Showing posts with label Polish Archbishop. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Polish Archbishop. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 25, 2015
Polish priest jailed seven years over child sex abuse, Dartmouth 'Animal House' fraternity probed
Polish priest jailed for seven years over child sex abuse
WARSAW Wed Mar 25, 2015
(Reuters) - A Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing children in Poland and the Dominican Republic was sentenced to seven years in jail by a Polish court on Wednesday....
The priest, who under Polish law can only be identified as Wojciech G., was suspended by his religious order in the rural Dominican parish of Juncalito last year after local residents accused him of molesting altar boys, according to the church.
He was arrested after returning to his native Poland and was tried on 10 charges relating to child sex abuse and possessing pornographic images of children. The charges carried a maximum penalty of 15 years in jail.
Earlier in March, the priest offered to serve a seven-year jail term, under a part of Polish law that lets defendants file such motions without admitting guilt. Polish media have quoted the priest as saying he is not guilty....
The Vatican last year arrested a defrocked Polish archbishop, Jozef Wesolowski, former Vatican ambassador to the Dominican Republic, after he was accused of having sex with children during his posting.
A church tribunal had previously ordered Wesolowski to be stripped of the priesthood.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/25/us-poland-priest-court-idUSKBN0ML1IK20150325
Dartmouth 'Animal House' fraternity probed for branding rite
By John Lauerman and Michael McDonald, Bloomberg News March 25, 2015
Dartmouth College is investigating its Alpha Delta fraternity, inspiration for the movie "Animal House," for branding students' flesh as part of an initiation ritual.
The accusations, if proven by the school, could result in probation, suspension or permanent loss of recognition for the fraternity. The alleged incident occurred in the fall, Dartmouth said in a statement. The school didn't give further details.
Colleges across the U.S. have punished fraternities in recent weeks amid allegations of racism, hazing and offensive behavior toward women. Philip Hanlon, Dartmouth's president since 2013 and a former Alpha Delta member, has defended fraternity life while condemning "extreme behavior" that he said hurts the Hanover, New Hampshire, college and its reputation.
Alpha Delta "has a significant three-year history of disciplinary violations, including hazing, underage service of alcohol and hosting unregistered events," the college said in the statement....
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-wp-blm-news-bc-dartmouth-fraternity25-20150325-story.html
Monday, August 25, 2014
For Nuncio Accused of Abuse, Dominicans Want Justice at Home, Not Abroad, Polish archbishop appeals defrocking for sexual abuse: Vatican
"the church failed to inform the local authorities of the evidence against him, secretly recalled him to Rome last year before he could be investigated, and then invoked diplomatic immunity for Mr. Wesolowski so that he could not face trial in the Dominican Republic"
For Nuncio Accused of Abuse, Dominicans Want Justice at Home, Not Abroad
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN AUG. 23, 2014
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic — He was a familiar figure to the skinny shoeshine boys who work along the oceanfront promenade here. Wearing black track pants and a baseball cap pulled low over his balding head, they say, he would stroll along in the late afternoon and bring one of them down to the rocky shoreline or to a deserted monument for a local Catholic hero.
The boys say he gave them money to perform sexual acts. They called him “the Italian” because he spoke Spanish with an Italian accent.
It was only after he was spirited out of the country, the boys say, his picture splashed all over the local news media, that they learned his real identity: Archbishop Jozef Wesolowski, the Vatican’s ambassador to the Dominican Republic....
The case is the first time that a top Vatican ambassador, or nuncio — who serves as a personal envoy of the pope — has been accused of sexual abuse of minors. It has sent shock waves through the Vatican and two predominantly Catholic countries that have only begun to grapple with clergy sexual abuse: the Dominican Republic and Poland, where Mr. Wesolowski was ordained by the Polish prelate who later became Pope John Paul II....
Mr. Wesolowski has already faced the harshest penalty possible under the church’s canon law, short of excommunication: on June 27, he was defrocked by the Vatican, reducing him to the status of a layman. The Vatican, which as a city-state has its own judicial system, has also said it intends to try Mr. Wesolowski on criminal charges — the first time the Vatican has held a criminal trial for sexual abuse.
But far from settling the matter, the Vatican has stirred an outcry because it helped Mr. Wesolowski avoid criminal prosecution and a possible jail sentence in the Dominican Republic. Acting against its own guidelines for handling abuse cases, the church failed to inform the local authorities of the evidence against him, secretly recalled him to Rome last year before he could be investigated, and then invoked diplomatic immunity for Mr. Wesolowski so that he could not face trial in the Dominican Republic....
A Dominican bishop, Victor Masalles, visiting Rome in late June, said in a Twitter message that he was surprised to see Mr. Wesolowski “strolling the Via della Scrofa,” in the city’s picturesque ancient center. He added, “The silence of the Church has hurt the people of God.”....
Mr. Wesolowski, 66, was ordained at 23 in Krakow by Archbishop Karol Józef Wojtyla, who later became Pope John Paul II. In 1999, he was appointed papal nuncio to Bolivia, and in 2002, he was reassigned to Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan....
Neither the cardinal, nor other church officials, reported the allegations to the local authorities, Dominican officials say. Vatican guidelines say that criminal sexual abuse accusations should be reported in countries where reporting is required....
The case has reverberated in Poland, where prosecutors have sought to extradite Mr. Wesolowski, who holds both Vatican and Polish citizenship. Poland has indicted another Polish priest, the Rev. Wojciech Gil, who fled the Dominican Republic last year amid allegations that he abused altar boys in his rural parish. Prosecutors in the Dominican Republic say that Father Gil and Mr. Wesolowski spent time with young boys at the nuncio’s beach house....
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/24/world/americas/whisked-away-vatican-ambassador-accused-of-sexual-abuse-of-minors.html
Polish archbishop appeals defrocking for sexual abuse: Vatican
VATICAN CITY Mon Aug 25, 2014
(Reuters) - A Polish archbishop accused of child sex abuse in the Dominican Republic has appealed against a Roman Catholic tribunal's decision to defrock him, the Vatican said on Monday.
Jozef Wesolowski, who had served as a Vatican nuncio or ambassador to the Caribbean nation, was sentenced in late June to be expelled from the priesthood, an extremely rare step against such a senior church official.
"Former nuncio Josef Wesolowski has recently appealed, within the prescribed limit of two months, against the most serious canonical sentence, that of a return to the lay state, which has been imposed upon him," Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said in a statement....
If found guilty in a criminal trial, Wesolowski could risk extradition to the Dominican Republic, which has appointed a special prosecutor to investigate the case....
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/25/us-vatican-abuse-archbishop-idUSKBN0GP1QG20140825
For Nuncio Accused of Abuse, Dominicans Want Justice at Home, Not Abroad
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN AUG. 23, 2014
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic — He was a familiar figure to the skinny shoeshine boys who work along the oceanfront promenade here. Wearing black track pants and a baseball cap pulled low over his balding head, they say, he would stroll along in the late afternoon and bring one of them down to the rocky shoreline or to a deserted monument for a local Catholic hero.
The boys say he gave them money to perform sexual acts. They called him “the Italian” because he spoke Spanish with an Italian accent.
It was only after he was spirited out of the country, the boys say, his picture splashed all over the local news media, that they learned his real identity: Archbishop Jozef Wesolowski, the Vatican’s ambassador to the Dominican Republic....
The case is the first time that a top Vatican ambassador, or nuncio — who serves as a personal envoy of the pope — has been accused of sexual abuse of minors. It has sent shock waves through the Vatican and two predominantly Catholic countries that have only begun to grapple with clergy sexual abuse: the Dominican Republic and Poland, where Mr. Wesolowski was ordained by the Polish prelate who later became Pope John Paul II....
Mr. Wesolowski has already faced the harshest penalty possible under the church’s canon law, short of excommunication: on June 27, he was defrocked by the Vatican, reducing him to the status of a layman. The Vatican, which as a city-state has its own judicial system, has also said it intends to try Mr. Wesolowski on criminal charges — the first time the Vatican has held a criminal trial for sexual abuse.
But far from settling the matter, the Vatican has stirred an outcry because it helped Mr. Wesolowski avoid criminal prosecution and a possible jail sentence in the Dominican Republic. Acting against its own guidelines for handling abuse cases, the church failed to inform the local authorities of the evidence against him, secretly recalled him to Rome last year before he could be investigated, and then invoked diplomatic immunity for Mr. Wesolowski so that he could not face trial in the Dominican Republic....
A Dominican bishop, Victor Masalles, visiting Rome in late June, said in a Twitter message that he was surprised to see Mr. Wesolowski “strolling the Via della Scrofa,” in the city’s picturesque ancient center. He added, “The silence of the Church has hurt the people of God.”....
Mr. Wesolowski, 66, was ordained at 23 in Krakow by Archbishop Karol Józef Wojtyla, who later became Pope John Paul II. In 1999, he was appointed papal nuncio to Bolivia, and in 2002, he was reassigned to Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan....
Neither the cardinal, nor other church officials, reported the allegations to the local authorities, Dominican officials say. Vatican guidelines say that criminal sexual abuse accusations should be reported in countries where reporting is required....
The case has reverberated in Poland, where prosecutors have sought to extradite Mr. Wesolowski, who holds both Vatican and Polish citizenship. Poland has indicted another Polish priest, the Rev. Wojciech Gil, who fled the Dominican Republic last year amid allegations that he abused altar boys in his rural parish. Prosecutors in the Dominican Republic say that Father Gil and Mr. Wesolowski spent time with young boys at the nuncio’s beach house....
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/24/world/americas/whisked-away-vatican-ambassador-accused-of-sexual-abuse-of-minors.html
Polish archbishop appeals defrocking for sexual abuse: Vatican
VATICAN CITY Mon Aug 25, 2014
(Reuters) - A Polish archbishop accused of child sex abuse in the Dominican Republic has appealed against a Roman Catholic tribunal's decision to defrock him, the Vatican said on Monday.
Jozef Wesolowski, who had served as a Vatican nuncio or ambassador to the Caribbean nation, was sentenced in late June to be expelled from the priesthood, an extremely rare step against such a senior church official.
"Former nuncio Josef Wesolowski has recently appealed, within the prescribed limit of two months, against the most serious canonical sentence, that of a return to the lay state, which has been imposed upon him," Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said in a statement....
If found guilty in a criminal trial, Wesolowski could risk extradition to the Dominican Republic, which has appointed a special prosecutor to investigate the case....
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/25/us-vatican-abuse-archbishop-idUSKBN0GP1QG20140825
Friday, October 11, 2013
Satanic murder suspect apologised, 'Satanic' child sentenced to eight years for killing friend, Father beheads stepdaughter for ritual purposes, Polish Archbishop Jozef Michalik Sex Abuse Comments Prompt Outrage
- Satanic murder suspect apologised
- 'Satanic' child sentenced to eight years for killing friend
- Gory: Father beheads stepdaughter for ritual purposes
- Polish Archbishop Jozef Michalik Sex Abuse Comments Prompt Outrage: 'Child Seeking Love' Because Of Divorced Parents
Satanic murder suspect apologised
October 10 2013 By Naledi Mailula
Johannesburg - Murder accused Linden Wagner wanted to apologise for his role in the alleged satanic killing of Johannesburg teenager Kirsty Theologo and the assault of her friend, a court heard on Thursday.
Wagner told the High Court in Johannesburg, sitting in Palm Ridge, that he had written letters to the girls and their families, which they had initially refused to accept....
He looked at Theologo's friend, seated in the public gallery, while he said this. She raised her middle finger at him. She was 14 at the time of the attack....
The girls were assaulted and Theologo was set alight as part of an apparent satanic ritual at a hill in Linmeyer, in October 2011....
Wagner, Harvey Isha, Robin Harwood, and Courtney Daniels are on trial for Theologo's murder and the attempted murder of her friend, and for assault with intent to cause grievous bodily harm. All have pleaded not guilty.
Two other accused, Jeremy King and Lester Moody, confessed to the crime and were each sentenced to 17 years' imprisonment, five of them suspended....
http://www.thepost.co.za/satanic-murder-suspect-apologised-1.1590290
'Satanic' child sentenced to eight years for killing friend Sapa 11 October, 2013
A satanist teenage girl who confessed to killing her friend was sentenced to in effect eight years in juvenile prison by the High Court in Johannesburg, sitting in Palm Ridge.
Judge Geraldine Borchers imposed a sentence of 10 years, two of them suspended, and ordered that it be served in the juvenile section of the Leeuwkop prison.
In a statement, the teenager confessed to killing Keamogetswe Sefularo on March 1, near Randfontein, after Sefularo decided to leave a cult....
The court heard that the girl had hoped to gain financially from satanism.
She believed her spirit would be able to get into key holes and into a bank where she could steal money, said Borchers.
It was horrific that such a young person could be lured into satanism because of a desire for money, she said....
http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/2013/10/11/satanic-child-sentenced-to-eight-years-for-killing-friend
Gory: Father beheads stepdaughter for ritual purposes
Crime & Punishment of Friday, 11 October 2013
Source: Daily Graphic
The entire Kyekyewere community in the Tarkwa Nsuaem municipality in the Western Region was thrown into a state of shock when a resident of the community beheaded his four-year-old stepdaughter.
The suspect, identified as Kwesi Qaison, 45, was said to have beheaded the stepdaughter, Effua Otoo, for ritual purposes, but an angry mob lynched him afterwards....
http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/crime/artikel.php?ID=288605
Polish Archbishop Jozef Michalik Sex Abuse Comments Prompt Outrage: 'Child Seeking Love' Because Of Divorced Parents
WARSAW, Oct 8 (Reuters) - Poland's most senior Catholic cleric said children with divorced parents were sometimes more vulnerable to sexual abuse by priests, remarks that prompted a storm of outrage though the church later said it was a slip of the tongue.
The comments from Archbishop Jozef Michalik entrenched the view among some younger Poles that the church is out of touch with modern society and failing to properly confront allegations of sexual abuse by priests.
In comments shown on Tuesday by broadcaster TVN24, Michalik said child sexual abuse by priests was unacceptable, but the debate about it needed to be broadened out beyond the immediate physical or psychological wounds inflicted on the victims.
"And one has to say ... how many wounds are inflicted when parents divorce? We often hear that this inappropriate attitude (paedophilia), or abuse, manifests itself when a child is seeking love," said the clergyman, who is head of the Roman Catholic episcopate in Poland....
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/08/polish-archbishop-jozef-michalik-sex-abuse-comments-_n_4065751.html
- 'Satanic' child sentenced to eight years for killing friend
- Gory: Father beheads stepdaughter for ritual purposes
- Polish Archbishop Jozef Michalik Sex Abuse Comments Prompt Outrage: 'Child Seeking Love' Because Of Divorced Parents
Satanic murder suspect apologised
October 10 2013 By Naledi Mailula
Johannesburg - Murder accused Linden Wagner wanted to apologise for his role in the alleged satanic killing of Johannesburg teenager Kirsty Theologo and the assault of her friend, a court heard on Thursday.
Wagner told the High Court in Johannesburg, sitting in Palm Ridge, that he had written letters to the girls and their families, which they had initially refused to accept....
He looked at Theologo's friend, seated in the public gallery, while he said this. She raised her middle finger at him. She was 14 at the time of the attack....
The girls were assaulted and Theologo was set alight as part of an apparent satanic ritual at a hill in Linmeyer, in October 2011....
Wagner, Harvey Isha, Robin Harwood, and Courtney Daniels are on trial for Theologo's murder and the attempted murder of her friend, and for assault with intent to cause grievous bodily harm. All have pleaded not guilty.
Two other accused, Jeremy King and Lester Moody, confessed to the crime and were each sentenced to 17 years' imprisonment, five of them suspended....
http://www.thepost.co.za/satanic-murder-suspect-apologised-1.1590290
'Satanic' child sentenced to eight years for killing friend Sapa 11 October, 2013
A satanist teenage girl who confessed to killing her friend was sentenced to in effect eight years in juvenile prison by the High Court in Johannesburg, sitting in Palm Ridge.
Judge Geraldine Borchers imposed a sentence of 10 years, two of them suspended, and ordered that it be served in the juvenile section of the Leeuwkop prison.
In a statement, the teenager confessed to killing Keamogetswe Sefularo on March 1, near Randfontein, after Sefularo decided to leave a cult....
The court heard that the girl had hoped to gain financially from satanism.
She believed her spirit would be able to get into key holes and into a bank where she could steal money, said Borchers.
It was horrific that such a young person could be lured into satanism because of a desire for money, she said....
http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/2013/10/11/satanic-child-sentenced-to-eight-years-for-killing-friend
Gory: Father beheads stepdaughter for ritual purposes
Crime & Punishment of Friday, 11 October 2013
Source: Daily Graphic
The entire Kyekyewere community in the Tarkwa Nsuaem municipality in the Western Region was thrown into a state of shock when a resident of the community beheaded his four-year-old stepdaughter.
The suspect, identified as Kwesi Qaison, 45, was said to have beheaded the stepdaughter, Effua Otoo, for ritual purposes, but an angry mob lynched him afterwards....
http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/crime/artikel.php?ID=288605
Polish Archbishop Jozef Michalik Sex Abuse Comments Prompt Outrage: 'Child Seeking Love' Because Of Divorced Parents
WARSAW, Oct 8 (Reuters) - Poland's most senior Catholic cleric said children with divorced parents were sometimes more vulnerable to sexual abuse by priests, remarks that prompted a storm of outrage though the church later said it was a slip of the tongue.
The comments from Archbishop Jozef Michalik entrenched the view among some younger Poles that the church is out of touch with modern society and failing to properly confront allegations of sexual abuse by priests.
In comments shown on Tuesday by broadcaster TVN24, Michalik said child sexual abuse by priests was unacceptable, but the debate about it needed to be broadened out beyond the immediate physical or psychological wounds inflicted on the victims.
"And one has to say ... how many wounds are inflicted when parents divorce? We often hear that this inappropriate attitude (paedophilia), or abuse, manifests itself when a child is seeking love," said the clergyman, who is head of the Roman Catholic episcopate in Poland....
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/08/polish-archbishop-jozef-michalik-sex-abuse-comments-_n_4065751.html
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