The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis suffers from “serious shortcomings” in its handling of child sex-abuse complaints that have allowed priests to continue abusing victims, sometimes for years, a task force reported Monday.The solution, according to the church-ordered study, is to foster a culture that “places victims first” and creates more accountability by involving ordinary church members in the oversight and discipline of wayward clergy.“The Archdiocese concentrated too much power in one or two individuals to make decisions regarding allegations of clergy sexual abuse of minors,” …
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K. Bernard Schade, the founder of the Singing Boys of Pennsylvania choir facing rape charges, had more than 1,100 pictures of child pornography stashed in two suitcases at his home and asked a neighbor to hide them knowing police would come looking for them, according to court records.Schade, 74, was awaiting a hearing on charges he allegedly raped a boy in 1996 and called his neighbor from Monroe County Correctional Facility, asking her to remove the two locked suitcases from his Middle Smithfield Township home and keep them in a safe place, according to court records.Schade told the neighbor…
NEW YORK (AP) — A second U.N. committee plans to question Vatican officials on failures to stop clergy sex abuse.The hearing scheduled for May 5-6 in Geneva will look at whether the Vatican’s record on child protection violates the U.N. Convention Against Torture. The Holy See ratified the treaty in 2002.Vatican spokesmen said Monday they could not immediately comment.Last January, Vatican officials testified for eight hours before an obscure human rights committee on the scale of clergy sex abuse globally.The Vatican was compelled to appear as a signatory to the U.N. Convention for the Rights…
NEW YORK (AP) — A second U.N. committee plans to question Vatican officials on failures to stop clergy sex abuse.The hearing scheduled for May 5-6 in Geneva will look at whether the Vatican’s record on child protection violates the U.N. Convention Against Torture. The Holy See ratified the treaty in 2002.Vatican spokesmen said Monday they could not immediately comment.Last January, Vatican officials testified for eight hours before an obscure human rights committee on the scale of clergy sex abuse globally.The Vatican was compelled to appear as a signatory to the U.N. Convention for the Rights…
(CNN) — Pope Francis made his strongest condemnation yet of sexual abuse by Catholic clergy on Friday, asking for forgiveness and pledging to impose penalties on “men of the church” who harm children.”I feel compelled to personally take on all the evil which some priests — quite a few in number, obviously not compared to the number of all the priests — to personally ask for forgiveness for the damage they have done for having sexually abused children,” the Pope said in remarks quoted by Vatican Radio.”The church is aware of this damage, it is personal, moral damage carried out by men of the…
News ReleaseApril 7, 2014
Sex
abuse lawsuit filed against diocese, former bishopNew Hawaii predator priest exposed
Deadline
to come forward, use courts is April 24
(Honolulu, HI) – Less than three weeks before a legal
deadline, a Honolulu man has come forward and filed a lawsuit charging that he
was sexually abused by Catholic priests and a former Catholic bishop.
The lawsuit, filed Friday, says that the victim, John Roe 27, was sexually
abused at St. Stephen’s Seminary and Damien Memorial School. The boy was a
14-year-old student at St. Stephen’s in 1968 when …
(Honolulu, HI) – Less than three weeks before a legal deadline, a Honolulu man has come forward and filed a lawsuit charging that he was sexually abused by Catholic priests and a former Catholic bishop.The lawsuit, filed Friday, says that the victim, John Roe 27, was sexually abused at St. Stephen’s Seminary and Damien Memorial School. The boy was a 14-year-old student at St. Stephen’s in 1968 when Fr. William Queenan began …
News ReleaseApril 7, 2014
Sex
abuse lawsuit filed against diocese, former bishopNew Hawaii predator priest exposed
Deadline
to come forward, use courts is April 24
(Honolulu, HI) – Less than three weeks before a legal
deadline, a Honolulu man has come forward and filed a lawsuit charging that he
was sexually abused by Catholic priests and a former Catholic bishop.
The lawsuit, filed Friday, says that the victim, John Roe 27, was sexually
abused at St. Stephen’s Seminary and Damien Memorial School. The boy was a
14-year-old student at St. Stephen’s in 1968 when …
The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis said Thursday that it has contacted nearly 50 law enforcement agencies in the past two weeks to provide files on priests accused of child sexual abuse. However, none of 12 metro law enforcement agencies contacted by MPR News confirmed that the archdiocese had offered files to review.
Newly released church documents involving clergy working in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis describe one priest allegedly sexually abusing a brain-injured woman and another abusing a teenage boy who killed himself and his wife years later in a murder-suicide. The new details were revealed in a statement by the archdiocese late Monday as part of a lawsuit that is also compelling Archbishop John Nienstedt to testify under oath Wednesday about decades’ worth of alleged abuse. The archdiocese was ordered by a judge to disclose tens of thousands of pages of documents…