese attorney Rand Wonio told the judge he was "disappointed" at Levien’s request for sanctions, since both attorneys agreed to instead focus on insurance report letters needed to help in mediations of the cases outside of the courtroom.
• Thomas Kuhn receives probation [500 hours service, > $US 10,000]
   The Catholic Telegraph, www.catholiccincinnati.org/tct/july3004/073004kuhn.html , By Lenore Christopher, July 30, 2004
   DAYTON (OH): DAYTON DEANERY - Thomas Kuhn, a priest on administrative leave from the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, was sentenced in Montgomery County Common Pleas Court July 21 to five years of supervised probation, 500 hours of community service and ordered to pay the maximum fines of more than $10,000 on 11 misdemeanor charges of public indecency and providing alcohol to minors.
   Judge Mary Katherine Huffman said she opted for a longer probationary term under the court’s control rather than impose 18 months of incarceration, in part, because Kuhn had not displayed remorse for the charges to which he pleaded "no contest" on June 23 and was therefore found guilty.
   Referring to a report she received from court-appointed psychologist Susan Perry Dyer, Huffman said she was concerned about Kuhn’s denial of responsibility and his abuse of trust that has caused "turmoil" in the community.
   The former pastor may not work for any organization that involves people younger than 21 years of age. He must attend an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting each day and cannot enter any establishment where alcohol is served. He must complete appropriate treatment related to gambling, alcohol and other problems.
• Catholic Priest Suspended -- again
   WIVB, www.wivb.com/Global/story.asp?S=2110877&nav=0RapPM9B , July 30, 2004
   TONAWANDA (NY): A Catholic priest in Buffalo has been suspended after his second arrest for public lewdness.
   Town of Tonawanda police say they busted Father Charles Werth and three other men at Ellicott Creek Park on Wednesday.
   The 76 year old priest was placed on leave a decade ago when he was arrested in the same place, for the same crime.
   The diocese restored his duties after he underwent counseling.
   Kevin Keenan of the Buffalo Catholic Diocese: "...acted decisively. When something like this happens, one of the things that the bishop does is to remove that individual from the priesthood pending the outcome of the investigation."
• Dozens speak out against pedophile priest's release [Larson]
   The Wichita Eagle, www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/state/9278921.htm , Associated Press, ~ July 30, 2004
   WICHITA, Kan. - Dozens of people spoke out Thursday against the possible prison release of a Roman Catholic priest who admitted molesting four young men.
   Robert Larson, a former Diocese of Wichita priest, is expected to go before the Kansas Parole Board on Wednesday to plead his case for release. Larson was defrocked after saying he sexually abused three altar boys and a teenage boy at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Newton.
   Some who gathered at the Finney State Office Building on Thursday defended Larson; but the night was largely about the former priest's victims and their advocates.
   Janet Patterson of Conway Springs said granting Larson parole, which the board refused two years ago, would be "like a stab in the heart."
   Patterson's oldest son, Eric, committed suicide in 1999 after telling his family Larson molested him when he was an altar boy in the early 1980s. Larson has denied molesting Patterson's son along with four other young men who served Mass for him and later committed suicide.
• Catholic diocese disowns nun [Phiri, Kalino] Malawi flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Nation Malawi Online, www.nationmalawi.com/articles.asp?articleID=8620 , by George Ntonya, 30 July 2004
   MALAWI: Dedza Diocese of the Catholic Church has disassociated itself from Annetta Phiri, a nun who Lilongwe International Airport (Lia) police arrested on Wednesday allegedly for having sex in a car with a priest.
   The father and sister were on Thursday convicted and given an 18-month suspended sentence by the courts.
   "We cannot comment on this issue because we do not have Annetta Phiri in this diocese. I don’t know any sister by the name Annetta Phiri," the diocese’s vicar general Father Peter Kasonkanji said on Thursday morning.
   He accused the media of publicising the sex scandal before confirming the police report that identified Sister Phiri as working for Dedza diocese.
   "You have defamed Dedza diocese. I am confirming here that this lady is not from this diocese. She does not work here," Kasonkanji said in a telephone interview on Thursday, admitting, however that he knew Father Morris Kalino from Lilongwe Diocese.
   According to police records, Morris Kalino got arrested together with Phiri minutes after they had parked a red tinted Toyota Corolla registration number BM 3561 in the airport car park. They were found making love naked, the police said.
• Former Priest Among Four Arrested For Lewd and Indecent Behavior [1994, 2004 Werth]
   WGRZ, www.wgrz.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=22087 , Posted by Jeff Woodard, Executive Producer, July/30/2004
   TONAWANDA (NY): Town of Tonawanda police arrested four men in Ellicott Creek Park during another undercover operation to crackdown on lewd and indecent behavior in the park and public restrooms.
   One of the men arrested was Rev. Charles M. Werth, 76, of Williamsville. He was charged with lewdness. Werth was arrested in August, 1994 on the charge of third-degree sexual abuse. Rev. Werth was pastor of St. Barnabus Church, 2049 George Urban Boulevard.
• Lacey man files lawsuit against area archdiocese [1960s McGreal; $US8.6m wasted]
   The Olympian, www.theolympian.com/home/news/20040730/southsound/109542.shtml , SCOTT GUTIERREZ, July 30, 2004
   OLYMPIA (WA): A Lacey man who says he was molested by a priest in the late 1960s has filed a lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle, accusing church officials of deceiving him into settling a claim of sexual abuse without hiring his own attorney.
   The victim, now in his 50s, was molested by Fr. James McGreal while he was an altar boy at St. Michael Catholic Church in Olympia. McGreal, now in his 80s, was at the center of an $8.6 million settlement between the archdiocese and 16 men who sued him for sexual abuse.
   The plaintiff, identified as "J.B." in court papers, came forward in 2003 by calling a special hot line for victims and those who want to report allegations of clergy sexual abuse.
   According to the lawsuit, Jessie Dye, a pastoral outreach coordinator and ombudsman, contacted the plaintiff. It alleges that she offered to connect him with therapy and spiritual support but never disclosed that she was an attorney. The lawsuit also alleges that she urged him not to hire his own legal counsel before negotiating a $100,000 settlement.
• Retrial for priest on sexual assault charges [Conroy] Ireland flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   One in Four, http://oneinfour.org/news/news2004/retrial , ~ July 30, 2004
   IRELAND: The trial of a former missionary priest, Father Chris Conroy, for sexual assault of a 14-year-old girl collapsed at Wicklow Circuit Court yesterday after Judge Pat McCartan ruled that the credibility of the witness, now a young woman, may have been unfairly damaged.
   He also ruled that the veracity of the witness's father may have been unfairly called into question.
   Judge McCartan remanded Father Conroy on continuing bail and ordered that he face a retrial on two counts of sexual assault.
   After hearing legal argument from Mr Paul Murray SC for the Director of Public Prosecutions, and Mr Richard N. Kean SC for Father Conroy, Judge McCartan said issues of truth and credibility had arisen during cross-examination which may have influenced the jury.
   He said the young woman had been cross-examined "very vigorously" on a number of matters. These were central to her credibility and her truth and particularly related to the date of an alleged assault, which she maintained had happened after a shopping trip to Dún Laoghaire in Dublin when Father Conroy had bought her clothes.
• Polygamist leader named in abuse suit. Allegations: The polygamous church president, two others are accused of sexual assault [Jeffs, Jeffs, and Jeffs] -- breakaway Mormon group
   The Salt Lake Tribune, www.sltrib.com/utah/ci_2385468 , By Pamela Manson, July 30, 2004
   SALT LAKE CITY (UT): A former member of a polygamous sect on the Utah-Arizona border on Thursday accused three of his uncles, one of them the faith's leader, of sexually assaulting him when he was a child and calling it "God's work."
   In a lawsuit, Brent Jeffs claims that the trio of leaders in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) - president Warren Steed Jeffs, considered by his followers to be their prophet, and his brothers, Blaine Balmforth Jeffs and Leslie Balmforth Jeffs - described the abuse as a way to make him a man.
   "Those defendants explained to plaintiff that it was 'God's will' that he never disclose the abuses to anyone, and if he did, it would be upon pain of eternal damnation," Brent Jeffs, 21, said in his suit, filed in Utah's 3rd District Court. "Thus, for many years, the frightened child remained silent."
   But Brent Jeffs said his brother's suicide two years ago prompted him to finally break his silence. His suit, which claims FLDS leaders knew of the "perversity and sexually predatory acts" but did nothing to stop them, gives no details about the death.
• Suit accuses polygamist of sex abuse, cover-up [Jeffs]
   The Arizona Republic, www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0730polygamy30.html , by Joseph A. Reaves, Jul. 30, 2004
   SALT LAKE CITY (UT): The head of the nation's largest polygamous community, headquartered along the Arizona-Utah line, was accused Thursday in a lawsuit of repeatedly sodomizing his nephew and for decades covering up wide-scale sexual abuse of children by fellow members of his sect.
   The allegations were the most serious and graphic to be brought against Warren Jeffs, 48, the embattled self-proclaimed prophet of a breakaway religious sect known as the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
   Jeffs and his top lieutenants in the FLDS have been the focus of a series of criminal investigations under way for years by the attorneys general of Utah and Arizona. So far, no criminal charges have been filed against anyone in the church hierarchy, but Thursday's civil suit opened a new track in the investigations.
• Priest accused of abuse resigns over adult male's complaint [Tressic]
   Albany Times Union, www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=271287&category=REGIONOTHER& BCCode=HOME&newsdate=7/30/200 ; By MICHELE MORGAN BOLTON, Friday, July 30, 2004
   ALBANY (NY): A divorced Connecticut millionaire who divested his fortune to become a priest in the Albany Roman Catholic Diocese in 1995 has resigned following two years of claims he had inappropriate sex with a former homeless man he met in Washington Park.
   The Rev. David Tressic, 61, left his assignment as pastor at Sacred Heart Church in Gloversville in late June, according to a woman who answered the parish telephone.
   His departure followed a dramatic saga in which he took a leave of absence to fight allegations of forced homosexual sex and what he said was the alleged victim's subsequent extortion for hush money.
   Tressic was the first Albany priest to leave the ministry because of sexual misconduct claims with an adult man.
• Man sues priest, alleges abuse 20 years ago in Hinsdale [1983 Lenczycki]
   Chicago Sun-Times, www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-cath30.html , BY MONIFA THOMAS, July 30, 2004
   HINSDALE (IL): A Roman Catholic priest imprisoned for molesting boys at a Hinsdale parish 20 years ago was sued Thursday by a former member of the parish, who said the priest fondled him when he was 13.
   The lawsuit alleges the Rev. Frederick Lenczycki, most recently a priest with the Archdiocese of St. Louis before his January conviction in DuPage County on sex-abuse charges, fondled and poured holy water on the naked body of the alleged victim, who asked not to be named, in 1983.
   At that time, the plaintiff was an eighth-grader at St. Isaac Jogues in Hinsdale, part of the Diocese of Joliet, and he did not report the allegation. He is now 34.
   The diocese and its bishop, Joseph Imesch, also are named in the suit, which cites their failure to report Lenczycki after other complaints of sexual abuse about him first surfaced in 1984.
   That year, Lenczycki, who is serving a five-year prison sentence, took a three-year leave of absence before being transferred to parishes in California and Missouri, said the plaintiff's lawyer, Marc Pearlman.
• Man sues Joliet diocese over abuse [1983 Lenczycki]
   Chicago Tribune, www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/northshore/chi-0407300268jul30,1,1426890.story? coll=chi-newslocalnorthshore-hed ; July 30, 2004
   JOLIET (IL): A priest imprisoned for child sex abuse now faces a civil suit from another alleged victim.
   Rev. Frederick A. Lenczycki, a priest in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Joliet, is being sued by an Illinois man, filing as John Doe 87A. The diocese and its bishop, Rev. Joseph Imesch, also are named in the suit.
   Marc Pearlman, the plaintiff's attorney, said that in 1983--a year after the plaintiff was baptized a Roman Catholic--Lenczycki allegedly called him out of class at St. Isaac Jogues Parish School in Hinsdale.
   Lenczycki allegedly took the boy, then 13, to his quarters where he told him he had to follow instructions to qualify for confirmation, Pearlman said.
   Lenczycki then allegedly told the boy to get undressed, poured holy water on him and fondled him, Pearlman said.
• Giving priests their due
   The Press-Enterprise, www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_canon30.f233.html , By MICHAEL FISHER, Thursday, July 29, 2004
   DEFENSE: A canon lawyer advising Inland clerics says abuse scandals have hurt everyone's rights.
   CALIFORNIA: As Catholics agonize over ongoing allegations of sexual abuse targeting some clergy, a former Inland priest turned activist, Michael Higgins, argues that the rights of good clerics nationwide are being trampled, destroying their lives and careers.
   "When an allegation is made, whatever it is, a bishop is supposed to follow a canonical process," the San Diego area canon lawyer said, referring to the body of laws governing the Catholic Church. "In most cases, that is not being followed. In most cases, you are guilty until proven innocent."
   Higgins is the executive director of Justice for Priests and Deacons, a San Diego-based nonprofit group of 90 canonists dedicated to defending the rights of clergy accused of sexual misconduct, embezzlement or other wrongdoing. Formed in 1997, the group has advised 300 to 400 clergy accused of transgressions, including four Inland-area clerics.
   Higgins said he could not discuss details of the four Inland cases. Higgins - whom Diocese of San Diego officials say was removed from the priesthood due to an allegation of misconduct, which he denies - argues that accused priests are not advised of their rights under canon law and are not receiving due process.
• Group requests deadline delay [46 complainants]
   The Republican, www.masslive.com/metrowest/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-1/109117540494740.xml , By BILL ZAJAC, wzajac@repub.com , Friday, July 30, 2004
   SPRINGFIELD (MA): A support group is urging the bishop to extend the settlement deadline for those who have accused the diocese of clergy sexual abuse so the claimants can review investigation files due to be released.
   In a settlement announced July 22, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield agreed to provide more than $7 million, lifetime counseling and other benefits to 46 people who said they were the victims of clergy sexual abuse. Claimants have until Aug. 5 to opt in or out of the settlement.
   John J. Stobierski, the Greenfield lawyer representing the claimants, also had been trying to force the release of impounded investigation files dealing with the 1972 murder of Daniel Croteau, a 13-year-old altar boy from Springfield. The suspect in the case, defrocked priest Richard R. Lavigne, was accused by 24 of the claimants of abuse. Stobierski wanted the files to determine when church officials became aware of abuse complaints against Lavigne.
   Stobierski was joined in the legal effort by The Republican. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Tuesday ruled that the records should be released.
   The Springfield Chapter of Those Abused by Priests issued a statement yesterday asking the diocese to delay the settlement deadline, saying the claimants may want to review the files. Some of the documents were released Tuesday, and others may be available next week.
• Lacey man files lawsuit against Seattle archdiocese [1960s McGreal $US100,000]
   Seattle Post-Intelligencer, http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/aplocal_story.asp?category=6420&slug=WA%20Catholic%20Lawsuit ; THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, Friday, July 30, 2004
   OLYMPIA, Wash. -- A Lacey man who said he was molested by a priest in the late 1960s when he was an altar boy has filed a lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle.
   The man, now in his 50s, accused church officials of deceiving him into settling a claim of sexual abuse without hiring his own lawyer. He was identified as "J.B." in court papers.
   The suit was filed in July in Thurston County Superior Court. It accuses the archdiocese of fraud, malpractice and violating consumer protection laws.
   The victim said he was molested by the Rev. James McGreal at St. Michael Catholic Church in Olympia. McGreal, now in his 80s, is a former pastor at several churches in Western Washington.
   McGreal was at the center of an $8.6 million settlement between the archdiocese and 16 men who sued him for sexual abuse.
   The plaintiff came forward in 2003 by calling a special hot line for victims and those who want to report allegations of clergy sexual abuse.
   The suit said Jessie Dye, a pastoral outreach coordinator and ombudsman, contacted the plaintiff. It alleges that she offered to connect him with therapy and spiritual support but never disclosed that she was a lawyer.
   The suit also alleges that she urged him not to hire his own legal counsel before negotiating a $100,000 settlement.
   "He got betrayed when he was sexually assaulted and he got betrayed again by Jessie Dye when she wasn't up front with him, especially after she gained his trust," said Kevin Johnson, an Olympia lawyer representing him.  ...
Information from: The Olympian, http://www.theolympian.com [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 07:53 AM[
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Fri July 30, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
• Man sues priest, alleges abuse 20 years ago in Hinsdale. [1983 Lenczycki]
   Chicago Sun-Times, http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-cath30.html , BY MONIFA THOMAS, July 30, 2004
   UNITED STATES: A Roman Catholic priest imprisoned for molesting boys at a Hinsdale parish 20 years ago was sued Thursday by a former member of the parish, who said the priest fondled him when he was 13.
   The lawsuit alleges the Rev. Frederick Lenczycki, most recently a priest with the Archdiocese of St. Louis before his January conviction in DuPage County on sex-abuse charges, fondled and poured holy water on the naked body of the alleged victim, who asked not to be named, in 1983.
   At that time, the plaintiff was an eighth-grader at St. Isaac Jogues in Hinsdale, part of the Diocese of Joliet, and he did not report the allegation. He is now 34.
   The diocese and its bishop, Joseph Imesch, also are named in the suit, which cites their failure to report Lenczycki after other complaints of sexual abuse about him first surfaced in 1984.
   That year, Lenczycki, who is serving a five-year prison sentence, took a three-year leave of absence before being transferred to parishes in California and Missouri, said the plaintiff's lawyer, Marc Pearlman. (By courtesy of Catholic World News, Abuse Scandal Update for July 30, 2004, www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=31173 )
#### Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker, www.ncrnews.org/abuse, Sat July 31, 2004 edition follows:-
• Vatican Letter Denounces 'Lethal Effects' of Feminism  Vatican City flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Washington Post, www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30761-2004Jul31.html , By Daniel Williams and Alan Cooperman Washington Post Foreign Service, Page A16, Sunday, August 1, 2004
   ROME, July 31 -- The Vatican issued a letter Saturday attacking the "distortions" and "lethal effects" of feminism, which it defined as an effort to erase differences between men and women -- a goal, the statement said, that undermines the "natural two-parent structure" of the family and makes "homosexuality and heterosexuality virtually equivalent."
   The sharp critique was contained in a document issued by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, a chief adviser to Pope John Paul II and head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the department in charge of laying out Roman Catholic orthodoxy. The 37-page document also outlined the Vatican's own formula for relationships between men and women, calling for "active collaboration between the sexes" and rejecting subjugation of women.
   The statement was the latest Vatican salvo against trends it regards as undermining its teachings on sexuality and the family. Vatican officials have assailed abortion and contraception; politicians who support abortion through legislation; and legalized same-sex unions. The pope approved the document issued Saturday, which is titled "Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on the Collaboration of Men and Women in the Church and the World."  ...
   Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza, a feminist theologian at Harvard Divinity School, said the document restated positions the Vatican has taken many times and that the only surprise was its timing. She said church leaders may be feeling some urgency to combat same-sex marriage, as well as renewed pressure to consider ordaining women in response to the worldwide scandal over sexual abuse by priests. [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 08:02 PM]
   [COMMENT: Hypocrite! First remove the beam from your own eye, then you will see clearly to extract the speck from your brother's eye. (Matthew 6:5). COMMENT ENDS.]
• Former priest named in second sex-abuse lawsuit [1968-80 Springer]
   The Times-Picayune, www.nola.com/newsflash/louisiana/index.ssf?/base/news-10/1091290477218040.xml , The Associated Press, July/31/2004
   BATON ROUGE (LA) (AP) - A former Louisiana priest is now named in a second sexual abuse lawsuit, this one involving five former altar boys and allegations spanning from 1968 to 1980.
   The alleged victims' names were not disclosed in the lawsuit filed late Friday against Christopher Springer.
   The lawsuit asks for money to cover medical expenses, pain and suffering, mental anguish, lost earning capacity and other damages.
   It also asks that the church be ordered to pay punitive damages, claiming that would "deter the outrageous conduct taken in heedless and reckless disregard for the safety" of the alleged victims.
   Another suit filed in January 2003 by former altar boy Patrick Myers is pending against Springer, the Baton Rouge diocese and others.
• Archbishop urged to name accused priest
   Albuquerque Tribune, www.abqtrib.com/archives/news04/073104_news_priest.shtml , By Joline Gutierrez Krueger, July 31, 2004
   NEW MEXICO: A national support group for survivors of clergy sex abuse is asking Archbishop Michael J. Sheehan to go public with the name of an Albuquerque priest accused of sexually inappropriate behavior decades ago so that other possible victims can be identified.
   The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, is the oldest and largest support group for victims of sexual abuse by clergy in the country. It's based in Chicago and has more than 5,000 members, including those in the New Mexico chapter. For information log on to www.snapnetwork.org.
   The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, urges Sheehan to place ads in the Archdiocese of Santa Fe newsletter and church bulletins informing people about the allegations lodged against the priest so that anybody who has been abused or knows of abuse can contact law enforcement.
   "Sheehan and his brother bishops have repeatedly promised to be open about sex abuse allegations and to temporarily suspend accused priests while accusations are being investigated. In this case, he is apparently violating his promises," SNAP national director David Clohessy of St. Louis said in a news release issued Friday.
   Clohessy also asked Sheehan to make public announcements in each parish where the priest, who is now 71, has worked. He also urged parents to ask their children about any inappropriate actions the priest may have made toward them.
   "If you have any information that might prove his innocence or guilt, it is crucial that you come forward," Clohessy said.
   In a lawsuit not related to the allegations against the priest, he was named in documents which were subsequently sealed by court order. The documents include six letters written in 1995 by men who accuse him of misconduct when they were parochial middle school students in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
   The allegations include asking boys to sleep in his bed with him, wrestling with them in underwear, making them stand naked in front of a mirror and asking to wear their jock straps.
• Pastor escapes after raping married woman [2004 Quansah] Ghana flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Ghana Web, www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=62962 , July 30, 2004
   AKIM ACHIASE, GHANA: GNA- Pastor Stephen Quansah of the African Faith Tabernacle Church at Akim Achease, who claimed he could make a married woman have a child, fled into the bush when he was confronted over the raping of the woman at a hotel at Akim Oda.
   A Police source at Akim Achiase told the Ghana News Agency at Akim Oda on Thursday, that for sometime now the woman, whose name has been withheld had been having a series of miscarriages.
   He said the husband therefore, took her to the pastor's Prayer Camp at Akim Achiase where it was agreed that the husband would pay the Pastor a fee of 400,000 cedis if he was able make the woman give birth successfully.
   The source said a few days later, Pastor Quansah invited the woman to his camp and gave her a concoction which he claimed cost 30,000 cedis and later asked her to accompany him to Akim Oda to collect the money from her husband.
   On the way, Pastor Quansah told the woman that he saw a taxi belonging to the husband parked at a place and asked the woman to talk to his driver.
• Cambodian monks urged to improve their behaviour after series of scandals
   Cnews, http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/WeirdNews/2004/07/29/561755-ap.html , July 29, 2004
   PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) - Cambodia's acting head of state appealed to Buddhist monks Thursday to stop misbehaving after a string of scandals.
   Several monks have grabbed newspaper headlines recently for fighting with slingshots and petrol bombs at a temple, molesting a boy, and for beating a man and stealing motorcycles.
   At a three-day conference of 670 monks, nuns and religious officials, Chea Sim, president of the ruling Cambodian People's Party and acting head of state while King Norodom Sihanouk is away, said "negative acts" by some members of the monkhood "must be addressed, solved and improved."
• The church and bankruptcy: an expert view  U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   The Oregonian, www.oregonlive.com/living/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/living/1091275640263071.xml , By NANCY HAUGHT, Saturday, July 31, 2004
   PORTLAND (OR): The crux of the Archdiocese of Portland's bankruptcy claim earlier this month is whether each of the 124 Roman Catholic parishes owns its own property and controls its own finances.
   Archbishop John G. Vlazny cites canon law, saying that parishes are the rightful owners and that he cannot seize property to pay off clergy-abuse settlements. Critics of the church, especially attorneys for plaintiffs in pending lawsuits, say the archbishop owns it all and should spend what it takes to compensate their clients and pay the penalty for bishops who allowed the abuse to continue.
   Parishioners, the folks in the pews, may find themselves stuck in the middle: sympathetic with victims of abuse, angry at bishops that knew about it and didn't stop it and worried about how their own contributions will be spent.
   Chances are, Judge Elizabeth Perris of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court will decide how much weight canon law will carry in this case.
   Meanwhile, The Oregonian talked to Monsignor Ronny Jenkins, a professor of canon law at The Catholic University of America, in Washington, D.C., about church law, what it does and doesn't require and what may be at stake for the broader Catholic Church. His answers have been edited for length and clarity.
• Abused man returns to scene [1970s]
   Ledger-Enquirer, http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/living/9284969.htm , Knight Ridder Newspapers, ~ July 31, 2004
   HACKENSACK, N.J. - He was only 11 when the trips to the rectory basement of the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Paterson, N.J., he recalls, became journeys to hell.
   Inside the towering, Gothic-style church, where Johnny Vega's parents and scores of other Latino newcomers found comfort and strength as they built new lives here, a priest sexually assaulted Vega and other boys over several years, he says. That was three decades ago, when such indignities often brought shame to a victim and his family, and the solution usually was secrecy.
   Now, at 40, Vega -- who repressed memories of the abuse -- is on a full-throttle mission to face his demons and make sure that the church, and Latino parents, never again foment a climate that discourages children who are victimized by a priest or other church official from reporting the incident.
   "I wonder about other people, if they were abused and haven't told anyone," says Vega, who lives with his wife and two sons in Wallington.
   This year, Vega founded a Hispanic chapter of the national Survivor Network of Those Abused by Priests [SNAP], because, he says, Hispanics have additional cultural obstacles that impede efforts to cope with the abuse and its lingering effects.
   He wants to bring together Hispanic victims from different states for a one-day meeting, but coming up with the right place, and the money, to pull it off has been an obstacle.
   And he is doing what he has contemplated -- and dreaded -- since the priest abuse scandal first broke in Boston two years ago.
   He is reaching out to officials of the Paterson Diocese, and to the clergy of the very parish where he says he was abused.
   The most daring, and frightening, step Vega has taken is requesting a meeting with Monsignor Mark Giordani of St. John's.
• Diocese removes another priest [Tressic] -- adult male victim
   Troy Record, www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=12559083&BRD=1170&PAG=461&dept_id=7021&rfi=6 , By Robert Connors, July/31/2004
   ALBANY (NY): Rev. David Tressic, formerly of Sacred Heart Church in Gloversville, has become the 21st priest to leave the Albany Roman Catholic Diocese for sexual misconduct and the first to leave because his accuser was an adult man.
   Tressic, 61, a millionaire from Connecticut who became a Catholic priest after his marriage was annulled in 1995, left his post as pastor at Sacred Heart in late June.
   Tressic was accused of sexual misconduct by Steven Hall, 34, of Cortland. Hall was a homeless drug addict when Tressic met him in Albany's Washington Park.
   Tressic hired Hall and gave him room and board at the Sacred Heart rectory. Hall claims he was sexually molested when he was either sleeping or was in an alcohol/drug-induced state.
• Diocese wants negligence claims dropped against accused priests
   Courier, www.wcfcourier.com/articles/2004/07/31/news/breaking_news/6c79c4b79da3947b86256ee 20044b77d.txt ; By TODD DVORAK, Associated Press Writer, ~ July 31, 2004
   DAVENPORT (IA) -- Claims that the Roman Catholic Diocese of Davenport mismanaged abusive priests and deliberately caused victims emotional distress should be dropped from a lawsuit, diocese attorneys argued Friday.
   Meanwhile, attorneys for the victim known only as John Doe 1-A asked District Judge C.H. Pelton to force the diocese to turn over hundreds of pages of documents deemed necessary to prepare for trial.
   The hearing in Scott County District Court covered an assortment of motions in one of 15 lawsuits filed against the church and priests who worked in parishes scattered throughout the diocese in the last 50 years.
   Earlier this month, Pelton rejected a diocese request to dismiss Doe's lawsuit entirely.
   That decision forced diocese attorneys to explore a different strategy, targeting the dismissal of specific claims alleged in the lawsuit.
• Vatican's "Sexorcist" Gags Scandal Bishop [2004 Krenn] Austria flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Deutsche Welle, www.dw-world.de/english/0,3367,1430_A_1282357_1_A,00.html?mpb=en , ~ July 31, 2004
   AUSTRIA: The man chosen by the Vatican to investigate the St. Poelten sex scandal in Austria has ordered the local bishop not to speak to the media in a bid to halt the damage to the Catholic Church.
   The Vatican's investigator dispatched to Austria [sic] to probe the seminary at the center of a sex scandal has ordered the local bishop not to speak to the media in a bid to halt the damage being done by the child porn inquiry.
   Bishop Klaus Kueng, Pope John Paul II's own choice, is working at uncovering the truth and depth of the scandal that consumed the St Poelten earlier this month and which has been a staple of the Austrian media ever since photographs of clerics at seminary kissing and fondling student priests were published.
   Bishop's comments inflaming situation
   Local bishop Kurt Krenn has been adding fuel to the media fire through a number of rash statements, specifically one which caused outrage when the described the incidents in the photographs as pranks and a number of comments slamming Islam.
• Ex-pastor sued by sex-abuse victim [1979-81 Winkler] -- Disciples of Christ
   News-Leader, http://springfield.news-leader.com/news/today/0731-Expastorsu-145807.html , By Linda Leicht, July 31, 2004
   MISSOURI: A former local pastor who was convicted in 2002 of sexually abusing at least six young teenage boys in Kansas now faces a lawsuit by one of his victims.
   Russell Winkler - who was living and serving a church in Republic when he was first accused - lost his pastoral credentials with the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) after he admitted abuse that dated back to 1979-81. He pleaded no contest in court and was given five years' probation. He was also ordered to register as a sex offender in Greene County and participate in a counseling program in Missouri.
   Michael Peters, the only victim who has come forward against Winkler, filed a civil lawsuit Friday against the former pastor and the Christian Church of Kansas. The suit, which asks for unspecified damages, was filed in Shawnee County Circuit Court in Topeka. Peters also brought the accusations against Winkler that led to his criminal charges in late 2001.
   "I didn't really feel justified," Peters said of the outcome of those charges. Winkler could have been sentenced to up to 10 years in prison on the six sexual abuse charges.
• Pastor: Congregation shocked by allegations against teacher [? 2003-04 Primero ] -- Seventh Day Adventist
   The Daily Reflector, www.reflector.com/news/newsfd/auto/feed/news/2004/07/30/1091216376.18121.3539.4646. html;COXnetJSessionID=BLVygZcRPVdtbBBAgfjUJNYERGIJtfLcxlnuKXueGO1DqPzNKSDM! 1973982082?urac=`LcQYMbKXY]X_YURcXXXYYcX]XbY^V_Y]XVXbYWXYYUXUYaU[Y^Y_YYS_T^TaTaTc ; By Stanley B. Chambers Jr., schambers@coxnews.com , ~ July 31, 2004
   WINTERVILLE (NC): Allegations of sexual abuse by a teacher at a Winterville church school left the congregation shocked Thursday, the pastor said in a written statement.
   Moses Primero of Winterville is facing a statutory rape charge for allegedly having relations with a student at the Greenville Seventh Day Adventist Church school, investigators with the Pitt County Sheriff's Office said.
   The 43-year-old, who has taught at the Reedy Branch Road school since 2001, was last known to be at a Charlotte hospital after a drug overdose, officials said. His whereabouts were unknown Thursday.
   "We were shocked by the allegations and stand with our community against such behavior," church pastor John Seaman said in a written statement. "We will cooperate fully with investigators to ascertain the facts.
   "At this point, our Christian prayers and concern are with the family of the alleged victim as well as the family of the accused," Seaman said.
   Detectives were notified of the alleged relationship — believed to have occurred for about two years — on Wednesday, officials said. The victim is now 14 years old.
   It is believed school officials and the victim's parents discovered the relationship recently.
   Investigators are planning to look into Primero's past in Michigan, and they also are checking to see if there are other local victims. #
• New group to help victims of clergy abuse
   KnoxNews.com ; www.knoxnews.com/kns/religion/article/0,1406,KNS_315_3076518,00.html , By JEANNINE F. HUNTER, hunter@knews.com , July 31, 2004
   KNOXVILLE (TX): A group established to draw attention to the sexual-abuse victims of Catholic priests has formed an organization to expand its mission.
   The Sunshine Alliance will focus on advocacy, education and activism on behalf of people abused by religious figures.
   Its founders are primarily members of Knoxville-based SNAP of Tennessee, the state affiliate of the national Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.
   Working with organizations including the Tennessee Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault and the Sexual Assault Crisis Center, the alliance has set goals of seeking amendments to statute-of-limitation laws, developing materials for secondary-school educators and serving as a vehicle for abuse victims to report incidents.
   The name "Sunshine Alliance" reflects the members' mission: to shine light on the truth of clergy sexual abuse, regardless of the gender and faith tradition of perpetrators.
   "In the public's view, this issue doesn't exist anymore, but it does," said Alliance board member Mary Monroe-Ellis.
• Krakauer still vexed by FLDS [Jeffs] -- polygamy group
   Deseret News, http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,595081003,00.html , By Patty Henetz, Associated Press, ~ July 31, 2004
   UNITED STATES: A year ago Jon Krakauer told the more than 800 people crammed into a Utah movie theater for a reading of his book, "Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith," that he wasn't pursuing social reform when he wrote about religious extremism.
   Since then, he has so deeply immersed himself in the distressed lives of members and former members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints that he no longer will write about the polygamous sect that inhabits twin towns on the Utah-Arizona border.
   "I've been asked to help a lot of people who feel they've been victimized by this culture," Krakauer told the Associated Press on Friday in a rare interview. "I just keep getting drawn deeper and deeper into this."
   By "this," Krakauer means the religious politics of FLDS and its leader-prophet, Warren Jeffs, who reportedly has banished hundreds of men and boys from Hildale and Colorado City, Ariz., in a struggle for control over the sect, whose estimated 6,000 to 12,000 members make it the largest polygamous group in the West.
• Judge hears diocese sex abuse motions
   Quad-City Times, www.qctimes.com/internal.php?story_id=1032171&l=1&t=Local+News&c=2,1032171 , By Todd Ruger, ~ July 31, 2004
   DAVENPORT (IA): The attorney for men alleging sexual abuse by priests in the Catholic Diocese of Davenport more than 20 years ago demanded that church leaders turn over priest personnel files and other records Friday as trial dates for their lawsuits loom four months away.
   The diocese holdup is preventing the men from preparing for trials and expanding the required pre-trial work by attorneys, attorney Craig Levien told District Court Judge C.H. Pelton on Friday.
   "When do these men who have been injured get to see this information," Levien said, calling for sanctions against the diocese for a 14-month delay. "Perhaps we’ve been too patient."
   Pelton, who cited the separation of church and state in being "very reluctant" to sanction the diocese, will rule at a later date on Levien’s motion to force the diocese to turn over the documents.
   Diocese attorney Rand Wonio told the judge he was "disappointed" at Levien’s request for sanctions, since both attorneys agreed to instead focus on insurance report letters needed to help in mediations of the cases outside of the courtroom.
   The diocese and 18 plaintiffs will try to settle lawsuits during five days in September, Wonio said.
   The jury trials for lawsuits in Scott and Clinton counties are scheduled to begin in November, with about one trial per month scheduled through October 2005, Pelton told a Scott County courtroom with about 40 spectators, including a priest and parishioners from Grand Mound, Iowa.
• Five more ex-altar boys sue, claim abuse by priest [1968-80 Springer] -- diocese, Redemptorists
   The Advocate, www.2theadvocate.com/stories/073104/new_altarboys001.shtml , By ADRIAN ANGELETTE, aangelette@theadvocate.com , July 31, 2004
   LOUISIANA: Five more former altar boys have claimed sexual abuse at the hands of a former Louisiana priest in a lawsuit filed late Friday.
   The five former altar boys, whose names were not disclosed in the lawsuit, allege that former priest Christopher Springer sexually abused them during a 12-year period between 1968 and 1980.
   Houston attorney Felecia Peavy is representing the five former altar boys as well as Patrick Myers, another former altar boy who sued Springer, the Baton Rouge diocese and others in January 2003. Myers' lawsuit is still pending.
   The names of defendants were also not included in the lawsuit, but their addresses were. The addresses indicate that the defendants in the lawsuit filed Friday are the same as those in the Myers case. They are Springer, Bishop Robert W. Muench; the Very Rev. Thomas Picton, vice provincial of The Redemptorists/New Orleans Vice Province; the Redemptorist order; and the diocese's insurance companies.
   The Very Rev. Thomas D. Picton, vice provincial for the Redemptorist order, said he could not comment Friday because he had not been served a copy of the suit. Springer and diocesan officials could not be reached late Friday.
• Woman sues religious order, alleging abuse by nun [1950s-60s Camilla Donahue] -- Sisters of Charity of Nazareth -- bare buttock punishments
   The Courier-Journal, www.courier-journal.com/localnews/2004/07/31ky/B3-abuse0731-2796.html , By Peter Smith, psmith@courier-journal.com , July 31, 2004
   LOUISVILLE (KY): A woman who alleges that a nun sexually abused her at an Anchorage orphanage more than 40 years ago is the 21st to file a lawsuit this month against the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth.
   Charlotte Marie Bailey, 50, filed suit yesterday in Jefferson Circuit Court, alleging that Sister Mary Camilla Donahue sexually abused her at the St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage in the 1950s and 1960s.
   The lawsuit alleges that Donahue struck Bailey on her bare buttocks with a leather strap while others watched and made "her to stand naked in front of the entire dormitory wet and forced (her) to sing."
   Two other plaintiffs have previously accused Donahue of abuse.
   A spokeswoman for the Roman Catholic religious order, Barbara Qualls, said Donahue worked at the orphanage and is now deceased. The orphanage closed in 1983.
• Wisconsin court dismisses church sex abuse claims [1960-80 Nuedling]
   Sauk Valley Newspapers, www.saukvalley.com/287693012104839.bsp , Published: Saturday, July 31, 2004
   MADISON, Wis. (AP) - Ten people who claimed a Milwaukee priest sexually assaulted them decades ago waited too long to file civil complaints against the church, a state appeals court ruled Friday.
   The 1st District Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 the statute of limitations had expired and that the First Amendment bans negligence claims against churches.
   "The victims of clergy abuse in Wisconsin are uniquely denied access to justice," said Jim Smith, an attorney for the group. An attorney for the archdiocese and diocese officials didn't return messages.
   The group filed civil complaints alleging the late Rev. George Nuedling abused them between 1960 and 1980. The group filed its first complaints in 2002, according to court records.
   The group alleges the Milwaukee Archdiocese and St. John the Evangelist Church were negligent and committed fraud because they knew Nuedling was abusing them and didn't protect them.
   A 2003 law extended Wisconsin's statute of limitations in civil child sexual assault cases by allowing alleged victims to file actions before age 35. But Nuedling's accusers fell under a previous law that said victims had to file the action within five years of the assault.
• Church settles second abuse case [Feliciano] U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Hawaii flag (USA State); Mooney's MiniFlags
   Honolulu Advertiser, http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2004/Jul/31/ln/ln09a.html , By Mike Gordon, July 31, 2004
   HAWAII: For the second time this year, Catholic Church officials in Hawai'i have agreed to a confidential court settlement of a sex-abuse case.
   Unnamed plaintiffs identified only as K.J. and her two sons sued the church and a former employee who admitted to molesting one of the boys.
   Manuel Feliciano, a sacristan who trained altar boys, pleaded guilty in the summer of 2000 to molesting one of the boys while he was employed at Sts. Peter and Paul Church in Honolulu. The suit was filed that October.
   The settlement, agreed to in February by the Catholic Diocese of Honolulu, contradicts a belief by U.S. bishops that confidential settlements for such scandals will be interpreted as hush money.
   The diocese agreed two years ago that it would enter into confidential settlements only if there were serious and substantial reasons.
   "That was the case here," said church spokesman Patrick Downes. "The diocese would have preferred that the case be settled openly so that everyone would know how it was settled. But the plaintiffs requested it be confidential." [Posted by Kathy Shaw at 07:33 AM]
////////// End of Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse , Sat July 31, 2004
Religions' sex abuse Chronology, visit: http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethics/ethcont90.htm
FOR GOOD TEACHINGS TO BE HEEDED, A BIG CLEAN-UP IS NEEDED
Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker SIGN-UP: www.ncrnews.org/abuse/signup.php for daily e-mails
or click Clergy Sex Abuse Tracker www.ncrnews.org/abuse for current on-line
The Boston Globe Spotlight http://www.boston.com/globe/spotlight/abuse
The Needle periodically, and books: pbpress@iinet.net.au W. Australia
References at: www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/ethicscontents.htm
Overview at: www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/minilist.htm
Books: www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/carnalbooks.htm
Buy Fidelity magazine www.j23.com.au Australia

INTENTION: A challenge to RELIGIONS to PROTECT CHILDREN. Click for more explanation.

NEWSITEMS RECEIVED COVERING OTHER THAN CHILD AND/OR SEXUAL ABUSE
• A Catholic father warns of a buried prophecy, apostasy at the highest reaches of the church U.S.A. flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   East Valley Tribune, www.eastvalleytribune.com/index.php?sty=25274 , By Lawn Griffiths, July 24, 2004
   PHOENIX (AZ): Billions of souls are at stake, the "Fatima Priest" relentlessly warns.
   The Roman Catholic Church is deep into apostasy, he argues, and it being undermined by the forces of modernism like Vatican Council II, "new world order" proponents, false religions, wayward priests, liberals, secular humanists, Communists, the Masonic Order and dilution from ecumenism's interfaith compromise.
   Moreover, the church has refrained from talking about hell or the consequences of sin - and the Catholic Church is failing to meet the devil's challenges, asserts the Rev. Nicholas Gruner, a hard-line traditional priest who is on a mission to end the "great apostasy" at the highest levels of the church.
   Such apostasy, he said, is epitomized by the Vatican's refusal to publicly reveal the true third part of the "Secret of Fatima," what the Blessed Mother of Jesus is said to have told three peasant children near the Portuguese village of Fatima during several visitations in 1917.
   The last surviving of the children, Sister Lucia dos Santos, now 96, wrote down the message in 1944 by order of a bishop and instructed that it be revealed to the world in 1960, or at the time of her death. What the Vatican purportedly released in June 2000 as the nun's "entire" 285-word translated text has been discredited by Gruner and others - some of whom called it "Fatima-gate." ...
   The third secret, he said, foretold that the "great apostasy in the church begins at the top" and began manifesting itself in the 1960s. It speaks of the great punishment or "chastisement" for the world, apostasy commencing in the Vatican, the crisis of faith in the Catholic Church and a preservation of dogma in Portugal but not elsewhere in the church.
• Women receives 10-year sentence for stealing from church [Lamb] -- Methodist
   Ames Tribune, www.amestrib.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=12405425&BRD=2035&PAG=461&dept_id=238101&rfi=6 , By Jason Kristufek, July 20, 2004
   STORY (Nevarda): A Story City woman who admitted to stealing up to $175,000 from an Ames church was sent to prison for 10 years on Monday.
   Janine Joyce Lamb, 38, apologized for misappropriating the money over a three-year period but did not explain her actions to the 30 First United Methodist Church congregants that packed the Story County courtroom for her sentencing.
   "I am sorry to hear that she hasn't figured out why she did what she did," said retired senior pastor Larry LaVelle. Turning to Lamb he said, "We wish you the best. We love you. We love you."
   A tearful Lamb also spoke to Judge Michael Moon and urged for leniency. She said she is seeking treatment for depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.
   "I made a mistake," Lamb said. "I didn't realize how many people have been impacted. I don't understand what I've done, why I've done what I have done."
   Church members say the financial burden can be recovered over time. Volunteers have donated about 2,000 hours to fix the church's financial recording. Still, some fear the church's reputation may never recover.
• Genocide: Trial of Catholic Priest to Begin September [Seromba] Rwanda flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   allAfrica.com ; http://allafrica.com/stories/200407300355.html , Hirondelle News Agency (Lausanne), July 30, 2004
   ARUSHA, RWANDA, Africa: The trial of a Rwandan Catholic priest who is accused of genocide and crimes against humanity during the 1994 Rwandan genocide will begin September 20, 2004 at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).
   Father Athanase Seromba who hails from Rutsiro commune in Kibuye Prefecture (Western Rwanda) is charged with four counts including genocide, or in the alternative complicity in genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide and extermination as a crime against humanity. At the time of the genocide where an estimated one million Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed, the accused was the parish priest in charge of Nyange Parish in Kivumu commune also in Kibuye.
   The indictment states that many refugees fled to hide in churches and public buildings but the genocide suspect "refused to celebrate mass for those who had taken refuge in the church and stressed that he didn't want to do that for the inyenzi", a Kinyarwanda word for cockroaches which was used at the time to refer to Tutsis. This is the first time the tribunal will adjudicate the trial of a Catholic priest accused of genocide.
   The prosecutor alleges that the accused along with a recently arrested former businessman from Kibuye, Gaspard Kanyarukiga, was on April 14th, 1994, involved in the massacre of some 6,000 Tutsis who had taken refuge at Nyange Parish church. During this incident, the indictment states that, "Father Seromba ordered the interahamwe and the militia to launch attacks to kill the Tutsis, beginning with the intellectuals. Soon after, the interahamwe poured fuel through the roof of the church while gendarmes and communal police launched grenades and killed the refugees"
   Later he ordered the church to be destroyed by a bulldozer saying that "Hutu people were numerous and could build another one" More than 2000 Tutsis who were gathered inside were crushed to death, then "Father Seromba ordered the interahamwe to clean the "rubbish". The Catholic priest surrendered himself to the tribunal on the 6th of February, 2002 and has since been held at the United Nations Detention Facility also in Arusha.
   According to the ICTR calendar, Father Seromba will be represented by defence counsel Alfred Pognon of Benin while the prosecution will be led by Sylvia Arbia. The trial will be heard in trial chamber I of the ICTR but the judges who will adjudicate Seromba's case are yet to be known. #
• Press 'M' for murder [Fossmo] -- obscure sect Sweden flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   iol; www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=24&art_id=qw1091198880589B265 , By Simon Johnson, July 30 2004
   STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN: A Swedish Lutheran pastor who faked cellphone text messages from God to get his nanny-lover to murder his wife and try to kill the husband of a second mistress, was sentenced to life in jail on Friday.
   The case has fascinated Sweden with its intoxicating mix of sex, death and the workings of an obscure religious sect.
   The court found Helge Fossmo, a Pentecostal minister in the town of Knutby, north of Stockholm, guilty of inciting Sara Svensson, his children's 27-year-old nanny, to kill his second wife and his next-door-neighbour, Daniel Linde.
   He was having an affair with the nanny and Linde's wife.
   The nanny admitted to the January murder of Alexandra Fossmo and to shooting Linde, who survived the attack. The same court has ordered her to be sent to a psychiatric institution.
   "Helge Fossmo ruthlessly made use of Sara Svensson's love for him and her dependency on him as a religious leader," read the verdict of the court in the town of Uppsala.
   The trial painted a picture of a bizarre religious community, far removed from the liberal and secular society most Swedes would recognise. Life in the sect, an off-shoot of the Lutheran Church of Sweden, was controlled by a woman known as "Christ's Bride" after she got engaged to Jesus in a ceremony.
   The community's ministers also exercised a controlling influence in the lives of their flock. In Fossmo's case that included using the latest technology to get his nanny to commit murder. Svensson testified she received anonymous text messages, which she believed to be from God, urging her to kill.
   A technology company traced erased messages on her phone to Fossmo, who admitted sending them but said they were intended only to guide the nanny in her faith.
   Svensson also said the pastor told her that killing his wife and neighbour was the only way she could please God.
   The confessions of the nanny led the police to reopen the investigation into the death of Fossmo's first wife.
   She died in 1999 after apparently falling over in the bath, hitting her head on the tap, according to Fossmo. At the time, her death was treated was an accident. The court on Friday cleared him of any responsibility for her death. #
• Priest's murder plot sickens [2004 Fossmo] Sweden flag; Mooney's MiniFlags  Norway flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   News 24, www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1565933,00.html , 22:45, 30/July/2004
   STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN: A Swedish court on Friday sentenced a Pentecostal pastor to life for his role in a murder case that grabbed headlines in both Sweden and Norway.
   Norwegian-born pastor Helge Fossmo was found guilty by Uppsala district court of planning the murder of his second wife, Alexandra, on January 10.
   The court also ruled that he masterminded the shooting of a neighbour whose wife he had an affair with at the time.
   The crimes were carried out by 33-year-old Fossmo's former nanny, Sara Svensson. Svensson, 27, was sentenced to psychiatric care in a secure unit.
   Prosecutor Elin Blank said Fossmo had urged the nanny to kill his wife "on behalf of God" since divorce was unthinkable for a Pentecostal pastor.
   The court said Fossmo had "ruthlessly used Sara Svensson's love for him and her dependence on him as a spiritual leader."
   In addition to shooting 23-year-old Alexandra Fossmo, Svensson also confessed to attacking Alexandra with a hammer last November, as well as the shooting of a 30-year-old neighbour of Fossmo's that January night.
• Priest gets life for 'SMS murder' [2004 Fossmo]
   BBC News, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3941453.stm , Friday, 30 July, 2004,
   SWEDEN: A Swedish priest has been jailed for life for persuading his lover, the family nanny, to murder his wife.
   A court in Uppsala found Helge Fossmo, 32, guilty of inciting Sara Svensson to shoot his wife by sending mobile phone text messages he said came from God.
   Miss Svensson, 27, the family's former nanny, was judged mentally ill and placed under psychiatric care.
   The court acquitted Mr Fossmo of having anything to do with a death of his first wife in 1999 in a bathtub.
   'No alternative'
   At the end of a bizarre case that has fascinated Sweden, Lutheran pastor Helgo Fossmo was found guilty of the incitement to kill his second wife, 23-year-old Alexandra Fossmo.
• Priest convinced nanny to murder with ‘texts from God’ [2004 Fossmo]
   Irish Examiner, www.examiner.ie/pport/web/world/Full_Story/did-sgbk8iTgyklb6sg7IQHSmeYhNE.asp , By Mattias Karen, Stockholm, 31/July/04
   SWEDEN: A Swedish priest was jailed for life yesterday for manipulating his former nanny into murdering his wife, using mobile phone text messages he said were from God to convince her to commit the crime.
   The Uppsala District Court ruled that Helge Fossmo, 32, a Pentecostal church pastor, convinced Sara Svensson, 27, to shoot his wife as she was sleeping in their house in Knutby, near Stockholm. She also shot Fossmos’ neighbour, Daniel Linde, who survived the attack.
   Svensson, who was deemed mentally ill by a panel of judges, was sentenced to psychiatric care.
   She admitted the shootings, but maintained that Fossmo convinced her to do it, in part by sending her text messages he claimed were from God.
• Chief incumbent succumbs to acid burns: Police after fugitive Thera [2004] -- Buddhist Sri Lanka flag; Mooney's MiniFlags 
   Sunday Observer, http://www.sundayobserver.lk/2004/08/01/new22.html , by Jayampathy Jayasinghe, for August 1, 2004
   SRI LANKA: The recent slaying of the chief incumbent Thera of Aldeniya Abinawarama temple at Kadawata by a fellow Buddhist priest of the same temple has sent ripples of shock among the Buddhist community. Although we hear of Buddhist priests being killed by robbers these days, it was a shock to many that a chief priest had been killed by another priest of the same temple.
   The incident happened last Monday around noon.
   The high priest, Aldeniye Saranajothi (63) was resting on his sofa in the verandah of his temple when the suspect had stealthily crept into the verandah with a jar of acid. He went closer to the chief priest and threw it on his body critically injuring him. After committing the act he ran out of the temple.
   The chief priest groaning in pain had come out of the building covering his face with both hands due to acid burns. With difficulty he scrambled across the garden to the temple bell and started ringing it incessantly several times to draw the attention of villagers. Several persons who heard the toll of the bell rushed to the temple to find out what it was all about.
   The priest who was in excruciating pain had pleaded with the crowd for a trishaw taxi to get to the hospital. Shortly after, the high priest was rushed to the hospital. On the way to hospital, the driver stopped his vehicle for a while as he could not endure the strong smell of acid. He saw the priest groaning in pain covering his face with both hands while acid fumes were oozing on his face. However, the priest succumbed to injuries at the Ragama hospital. [...]
   The suspect priest was a graduate teacher around 38 years old employed at a government school in Kadawata area. The motive for throwing acid on the high priest was due to constant quarrels he has had with him in the past. The suspect priest monk had aspirations to be the incumbent of the Abinawaramaya temple.
   However the Sangakaraka Sabawa had nominated Aldeniye Saranojothi to succeed him bypassing the suspect priest.
The END of Newsitems Received Covering Other Than Child And/Or Sexual Abuse
If the original heading or name of an article or newsitem is not used at the start of an entry, the original heading or name will be found elsewhere in the entry.
Some clickable links are for network access only, so might not work for you.
*** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is available here without profit to people who want to read it for research and educational purposes. If you quote from this, please check (if possible) and acknowledge the ORIGINAL source. ***
To SEARCH only ONE WEBPAGE AT A TIME, you may use the built-in features of your own Browser.  With most systems press [Ctrl] + F.  This will cause a Find or Find/Replace dialogue box, or a Search/Replace box, to appear.  (With some old programmes, start by pressing [Ctrl] + [Shift] + F.  However, if your system requires it, click Edit, then click Find.)  Type in a keyword, and press [Enter], or click Find Next, or Find, or Search.
To SEARCH all of This Site, use the special panel provided.
^ ^  CONTENTS 1   14  Translate  Links  Events  Books  HOME  v v
< < Back  ^ ^  SCA-SOS  SOSA  Survivors Network Minnesota  Celibacy Crept  Non-marital  REFERENCES 41   81  Overview  Outreach  Books  "Fathers"  Religion  Submit  v v   Next > >
Search for
Impressed? LookSmart and get a Free Search Engine for your own Web Site
WWW Search Engines: www.google.com  www.metacrawler.com  www.looksmart.com ; McAfee Virus Shield is used
Background colour changer
                             
By courtesy of www.ctpc.org/nltr1202/pl1202.htm -- Be CAREFUL with your mouse cursor!
Flag/s by courtesy of Mooney's Miniflags http://www.edwardmooney.com/miniflags and/or Aust. Nat. Flag Assn. http://www.flagaustnat.asn.au . Flags are miniaturised, and where necessary, various images are adjusted by Jasc Paint Shop Pro.
Hived off with Microsoft® WordPad©, first entries transferred on 23 July 04, first CSAT Id No. 005211, spellchecked with Ms Word© (regional spellings and grammar retained where applicable) on 24 Aug 04, last modified on 02 Jan 05
Composed with monitor screen of 800 x 600 pixels, High Colour (16 bit)
Translations: http://babelfish.altavista.com/  www.tranexp.com/  www.alis.com/  http://lingvo.org/traduku
Doc. 238 +:  ethcont90.htm