priest pled guilty to 47 victims, Scottish pedophile ring

Record settlement for victim of pedophile priest By Donald McArthur, The Windsor Star 5/7/09 A victim of pedophile priest Charles Sylvestre has secured a record-setting settlement from the London diocese of the Roman Catholic Church, just days before her civil lawsuit was to proceed to trial. Lou Ann Soontiens, who endured five years of abuse as a girl and underwent a forced abortion, will share her story and announce details of the historic settlement Friday in London....Sylvestre was sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty in 2006 to sexually assaulting 47 girls over 40 years in Windsor, Chatham, Pain Court, Sarnia and London. Publicity surrounding his case prompted more victims to come forward. Sylvestre died in Kingston Penitentiary in January 2007, less than four months into his sentence....In particular, Talach (of Ledroit Beckett in London) said evidence suggested Sylvestre was moved from Hamilton to Windsor in the early 1950s after complaints were made against him in Hamilton. "He should have never been in Windsor, he should have never been in London, he should have never been in Sarnia, he should have never been in Chatham, he should never have been in Pain Court," said Talach. "All those victims in those cities could have been avoided." http://www.windsorstar.com/news/Record+settlement+victim+pedophile+priest/1574063/story.html

Scottish paedophile ring found guilty of more than 50 charges Severin Carrell, Scotland correspondent guardian.co.uk, 5/7/09 A ring of eight paedophiles, including a former welfare campaigner for young gay men, were today convicted of child abuse and producing indecent images of children. The men, from across central Scotland, were found guilty by a jury in Edinburgh of more than 50 charges, ranging from abusing infants from three months old to conspiracy and holding more than 125,000 images of child pornography. Two of the leaders of the gang, the biggest paedophile network uncovered in Scotland, were convicted of raping and abusing the young children of close friends while they were babysitting, and sharing images of the abuse....A further 7,000 images were found, together with emails clearly showing that other children were at serious risk. Lothian and Borders detectives launched Operation Algebra, and were given warrants by courts in the United States to obtain email records from Microsoft. Expert witnesses were able to identify one digital camera used to record the abuse from the photographs....Milligan had 78,000 images in his possession. He was allowed to listen on the telephone to Rennie abusing the toddler, and had discussed getting access to the boy. Webber, Boath and Milligan were found guilty of conspiring to participate in the sexual abuse of children along with Strachan and Rennie. Campbell was cleared of conspiracy. http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/may/07/scottish-paedophile-ring-guilty-child-abuse