UPDATED::Somerset County priest found guilty of molesting Honduran orphans | Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

UPDATE::  Court upholds priest's sex-abuse conviction involving orphans in Honduras

A federal appeals court on Monday upheld the conviction of a former Somerset County priest who was found guilty in 2015 of traveling to Honduras to sexually abuse orphans and sentenced last year to more than 16 years in federal prison.

The Rev. Joseph D. Maurizio Jr., who at the time of his September 2014 arrest was the pastor at Our Lady Queen of Angels Parish in Central City, had asked the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit to overturn his conviction.

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We haven't heard the last of this horrid affair,,,

A Somerset County priest was found guilty Tuesday of sexually abusing three orphan boys during trips to Honduras between 2004 and 2009.

After an eight-day trial in U.S. District Court in Johnstown, Joseph D. Maurizio Jr., 70, suspended pastor at Our Lady Queen of Angels in Central City, was convicted of engaging in illicit sexual conduct in foreign places, possession of child pornography and international money laundering.

The jury acquitted him on a fourth sex count involving one of the victims as well as two other counts of transferring money to Honduras for illicit purposes.

U.S. District Judge Kim Gibson set sentencing for Feb. 2.

The Justice Department said the priest was known as the “money man” who used cash from a charity he created to fund trips to the ProNino orphanage in rural Honduras, where he paid boys with money and candy for sex acts.

Rev. Maurizio's lawyer, Steven Passarello, had argued that the prosecution failed to prove its case and pointed out that the FBI had examined the same facts in 2009 without taking action. It was the Department of Homeland Security that pursued the case, arresting Rev. Maurizio a year ago.

Somerset County priest found guilty of molesting Honduran orphans | Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Video: Dead teenager 'wakes up in grave in Honduras' – only to then 'die in hospital' - Telegraph

They seemed too quick to take her to an exorcist before a doctor,,, 

A teenage girl in Honduras had mistakenly been buried alive and apparently woke up in her coffin, only to die before she was freed.

Footage shows frantic relatives smashing into the concrete tomb of recently buried Neysi Perez, 16, after they said they heard her screaming from inside. She had been buried the previous day.

When they opened the coffin, Perez was dead. But according to relatives, she was still warm and had bruises on her fingertips. The glass viewing pane on her coffin had been smashed.

"As I put my hand on her grave, I could hear noises inside," her husband, Rudy Gonzales told Primer Impacto TV news. "I heard banging, then I heard her voice. She was screaming for help."

Perez, 16, had been three months pregnant, and apparently fell unconscious when she heard a burst of gunfire near her home in La Entrada, western Honduras.

When she began foaming at the mouth, her parents – who thought she was possessed by an evil spirit – called a local priest who attempted to perform an exorcism. 

Perez was rushed to hospital when she became lifeless and was soon pronounced dead by doctors three hours later. She was buried wearing her wedding dress.

The video (in Spanish), if you are interested:

Now for some skepticism,,,

Though there are some missing details in this strange case, there’s enough information to suggest a plausible scientific and psychological explanation: the faint, muffled “scream” heard seemingly coming from Perez’ above-ground tomb was not a scream at all, but instead some ambient urban sound (perhaps car brakes squealing in the distance, or a siren’s wail) that was interpreted by the girl’s grieving family as a cry for help.

Despite sensational news reports that Perez was “screaming” and “banging” on her coffin, there’s simply no evidence of that beyond the (surely sincere but likely mistaken) claim by her husband. Once he began, quite understandably, panicking that his wife may have been buried alive, the others joined in. Hearing a dead loved one’s voice is common and harmless, especially in the early stages of grief or panic.

Illusory voices and signs of life can be created by well-understood psychological process called apophenia, which cause people to “hear” distinct sounds and voices in random noise. In fact, earlier this year several rescuers at a car accident in a Utah river mistakenly reported hearing a mysterious, non-existent voice calling to them from an overturned vehicle.

A closer look reveals no evidence suggesting that Perez was not (still) dead when her family broke into her coffin; she appeared calm and non-responsive in the videos. By all accounts she never moved, opened her eyes, or spoke, and there were no doctors present. Her family seemed to assume she had -- apparently up until moments before -- been alive and screaming because her body was warm and pliable.

Video: Dead teenager 'wakes up in grave in Honduras' – only to then 'die in hospital' - Telegraph

ADDENDUM::PA- Altoona priest is arrested; SNAP responds - Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests responds to the arrest of Rev. Joseph Maurizio Jr.:

A week ago, we asked Bartchak to write his Central American colleagues and urge them to aggressively reach out to others who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes or misconduct by a priest who has just been put on leave because federal agents raided his church and home. And we said that Bartchak should use his own parish bulletins, church websites and pulpit announcements to persuade his flock to share what they know or suspect about this priest with law enforcement.

We still stand by these requests and are disappointed that he has not responded to them. We also don't believe the Altoona-Johnston church officials who claims he and his colleagues knew nothing about Fr. Joseph Maurizio alleged “charity” work in Central and South America.

Fr. Maurizio says he has “traveled to 100 countries and has worked with orphanages in El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Haiti, Nicaragua, Bolivia and Peru,” according to Tribune Review. That's very worrisome to us.

We also noted a week ago that “Bartchak will no doubt be tempted to do nothing. That's wrong. He has a civic and moral duty to help police investigate and perhaps help prosecutors pursue Fr. Maurizio. He should not passively sit back and evade responsibility. Fr. Maurizio was likely recruited, educated, ordained, trained and transferred by Altoona-Johnstown Catholic officials. They can't wash their hands of him now.”

PA- Altoona priest is arrested; SNAP responds - Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

Somerset County priest accused of sex with Central American children | Local News - WTAE Home

Five years to press charges, but yet a 14-year-old kid in Pennsylvania is facing a possible 2-year sentence for pretending to face fuck a statue of a mythological figure!!

A priest accused of traveling to Honduras to engage in sex with children while promoting missionary work with the poor there has been arrested by federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials.

Documents reveal the Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown and law enforcement agencies first learned of the allegations five years ago.

Church officials, the Attorney General's Office and the FBI were all declining to comment Friday.

The Rev. Joseph Maurizio Jr., 69, spent two decades working with orphaned children in Central America. Homeland Security investigators say some of those same children were his victims.

"We see this very, very often with child-molesting Catholic clerics. They gravitate toward communities or countries where kids are especially vulnerable," said David Clohessy, national director of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP).

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Two weeks ago, authorities searched the rectory of Our Lady Queen of Angels Church in Central City, Somerset County, where Maurizio is pastor, and found multiple images of child pornography. ICE agents also searched the farm where Maurizio lived in Windber.

The allegations against Maurizio first surfaced in 2009, when volunteers reported him to the diocese, the FBI and the state attorney general. But the case apparently floundered until this year.

“That is so incredibly disappointing and so painfully common,” Clohessy said.

Maurizio is in jail, awaiting a detention hearing Monday morning. He has said abuse allegations against him were a bogus plot by the Honduran government to thwart his charity work.

Somerset County priest accused of sex with Central American children | Local News - WTAE Home