Twitter shuts down string of accounts containing child abuse images after hackers expose indecent content
NSPCC says hacking groups exposed the files last night
The charity says it has received a 'flurry' of reports
Unclear whether images came from British users or those abroad
Cases will now be investigated in the US where the site is based
Another child protection group received 30 reports of such images
By James Black
24 December 2012
A string of Twitter accounts have been closed after they were revealed to contain disturbing images of child abuse.
The
graphic pictures were apparently made public late last night after
hacking groups claimed to have broken into the private accounts to
expose their indecent content, the NSPCC said.
The charity said it
received a 'flurry' of reports overnight relating to at least half a
dozen Twitter accounts which were later disabled.
They will now be investigated in the US, where the micro-blogging site is based.
An NSPCC spokesman said: 'Apparently these were pretty disturbing images of child abuse.
"We understand the authorities in the US are now looking at the accounts.'
The
Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (Ceop) said it had also
received around 30 reports, relating to at least four accounts.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2252951/Twitter-shuts-string-accounts-containing-child-abuse-images-hackers-expose-indecent-content.html
Piero Corsi, Italian Priest, Says 'Provocative' Women To Blame For Spate Of Domestic Violence (VIDEO)
The Huffington Post | By Meredith Bennett-Smith 12/28/2012
An
Italian priest found himself embroiled in a national controversy this
week after a Christmas bulletin he posted in his church went viral.
Perio
Corsi's flier, entitled “Women and femicide – healthy self-criticism.
How often do they provoke?” claimed that women in Italy may be to blame
for a spate of domestic violence attacks, Raw Story notes. Members of
the priest's congregation then posted the text on the Internet:
How often do we see girls and mature women going around scantily dressed and in provocative clothes?
They
provoke the worst instincts, which end in violence or sexual abuse.
They should search their consciences and ask: did we bring this on
ourselves?
The flier went on to decry "increasingly provocative,"
"arrogant" and "self-sufficient" women who abandon their children, don't
clean their houses and serve cold meals.
Corsi is the leader of a church in the small parish of San Terenzo in northwest Italy, according to The Journal.
The
Daily Beast's Barbie Latza Nadeau notes that this year 120 women have
been killed in domestic disputes in the European nation, "a third more
than last year." In fact, the problem has even caught the attention of
the United Nations Human Rights Council, which urged the country to take
action last June.
As calls for the priest to resign intensified,
Euronews reported that Corsi issued an apology, only to quickly take it
back. He also used an anti-gay slur when debating a reporter from Rai
Radio, L'Huffington Post reports.
Meanwhile, local officials have been quick to distance themselves from the church leader's comments....
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/28/piero-corsi-italian-priest-provocative-women-to-blame-domestic-violence_n_2376702.html
Belgium To Prosecute Scientology As Criminal Organization; Church Faces Charges Of Extortion, Fraud
The Huffington Post | By Andres Jauregui 12/28/2012
Federal
public prosecutors in Belgium will institute legal proceedings against
the church of Scientology in that country and seek to recognize it as a
criminal organization.
The church of Scientology -- which is not
recognized as a faith in Belgium -- and several of its top-ranking
members face charges including extortion, fraud, illegal practice of
medicine and violation of privacy laws, according to Flanders News.
The
complaint stems from an investigation of fraudulent labor contracts
issued by the church of Scientology in an effort to recruit new
volunteers and members. A judge ordered raids on Scientology offices in
2008 that allegedly uncovered a "wealth of evidence" that the
organization had spied on and extorted money from its members, according
to De Standaard.
An estimated 500 people belong to the church of
Scientology in Belgium. The organization's European headquarters are
located in Brussels.
Belgium is not the only European country in which Scientology has faced criticism and legal action.
Scientology
came under fire in France in 2009 when it was convicted of fraud for
"[pressuring] members into paying large sums for questionable remedies,"
according to the Associated Press. That conviction was upheld in a
French appeals court in February 2012.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/28/belgium-prosecutes-scientology-extortion-fraud_n_2375823.html
Showing posts with label Belgium. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Belgium. Show all posts
Saturday, December 29, 2012
Twitter shuts down string of accounts containing child abuse images after hackers expose indecent content, Piero Corsi, Italian Priest, Says 'Provocative' Women To Blame For Spate Of Domestic Violence (VIDEO), Belgium To Prosecute Scientology As Criminal Organization; Church Faces Charges Of Extortion, Fraud
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Belgian woman in child-sex case enters convent - Marc Dutroux case
Belgian woman in child-sex case enters convent
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Brussels --
A woman who let two 8-year-old girls starve in a cellar and helped her pedophile husband carry out horrific abuse of other girls went from prison to a convent Tuesday, outraging Belgians who opposed the early release of one of the country's most despised criminals.
The nation's highest court approved Michelle Martin's release after serving 16 years of a 30-year prison term for her role in the mid-1990s kidnappings, rapes and killings by her then-husband, Marc Dutroux....
The Dutroux case horrified the nation and led to widespread changes in Belgian police procedures. Police had visited the home twice in the mid-1990s and didn't find the kidnapped girls, although they heard voices, and ignored a letter from Dutroux's mother that expressed concern her son was abusing young girls.
Dutroux, an unemployed electrician and convicted pedophile on parole at the time of the crimes, was arrested in 1996 and convicted eight years later of abducting, imprisoning and raping six girls between the summers of 1995 and 1996. He was also found guilty of murdering two of the six girls, who ranged in age from 8 to 19 years old. He is serving a life sentence.
The last two of Dutroux's kidnap victims were found alive in his basement a few days after his arrest.
Martin was accused of conspiracy in the kidnappings and imprisonment leading to the deaths of the two starved girls, who were held in a secret dungeon specially built in a cellar. Martin said she had been too scared to go into the cellar to feed them while Dutroux was serving a four-month jail term for car theft.
One year after they were kidnapped, the bodies of the two were found in the garden of a house that Dutroux owned.
Martin has depicted herself as a passive culprit of the psychopath Dutroux, but was blamed for aiding her husband and letting the young girls die.
http://www.sfgate.com/world/article/Belgian-woman-in-child-sex-case-enters-convent-3822915.php
for more information on the Dutroux case:
http://ritualabuse.us/2008/10/issue-56-may-2004/
http://ritualabuse.us/2008/10/issue-57-july-2004/
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Brussels --
A woman who let two 8-year-old girls starve in a cellar and helped her pedophile husband carry out horrific abuse of other girls went from prison to a convent Tuesday, outraging Belgians who opposed the early release of one of the country's most despised criminals.
The nation's highest court approved Michelle Martin's release after serving 16 years of a 30-year prison term for her role in the mid-1990s kidnappings, rapes and killings by her then-husband, Marc Dutroux....
The Dutroux case horrified the nation and led to widespread changes in Belgian police procedures. Police had visited the home twice in the mid-1990s and didn't find the kidnapped girls, although they heard voices, and ignored a letter from Dutroux's mother that expressed concern her son was abusing young girls.
Dutroux, an unemployed electrician and convicted pedophile on parole at the time of the crimes, was arrested in 1996 and convicted eight years later of abducting, imprisoning and raping six girls between the summers of 1995 and 1996. He was also found guilty of murdering two of the six girls, who ranged in age from 8 to 19 years old. He is serving a life sentence.
The last two of Dutroux's kidnap victims were found alive in his basement a few days after his arrest.
Martin was accused of conspiracy in the kidnappings and imprisonment leading to the deaths of the two starved girls, who were held in a secret dungeon specially built in a cellar. Martin said she had been too scared to go into the cellar to feed them while Dutroux was serving a four-month jail term for car theft.
One year after they were kidnapped, the bodies of the two were found in the garden of a house that Dutroux owned.
Martin has depicted herself as a passive culprit of the psychopath Dutroux, but was blamed for aiding her husband and letting the young girls die.
http://www.sfgate.com/world/article/Belgian-woman-in-child-sex-case-enters-convent-3822915.php
for more information on the Dutroux case:
http://ritualabuse.us/2008/10/issue-56-may-2004/
http://ritualabuse.us/2008/10/issue-57-july-2004/
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Psychologist reveals new details about Josh Powell, Child P_rnography in France, Belgium and the Netherlands
Psychologist reveals new details about Josh Powell
By 97.3 KIRO FM Staff report May 28, 2012
A new documentary on E! Network called "A Family Tragedy: The Powells", features the first interviews with the psychologist who worked with Josh Powell. It paints an even darker picture of Powell, who died earlier this year when he set his house on fire after killing both his young sons.
Forensic psychologist Dr. James Manley, who works for the state of Washington, says in the documentary that investigators found computer-generated videos and photos that show adults having sex with children.
"And there was [sic] about fifteen images that I found the most disturbing - and they were very lifelike - computerized drawings of adults and children having sex in various ways," Dr. Manley tells Laura Ling in the documentary.
The images prompted Dr. Manley to recommend a psycho- sexual evaluation. He says the pornography wasn't a good sign for a parenting situation....
Relatives were also fighting to keep custody of Powell's two kids, fearing that Powell had been involved in the high-profile disappearance of his wife, Susan Cox Powell. It is unclear whether or not they were aware of the pornography.
The documentary will air for the first time on "E! Investigates" May 29 at 8:00 p.m. http://mynorthwest.com/11/684531/Josh-Powell-more-sinister-than-we-thought
Child Pornography in France, Belgium and the Netherlands
By James R. Marsh on May 29, 2012
Here is a recent documentary on child pornography in France, Belgium and the Netherlands by French journalist Karl Zéro. The report focuses on the Marc Dutroux affair which was widely reported in the international press in 2004.
An excellent in-depth exposé of the European perspective on child pornography and child exploitation with a focus the seeming inability and unwillingness of France to deal with this problem.
In French with English subtitles. Well worth the time and effort to watch the entire program.http://www.childlaw.us/2012/05/child-pornography-in-france-be.html
By 97.3 KIRO FM Staff report May 28, 2012
A new documentary on E! Network called "A Family Tragedy: The Powells", features the first interviews with the psychologist who worked with Josh Powell. It paints an even darker picture of Powell, who died earlier this year when he set his house on fire after killing both his young sons.
Forensic psychologist Dr. James Manley, who works for the state of Washington, says in the documentary that investigators found computer-generated videos and photos that show adults having sex with children.
"And there was [sic] about fifteen images that I found the most disturbing - and they were very lifelike - computerized drawings of adults and children having sex in various ways," Dr. Manley tells Laura Ling in the documentary.
The images prompted Dr. Manley to recommend a psycho- sexual evaluation. He says the pornography wasn't a good sign for a parenting situation....
Relatives were also fighting to keep custody of Powell's two kids, fearing that Powell had been involved in the high-profile disappearance of his wife, Susan Cox Powell. It is unclear whether or not they were aware of the pornography.
The documentary will air for the first time on "E! Investigates" May 29 at 8:00 p.m. http://mynorthwest.com/11/684531/Josh-Powell-more-sinister-than-we-thought
Child Pornography in France, Belgium and the Netherlands
By James R. Marsh on May 29, 2012
Here is a recent documentary on child pornography in France, Belgium and the Netherlands by French journalist Karl Zéro. The report focuses on the Marc Dutroux affair which was widely reported in the international press in 2004.
An excellent in-depth exposé of the European perspective on child pornography and child exploitation with a focus the seeming inability and unwillingness of France to deal with this problem.
In French with English subtitles. Well worth the time and effort to watch the entire program.http://www.childlaw.us/2012/05/child-pornography-in-france-be.html
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Craigslist faces new wave of political attacks, Vatican as a rogue state
Craigslist faces new wave of political attacks by Declan McCullagh September 9, 2010 A year ago, Craigslist founder Craig Newmark was busy touting e-government, promoting neighborhood social networks, and blogging about squirrel-proofing his bird feeder. But now the 57-year-old entrepreneur is spending his days in more nerve-wracking pursuits: responding to attacks from ambitious attorneys general, legal threats from antiprostitution advocacy groups that sometimes seem to be actually anti-Craigslist, and critical articles written by journalists employed by the same newspapers that his company is helping to slowly eviscerate. And now, two sources have told CNET, a congressional committee has asked Newmark to testify at a hearing in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday afternoon on the topic of "domestic minor sex trafficking."....
Liability and the law
Then there's the option of persuading Congress to rewrite Section 230 of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which says: "No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." Translated, that means Craigslist isn't generally liable for what its users do.
But the law that immunizes Craigslist from lawsuit also protects Facebook, Blogspot, Flickr, and innumerable other Web sites. It lets news organizations, including CNET publisher CBS Interactive, permit readers to post comments without prior approval by an editor. It's probably no exaggeration to say that one sentence--inserted as part of negotiations over antiporn legislation--gave birth to Web 2.0 and modern social networks.
"Any attempt to reopen section 230 will inevitably invite a flurry of other proposals of how to deputize online intermediaries to handle any concern or pet grievance," says Berin Szoka, a senior fellow at the free-market Progress and Freedom Foundation. "Just limiting it to adult services or prostitution is naive." Andrea Powell, executive director of the FAIR Fund, is also weighing a class action lawsuit against Craigslist. "There are enough victims," Powell said. "We were thinking about this one day and reached out and it turns out other groups were pondering it. I had a conversation with one woman who was victimized by Craigslist. By our records, our financial records, they owe her $60,000." http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20015916-38.html
Call to treat Vatican as a rogue state September 9, 2010 THE Vatican should be treated as a kind of ''rogue state'' by the rest of the world until it stops using statehood - and the ancient rules of the canon law - to protect paedophile priests.
So says Geoffrey Robertson, QC, the veteran human rights lawyer and United Nations judge, arguing that the Catholic Church is the only religion permitted under international law to claim the privileges of statehood and its leaders immunity from civil or criminal action.
In his new book, The Case of the Pope: Vatican Accountability for Human Rights Abuse published as a Penguin special in Britain - and in Australia at the weekend - Mr Robertson urges the world to press the Catholic Church into abandoning canon law, the ancient set of ecclesiastical rules that also define disciplinary provisions for offences ranging from sex crimes to ordaining women.
However, these punishments, sometimes meted out under mediaeval written procedures run by fellow priests, allow ''neither cross-examination and medical examination, nor DNA testing'' and ''no punishment worthy of that name'', he says. ''The worst that can happen, other than an order to do penance, is 'laicisation'; that is, defrocking, which permits the paedophile to leave the church and get a job in a state school or care home, without anyone knowing of this conviction. Canon law has no sex offenders registry. ''While there can be no objection to an organisation disciplining members for a breach of arcane rules, there is every objection when those breaches amount to serious crimes and the organisation claims the right to deal with them internally without reporting them to the police. ''And that is precisely what the Vatican has been doing: instead of reporting to law enforcement authorities those priests it knows to be guilty of raping children, and to be likely to rape more children in the future, it has been dealing with them under canon law, which demands utmost pontifical secrecy, moving them to other parishes and letting them off with admonitions and unenforceable penances … usually to say prayers for their victims.' http://www.smh.com.au/world/call-to-treat-vatican-as-a-rogue-state-20100908-151cg.html
Belgian court bins church paedophile raids evidence Sep 9, 2010 BRUSSELS (AFP) – Belgian judges ruled invalid on Thursday truckloads of evidence seized by police in summer raids probing paedophile scandals within the country's Roman Catholic Church.
An appeals court deemed the raids, on the church headquarters in Brussels and at the home of its former top cardinal, disproportionate, and ordered that the material -- on hundreds of individual investigations conducted by an internal church commission -- be returned with prosecutors unable to use it. http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100909/wl_afp/belgiumreligionchildabuse
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Dioceses oust abusers had pledged to monitor, child abuse witness death threats
Dioceses oust abusers they had pledged to monitor By RACHEL ZOLL (AP) 7/4/10
NEW YORK — At the peak of the Roman Catholic clergy sex abuse crisis, the discipline plan American bishops adopted prompted dioceses to remove nearly all accused clergy from the priesthood. Some of the men, however, were considered too old or sick to be kicked out. Instead, bishops barred those clerics from functioning as priests and promised to keep watch over them in supervisory programs that would keep the men far from children.
But interviews with canon lawyers, church child protection officials and experts who advise them found that, eight years after the plan was approved, few of those diocesan programs exist. Church leaders are more likely to oust a cleric from the priesthood than monitor him. http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hlHdJHra37XaI5cjan-Cm_WJNdhQD9GOCFV80
Child abuse witnesses get death threats 04 Jul 2010 Police investigating claims of child abuse by Belgian clergy say they are probing death threats against witnesses and magistrates. The threats have been made to witnesses who gave information to the police and to the magistrates who may end up judging the case. Last month, police raided a meeting of Catholic bishops as part of a probe into allegations of child abuse by priests in Belgium. http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=133423§ionid=351020605
NEW YORK — At the peak of the Roman Catholic clergy sex abuse crisis, the discipline plan American bishops adopted prompted dioceses to remove nearly all accused clergy from the priesthood. Some of the men, however, were considered too old or sick to be kicked out. Instead, bishops barred those clerics from functioning as priests and promised to keep watch over them in supervisory programs that would keep the men far from children.
But interviews with canon lawyers, church child protection officials and experts who advise them found that, eight years after the plan was approved, few of those diocesan programs exist. Church leaders are more likely to oust a cleric from the priesthood than monitor him. http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hlHdJHra37XaI5cjan-Cm_WJNdhQD9GOCFV80
Child abuse witnesses get death threats 04 Jul 2010 Police investigating claims of child abuse by Belgian clergy say they are probing death threats against witnesses and magistrates. The threats have been made to witnesses who gave information to the police and to the magistrates who may end up judging the case. Last month, police raided a meeting of Catholic bishops as part of a probe into allegations of child abuse by priests in Belgium. http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=133423§ionid=351020605
Monday, June 28, 2010
US Supreme Court deals pedophilia blow for Vatican, human trafficking
also :
Pope causes outrage for condemning church abuse raids in Belgium
Church panel resigns to protest raid
The Catholic Church faces another scandal (Popes)
US Supreme Court deals pedophilia blow for Vatican (AFP) 6/28/10
WASHINGTON — The US Supreme Court declined Monday to hear an appeal by the Vatican in a landmark case that opens the way for priests in the United States to stand trial for pedophilia. Allowing a federal appeals court ruling to stand, the decision means Vatican officials including theoretically Pope Benedict XVI could face questioning under oath related to a litany of child sex abuse cases. The Supreme Court effectively confirmed the decision of an appellate court to lift the Vatican's immunity in the case of an alleged pedophile priest in the northwestern state of Oregon. The Oregon case, which was filed in 2002, does not directly address questions raised in a separate lawsuit in Kentucky alleging that US bishops are employees of the Holy See.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5j_isWYyYa91PA0oeM_aaVurBHDZQ
REDLIGHT, narrated by Lucy Liu, is a powerful and moving documentary about children emerging from lives in which they were trafficked into prostitution. http://www.lexisnexis.com/redlight/index.html
Human trafficking is modern-day slavery
27 - The number, in millions, of trafficked persons in the world.
32 - The estimated global annual profit, in billions US$, of human trafficking.
http://www.lexisnexis.com/redlight/human_trafficking.html
Pope causes outrage for condemning church abuse raids in Belgium - Victims groups say Vatican criticism of police shameful, as pontiff calls raid deplorable and demands church role in investigations 27 June 2010 Groups representing the victims of clerical abuse tonight expressed outrage after the pope criticised raids on the Catholic church by Belgian police. Last week, police raided the home of a retired bishop, opened the grave of at least one archbishop and detained Belgium's nine current serving bishops as they met, seizing their mobile phones and only releasing them after nine hours. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jun/27/pope-causes-outrage-over-condemnation
Belgium church abuse probe body quits en masse 6/28/10 (AFP) – 13 hours ago
BRUSSELS — A Belgian Catholic Church-backed commission probing hundreds of reported cases of child abuse by priests announced its resignation en masse on Monday, after police raids that angered the pope....Thursday's raids were prompted by new claims of child abuse by members of the Catholic Church in Belgium, one of the countries worst hit by recent revelations of paedophilia by priests in Europe and North America.
Police confiscated phones, computers and the archdiocese's accounting system in a search for documents including any correspondence between alleged victims and the Catholic authorities....The Belgian Church was rocked in April when its longest-serving bishop, 73-year-old Roger Vangheluwe, resigned after admitting sexually abusing a boy for years.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5j-z7W98WVMD9DcgBiGsXZjcY9nrQ
Church panel resigns to protest raid
By the CNN Wire Staff June 28, 2010
http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/europe/06/28/belgium.church.raids/
Made in his own image: The Catholic Church faces another scandal - Joseph Ratzinger is having a terrible year. But as the Catholic Church faces yet another scandal, blame is falling on its most popular figure of modern times, Pope John Paul II, writes Peter Popham 28 June 2010
....Maciel was the founder of a highly conservative order called the Legion of Christ, but it has gradually emerged over the years – particularly since his death in 2008 – that he was much else besides: a morphine addict for decades who sexually abused his own seminarians, fathered several children by two mistresses, and then went on to abuse and rape those children. Yet Maciel was greatly favoured by John Paul II, remaining persona grata at the Vatican until nearly the end of his life, and Sodano, like other senior members of the Curia (though not Ratzinger) received large cash gifts from him. Sodano repaid Maciel generously by killing a Vatican investigation into his misdeeds in 1998.
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/faith/made-in-his-own-image-the-catholic-church-faces-another-scandal-2012093.html
Pope causes outrage for condemning church abuse raids in Belgium
Church panel resigns to protest raid
The Catholic Church faces another scandal (Popes)
US Supreme Court deals pedophilia blow for Vatican (AFP) 6/28/10
WASHINGTON — The US Supreme Court declined Monday to hear an appeal by the Vatican in a landmark case that opens the way for priests in the United States to stand trial for pedophilia. Allowing a federal appeals court ruling to stand, the decision means Vatican officials including theoretically Pope Benedict XVI could face questioning under oath related to a litany of child sex abuse cases. The Supreme Court effectively confirmed the decision of an appellate court to lift the Vatican's immunity in the case of an alleged pedophile priest in the northwestern state of Oregon. The Oregon case, which was filed in 2002, does not directly address questions raised in a separate lawsuit in Kentucky alleging that US bishops are employees of the Holy See.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5j_isWYyYa91PA0oeM_aaVurBHDZQ
REDLIGHT, narrated by Lucy Liu, is a powerful and moving documentary about children emerging from lives in which they were trafficked into prostitution. http://www.lexisnexis.com/redlight/index.html
Human trafficking is modern-day slavery
27 - The number, in millions, of trafficked persons in the world.
32 - The estimated global annual profit, in billions US$, of human trafficking.
http://www.lexisnexis.com/redlight/human_trafficking.html
Pope causes outrage for condemning church abuse raids in Belgium - Victims groups say Vatican criticism of police shameful, as pontiff calls raid deplorable and demands church role in investigations 27 June 2010 Groups representing the victims of clerical abuse tonight expressed outrage after the pope criticised raids on the Catholic church by Belgian police. Last week, police raided the home of a retired bishop, opened the grave of at least one archbishop and detained Belgium's nine current serving bishops as they met, seizing their mobile phones and only releasing them after nine hours. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jun/27/pope-causes-outrage-over-condemnation
Belgium church abuse probe body quits en masse 6/28/10 (AFP) – 13 hours ago
BRUSSELS — A Belgian Catholic Church-backed commission probing hundreds of reported cases of child abuse by priests announced its resignation en masse on Monday, after police raids that angered the pope....Thursday's raids were prompted by new claims of child abuse by members of the Catholic Church in Belgium, one of the countries worst hit by recent revelations of paedophilia by priests in Europe and North America.
Police confiscated phones, computers and the archdiocese's accounting system in a search for documents including any correspondence between alleged victims and the Catholic authorities....The Belgian Church was rocked in April when its longest-serving bishop, 73-year-old Roger Vangheluwe, resigned after admitting sexually abusing a boy for years.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5j-z7W98WVMD9DcgBiGsXZjcY9nrQ
Church panel resigns to protest raid
By the CNN Wire Staff June 28, 2010
http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/europe/06/28/belgium.church.raids/
Made in his own image: The Catholic Church faces another scandal - Joseph Ratzinger is having a terrible year. But as the Catholic Church faces yet another scandal, blame is falling on its most popular figure of modern times, Pope John Paul II, writes Peter Popham 28 June 2010
....Maciel was the founder of a highly conservative order called the Legion of Christ, but it has gradually emerged over the years – particularly since his death in 2008 – that he was much else besides: a morphine addict for decades who sexually abused his own seminarians, fathered several children by two mistresses, and then went on to abuse and rape those children. Yet Maciel was greatly favoured by John Paul II, remaining persona grata at the Vatican until nearly the end of his life, and Sodano, like other senior members of the Curia (though not Ratzinger) received large cash gifts from him. Sodano repaid Maciel generously by killing a Vatican investigation into his misdeeds in 1998.
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/faith/made-in-his-own-image-the-catholic-church-faces-another-scandal-2012093.html
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Stern: Terrorism Expert No Longer in 'Denial' About Her Rape, clergy abuse
clergy abuse articles : Italy, Ireland, Belgium
Books of The Times - Violence Expert Visits Her Dark Past By DWIGHT GARNER
June 24, 2010 Jessica Stern is among the world’s experts on violence and evil, a woman who spends her time thinking about bad men and bad deeds. She has lectured at Harvard about terrorism and is the author of a respected book, “Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill” (2003). During the Clinton administration she was on the staff of the National Security Council....
“Denial” is Ms. Stern’s plainspoken and very raw account of why, long before 9/11, she was driven to study terrorism and to put herself repeatedly into danger as she flew around the world, like some scholarly twin of the former CNN war correspondent Christiane Amanpour, interviewing committed terrorists. Central among the reasons, it turns out, was her own experience of terror. On Oct. 1, 1973, when Ms. Stern was 15 and her sister 14, the two of them, alone in a suburban house in leafy Concord, Mass., were raped by a man who cut the house’s telephone lines before walking inside and leading them upstairs.
Ms. Stern describes that evening in brutal detail. It was a night that changed her and taught her a dire lesson: “Shame can be sexually transmitted.” The crime wasn’t properly investigated. The police didn’t believe her when she said the rapist was a stranger. Because her story and those of others were not publicized or taken seriously enough by the police, the same man was able to rape some 44 girls — an incredible, heart-collapsing number — from 1971 to 1973. “The entire community,” she writes, “was in denial.” http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/25/books/25book.html
Terrorism Expert No Longer in 'Denial' About Her Rape Andrea Stone Senior Washington Correspondent 6/25/10 WASHINGTON (June 22) -- Jessica Stern, one of the world's foremost authorities on terrorism, never made the connection between her chosen profession and the terror she suffered as a teenager. Stern was 15 and her sister Sara 14 when a blue-eyed stranger carrying a small handgun entered their home in Concord, Mass., on the evening of Oct. 1, 1973. The man threatened to kill them. Then he raped them. There was no one for the girls to turn to -- their mother was dead, their father on a business trip in Europe, the baby sitter had left them alone. The police refused to believe the girls didn't know the man. They were in denial. Worse, their father refused to cut short his trip to rush home.
A few months later -- his daughters' rapist still at large -- he told police they had gotten over it. He was in denial. But it took more than 30 years for Stern to discover that she, too, was in denial....Stern knew from therapy that she suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a diagnosis she had denied for years....Stern was not content to confine herself to the personal. She talked to a fellow victim and met a veteran who was injured in Iraq and suffers from PTSD. While she doesn't equate rape with being maimed by a roadside bomb -- "I was not a victim of terrorism. That is much more serious and has a political element" -- she was struck by how many symptoms she shared with the soldier....
Connecting her trauma to a wider circle, she wrote: Denial helps the bystander. We don't want to know what the boys we send to Iraq have done to others out of terror, or what others have done to them. We would rather not know about terror or be confronted with evil. This is as true about Abu Ghraib as it is about personal assaults and more private crimes, the crimes that occur inside families. But the victim, too, cannot bear to believe. She may bury or disassociate from or disown her pain.
http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/terrorism-expert-jessica-stern-no-longer-in-denial-about-her-rape/19524354
Abuse Loosens Church’s Culture of Silence in Italy
By RACHEL DONADIO June 26, 2010 ROME — One afternoon last month, a rare thing happened in Rome’s main courthouse: for perhaps the first time ever, an Italian bishop took the witness stand in the case of a priest accused of the sexual abuse of children.
Soon after, another rare thing happened. The leader of the Italian bishops’ conference acknowledged at a news conference that it was “possible” that bishops in Italy had covered up abuse, while his deputy said that in the past decade, 100 Italian priests had faced church trials in connection with the sexual abuse of minors.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=132214§ionid=351021820
Irish priest resigns over abuse case 27 Jun 2010 A priest in charge of protecting children in a rural diocese in Northern Ireland has been forced to resign over a case of child sex abuse filed against another priest under his authority. Earlier, an Irish Examiner report said Fr Bermingham in charge of the Diocese of Cloyne, in County Cork had received a note from a woman claiming abuse by a priest under his ministration. Bermingham had hushed up the matter and let his colleague know of the note before referring him to the police.
Bermingham said he had turned in the abuse statement which he received in May 2009 to the police and the Health Service Executive in the Irish Republic right away....This spring, a group of deaf men in Verona were granted a rare hearing on national television to denounce the priests they said serially molested them as children in a school for the deaf. “We just want justice,” said one of the men, Gianni Bisoli.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=132214§ionid=351021820
Pope denounces 'deplorable' raid on Belgian church - Raids come amid fresh claims of sex abuse in Catholic Church Agence France-Presse June 27, 2010
VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday accused Belgian police of "deplorable methods" for raiding a bishops' meeting as part of a pedophilia probe, as Brussels said the Vatican was overreacting....Thursday's raids came amid new claims of child abuse by members of the Catholic Church in Belgium, one of the countries rocked by recent revelations of pedophilia by priests in Europe and North America. http://www.montrealgazette.com/life/Pope+denounces+deplorable+raid+Belgian+church/3208676/story.html
Books of The Times - Violence Expert Visits Her Dark Past By DWIGHT GARNER
June 24, 2010 Jessica Stern is among the world’s experts on violence and evil, a woman who spends her time thinking about bad men and bad deeds. She has lectured at Harvard about terrorism and is the author of a respected book, “Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill” (2003). During the Clinton administration she was on the staff of the National Security Council....
“Denial” is Ms. Stern’s plainspoken and very raw account of why, long before 9/11, she was driven to study terrorism and to put herself repeatedly into danger as she flew around the world, like some scholarly twin of the former CNN war correspondent Christiane Amanpour, interviewing committed terrorists. Central among the reasons, it turns out, was her own experience of terror. On Oct. 1, 1973, when Ms. Stern was 15 and her sister 14, the two of them, alone in a suburban house in leafy Concord, Mass., were raped by a man who cut the house’s telephone lines before walking inside and leading them upstairs.
Ms. Stern describes that evening in brutal detail. It was a night that changed her and taught her a dire lesson: “Shame can be sexually transmitted.” The crime wasn’t properly investigated. The police didn’t believe her when she said the rapist was a stranger. Because her story and those of others were not publicized or taken seriously enough by the police, the same man was able to rape some 44 girls — an incredible, heart-collapsing number — from 1971 to 1973. “The entire community,” she writes, “was in denial.” http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/25/books/25book.html
Terrorism Expert No Longer in 'Denial' About Her Rape Andrea Stone Senior Washington Correspondent 6/25/10 WASHINGTON (June 22) -- Jessica Stern, one of the world's foremost authorities on terrorism, never made the connection between her chosen profession and the terror she suffered as a teenager. Stern was 15 and her sister Sara 14 when a blue-eyed stranger carrying a small handgun entered their home in Concord, Mass., on the evening of Oct. 1, 1973. The man threatened to kill them. Then he raped them. There was no one for the girls to turn to -- their mother was dead, their father on a business trip in Europe, the baby sitter had left them alone. The police refused to believe the girls didn't know the man. They were in denial. Worse, their father refused to cut short his trip to rush home.
A few months later -- his daughters' rapist still at large -- he told police they had gotten over it. He was in denial. But it took more than 30 years for Stern to discover that she, too, was in denial....Stern knew from therapy that she suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a diagnosis she had denied for years....Stern was not content to confine herself to the personal. She talked to a fellow victim and met a veteran who was injured in Iraq and suffers from PTSD. While she doesn't equate rape with being maimed by a roadside bomb -- "I was not a victim of terrorism. That is much more serious and has a political element" -- she was struck by how many symptoms she shared with the soldier....
Connecting her trauma to a wider circle, she wrote: Denial helps the bystander. We don't want to know what the boys we send to Iraq have done to others out of terror, or what others have done to them. We would rather not know about terror or be confronted with evil. This is as true about Abu Ghraib as it is about personal assaults and more private crimes, the crimes that occur inside families. But the victim, too, cannot bear to believe. She may bury or disassociate from or disown her pain.
http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/terrorism-expert-jessica-stern-no-longer-in-denial-about-her-rape/19524354
Abuse Loosens Church’s Culture of Silence in Italy
By RACHEL DONADIO June 26, 2010 ROME — One afternoon last month, a rare thing happened in Rome’s main courthouse: for perhaps the first time ever, an Italian bishop took the witness stand in the case of a priest accused of the sexual abuse of children.
Soon after, another rare thing happened. The leader of the Italian bishops’ conference acknowledged at a news conference that it was “possible” that bishops in Italy had covered up abuse, while his deputy said that in the past decade, 100 Italian priests had faced church trials in connection with the sexual abuse of minors.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=132214§ionid=351021820
Irish priest resigns over abuse case 27 Jun 2010 A priest in charge of protecting children in a rural diocese in Northern Ireland has been forced to resign over a case of child sex abuse filed against another priest under his authority. Earlier, an Irish Examiner report said Fr Bermingham in charge of the Diocese of Cloyne, in County Cork had received a note from a woman claiming abuse by a priest under his ministration. Bermingham had hushed up the matter and let his colleague know of the note before referring him to the police.
Bermingham said he had turned in the abuse statement which he received in May 2009 to the police and the Health Service Executive in the Irish Republic right away....This spring, a group of deaf men in Verona were granted a rare hearing on national television to denounce the priests they said serially molested them as children in a school for the deaf. “We just want justice,” said one of the men, Gianni Bisoli.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=132214§ionid=351021820
Pope denounces 'deplorable' raid on Belgian church - Raids come amid fresh claims of sex abuse in Catholic Church Agence France-Presse June 27, 2010
VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday accused Belgian police of "deplorable methods" for raiding a bishops' meeting as part of a pedophilia probe, as Brussels said the Vatican was overreacting....Thursday's raids came amid new claims of child abuse by members of the Catholic Church in Belgium, one of the countries rocked by recent revelations of pedophilia by priests in Europe and North America. http://www.montrealgazette.com/life/Pope+denounces+deplorable+raid+Belgian+church/3208676/story.html
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
followers of accused cult leader convicted child abuse, Priest scandals Belgium
describes abuse
Four followers of accused cult leader convicted of child abuse
Ultra-Orthodox cult leader Elior Chen and his followers allegedly used knives and hammers to abuse children as young as 3 and 4 years old. By Nir Hasson 5-12-10
The Jerusalem District Court convicted four disciples of accused cult leader Elior Chen of child abuse on Wednesday. Elior Chen was the spiritual leader of an ultra-Orthodox Jerusalem sect suspected of severe child abuse.
Chen and several of his followers allegedly used knives, hammers and other instruments to abuse children as young as 3 and 4 years old in the West Bank settlement of Beitar Illit in February and March 2008. The four convicted followers were accused of 22 charges stemming from 40 instances of child abuse. http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/four-followers-of-accused-cult-leader-convicted-of-child-abuse-1.289898
Priest sex scandals on rise in Belgium 12 May 2010
In Belgium complaints of sexual abuse continue to pile up as the Roman Catholic Church struggles to mend its severely tainted reputation. An investigative committee probing allegations of priestly pedophilia says it has received 270 separate letters in this regard since April 23rd. The commission's president Peter Adriaenssens revealed on Tuesday that 90 percent of the reports involve boys. 95 percent of the reports come from the northern Belgian region of Flanders, the diocese where pedophile Bishop Roger Vangheluwe served. Vangheluwe, after his April 23 resignation, admitted sexually abusing a boy when in office in the Flemish city of Bruges.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=126227§ionid=3510212
Wikipedia's Parent Company Starts Purging Porn From Its Websites
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/05/07/wikipedia-purges-porn/
Wikipedia – Bomis and online pornography
http://www.childlaw.us/2010/04/congress-reacts-to-wikipedia-f.html
Four followers of accused cult leader convicted of child abuse
Ultra-Orthodox cult leader Elior Chen and his followers allegedly used knives and hammers to abuse children as young as 3 and 4 years old. By Nir Hasson 5-12-10
The Jerusalem District Court convicted four disciples of accused cult leader Elior Chen of child abuse on Wednesday. Elior Chen was the spiritual leader of an ultra-Orthodox Jerusalem sect suspected of severe child abuse.
Chen and several of his followers allegedly used knives, hammers and other instruments to abuse children as young as 3 and 4 years old in the West Bank settlement of Beitar Illit in February and March 2008. The four convicted followers were accused of 22 charges stemming from 40 instances of child abuse. http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/four-followers-of-accused-cult-leader-convicted-of-child-abuse-1.289898
Priest sex scandals on rise in Belgium 12 May 2010
In Belgium complaints of sexual abuse continue to pile up as the Roman Catholic Church struggles to mend its severely tainted reputation. An investigative committee probing allegations of priestly pedophilia says it has received 270 separate letters in this regard since April 23rd. The commission's president Peter Adriaenssens revealed on Tuesday that 90 percent of the reports involve boys. 95 percent of the reports come from the northern Belgian region of Flanders, the diocese where pedophile Bishop Roger Vangheluwe served. Vangheluwe, after his April 23 resignation, admitted sexually abusing a boy when in office in the Flemish city of Bruges.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=126227§ionid=3510212
Wikipedia's Parent Company Starts Purging Porn From Its Websites
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/05/07/wikipedia-purges-porn/
Wikipedia – Bomis and online pornography
http://www.childlaw.us/2010/04/congress-reacts-to-wikipedia-f.html
Friday, April 23, 2010
Clergy abuse lawsuit against Pope, Cardinal praises cover up, clergy abuse Chile and Belgium
"I congratulate you for not denouncing a priest to the civil administration," the Colombian (Cardinal) wrote to Bishop Pierre Pican of Bayeux-Lisieux.
New Lawsuit Shows Letters to Vatican on Sexual Abuse Earlier Than Previously Thought By LAURIE GOODSTEIN April 22, 2010 Documents released in a lawsuit filed Thursday against Pope Benedict XVI show that the Vatican was informed more than a year earlier than previously thought about the case of a priest who molested deaf boys for two decades at a boarding school in Wisconsin.
One victim of the priest wrote two letters to the Vatican’s secretary of state in 1995 asking Pope John Paul II himself to read his anguished letters and “excommunicate” the priest, the Rev. Lawrence Murphy.
Father Murphy, who died in 1998, admitted to a psychologist hired by the Archdiocese of Milwaukee that he had molested 34 children when he worked at St. John’s School for the Deaf in St. Francis, Wis., from 1952 to 1974. Church officials concluded that there might have been as many as 200 victims.
The Vatican had previously said that the first notice it had about Father Murphy was when Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — now Pope Benedict XVI — received a letter about the case in 1996 from Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland of Milwaukee.
The letter writer, whose name was excised, is now the unnamed plaintiff in the latest lawsuit filed by Jeffrey Anderson, a lawyer who has brought hundreds of sexual abuse cases against the Roman Catholic Church. The victim said he never received a response.
What makes this lawsuit unusual is that it names as defendants Pope Benedict; the Vatican’s current secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone; a former secretary of state, Cardinal Angelo Sodano; and the Holy See. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/23/us/23priest.html
Pride and wickedness Embattled and arrogant to the last, a Colombian cardinal implicates Pope John Paul II in the cover-up Austen Ivereigh Wednesday 21 April 2010
Cardinal Castrillón was no ordinary official. From 1996 to 2006, he headed the Congregation for the Clergy in Rome, the department which safeguards the interests and rights of priests. In September 2001, he wrote to a French bishop to praise him for refusing to turn over an abusive priest to the police. The letter could not have been clearer or more damning.
"I congratulate you for not denouncing a priest to the civil administration," the Colombian wrote to Bishop Pierre Pican of Bayeux-Lisieux. "You have acted well and I am pleased to have a colleague in the episcopate who, in the eyes of history and of all other bishops in the world, preferred prison to denouncing his son and priest."
The last was a reference to the fact that Bishop Pican had received a suspended three-month sentence for refusing to report the crimes of Fr René Bissey, claiming that to do so would have violated the confessional (in fact, he had learned of the abuse from one of the victim's mothers). Nor, when Cardinal Castrillón wrote the letter, could he have been in any doubt about the priest's guilt. He had been jailed the year before for 18 years for the sexual abuse of 11 boys.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2010/apr/21/religion-castrillon-coverup-johnpaul2
Chilean priest allegedly abused 5 young men AP Apr 22, 2010 SANTIAGO, Chile – A Chilean prosecutor on Thursday announced a criminal investigation of a popular retired priest accused of sexually abusing five young men in his parish residence.
The allegations were lodged late last year and confirmed by the archbishop of Santiago only this week, as Chile's Roman Catholic leadership appealed publicly for forgiveness for alleged abuses involving 20 clergy members. Five of them have been convicted and 15 others are under investigation.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100423/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/lt_chile_church_abuse
Belgium's Catholic bishop of Bruges quits over abuse 4/23/10 The bishop of the Belgian city of Bruges, Roger Vangheluwe, has resigned after admitting sexual abuse of a boy earlier in his career. Bishop Vangheluwe, 73, said the abuse had happened when he was a simple priest and continued when he started as a bishop, a Vatican statement said. The Vatican said Pope Benedict XVI had accepted the resignation. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8639253.stm
New Lawsuit Shows Letters to Vatican on Sexual Abuse Earlier Than Previously Thought By LAURIE GOODSTEIN April 22, 2010 Documents released in a lawsuit filed Thursday against Pope Benedict XVI show that the Vatican was informed more than a year earlier than previously thought about the case of a priest who molested deaf boys for two decades at a boarding school in Wisconsin.
One victim of the priest wrote two letters to the Vatican’s secretary of state in 1995 asking Pope John Paul II himself to read his anguished letters and “excommunicate” the priest, the Rev. Lawrence Murphy.
Father Murphy, who died in 1998, admitted to a psychologist hired by the Archdiocese of Milwaukee that he had molested 34 children when he worked at St. John’s School for the Deaf in St. Francis, Wis., from 1952 to 1974. Church officials concluded that there might have been as many as 200 victims.
The Vatican had previously said that the first notice it had about Father Murphy was when Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — now Pope Benedict XVI — received a letter about the case in 1996 from Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland of Milwaukee.
The letter writer, whose name was excised, is now the unnamed plaintiff in the latest lawsuit filed by Jeffrey Anderson, a lawyer who has brought hundreds of sexual abuse cases against the Roman Catholic Church. The victim said he never received a response.
What makes this lawsuit unusual is that it names as defendants Pope Benedict; the Vatican’s current secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone; a former secretary of state, Cardinal Angelo Sodano; and the Holy See. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/23/us/23priest.html
Pride and wickedness Embattled and arrogant to the last, a Colombian cardinal implicates Pope John Paul II in the cover-up Austen Ivereigh Wednesday 21 April 2010
Cardinal Castrillón was no ordinary official. From 1996 to 2006, he headed the Congregation for the Clergy in Rome, the department which safeguards the interests and rights of priests. In September 2001, he wrote to a French bishop to praise him for refusing to turn over an abusive priest to the police. The letter could not have been clearer or more damning.
"I congratulate you for not denouncing a priest to the civil administration," the Colombian wrote to Bishop Pierre Pican of Bayeux-Lisieux. "You have acted well and I am pleased to have a colleague in the episcopate who, in the eyes of history and of all other bishops in the world, preferred prison to denouncing his son and priest."
The last was a reference to the fact that Bishop Pican had received a suspended three-month sentence for refusing to report the crimes of Fr René Bissey, claiming that to do so would have violated the confessional (in fact, he had learned of the abuse from one of the victim's mothers). Nor, when Cardinal Castrillón wrote the letter, could he have been in any doubt about the priest's guilt. He had been jailed the year before for 18 years for the sexual abuse of 11 boys.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2010/apr/21/religion-castrillon-coverup-johnpaul2
Chilean priest allegedly abused 5 young men AP Apr 22, 2010 SANTIAGO, Chile – A Chilean prosecutor on Thursday announced a criminal investigation of a popular retired priest accused of sexually abusing five young men in his parish residence.
The allegations were lodged late last year and confirmed by the archbishop of Santiago only this week, as Chile's Roman Catholic leadership appealed publicly for forgiveness for alleged abuses involving 20 clergy members. Five of them have been convicted and 15 others are under investigation.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100423/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/lt_chile_church_abuse
Belgium's Catholic bishop of Bruges quits over abuse 4/23/10 The bishop of the Belgian city of Bruges, Roger Vangheluwe, has resigned after admitting sexual abuse of a boy earlier in his career. Bishop Vangheluwe, 73, said the abuse had happened when he was a simple priest and continued when he started as a bishop, a Vatican statement said. The Vatican said Pope Benedict XVI had accepted the resignation. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8639253.stm
Monday, April 12, 2010
bishops fight sex abuse bill, implicated in coverup, complaints 'unpunished'
Connecticut bishops fight sex abuse bill Jamie Guzzardo, CNN April 11, 2010 Hartford, Connecticut (CNN) -- A bill in Connecticut's legislature that would remove the statute of limitations on child sexual abuse cases has sparked a fervent response from the state's Roman Catholic bishops, who released a letter to parishioners Saturday imploring them to oppose the measure.
Under current Connecticut law, sexual abuse victims have 30 years past their 18th birthday to file a lawsuit. The proposed change to the law would rescind that statute of limitations.
The proposed change to the law would put "all Church institutions, including your parish, at risk," says the letter, which was signed by Connecticut's three Roman Catholic bishops.
The letter is posted on the Web site of the Connecticut Catholic Public Affairs Conference, the public policy and advocacy office of Connecticut's Catholic bishops. It asks parishioners to contact their legislators in opposition of the bill.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/04/11/connecticut.abuse.bill/index.html
Ex-St. Catharines bishop implicated in coverup By GRANT LAFLECHE, QMI AGENCY 4/12/10 As local Catholics puzzle Friday over the sudden resignation of their bishop, his predecessor was implicated in the coverup of sexual abuse by a priest in Pembroke. Former St. Catharines bishop John O'Mara was named by former Pembroke bishop Joseph Windle in a 1993 letter to the Vatican's ambassador in Ottawa. O'Mara was named as part of a group of Ontario bishops who backed Windle's recommendation that the abuse of minors by a Pembroke priest be kept silent. The priest in question, Father Bernard Prince, had been shipped off to Rome and became a friend of then Pope John Paul II.
In his letter, Windle was deeply concerned that if the Vatican graced the priest with any attention or honours, it would expose the abuse and create a scandal....Prince was convicted in 2008 of sexually molesting 13 boys between 1964 and 1984, and was formally defrocked by Pope Benedict XVI last year. He was sent to Rome and became a Vatican official in 1991 after church officials in Canada first heard from a victim of his crimes. In his letter, which became public Friday as part of a civil case against the Pembroke Diocese and Prince, Windle supported the move even in light of the seriousness of the allegations. "I would not object to him being given another chance since it would remove him from the Canadian scene," Windle wrote. By 1993, further allegations against Prince surfaced. Windle explained in his letter there were four or five known victims and at least one of them was asking pointed questions about how the church was handling the situation. Still, Windle believed the Church could keep the situation secret because the victims were unlikely to go to the police or the press. http://www.niagarafallsreview.ca/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2529871
Paedophilia complaints 'unpunished' April 13, 2010 BELGIAN bishops have failed to punish any clergy over 300 complaints of paedophilia brought to their attention in the 1990s, claims a priest who helped many victims. ''We brought forward between 1992 and 1998 more than 300 complaints from victims of abuse committed by priests, but only 15 ended up with admissions'' of guilt, Father Rick Deville told the Flemish dailies De Standaard and Het Nieuwsblad yesterday.
''A priest accused would most often be moved, but was never punished,'' he complained. Founder of the group Human Rights in the Church, which defends victims of abuse, the 65-year-old Father Deville deplored the lack of support from the Belgian Catholic hierarchy. ''Very few bishops helped us,'' he said. In most cases the victims were told that their actions were ''unfortunately banned''. In some cases the victims themselves were accused of defamation, he said. AFP
http://www.theage.com.au/world/paedophilia-complaints-unpunished-20100412-s4e9.html
Vatican Clarifies Its Policy on Reporting Abuse VATICAN CITY (AP) - The Vatican on Monday responded to allegations it long concealed clerical sex abuse by making it clear for the first time that bishops and clerics worldwide should report such crimes to police if they are required to by law.
The policy, spelled out in a guide for laymen and posted on the Vatican's Web site, matches the policy worked out by U.S. bishops after an explosion of sex abuse cases in 2002.
Unlike the American norms, however, the Vatican guide contains no call for ''zero tolerance'' for priests who rape and molest children, and victims immediately criticized it as insufficient.
The Vatican insists it has long been the Catholic Church's policy for bishops, like all Christians, to obey civil reporting laws. But such an explicit policy had never been spelled out -- until Monday. ''Civil law concerning reporting of crimes to the appropriate authorities should always be followed,'' said the newly posted guideline.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/04/12/world/AP-EU-Church-Abuse.html
Under current Connecticut law, sexual abuse victims have 30 years past their 18th birthday to file a lawsuit. The proposed change to the law would rescind that statute of limitations.
The proposed change to the law would put "all Church institutions, including your parish, at risk," says the letter, which was signed by Connecticut's three Roman Catholic bishops.
The letter is posted on the Web site of the Connecticut Catholic Public Affairs Conference, the public policy and advocacy office of Connecticut's Catholic bishops. It asks parishioners to contact their legislators in opposition of the bill.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/04/11/connecticut.abuse.bill/index.html
Ex-St. Catharines bishop implicated in coverup By GRANT LAFLECHE, QMI AGENCY 4/12/10 As local Catholics puzzle Friday over the sudden resignation of their bishop, his predecessor was implicated in the coverup of sexual abuse by a priest in Pembroke. Former St. Catharines bishop John O'Mara was named by former Pembroke bishop Joseph Windle in a 1993 letter to the Vatican's ambassador in Ottawa. O'Mara was named as part of a group of Ontario bishops who backed Windle's recommendation that the abuse of minors by a Pembroke priest be kept silent. The priest in question, Father Bernard Prince, had been shipped off to Rome and became a friend of then Pope John Paul II.
In his letter, Windle was deeply concerned that if the Vatican graced the priest with any attention or honours, it would expose the abuse and create a scandal....Prince was convicted in 2008 of sexually molesting 13 boys between 1964 and 1984, and was formally defrocked by Pope Benedict XVI last year. He was sent to Rome and became a Vatican official in 1991 after church officials in Canada first heard from a victim of his crimes. In his letter, which became public Friday as part of a civil case against the Pembroke Diocese and Prince, Windle supported the move even in light of the seriousness of the allegations. "I would not object to him being given another chance since it would remove him from the Canadian scene," Windle wrote. By 1993, further allegations against Prince surfaced. Windle explained in his letter there were four or five known victims and at least one of them was asking pointed questions about how the church was handling the situation. Still, Windle believed the Church could keep the situation secret because the victims were unlikely to go to the police or the press. http://www.niagarafallsreview.ca/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2529871
Paedophilia complaints 'unpunished' April 13, 2010 BELGIAN bishops have failed to punish any clergy over 300 complaints of paedophilia brought to their attention in the 1990s, claims a priest who helped many victims. ''We brought forward between 1992 and 1998 more than 300 complaints from victims of abuse committed by priests, but only 15 ended up with admissions'' of guilt, Father Rick Deville told the Flemish dailies De Standaard and Het Nieuwsblad yesterday.
''A priest accused would most often be moved, but was never punished,'' he complained. Founder of the group Human Rights in the Church, which defends victims of abuse, the 65-year-old Father Deville deplored the lack of support from the Belgian Catholic hierarchy. ''Very few bishops helped us,'' he said. In most cases the victims were told that their actions were ''unfortunately banned''. In some cases the victims themselves were accused of defamation, he said. AFP
http://www.theage.com.au/world/paedophilia-complaints-unpunished-20100412-s4e9.html
Vatican Clarifies Its Policy on Reporting Abuse VATICAN CITY (AP) - The Vatican on Monday responded to allegations it long concealed clerical sex abuse by making it clear for the first time that bishops and clerics worldwide should report such crimes to police if they are required to by law.
The policy, spelled out in a guide for laymen and posted on the Vatican's Web site, matches the policy worked out by U.S. bishops after an explosion of sex abuse cases in 2002.
Unlike the American norms, however, the Vatican guide contains no call for ''zero tolerance'' for priests who rape and molest children, and victims immediately criticized it as insufficient.
The Vatican insists it has long been the Catholic Church's policy for bishops, like all Christians, to obey civil reporting laws. But such an explicit policy had never been spelled out -- until Monday. ''Civil law concerning reporting of crimes to the appropriate authorities should always be followed,'' said the newly posted guideline.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/04/12/world/AP-EU-Church-Abuse.html
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