Welcome to H&C,,, where I aggregate news of interest. Primary topics include abuse with "the church", LGBTQI+ issues, cults - including anti-vaxxers, and the Dominionist and Theocratic movements. Also of concern is the anti-science movement with interest in those that promote garbage like homeopathy, chiropractic and the like. I am an atheist and anti-theist who believes religious mythos must be die and a strong supporter of SOCAS.
A Detroit-area Catholic priest was sentenced to 45 days in jail
Wednesday for assaulting a suicidal younger man who wanted counseling,
while a priest in western Michigan pleaded guilty to binding a teenager
with bubble wrap and tape.
The Rev. Patrick Casey was accused of engaging in sex
acts with the man, who was struggling with homosexuality and his faith.
The victim said he “needed a shepherd” but that the priest didn’t help
him in 2013.
“I’m not blaming all my problems on (Casey). I was
messed up before I ever met him,” the man, now in his early 30s, said in
a written statement. “But he could have helped. And he chose not to. He
contributed to it instead. For the next several years I drank heavily
and constantly to cope with the pain and rage I felt.”
Michigan law enforcement officials made
their first arrests in a statewide investigation into Roman Catholic
clergy sexual abuse, the state’s attorney general announced on Friday.
Five
former Catholic priests have been charged with criminal sexual conduct,
Attorney General Dana Nessel said at a news conference. But hundreds,
or even thousands, of alleged victims could still remain across the
state, she said.
“This is just the tip of the iceberg,” she said. “We anticipate many more charges and arrests.”
Father Jacob Vellian, former priest from the Lansing diocese, is being charged with rape of a victim under the age of 16, and continuing his assaults when the victim became an adult. Vellian, 84 years old, is also facing complaints involving sex abuse of nuns in India.
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Father Neil Kalina, formerly of St. Kieran Church in Shelby Township,
was arrested on four counts of criminal sexual conduct involving the
same victim, who was assaulted at the age of 13, and again between the
ages of 13–15. Kalina had gotten in trouble with the law in 1985, at the
age of 30, arrested for supplying minors with cocaine, marijuana and alcohol in his rectory.
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Another Detroit priest, Fr. Patrick Casey, 53, was arrested in Oak Park,
Michigan, for a charge of performing oral sex on the victim during
confession, while acting as the victim's spiritual counselor. He had
formerly been administrator of Divine Savior Parish and pastor of St.
Theodore of Canterbury Parish and St. Damian Parish in Westland.
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Father Timothy Michael Crowley was charged with eight counts of
criminal sexual conduct, including raping a child under the age of 16 as
well as raping another victim older than 16. He was formerly assigned
to St. Thomas in Ann Arbor. The 69-year-old former cleric was arrested
in Tempe, Arizona.
Father Vincent DeLorenzo was arrested and charged with six counts of
criminal sexual conduct. The Lansing diocese said eight people have come
forward accusing him of abuse and that he's in the process of being
laicized. Formerly assigned to Holy Redeemer in Burton,
DeLorenzo resigned in 2002 after an allegation of sex abuse of a
minor. Now 80 years old, he was arrested in Marion County, Florida
Thursday.
The New Jersey pedophile priest who was found shot to death in his
Nevada home had a history of hiring male prostitutes, and police believe
he was targeted for death, according to reports and neighbors.
The Henderson Police Department outside of Las Vegas has declined to
comment on John Capparelli’s “suspicious” death, which has been ruled a
homicide by the Clark County Coroner, but the local Fox 5 outlet reported the disgraced and defrocked priest had a history of ordering male prostitutes, citing police sources.
A point I noted on BTTP last night concerning disregard for the safety of others. "Moving" accused priest in and out of various locales, some out of country. Ganster was first accused of abusing a teenage boy in 1977. According to Business Insider, "Ganster was given counseling and
reassigned to another church,,, Throughout his career, Ganster also
worked at two high schools and as a Catholic student adviser at Penn
State University Campus Ministry."
Ganster died in 2014, aged 71.
One priest got a job at Disney World after alleged abuse in Schuylkill County.
The Diocese of Allentown gave Fr. Edward Ganster a positive reference to Disney where he worked for 15 years driving a train.
Three boys accused Ganster of abuse, including one who said he was abused for a year and a half at St. Joseph’s in Frackville.
A.W. Richard Sipe, a priest and psychotherapist whose research on
celibacy and the Roman Catholic Church’s sex abuse scandal earned him
popular renown and official scorn, died Wednesday in his Mount Soledad
home. He was 85.
His son, Dr. Walter Sipe, attributed the cause of death to multiple organ failure.
Sipe’s
work was instrumental in the 2002 Boston Globe’s “Spotlight” reports,
which led to a worldwide revolt against Catholic clergy who had sexually
assaulted children. After initial denials, church leaders slowly agreed
to reforms.
In 2017, though, Sipe argued that the problem persisted, fueled in part by the secret sex lives of Catholic clergy.
“From the top down,” he told the Union-Tribune, “it hasn’t changed.
If you tithe to the Catholic Church, you helped pay for this. If you
continue to tithe, you're paying for this now. Giving
money to the catholic church is morally indefensible.
The priests, George testified, had a group of favored boys who they would take on trips and give gifts.
"He
(Zirwas) had told me they, the priests, would give their boys, their
altar boys or their favorite boys these crosses," George testified. "So
he gave me a big gold cross to wear."
In the
report, the grand jury said, the crosses "were a designation that these
children were victims of sexual abuse. They were a signal to other
predators that the children had been desensitized to sexual abuse and
were optimal targets for further victimization."
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When the new school year began, and she didn’t improve her math, she was
sent to Sperber again. The victim told the principal that he touched
her in weird ways. The principal became angry, scolded the child and
said “How dare you make these terrible accusations? You are a
demon-child.”
As Catholic officials across Pennsylvania brace for what has been described as a graphic and blistering investigation
report into clergy sex abuse, a Greensburg Diocese priest charged with
child sex crimes on Tuesday pleaded guilty to sexually molesting a boy.
At a news conference Tuesday morning in Westmoreland County, Attorney
General Josh Shapiro called Father John Sweeney of the Greensburg
Diocese a predator.
"...(T)oday there is no doubt, John Sweeney is accepting full
responsibility and admitting what he did," Shapiro said. Sweeney's
victim, whose first name is Josh, stood to the right of Shapiro, flanked
by deputy attorney generals.
A former Chicago Roman Catholic priest deemed to be a sexually
violent person on Wednesday was ordered committed indefinitely to an
Illinois facility for sex offenders.
Daniel McCormack will be confined in a
detention facility in Rushville, where he has been living since 2009. He
completed a five-year sentence that year for molesting five boys in the
West Side Chicago parish where he worked as a priest, teacher and
basketball coach.
Cook County Circuit Judge Dennis Porter in a
September trial found McCormack to be a sexually violent person.
Prosecutors contended the 49-year-old McCormack would likely re-offend
if he were set free.
A Cook County judge ruled Friday that former Chicago priest Daniel
McCormack is a sexually violent person and should remain indefinitely in
a state facility for sex offenders.
Now,
almost eight years after McCormack completed his prison term, Illinois
prosecutors want him declared a sexually violent person under a
little-known and controversial state law that could keep the disgraced
former priest indefinitely committed to a state facility with other sex
offenders.
A hearing is scheduled to begin Wednesday in Judge Dennis Porter's courtroom at the Leighton Criminal Court Building.
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The proceedings to keep McCormack committed have been on hold for
nearly eight years — an extraordinarily long time even by the standards
of the sometimes-glacial pace at the county's main criminal courthouse
at 26th Street and California Avenue.
Part of the delay, according
to the attorney general's office, was due to the filing in 2014 of a
new criminal charge of sex abuse against McCormack by a sixth alleged
victim, but two years later, the charge was dropped when the accuser
stopped cooperating.
Cook County prosecutors have dropped an aggravated criminal sexual
abuse charge against a former Chicago priest because the alleged victim
stopped cooperating.
They dismissed the charge Wednesday against Daniel
McCormack, who pleaded guilty to multiple child sex abuse charges in
2007 and was sentenced to five years in prison. He was removed from the
priesthood.
McCormack also was arrested in 2014 in a 2005 case
involving a 10-year-old alleged victim at a West Side parish, but
prosecutors say as the case progressed in the courts, the victim stopped
cooperating with them.
The Rev. Norbert F. Orsolits isn't the only priest in the Catholic
Diocese of Buffalo who's been publicly accused of inappropriate sexual
conduct.
At least 19 priests who worked in the Buffalo area have been publicly
accused in recent decades, according to a search of The News archives.
Some were arrested. Some were named in lawsuits. Some were accused of wrongdoing outside of Western New York.
They represent a fraction of the priests who have been the targets of
complaints privately filed with the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo.
In 2004, the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo said 93 complaints alleging
sexual abuse had been lodged against 53 clerics in the diocese since
1950. The diocese has refused to identify most of those men. At the
time, those about whom complaints had been filed represented 2.6 percent
of all clerics who served between 1950 and 2002.
I include this story only because of the local ramifications. Due to SOLs I don't believe there will any criminal charges stemming from Orsolits' admission.
A retired priest, who admitted this week to sexually
abusing dozens of teenage boys decades ago, served in Olean and
Portville during the 1980s.
The Rev. Norbert Orsolits
admitted to The Buffalo News Tuesday he sexually abused “probably
dozens” of teenage boys during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Orsolits,
now 78 and living in Ashford, was assigned to St. Mary of the Angels
Church in Olean from 1982 to 1983 and Sacred Heart Church in Portville
from 1984 to 1988, during which time he also taught at Archbishop Walsh
High School in Olean.
According to Orsolits, he was
assigned to Sacred Heart after the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo received a
complaint he sexually abused a child and ordered him to receive
psychological treatment at a Canadian facility.
At the same time the Catholic Church was fighting a
family who refused to accept $55,000 compensation for each of their
abused daughters, it purchased a Kew mansion for Archbishop Denis Hart
now valued at $2.25 million.
Three years later,
the church also spent $872,000 on a beach house with bay views in
Dromana for Archbishop Hart, which he now personally owns after buying
it off the Archdiocese for $1.12 million in 2017.
Details of the church’s residential property purchases have emerged from a ground-breaking, six-month Age investigation into the wealth of the church, which identified assets of at least $9 billion in Victoria and $30 billion nationwide.
So I have seen this headline floating around AGAIN.
Being that the site in question is, shall we say questionable, it is difficult to determine whether it was meant in jest. Based on comments received, the readership of said site is accepting it at face value as a means of Catholic bashing.
While I am staunchly against the RCC's handling of the pedophile priest issue, I find it distressing when I see bullshit such as this especially from so-called Christians. This article is being passed like candy through the ranks. Victims are having enough problems getting justice let alone treatment and compensation.
What I have peiced together is this,,,
The information is from the 2017 Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse (AUS). Neon Nettle originally reported that Archbishop Denis Hart had rejected the confessional proposal and shockingly, described sexual abuse as a spiritual encounter. However, the claim that Archbishop Hart actually made concerned confession. "Confession in the Catholic Church is a spiritual encounter with God through the priest. It is a fundamental part of the freedom of religion, and it is recognised in the Law of Australia and many other countries. It must remain so here in Australia. Outside of this all offences against children must be reported to the authorities, and we are absolutely committed to doing so."
When asked if he would go to jail to uphold the sanctity of the confessional, the Archbishop of Melbourne, Denis Hart, told ABC Radio Melbourne he would.
“I’ve said that I would [go to jail.] I believe that this is an absolutely sacrosanct communication of a higher order.”
Archbishop Hart denied suggestions priests would be above the law.
“I would go to extreme lengths outside of the confessional to make sure that the law was observed,” he said. “But there are some matters which are of a higher order, things to do with God.”
Conclusion, the headline in question and subsequent "reporting" is bukem!
A former Catholic priest suspected of sexually abusing as many as 100
boys in the late 70s and 80s, spent his last seven years in the
Dallas-Fort Worth area where he used an alias on social media to meet
young men. CBS DFW reports that James Brzyski,
considered one of the worst abusers in the history of the Archdiocese
of Philadelphia, was found dead in September in a Fort Worth motel room.
An autopsy revealed Brzyski suffered from heart disease and was full of vodka and anti-depressants at the time of his death.
Records,
obtained through the Texas Public Information Act, show that police
recovered a laptop, thumb drives and a cell phone from Brzyski's room.
Fort Worth Police detectives, however, said they found nothing further
to investigate.
James Brzyski, a defrocked Archdiocese of Philadelphia priest once described as one of the region’s most monstrous sexual predators, but who eluded prosecution after allegedly abusing dozens of boys in the 1970s and 1980s, was found dead Wednesday at a Texas motel.
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His alleged victims included boys as young as 10 during his only two assignments as a parish priest, at Saint John the Evangelist in Lower Makefield, which he joined in 1977, and St. Cecilia’s in the Fox Chase section of Northeast Philadelphia, where he became an associate pastor in 1981. The late Cardinal John Krol once described Brzyski’s conduct as that of a “wolf in sheep’s clothing.”
But, like 62 other priests the grand jury said abused hundreds of children over decades in the five-county archdiocese, Brzyski was never criminally charged or prosecuted. After top archdiocesan officials learned about his assaults, Brzyski admitted to acts of sexual misconduct, and he was sent to a Catholic treatment center, where a top clinician said the priest manifested pedophilia.
Brzyski walked out on treatment, however, and refused to stay in ministry. Church officials chose not to report him to law enforcement and only told parishioners at St. Cecilia’s that he had left for medical reasons. The church further issued a policy instructing that no effort be made to locate victims from St. Cecilia’s, the grand jury found.
By the time prosecutors conducted their expansive probe of clergy abuse decades later, the statute of limitations had expired, barring the filing of criminal charges or any lawsuits against him or the church that had once overseen him.
Long-hidden documents show how the same man, prominent Honolulu psychiatrist Dr. Robert Browne, played a central role in two of Hawaii's biggest sex abuse scandals.
And, the documents show, he was also treating Catholic priests in Hawaii who had been caught abusing children.
Those priests weren't turned into the police, but were often instead sent for psychiatric treatment — to be "cured" of their pedophilia problem. Not surprisingly, one priest in particular who was getting therapy from Browne went on to molest kids for decades.
The York County grand jury has reindicted a former priest from
Massachusetts who is accused of repeatedly sexually abusing two boys he
brought to Maine in the 1980s.
Ronald Paquin now faces 31 counts of sexual abuse in York County. He was originally indicted in February
on 29 counts of sexual abuse for acts he allegedly committed in the
mid- to late 1980s when he brought the boys to Maine for “short-term
stays,” Kennebunk Police Chief Craig Sanford said at the time Paquin was
charged. Sanford would not say where the alleged abuse occurred, other
than to describe it as “a seasonal location,” or provide any other
information on the charges.
Paquin, who was removed from the priesthood in 2002, was a key figure
in the Massachusetts priest sex abuse scandal in the early 2000s and
pleaded guilty in 2002 to repeatedly raping a Haverhill, Massachusetts,
altar boy in the late 1980s and early 1990s, beginning when the boy was
12. Paquin was jailed in Massachusetts until 2015, when specialists said
he no longer met the criteria to be considered sexually dangerous.
The Essex District Attorney's Office on
Friday withdrew its petition to hold defrocked Haverhill priest Ronald
H. Paquin as a sexually dangerous person. Neither of the experts who
examined him found him "sexually dangerous," therefore, the District
Attorney's Office must, by law, withdraw its petition.
"Our contention is
that Mr. Paquin poses a danger to the community," District Attorney
Jonathan Blodgett said in a statement. "Unfortunately, we have no
further legal options available to hold Mr. Paquin."
After pleading
guilty in 2003 to raping and molesting an altar boy in Haverhill as many
as 50 times from 1989 to 1992, Paquin was sentenced to 12 to 15 years
at the Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Cedar Junction in
Walpole.
The first Catholic priest convicted and jailed for sex abuse is about to be released from state prison.
Now 72-years-old, Ronald Paquin has served 12 of his 12 to 15 year
sentence for raping and molesting an altar boy more than 50 times over a
three-year period.
But, the Eagle Tribune reports
that Essex County District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett says Paquin is
still too dangerous to walk the streets. He wants the former priest
held in Bridgewater State Hospital.
A spokeswoman for Blodgett said state law allows for petitions to
hold released prisoners indefinitely as "sexually dangerous persons."
A Louisville priest convicted earlier this year of sexually abusing a teenage boy in the 1970s is asking to be released from prison just six months into his 15-year sentence.
An attorney for the Rev. James Schook has given notice that he will ask a judge Monday to release Schook on shock probation, saying he “now realizes the importance of obeying and conforming to the community's rules.”
In April, a jury convicted Schook of three counts of sodomy and one count of indecent and immoral behavior with an individual and recommended the 15-year sentence, which the judge upheld.
David Lambertus, Schook's attorney, wrote that he has the support of family members and friends who have offered to care for him and “make sure he abides by the rules of shock probation.”
Schook suffers from terminal cancer. Shock probation allows inmates to be released after serving one to six months of their sentence, under the belief they have been so "shocked" by their experience that they would be deterred from future crimes.
A former priest who says prosecutors waited too long to charge him with
sexual abuse has lost his case at the Michigan appeals court.
James Rapp was sentenced to at least 20 years in prison for molesting
students at Lumen Christi High School in Jackson in the 1980s. He was in
prison in Oklahoma for similar crimes when he was charged in Michigan
in 2015.
James Francis Rapp,
a former Roman Catholic priest, recently pleaded no contest to charges
that he had sexual contact with students while he was a wrestling coach
and a teacher at Lumen Christi High School in Jackson.
Rapp, 75, is currently serving a 40-year sentence for sexually abusing a pair of teenage boys in Oklahoma.
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In terms of criminal cases, Clohessy gives credit to Michigan lawmakers
for enabling child sex abuse victims to file charges against their
predators. However, where the problem lies is with civil cases where the
state ranks among the worst.
“Michigan has some of the most
restrictive statutes of limitations in the country,” said Clohessy. “The
problem with that is that it’s the civil cases that expose both those
who commit and those who conceal abuse.”
On Monday, a former Jackson Lumen Christi High School priest pleaded
no contest to six counts of criminal sexual conduct, which spanned a
half decade of abuse at the school.
James Rapp, now 75, pleaded no contest to three counts of
first-degree criminal sexual conduct as well as three counts of
second-degree criminal sexual conduct Monday, Feb. 29, before Jackson
County Circuit Court Judge Susan Beebe.
As part of the plea, 13 counts of criminal sexual conduct were
dismissed, while Rapp will face anywhere from 20 to 40 years in prison
as part of a sentencing agreement, Assistant Attorney General Angela
Povilaitis said.
We're grateful that an ex-priest has pled guilty to more child sex
crimes. We hope this news will prod others that he has hurt to come
forward. (See attorney general’s news release below.)
Fr. James Francis Rapp has already been convicted on other child sex
charges and is imprisoned. So it would have been easy for law
enforcement to look the other way when more victims surfaced.
But Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette filed more child sex
charges against him for molesting kids at Jackson Lumen Christi Catholic
High School in Jackson in the 1980s.
Once a child molester is
convicted, many people who could be helpful get complacent. They assume
his sentence will stand, his appeals will fail, and he’ll be kept away
from kids for many years. But often, child molesters – especially
clerics – get top notch defense lawyers, exploit legal technicalities,
and escape with little or no jail time. Then, when other victims,
witnesses and whistleblowers find this out, it’s too late for them to
really make a difference.
So we’re glad Schuette was prudent, pro-active and successful here.
Now, the odds that Rapp will ever walk free are even slimmer. And more
of his victims feel vindicated.
_
Prosecutors have added six additional charges against a former Michigan
Catholic school priest, teacher and wrestling coach in connection with
reported sexual assaults of boys more than three decades ago.
James Rapp now faces 19 criminal sexual conduct charges after two more alleged victims came forward.
The charges were amended Friday at a district court hearing.
ASU research professor James "Jaime" Lara had his priesthood revoked
by the Vatican in 1992 for sexually abusing children, the Roman Catholic
Diocese of Brooklyn said in a statement Thursday.
The University asked for his resignation Thursday in light of the
announcement, according to an ASU official. Lara agreed to resign and is
no longer associated with the University, according to a University
statement.
“Jaime Lara is no longer affiliated with Arizona State University, effective Thursday,” the statement read.
The ASU official said the University found out about Lara’s history with the clergy when the diocese announced it on its website Thursday.
A hearing has found probable cause for the filing of charges against a
Catholic priest accused of sexually assaulting a young parishioner two
decades ago.
Probable cause was found for charges of first-degree aggravated
sexual assault and second-degree sexual assault against the Rev. Michael
"Mitch" Walters on Wednesday, according to an official with the
Guttenberg court. The case was then transferred from the municipal court
up to the Hudson County Superior Court.
Dave Ohlmuller is well-known on the North Shore as a Platform Tennis
Hall of Famer, coach and father. He also said he is a survivor of sexual
abuse at the hands of a Roman Catholic priest and is fighting to
prevent what happened to him from happening to others.
Ohlmuller, 46, said his memories of abuse came rushing back when his
son turned 11. He said he felt intense feelings of fear and anger
stemming from his days as an altar boy in New Jersey. Ohlmuller said he
was sexually abused multiple times. His feelings made him an
overprotective father.
“I’m not a little overprotective, I’m way overprotective,” Ohlmuller
said of his son. “I want to know where he’s going all the time, who he’s
with. We live in a nice place. It shouldn’t have to be like that here.”
When the memories returned in 2015, Ohlmuller did two things. He
reached out for support to get counseling and he hired lawyer Mitch
Garabedian, who was featured in the current Academy Award nominated
movie “Spotlight.” Garabedian called his client a hero.
“Dave Ohlmuller should be proud of himself for being so courageous to
stand up to the church,” he said. “There were thousands of abusers and
thousands of enablers and most people were silent. He is a real hero.”
Officials report that Fr. Michael Walters, a priest who formerly worked
as an assistant pastor at Our Lady of Sorrow Church in South Orange and who has recently been accused of sexual misconduct with minors at another parish in the 1980s, had no role in the school there and no contact with students.
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Jim Goodness, spokesman for the Archdiocese of Newark, reported that
parishioners were informed of the allegations against Fr. Walters and
his subsequent departure at masses in October.
However, Goodness and Sr. Judith Blair, the principal of OLS, noted
that families in the school were not directly notified by the school as
Fr. Walters had had no role at the school nor contact with students
through the school.
“Fr. Walters is not, and has never been, in any way involved with the
children at Our Lady of Sorrows School, or with the children at The
Nursery,” wrote Sr. Judith in an email. “In addition, he has not even
been on the property since October 2015.”
Paul R. Shanley
, a former “street priest” who became one of the most notorious figures
in the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal, is set to be released
from prison as early as this week after serving 12 years behind bars for
raping a Sunday school student in the early 1980s.
Middlesex
prosecutors said they had hoped to keep the 86-year-old defrocked priest
behind bars even after his sentence was completed by having him
declared a “sexually dangerous person.” But two doctors who examined
Shanley found that he did not meet the required criteria, prosecutors
said.
“We are awaiting their final reports,” Middlesex District Attorney
Marian T. Ryan’s office said in a statement Tuesday. “However, both
doctors have informed us that they have concluded that Shanley does not
satisfy the legal criteria for a petition to be filed.”
Not guilty was the verdict of a 12-member jury for the former Hibbing priest accused of sexual misconduct.
Brian
M. Lederer, 30, was facing four counts of criminal sexual conduct in
the second degree and two counts of criminal sexual conduct in the
fourth degree.
The alleged
incidents occurred during the 2014-2015 school year after school hours
at Assumption School. One incident took place in a residence, and other
actions occurred on a school bus.
A June trial date has been scheduled for a Hibbing priest accused of sexually abusing four girls.
A five-day trial for Brian Michael
Lederer, 30, is set to begin June 13 in State District Court in Hibbing,
according to court records.
Sixth
Judicial District Judge David Ackerson previously denied a motion to
dismiss the charges, and not guilty pleas were entered on Lederer's
behalf on Nov. 30.
Authorities said four girls, ranging in age
from 10 to 14, came forward to report incidents of inappropriate
touching by Lederer, who worked at Blessed Sacrament Parish and the
Assumption Catholic School.
Similar to the dialogue thatAnne Hendershottof the Veritas Center for Ethics in Public Life is endorsing. Not quite victim blaming, but damn close. By casting a pall over the narrative of the child they seek to diminish the impact.
An
attorney for the Hibbing priest accused of sexually abusing four girls
is seeking to have his client's criminal charges dismissed, alleging
that the case is the result of an overzealous prosecution fueled by the
ongoing child sexual abuse controversy in the Catholic Church.
The Rev. Brian Michael Lederer, 29, faces seven felony charges
related to the alleged inappropriate touching of the girls and
possession of child pornography.
Lederer's defense attorney, Peter Wold of Minneapolis, contended
in a motion filed last week in St. Louis County District Court that
there is a lack of probable cause to substantiate the charges.
Wold said in a 17-page memorandum that the church has been
"rocked" by abuse allegations, which he argued has led to a "cultural
shift" in the perception of interactions between clergy and
parishioners.
"Hugs are no longer gestures of caring, but sexual advances,"
Wold wrote. "Games played with kids are no longer innocent activities,
but opportunities of sexual assault. But, the fear that an innocent
touch is actually a sexual advance is not the standard in a criminal
court. Real evidence that establishes a reasonable probability that a
facially innocent act occurred with sexual intent must be presented."
Lederer was a parochial vicar at Blessed Sacrament Parish in Hibbing until he was charged in May.
_____
Another charge has been brought against a Hibbing, Minn., priest
currently on administrative leave in light of a fourth victim coming
forward.
Brian Lederer, 29, now faces six charges of criminal sexual conduct, as well as a charge of possession of child pornography.
Three victims were under 13, and another was under 16.
On Thursday the St. Louis County court approved adding a charge of criminal sexual conduct involving a fourth victim.
Child pornography was allegedly discovered on Lederer's personal computer, according the St. Louis County Attorney's Office.
I have great difficulty with this case based not only on said article, but questions raised concerning the star witness. I may be confusing the two issues, but justice needs to be served, it needs to done properly. Is the Avery case as pivotal as Williams declares? "Lynn's handling of Avery's case was no oversight, but was in accord
with his established practice for dealing with sexual predator priests." .
Philadelphia's District Attorney Seth Williams is urging the state's
highest court to consider an appeal of Msgr. William Lynn's case,
arguing that an appeals court decision ordering a new trial was
"embarrassingly unjustified" and that the reasoning "simply makes no
sense."
Williams has been on a losing streak in state appeals courts, and the
latest filing to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court represents the last
chance he has to keep the conviction of Lynn, who was the first Catholic
Church official nationwide to be convicted for covering up sexual abuse
by clergy.
In December, a three-judge appellate court ordered a new trial for
Lynn because of what the majority said was bad evidence presented at
trial. In particular, the judges found most of the prosecutors' 21
examples of the Philadelphia Archdiocese covering up child sex abuse had
nothing to do with Lynn. In fact, some of the evidence dated back to
the 1940s, decades before Lynn became a church official in charge of
priest assignments. Some of the other priests prosecutors cited were not
under the direct supervision of Lynn. The court found that he was being
unfairly blamed for systemic corruption.
Ex-priest Mark Broussard has been sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison.
In the words of Judge David Ritchie, Broussard's punishment comes 30 years late.
The
ex-priest convicted of raping and molesting young altar boys is
sentenced to two consecutive life sentences on two counts of aggravated
rape with 50 years added on for other sexual abuse charges.
First Assistant D.A. Cynthia Killingsworth said part of what made the case so heinous was the level of trust that was betrayed.
"People
would just let their kids go over there and let them stay there and
certainly had no problem with it; in fact, the moms, whoever were the
single moms in this case, were very glad he was mentoring their
children," said Killingsworth.
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In sentencing, Ritchie told Broussard he "had no right to use
children as his sex toys," and said that what he did was "pure, pure
evil."
Ritchie also expressed disgust with Broussard's refusal
to accept responsibility for what he's done in blaming anyone but
himself.
"He said it was the child's fault - this child came on to
him - basically, for the first event that I know of for sure," Ritchie
said.
Former priest Mark Broussard was found guilty of two counts
aggravated rape, one count molestation of a juvenile, one count
aggravated oral sexual battery and one count oral sexual battery.
The jury in his Calcasieu Parish case handed up the verdict shortly before 3 p.m. Friday afternoon.
Broussard
will be sentenced on March 11. Following the reading of the verdict,
14th Judicial District Judge David Ritchie ordered Broussard be held in
prison pending sentencing.
Broussard faces a life sentence for each count of aggravated rape.
Detective Katherine LeBlanc investigated the case for the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office.
First
Assistant District Attorney Cynthia Killingsworth prosecuted the case
for the Calcasieu Parish District Attorney’s Office with the help of
Assistant District Attorney Jacob Johnson.
A jury in a former priest's sex
abuse trial heard graphic testimony Monday from a man who said he was
sexually assaulted by Mark Broussard. The witness's
testimony portrayed Broussard as a predator who groomed the boy for
sexual activity, eventually accelerating to rape. Mark
Anthony Broussard is charged with molestation of a juvenile, oral sexual
battery, aggravated oral sexual battery and two counts of aggravated
rape. The allegations revolve around Broussard's time as a priest at Our
Lady Queen of Heaven and St. Henry Catholic Church, from 1986-91. The
charges against Broussard are based on allegations of two men who were
altar boys. Broussard, who is free on $1.5 million bond, was initially
indicted on 224 counts of sexual abuse, but the charges were reduced to
five, which reflect the entirety of the accusations. ,,, Defense attorney Tom Lorenzi attempted to attack the victim's
credibility, asking questions that suggested money might have been the
motive. Though the victim received $125,000 from the diocese in
2012, he said the money was not the motive for coming forward - plus
there's no money to be gained from a criminal trial. The man said he thought about keeping the allegations to himself, but ultimately told the secret to protect other children.
He said he considered killing Broussard, but never confronted him. "I
have no motive to lie; it's the truth," he said. "It's time Mark
Broussard face the truth about the sexual acts he committed" against me.
_
It could take a week to seat a jury in the case of a former priest facing child sex charges.
Jury
selection began Monday in the trial of Mark Broussard. He was
first arrested in March of 2012 after one alleged victim approached
authorities claiming he was abused 25 years earlier by Broussard. He was
rearrested twice more the same year on additional charges.
At one point, Broussard faced more than 200 criminal charges. But that number has been reduced to five.
![Fr. Michael Walters [Archdiocese of Newark]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uUPcm_Io_E8U8f-xt4AC5Yh3VOEG8T6YQ7eNyWRQTExmXB2qO7cuw4yHX0Y-7kX0IN1WsYMvb4XWYi4ETAREx9187_zSrBPKqj4F-r_5iJxFAdJoLMJG_zHgYOSI9uquXAPTbk1wPY_69GvxMqVfYkcXvEXzyPDXGNZwKxKoyIVrZ9vOgmvSBLfA=s0-d)
