Los Angeles Personal Injury Lawyer - Pope

Catholic Church "Repentant" Over Irish Abuse Scandal, Past and Present Actions Contradict Its Rhetoric

Paul Kiesel — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 18:07:43 GMT

DUBLIN (Reuters) - Irish bishops said they were "ashamed, humbled and repentant" about widespread abuse of children at Catholic-run schools after victims marched silently to the Irish parliament Wednesday to demand justice.

Disclosures of floggings, slave labor and gang rape in Ireland's now defunct system of industrial and reform schools have shamed Irish people, particularly older ones who did not confront what a report last month described as endemic abuse.

"Heinous crimes were perpetrated against the most innocent and vulnerable, and vile acts with life-lasting effects were carried out under the guise of the mission of Jesus Christ," the Irish Bishops' Conference said in a statement.

The leaders of the Catholic Church in Ireland met Pope Benedict Friday and he told them to make sure justice was done for all, "to bring healing to the survivors of abuse" and to prevent abuse from happening again, the bishops said.

The statement came hours after hundreds of victims of abuse, carrying children's shoes and wearing white ribbons symbolizing their lost youth, marched to parliament accompanied by thousands of other protestors.

"It was as if you were inside prison and when you come out you don't talk about it," said Marina Permaul, 66, who was brought up "military style" by nuns in the western county of Galway.

"You don't talk about it even to your children," said Permaul, who arrived from London to attend the march. "You're too ashamed of it all, and in any case would they believe you? You didn't dare speak out against a religious order."

COMPENSATION

Organizers of the march, held to coincide with a parliamentary debate on the report, have expressed anger that the debate was postponed to allow parliament to deal with a motion of confidence in the government.

"It really emphasizes again that the state hasn't actually understood one iota of what it was like for 165,000 children who went through 216 institutions," said victim Christine Buckley.

The inquiry, chaired by High Court Justice Sean Ryan, criticized religious authorities for covering up the crimes and the Department of Education for colluding in the silence. It noted children were also preyed upon by foster parents, volunteer workers and employers [. . .]

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Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Cardinal Mahony Testifies in Fresno Clergy Abuse Case

Paul Kiesel — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 16:37:32 GMT

From The Associated Press:

Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles is on the witness stand testifying in the case of two brothers who claim they were molested years ago by a priest at a San Joaquin Valley church.

Mahony was a high-level administrator in the Fresno diocese during some of the years George and Howard Santillan claim they were molested by Monsignor Anthony Herdegen at a church in Wasco, a small town north of Bakersfield.

The brothers filed their lawsuit in 2003 under a one-year window that voided the statute of limitations on old abuse claims in California.

Mahony is now head of the nation's largest Roman Catholic archdiocese. This marks only the second time he will take the witness stand to answer questions before jurors about alleged molestation by priests.

______________________________________________________

"This is extremely rare..."

The brothers' lawsuit had originally been thrown out by a trial judge but was revived last May by state appellate judges, who took a close look on Mahony's own words during a deposition. Mahony had indicated in that deposition that higher-ups in the Fresno Diocese were aware of the abuse that took place, but did nothing to neither stop it nor prevent it from occurring again.

Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of BishopAccountability.org, a website devoted to the documentation of clergy abuse and the preservation of church records, said, "This is extremely rare [. . .] Mahony is by far the highest-ranking U.S. Catholic official to testify at a civil trial."

Cardinal Mahony is a paradoxical public figure. Many people in the Los Angeles-area see him as a wolf in sheep's clothing, a malevolent force behind the clergy abuse scandals who tried painting himself and the pedophiles in the Los Angeles and surrounding Dioceses as victims of a larger, societal problem.

The Cardinal's Other Problems

The Cardinal is currently under investigation by the FBI. The probe is aimed at determining whether Mahony, and other church leaders, committed fraud by failing to adequately deal with priests accused of sexually abusing children.

The Cardinal has also been doing his best to prevent an Iraqi War Veteran, who says he was sexually abused by a priest in his L.A.-area Catholic high school at the age of 16, from having his day in court.

On top of all of this, the Pope came out today and said that condoms are not the answer to preventing the transmission of HIV. Whether condoms are the complete or partial answer is a futile argument. To discourage the use of condoms, particularly while on your first pilgrimage to Africa, a continent that is facing an AIDS epidemic, is flat out stupid.

If this is the best the Catholic Church has to offer, I'm unimpressed.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Vatican, the Pope to be Held Liable for Its "Employees" Who Sexually Abused Children

Paul Kiesel — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 20:25:15 GMT

From the Los Angeles Times:

Reporting from Chicago -- A federal appeals court ruling has brought an Oregon man one step closer to suing the Vatican for sexual abuse he says he suffered by a Roman Catholic priest.

In a 59-page decision issued Tuesday, a three-judge panel from the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the man -- who says he was molested in the 1960s by a priest at a Catholic school -- can pursue a civil lawsuit against the Holy See because the priest allegedly abused him while serving in a religious capacity.

Lawyers for the plaintiff hailed the ruling as a watershed moment for victims of clergy abuse, who for decades have wanted to hold the Catholic hierarchy accountable for protecting priests.

A lawyer for the Holy See commended the ruling for acknowledging the Vatican's decentralized structure.

"They have been choosing for years . . . to protect the clerics and not the kids," said Jeff Anderson, a Minneapolis lawyer representing the Oregon man. "This really is another step forward, another door open. . . . The good news for the laity, the community of faith, the parishioners and all of us is that the Vatican can now be held accountable."

Although the ruling does not permit victims to sue Pope Benedict XVI, Anderson said he intended to depose the pontiff.

The case involves the late Rev. Andrew Ronan, a Servite priest who, according to victims' lawyers, was sent to Chicago after being accused of molesting children in his native Ireland. Archdiocesan officials said Ronan worked for St. Philip High School on Chicago's West Side from 1960 through 1965. He was then transferred to a Catholic school in Oregon, where he reportedly assaulted the plaintiff in the case. St. Philip closed in 1970. Ronan died in 1992.

Officials from the Servite order did not return calls seeking comment.

"The fact that the United States courts have opened this opportunity in this case sets the standard for the whole world that there really can be justice for one victim even though he's a victim of one powerful organization," Hamilton said. "We now have a template for understanding that anyone who harms our children in the U.S. is going to be held accountable whether they're sovereign or not."

But Jeffrey Lena, a California lawyer who represented the Holy See, said the ruling favored the Vatican by recognizing that every action everywhere could not be traced directly to Rome.

"The court did recognize, based on the plaintiff's complaint, that within the Catholic Church there exists different and separate legal entities," he said.

The U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in November that a lawsuit filed against the Vatican by three men alleging they were abused by clergy could continue. The lawyer in that case is seeking class-action status, saying there are thousands of victims nationwide.

Some legal scholars say the rulings are not the last word and expect the 9th Circuit Court's ruling to be overturned by the Supreme Court.

But G. Robert Blakey, a professor of law at the University of Notre Dame, said that if the plaintiff could prove that the priest was an employee of the Vatican, the ruling would stand.

"Is the Vatican potentially liable for child molesting? The answer to that question is yes if and only if you can show that the priest was engaged in conduct as an employee of the Vatican," Blakey said.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel