Los Angeles Personal Injury Lawyer - Priests

Bishops and Thugs: How the Catholic Church is Shaping Health Care Legislation

Paul Kiesel — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 19:07:42 GMT

WASHINGTON - Catholic bishops have emerged as a formidable force in the health care overhaul fight, using their clout with millions of Catholics and working behind the scenes in Congress to get strong abortion restrictions into the House bill.

They don't spend a dime on what is legally defined as lobbying, but lawmakers and insiders recognize that the bishops' voices matter — and they move votes. Representatives for the bishops were in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's Capitol suite negotiating with top officials last Friday evening as they reached final terms of the agreement. Earlier in the day, Pelosi, a Catholic and an abortion rights supporter, had been on the phone to Rome with Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, Washington's former archbishop, on the subject.

It wasn't the first time a high-ranking Catholic had weighed in with a key player on writing strict abortion curbs into the health measure. Boston's Cardinal Sean P. O'Malley personally appealed to President Barack Obama about it near the church altar at the early September funeral for Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass. Bishops quietly called their congressmen and senators to weigh in.

"The Catholic Church used their power — their clout, if you will — to influence this issue. They had to. It's a basic teaching of the religion," said Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., a leading abortion foe and architect of the health measure's restrictions.

Bringing in the bishops' staff
It was Stupak who told Pelosi last Friday that if she wanted a deal on the health bill, she'd be well advised to invite the bishops' staff, who were already in his office, to her table. "I said, 'Well, they're here, and they're one of the key groups you want to have on your side, so why don't we just bring them in and work this out," Stupak said.

Pelosi did, and the result was a final measure that — much to the outrage of abortion rights supporters — bars a new government-run insurance plan from covering abortions, except in cases or rape, incest or the life of the mother being in danger, and prohibits any health plan that receives federal subsidies in a new insurance marketplace from offering abortion coverage. If women wanted to purchase abortion coverage through such plans, they'd have to buy it separately, as a so-called rider on their insurance policies.

The outcome has put Obama and Democratic leaders — already struggling for consensus on the complex and politically tricky health measure — in a tough spot. Democratic abortion foes in the Senate vow they won't support health legislation that omits the strict restrictions approved by the House, while abortion rights champions say they can't possibly vote for a bill that contains them.

Obama suggested Monday that he wants to strike a balance that doesn't allow backdoor federal funding of abortions but preserves women's insurance choices. For now, however, no such middle ground has been identified, and the bishops have served their notice that they will be a player — perhaps the dominant one — in the final outcome.

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Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

The Catholic Church Still Doesn't Want You to Know Its Secrets

Paul Kiesel — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 16:42:00 GMT

From the Associated Press:

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — A Roman Catholic diocese in Connecticut sought Friday to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court to keep under wraps sex abuse documents that could shed light on how a prominent retired cardinal handled the allegations.

Bridgeport Diocese officials asked the state Supreme Court to continue a stay on releasing the documents while it asks the nation's highest court to review the case.

The state court has ruled that more than 12,000 pages of documents from more than 20 lawsuits against priests should be released. Those documents have been sealed from public view since the diocese settled the cases in 2001.

The records could reveal details on how retired New York Cardinal Edward Egan handled the allegations when he was Bridgeport bishop from 1988 to 2000. Egan's deposition should be in the file, according to an attorney for the newspapers seeking the documents.

In Boston, Cardinal Bernard Law resigned after church records were released detailing his role in handling sexual abuse claims.

The Bridgeport Diocese faced a Monday deadline to appeal before the records were disclosed.

"The diocese believes there are important constitutional issues," said Ralph Johnson III, attorney for the church. "These are issues important to all citizens."

Johnson acknowledged that the nation's highest court takes up only a small percentage of cases it is asked to review.

The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post and The Hartford Courant have been seeking the documents. Jonathan Albano, attorney for some of the papers, said that he would object to continuing the stay and that the case really involves state law that has been resolved.

"It's somewhat disappointing that the diocese continues to approach the litigation in a way that delays the public's right to see these documents," Albano said. "There's been seven years of litigation."

An advocacy group for victims of church sexual abuse condemned the latest appeal.

"We're disappointed that the complicity of top Catholic officials continues to remain hidden," said David Clohessy, national director of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests. "This is not what Connecticut Catholics or citizens deserve. It's one more painful reminder that bishops will do everything possible to protect themselves and their colleagues instead of children."

Church officials said that the media have reported on the cases extensively and that attorneys and victims had access to the sealed documents.

Court officials declined to comment.

In California, state courts ordered Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony to turn over to prosecutors private personnel files of two former priests accused of sexual molestation. In 2006, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the archdiocese's appeal.

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Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

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

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

From Reuters:

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

Sexual Abuse of Children was 'Endemic' and Covered Up by the Clergy in Ireland

Paul Kiesel — Fri, 22 May 2009 19:59:14 GMT

From Bloomberg:

May 20 (Bloomberg) -- Sexual abuse of children in Irish state and church-run institutions for boys was “endemic” and covered up by the clergy, according to a commission’s report.

“The recidivist nature of sexual abuse was known to religious authorities,” the government-appointed Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse said in its report, published in Dublin today. “The risk was seen by the congregations in terms of potential for scandal and bad publicity should the abuse be disclosed. The danger to children was not taken into account.”

The five-volume, 2,500-page Commission Report was published amid angry scenes as victims demonstrated outside a press conference demanding copies. The document is the result of almost 10 years of investigation into beatings and rapes at orphanages, schools and hospitals from the 1930s until the 1990s. The inquiry heard confidential testimony from more than 1,000 people who had been in 216 institutions.

“The schools investigated revealed a substantial level of sexual abuse of boys in care that extended over a range from improper touching and fondling to rape with violence,” according to the report. Corporal punishment in girls’ schools was “pervasive, severe, arbitrary and unpredictable.”

More than 90 percent of witnesses who gave evidence to the commission’s confidential committee reported being physically abused. Around half of the witnesses reported sexual abuse.

‘Abuse and Neglect’

“These children lived under a regime of physical, sexual, emotional abuse and neglect,” Meave Lewis, executive director of One in Four, a victims’ lobby group, told reporters. “Even put in the context of the harsh child-rearing practices of the time, it is really shocking.”

The Catholic Church has been grappling in recent years with allegations of sexual abuse by clergy in countries including Ireland and the U.S. Priests have been jailed and defrocked while the church has faced criticism for covering up the allegations by moving pedophile priests from parish to parish.

“We are deeply sorry for the hurt caused,” the Christian Brothers in Ireland said in an e-mailed statement today. “We are ashamed and saddened that many who complained of abuse were not listened to. We acknowledge and regret that our responses to physical and sexual abuse failed to consider the long term psychological effects on children.”

Pope Benedict XVI said he was “outraged” by the sex abuse scandal on a trip to the U.S. last year. “No words of mine can describe the pain and harm inflicted by such abuse,” he said.

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Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Hundreds of Children Beaten, Sexually Abused and "Terrorized" for Decades at Catholic-run Schools in Ireland

Paul Kiesel — Wed, 20 May 2009 17:40:46 GMT

From the Los Angeles Times:

Reporting from London -- Boys and girls were beaten, sexually abused and emotionally terrorized for decades in workhouse-style schools run by Ireland's Catholic Church, in which a "culture of silence" showed more concern for protecting victimizers than the children in their care, according to a long-awaited report released today in Dublin.

For more than half a century, excessive and arbitrary punishment created a climate in which students at schools administered by Catholic religious orders lived "with the daily terror of not knowing where the next beating was coming from."

Sexual molestation was "endemic," committed by offenders who were often transferred to other institutions rather than dismissed or turned over to authorities, said the report by Ireland's Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse.

And through it all, government inspectors failed to stop what was going on, despite attempts by some individuals to bring their abusers to account in an effort to lessen the trauma that many still suffer years later.

These are some of the findings of the 2,600-page report unveiled after a nine-year investigation. Drawing on the testimony of nearly 2,000 witnesses, men and women at more than 200 Catholic-run schools during the 1940s through the 1990s, the commission pieced together a damning picture of a church engaged too often in covering up misdeeds within its ranks instead of rooting out their perpetrators.

The five-volume report is a major blow for a religious institution that continues to wield enormous, albeit declining, influence on Irish society, especially on moral issues such as divorce and abortion.

Even then, it wasn't tough enough for some of the victims. Many are angry that the report includes no names of alleged offenders, an omission that one of the religious orders under investigation won in court. Only pseudonyms are used, making the chances of criminal prosecution slim.

"We expected that these people would be named and shamed and that some of them would be convicted," John Barrett, who testified before the commission, told Irish radio station TodayFM. "At the end of the day, some of us won't sleep tonight. We're still nowhere near the truth."

Barrett alleges that he was sexually abused while at a school for boys with learning disabilities, which was run by the Brothers of Charity in Ireland's County Cork.

Edmund Garvey, a spokesman for the Christian Brothers, one of the religious orders whose schools came under investigation, said: "Our first response to the report is to openly and unreservedly express our heartfelt sorrow and sadness and regret to those people who were victimized . . . We are deeply sorry, deeply regretful."

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Message to Notre Dame Response Group: President Obama's the Least of Your Worries

Paul Kiesel — Tue, 12 May 2009 20:14:28 GMT

A group of students -- a very small group of students -- from Notre Dame University made a short movie trailer (a la Hollywood-summer-blockbuster trailers) in an attempt to rally support around their cause and what appears to be the thesis of their trailer: Don't let President Obama speak at this weekend's graduation ceremonies.

Kids, the president speaking at your commencement is the least of your problems.

First, the trailer chose to quote current clergy members, like quotes from movie critics and reviews (cute), and as if the opinions of these clergy members, like New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan (an apathetic voice to victims of clergy sexual abuse), are valid. (They're really not that valid, unless we're discussing Theology.) Seriously, they're not. Not unless the Catholic church begins to make a better effort to eradicate pedophiles, like Father Eric Swearingen. Once that effort has started and is clearly visible, then we can start discussing the validity of clergy members' opinions.

Second, you had former President George W. Bush, an enabler of torture, give last year's commencement speech at your school. (I'm shaking my head, too.)

Third, up until recently, the Catholic church fed the nonsensical belief to families who lost their children before baptizing them, that their unbaptized babies would unfortunately be lost in "purgatory" forever. (You know, because the Catholic church is vehement in its support of protecting innocent life, it just seems that the church stops caring about that innocent life, once it is born.)

Hmm... My conclusion: The Notre Dame Response Group is more concerned with women's reproductive rights and fearful of a pragmatic president, a venerable family man, who has done more in his first 100 days as president than Bush, the "alleged" torturer, did within his first seven months as president, who, again, spoke at Notre Dame last year without fanfare. To me, this reeks of nonsense, however, it does fit with some of the nonsense that is propagated throughout various Catholic teachings (i.e. Condoms have microscopic holes in them and are defenseless against AIDS -- yep, they're currently teaching that nonsense throughout Africa and South America).

Lastly, and to be completely serious, if I were a senior graduating from ANY college right now, I'd be less concerned with who's speaking at my graduation and more concerned with the ability to find a job after I receive my diploma.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Another Sex Abuse Trial Against the Catholic Church Set to Begin: Seattle isn't Fresno

Paul Kiesel — Tue, 05 May 2009 21:26:13 GMT

...At least for the victims' the sake, let's hope Seattle is different from Fresno.

From the Seattle Post-Intelligencer:

Archdiocese, Jury Selection is expected to begin later this week in a sex abuse lawsuit against the Seattle Catholic Archdiocese, which would become one of few such cases across the country to go to trial.

In court papers, four men claim they were sexually assaulted by Patrick O'Donnell, a former Spokane priest currently residing in Skagit County. Former Seattle Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen is named in the suit, among other church officials who supervised O'Donnell.

Spending most of his 26-year tenure as a priest in Spokane, O'Donnell served as a parish priest in Seattle's St. Paul parish between 1976 and 1978. He came to that post, according to the plaintiffs, after church officials learned he had been sexually abusing boys in Spokane.

The plaintiffs argue in court documents that, on hearing of the assaults from O'Donnell's supervisors, Hunthausen directed him to sex predator treatment. Still, they say Hunthausen restored O'Donnell's ministerial credentials six weeks after he arrived in Seattle and appointed him to a leadership position at a parish school.

During his time in Seattle, plaintiff's attorney Michael Pfau says, O'Donnell was allowed to obtain a doctorate in psychology at the University of Washington. His thesis, Pfau contends, was titled "A Prisoner's Dilemma: Evoking Trust Between Children and Adults."

Responding to the allegations in a statement, Archbishop Alex Burnett said:"I deeply regret the abuse these victims endured. Our goal and our consistent practice are to offer fair and just settlements and to provide psychological and pastoral care for victims of clergy sexual abuse."

Such settlements have meant that none of the dozens of plaintiffs filing such suits against Seattle Catholic institutions has gone to trial. That could change in coming weeks if the current suit proceeds as planned.

Attorneys for both sides were resolving pretrial motions Monday, with jury selection expected to begin Wednesday before Superior Court Judge Paris Kallas. A date for opening statements has not been set.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Why Cardinal Mahony is Wrong About the Catholic Church Being Safer Today for Children

Paul Kiesel — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 20:32:37 GMT

From The Times:

by Tom Perry

There is a common reaction from people whenever I talk about the sexual abuse that I and other pupils suffered at the hands of teachers at Caldicott boarding school in the 1960s and early 1970s, events which were successfully hushed up. “Ah, but that was then,” they say confidently, “things are different now.”

Really? Are you sure? Well, let’s take the case of Alastair, who was targeted at the age of 11 by a career paedophile at Caldicott and whose abuse was discovered by the matron in 1972 . His parents and those of other boys abused by the same teacher — Martin Carson — were called to the school, in Farnham Royal, Buckinghamshire. Carson was dismissed but police and social services were not alerted, apparently “for the benefit of the children”. None of the victims was seen by a doctor, nor any psychologically assessed. Carson later resumed teaching at another private school. (In 2003 he was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment after admitting indecent assault and possessing indecent images of children.) Faced with exactly the same events, what is different today? I’ll tell you — nothing. No school in England, maintained or independent, is under any statutory obligation to report alleged abuse to the authorities. This includes the Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO), the police or social services. Successive governments and the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) have delivered no practical improvements for the abused child for the past 38 years, despite endless child protection rhetoric.

I can almost hear the cries of “No — he’s wrong”. I have heard it so often. If you do not believe me — and many don’t — I suggest you try to identify a statute, then seek counsel’s opinion thereon if you think you've found something. I will wave you goodbye knowing that I will never hear from you again. Because nothing of the kind exists. You may encounter something that looks and smells like a statute but it does not bark like a statute. It is related to Section 175 of the Education Act 2002 for maintained schools, and Section 157 of the same Act for independent schools. These statutory duties are supported by “guidance” contained within Working Together to Safeguard Children, issued by the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) in April 2006, and Safeguarding Children and Safer Recruitment in Education, which was also issued by the DfES in November 2006 and took effect in January 2007.

All you will find at the cornerstone of child protection in English classrooms is that schools should report alleged abuse to the LADO. If a school fails to follow this “guideline” there is no sanction for “failing to report”. In theory the School Inspectors should put any such school on an undertaking to the DCSF to report alleged abuse appropriately: but this rarely happens (and is a frequent example of failure in the inspection process).

Presenting this “guidance” as quasi-statutory misleads most in the world of education, including, to my knowledge, a senior officer in the DCSF involved with Safeguarding. It is a triumph of presentation over reality. But the losers are the child victims of abuse, and it is this that the DCSF fails to understand. From many years of communication with the DCSF it has become clear that “Safeguarding” is not a subject of which there is much practical understanding. As far as I’m aware, I have never yet had an exchange about this with an officer from the DCSF who has had the benefit of a social-care background.

I discovered more about the fractured landscape of child protection in education as a result of finally and belatedly trying to confront the legacy of sexual abuse that has so troubled my life.

I was abused from the age of 12 by one of my teachers at Caldicott, Peter Wright, who went on to become headmaster. The abuse began when he asked me to visit him in his room close to our dormitory. It continued when I would be asked to take up his morning cup of tea. After all these years I can still remember his smell when he kissed me. At the time I said nothing, silenced by fear, shame and a deeply dysfunctional sense, then fostered within the school’s culture, that I had been singled out for special treatment, that I was somehow “privileged”. This experience I have recounted in detail in the Bafta-nominated Channel 4 documentary Chosen, which has ignited the debate about sexual abuse in schools.

A unique combination of events prompted me to find my voice late in life. The mental death of my mother from Alzheimer’s; my son moving towards the age at which I had been abused; the appalling revelations of sexual abuse by clergy in the US that filled the news. And an extraordinary article that I’d read about a lawyer who was the Roman Catholic Church’s principal child sexual-abuse lawyer in Florida, who stopped mid-sentence mid-trial when cross-examining a male complainant and said: “I can’t do this any more, I was abused by my priest when I was an altar boy.” His extraordinary state of denial and years of silence chimed with mine. Mentally, I imploded and became very unwell.

The article continues here.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

The Atlantic: Noonan, Sex Abuse and Torture

Paul Kiesel — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 18:39:51 GMT

Below is a brief and insightful blog from The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan:

21 Apr 2009 03:20 pm

Noonan, Sex Abuse And Torture

Am I the only one to free associate from Peggy Noonan's infamous quote last Sunday to the church sex abuse crisis? This is what Noonan said about evidence of torture and war crimes:

“It’s hard for me to look at a great nation issuing these documents and sending them out to the world and thinking, ‘Oh, much good will come of that.’ Sometimes in life you want to keep walking… Some of life has to be mysterious."

Isn't that exactly what the church authorities said when uncovering evidence of child abuse and rape among their own clergy?

“It’s hard for me to look at a great church issuing these documents and sending them out to the world and thinking, ‘Oh, much good will come of that.’"

And it's the same reasoning: your loyalty to an institution requires covering up its crimes, not exposing them. But there is one difference: child abuse was not the actual policy of the Vatican. Torture was the actual policy of the Bush White House. And still she walks on.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

AP: Former Priest Claims Molestation by Childhood Priest

Paul Kiesel — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 20:17:24 GMT

From The Associated Press:

ORANGE, Calif. (AP) — A former Roman Catholic priest filed a lawsuit Monday claiming that as a teenager in Southern California he was abused by a priest who was his mentor.

Ben Rodriguez, who left the priesthood in 2006, claims that Gordon J. Pillon molested him multiple times from 1978 to 1981 at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in La Habra.

The lawsuit said Pillon eventually influenced Rodriguez to enter seminary and become a priest.

Rodriguez's attorney Joseph George said Pillon is a professor at the University of Northern Virginia's campus in Prague. An e-mail to a Gordon Pillon at the Prague campus was not immediately returned.

In 2006, the diocese in Peoria, Ill., said Pillon was asked to step down after allegations of sexual misconduct with a minor surfaced. The Peoria diocese, where Pillon had been serving since 1993, said the alleged abuse happened when Pillon was serving in Orange County.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel