Hear what Roger Mahony does not want you to hear. Bishop who confronts sex and crime in the Catholic Church will appear in LA June 12

By Kay Ebeling

What a clear and direct opening paragraph: “Sexual abuse of minors by a significant number of priests, together with the attempts by many church authorities to conceal the abuse, constitute one of the ugliest stories ever to emerge from the Catholic Church. It is hard to imagine a more total contradiction of everything Jesus Christ stood for, and it would be difficult to overestimate the pervasive and lasting harm it has done to the Church.”

The book quoted above caused Roger Mahony to write: “I am hereby requesting that you cancel your visit to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. Canon 763 makes it clear that the Diocesan Bishop must safeguard the preaching of God’s Word in his own Diocese. Under the provisions of Canon 763, I hereby deny you permission to speak in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.” -- Signed His Eminence, Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, Archbishop of Los Angeles, May 9, 2008.

Showing all the respect due Roger Mahony when it comes to the issue of predator priests, Bishop Geoffrey Robinson from Australia, pictured above, will be speaking and signing his book, Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church, in Los Angeles June 12th at 7:00 PM , in the ballroom at the Four Points Sheraton Hotel near Fox Hills Mall, Culver City, 7:00 PM, admission free, $4 to park or you can take the 439 bus like me.

At least 10 other American bishops have sent letters like Roger Mahony’s urging Robinson to stay away, and the Australian Conference of Bishops has him under investigation because of his book “Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church.” There must be something worth seeing at Robinson's speaking engagements.

“These guys are like the Cosa Nostra, just like Frank Keating said,” says Tom Honore, pictured above, who organized the Culver City appearance, as an activist with A Call to Action. “Silence is their rule and that's why they're so angry about his book and what he’s saying.”

Robinson writes that the church is “fractured.” He says, “I felt that the demand was being made that I give my submission to the silence as well as to the words, and I could not do this."

Robinson’s ideas may be astonishing to Roman Catholics but once again as I forge through these stories, I realize how fortunate I was that my dad let me stop going to Catholic Church when I was 13 years old and showing so many signs of damage. My dad was only beginning to understand back in the early 1960s what rape by a priest in preschool years had done to my sister and me.

What Bishop Robinson is saying is not revolutionary. It’s what anyone who studies the Bible discovers about three or four books into the New Testament, that the problems in the Catholic Church date back to about the Year 100, when they started doing everything wrong and then built from there.

Plus, what Robinson is saying is considered by American bishops “dangerous to say” in “an institution that denounces homosexual behavior and all sexual activity outside of marriage but overlooks the perverted behavior of ‘celibate’ bishops and priests.”

That quote came in an email I think from Udo, and it expresses my thoughts exactly, although I have no idea who wrote it.

********************
‘Every ounce of effort I put forward to bring Bishop Robinson here would be worth it if survivors came to be with this man’
********************************

“From having read the book and witnessed the tears and horrible devastation that this abuse has wreaked in the lives of survivors, I hope survivors will come to see Geoffrey Robinson,” Honore said. “It’s rare to hear someone who’s a person of faith who understands authentic living and love,” Honore says.

“I would feel that every ounce of effort that I put forward would be worth it if survivors come and be with this man. He has a lot to offer.”

The ballroom at Four Points Sheraton where Robinson is speaking holds 200 people. City of Angels will be there and we hope to have video footage of an overflow crowd come to hear Geoffrey Robinson, retired bishop from Australia, speak, hopefully we'll get an interview to post here at City of Angels Network.

*********************
Robinson goes to Hebrews 5 and I’ve been looking for a reason to quote that book in the New Testament since I started the blog a year and a half ago!
********************************

ME: Misuse of this one construct in one book of the New Testament, written specifically for the Hebrews, is one core problem with the Catholic Church, pretty damnable evidence of dirty laundry all the way back to the year 100 or so. I hear a lot of dialogue about Hebrews 5:2-3 and the Catholic Church at Bible studies I go to in my neighborhood.

REVOLUTIONARY STUFF:

FROM the Introduction to Robinson’s Book:

‘Every high priest chosen from among human beings is put in charge of things pertaining to God on their behalf, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins.’ (Hebrews 5:1)

The Greek word (lambano) here translated as ‘chosen’ means simply ‘taken’, but the Latin text that was always quoted said assumptus, which means ‘taken up’.

The implication was that the priest was ‘taken up’ from among human beings to some higher level. This is not what the Letter to the Hebrews meant, for the next words are, ‘He is able to deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he himself is subject to weakness, and because of this he must offer sacrifice for his own sins as well as for those of the people.’ Hebrews (5:2-3)

Despite this, the idea of being ‘taken up’ was part of the culture and it brought some reflection of the ‘messiah complex’ into that culture. It was not a healthy idea and it must now be confronted.

This in turn led to a ‘mystique’ of the priesthood, a permanent state of being ‘taken up’.

ME: YES, YES, THAT'S THE CORE OF THE WHOLE PROBLEM,

That “Other Than” quality that priests carry with them, totally the opposite of what Christ wanted. Go, Bishop Robinson, keep talking!

*****************
ME: That's Also what sets CLERGY sex abuse apart from other forms of child molestation, because of the roots in spiritual abuse. That element of the “holier than thou” priest truly played into every one of our molests, all 500,000 or so of us who are walking on this earth damaged from rape by a pedophile priest.

It would not have happened if they hadn’t been priestsm if they hadn’t had that special entry into our families’ and therefore our lives.
*************************

SEMINARIES FOR PRIESTS ARE UNHEALTHY BECAUSE:

FROM ROBINSON’S BOOK CONTINUED:

It’s impossible to grow to maturity, especially when candidates are taken in as young as eleven or twelve years of age. There are many factors that do not contribute to healthy growth: the one-sex environment, the absence of parents and other nurturing figures, the other sex as a ‘threat’ to a vocation rather than as a positive and essential influence for adolescents, the absence of any positive preparation for a celibate lifestyle. At a time when adolescents and young adults need to develop their own identity.”

**********************
MORE ABOUT THE CULVER CITY APPEARANCE
*******************************

Honore, who organized, the Culver City appearance, started showing up at SNAP, VOTF, ACTA, and other demonstrations about clergy sex abuse around 2003.

“I kind of gravitated to people who were marginalized. As an African American it was a blessing for me to be on the outside looking in, and I feel like that's where the Gospel really takes us.”

Honore’s career took him from a Creole Catholic church in Baton Rouge, through the seminary and three years as a priest, then after leaving the priesthood, work in the Civil Rights movement, urban affairs, and finally a job with HUD that brought him to Los Angeles.

“I went to seminary at age 17 after my girlfriend died,” Honore said, “I entered in grief. It was during height of Civil Rights revolution. I was ordained 1965 one of the first four black men to graduate from St. Joseph Seminary in Washington DC.

Honore became a Josephite, an Order that worked in the late 1800s with ex-slaves.

“My parish was a black Catholic parish in Louisiana.” Honore said. “But I soon discovered the church hierarchy were patronizing and immature. That came to be true to me, so I resigned the priesthood. A year later I met my wife.”

She had been a nun with the Dominicans who left her order soon after going to North Africa to teach.

Honore worked as a professional community activist in Chicago 1968-1970. He got a masters in Urban Affairs at Loyola. He came to California in 1971 working for the federal Housing agency HUD developing Model Cities.

Ah those Golden Years when the federal government invested in its own people, but I digress. . . .

“I was fortunate I was ordained right as Vatican Council ended,” Honore says. “I started to see my faith was not involved with structure but it had a Gospel focus.”

**********************
If Roger Mahony says don’t listen, City of Angels Network will be there with camera ready to record Robinson for posterity.
*********************************

To me, as long as Roger Mahony and 10 other American bishops don’t want Robinson to talk, I want to go hear what he has to say. I mean read that letter, copied in full here:

MAHONY LETTER TO BISHOP ROBINSON:

Dear Bishop Robinson
I am writing once again in reference to your planned speaking engagement in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles on June 12, 2008.

Your letter informing me of your coming appearance made it clear that you were not seeking my permission or approval, that you were planning to come regardless.

Since your communication, I have come to learn that your new book is being investigated by the Australian Bishops’ Conference because of concerns about doctrinal errors and other statements in the book contrary to Church teaching.

I have also learned that His Eminence, Cardinal Giovanni Bautista, the Prefect for the Congregation of Bishops has urged you to cancel your visit to the United States.

Consequently, I am hereby requesting that you cancel your visit to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles now set for June 12, 2008. Canon 763 makes it clear that the Diocesan Bishop must safeguard the preaching of God’s Word and the teachings of the Church in his own Diocese. Under the provisions of Canon 763, I hereby deny you permission to speak in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

As a brother Bishop, I would urge you to cancel the entire speaking tour and to work closely with your own Bishops’ Conference on their investigation. I would surely expect you to fillow exactly their recommendations in this matter.

With every best wish, I am

Sincerely yours in Christ

Signed
His Eminence
Cardinal Roger M. Mahony
Archbishop of Los Angeles

*************************

ME: Mahony the man who has no credibility at all on the issue of pedophile priests tries to pull rank and intimidate a retired bishop from Australia.

THINK OF IT:

Robinson spent nine years in the 1990s dealing with the clergy abuse crisis and concluded the church is sick at its very core.

You have Mahony on one hand condemning Robinson, and Robinson on the other hand, describing the crimes of bishops like Mahony.

Which one are you going to believe.

The Cardinal tries to strong arm Bishop Robinson, saying as archbishop Mahony has to “safeguard the preaching of God’s Word in his own Diocese.”

If that's the case then Roger Mahony better leave the state quick

The Cardinal rose up through Church hieirarchy during the same years and decades that an epidemic of pedophiles raged in Roman Catholic parishes from canyons to desert to sea from at least the 1960s to the present, covering the entire Southern California region.

If Roger Mahony doesn't want people to hear Geoffrey Robinson, I say let’s organize carpools to the Four Points Sheraton Thursday June 12th to hear him speak at 7PM.

Normally, the sight of someone in a priest collar sends me the other direction, but some of the things Robinson says in his book hint at change, something good. So City of Angels will be at the Culver City appearance Thursday June 12 with video camera, hopefully to interview the bishop and post it on this blog.

“He puts the whole scandal in the context of someone who understands church history,” Honore said. “How the whole thing of power has corrupted the leaders, the distorted view of sex, how that has developed.”

“He sees how the abuse has come into a delicate and complicated truth of our lives, that we grow and develop by our experience of love,” Honore continued. “In those episodes of clergy abuse, the whole ability to love and trust was gouged like it was run through with a bulldozer.

“Robins admits there is no simple counseling, deep study is needed,” Honore said.

“He gives examples in a way that helps you to as an outsider get in touch with that reality and you start to understand how it’s going to take a long-long time in most instances, if the victims will ever be able to gain trust and to experience love.”

How does Robinson demonstrate that?
I asked.

“It comes up in Chapter 11 of the book, where he says some are trying to counsel people into forgiveness and healing without knowing how to walk the walk themselves.”

********************
Bishop Robinson had been molested as a child by an adult himself but did not realize the damage until he worked with other victims.
*******************************

Robinson was appointed in 1994 to the Australian Catholic Church's national professional standards committee to help develop procedures to respond to sex abuse complaints

He did not come out about his own sexual abuse publicly until three years after retirement, with the publication of the book. But his years working with the committee caused him to look at his own abuse differently.

Robinson is quoted as saying: "It was talking with victims and some of the things they said that aroused feelings and memories in my own mind. With the help of counselors, I became conscious of some of the effects it had had on me."

"I never wish to see any boy taken into the seminary at that age again."

Here are some quotes from the book’s Introduction.

ME: After reading a bit of it, I hope survivors have a presence at all three Robinson appearances in Southern California, if for no other reason, to show the world that the church needs to go in the direction of Geoffrey Robinson from Australia, not continue with the mafioso style strong arming of Roger Mahony of Hollywood.

QUOTES FROM INTRODUCTION

ROBINSON: In 1994 I was appointed by the Australian bishops to a position of leadership in responding to revelations of abuse, and for the following nine years I was at the heart of this storm within my country.

I felt sick to the stomach at the stories that victims told me.

It is inevitable that many will react to the sexual abuse of minors according to older values rather than with a new mind to meet a new problem.

****************************
A thousand years of secrecy
***************************************

“Those older values have for a thousand years included secrecy, the covering over of problems and the protection of the good name of the church.”

Robinson writes from an international perspective:

More from Robinson’s book”

There was a wide variety of responses to abuse within each nation.

Even now I cannot see evidence that a true confrontation of the problem is occurring. The staff of those clinical facilities specially set up for the treatment of priests and religious who have offended against minors have not been asked by Roman authorities for their findings on the causes of abuse.

The bishops of the world have not been asked to coordinate research and study within their own territories.

Until basic steps such as these are taken, I find it impossible to believe that church authorities are determined to confront rather than simply manage the problem.

********************
Celibacy is not the sole cause
************************************

Excerpt continued:

Celibacy is not the sole cause of sexual abuse by priests and religious. It would actually be good if it were, for then, by the simple expedient of abolishing celibacy, one could abolish all abuse. But even if celibacy were abolished tomorrow, there is every reason to believe that the problem would not disappear.

One of the best statements I have encountered concerning the causes of abuse, the one with the greatest promise of showing us the way forward, is that child abuse, by priests, religious or, for that matter, anyone else in the community, is most likely to occur when three factors come together:

an unhealthy psychological state, unhealthy ideas concerning power and sex, and an unhealthy environment or community in which a person lives.

*************************
HE IS TALKING DIRECTLY TO ME HERE:
******************************************

In almost every case there is evidence of careful selection and ‘grooming’ of a victim, of planning of the circumstances, and of care taken to ensure that the victim does not speak to others of what has happened, so it is impossible to dismiss paedophile activity as the result of a ‘sickness’ for which the offender is not responsible.

In most cases, there is clear evidence that offenders knew what they were doing and were responsible for their actions.

*****************
THE MESSIAH COMPLEX
********************************

Excerpt continued:

Worst case is that of the ‘messiah complex’, where a person believes that God is calling him or her to be, as it were, a messiah, a chosen one who is called to some special mission and is, therefore, above the rules out, that apply to ordinary mortals, an unhealthy domination and subservience will be present. including the moral rules. In such cases, if sexual abuse does not occur, some other form of abusive behaviour will.

********************
Robinson says the cause of clergy sex abuse is in the very roots of the Catholic church, where boys got isolated at way too young an age in seminaries, where priests were given godly attributes, directly the opposite of words written by Paul and others in the New Testament about how to carry out Christ’s message. Robinson even criticizes the clothes bishops and priests wear. For these ideas the bishops try to ban him from speaking to Americans.
*************************

God still has a sense of humor, or maybe it’s angels giving Nancy Drew here clues

Since I started writing this blog in January 2006, it’s never ceased to amaze me the parallels. Alberto Gonzales the Attorney General testifying, I don't recall, I don't recall at the same time as Roger Mahony was saying I don't recall I don't recall in what deposition testimony anyone was ever able to get in the LA Clergy Cases.

There was the arrest of the pedophiles in Utah at the same time as the Pope arrived in America, to try to keep the pedophile paparazzi away from the Pope. It didn't work.

Now we have Scott McClellan’s book about the Bush White House coming out in parallels to Bishop Geoffrey Robinson’s book about the broken Catholic Church.

It’s almost like God gives us clues, where to look for the truth, and I think it will be worthwhile to go hear Geoffrey Robinson speak June 12 in Culver City.

Usually news of a priest coming to speak, especially about clergy sex abuse, makes me make plans on the other side of town, but this time I'm going.

See ya there.

Geoffrey Robinson Southern California Tour Schedule

***
***

Thursday, June 12, 2008
7:00 pm

Four Points by Sheraton Hotel
5990 Green Valley Circle
Culver City, California

Sponsored by Call to Action
as well as IHM, VOTF, DIGNITY

Contact: Tom Honore' (cell) 310-748-1911, (phone) 310-559-7577 or e-mail: thonore@sbcglobal.net

ALSO IN SAN DIEGO TUESDAY
AND
COSTA MESA WEDNESDAY

Tuesday, June 10, 2008
7:00 pm – 10:00 pm
Atkins Pavilion of the UCSD Faculty Club
San Diego, California

Wednesday, June 11, 2008
7:00 pm
Hamilton Room at the Costa Mesa Neighborhood Center
1845 Park Avenue
Costa Mesa, California

Salesian compares sex abuse cases with burden and suffering of Christ. Salesian sex crime survivor writes, get out of your cesspool of denial

*******
A priest wrote: “The successful settlement with plaintiffs in the Los Angeles sexual abuse cases have (sic) been on the minds of all of us, especially with Father David Purdy, our provincial. I know for certain that these 17 cases have weighed heavily on him and have damaged his physical and psychological well being. With medication, rest, and conversation he seems to be doing much better.

"Didn’t St. Paul say we make up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ, an enigmatic statement for sure, but so true for Fr. David and our province these last few years? At the news that we had settled in Los Angeles, Fr. Pascual Chávez emailed to say, 'Now that the nightmare is over, I hope that Fr. David Purdy will feel better, because this was a tremendous pressure on him, and also the Province will be able to move forwardmore purified.'" -- Fr. John Itzaina, SDB, Vice Provincial, in In Touch, 5.19.08

A Salesian sex crime survivor wrote: "The current mouthpiece for World Record holder Clergy molesters the Salesians of California is Fr. John Itzaina. Itzaina goes on record as attacking Attorney Ray Boucher, for “getting rich on the misery of the abuses.” (see May 22 CofA post.)

Letter from Joey Piscitelli continued:

This formidable statement is followed by Itzaina’s claim that Salesians Clergy’s lives are ruined by “allegations without proof.” How can Attorneys get rich on the misery of the abused, if , according to Itzaina, the false accusers were not abused?

If it were true that the Salesians were merely innocent Priests who have been falsely targeted, I could not go on record and state in writing that: The Salesians Dabbenne and Billante were convicted, Presenti and Miani are serial pedophiles, Whelan and Vitone were found guilty by juries, and of course, the Salesians are record holder accused molesters.

********************
'Itzaina now cries that the Salesians are the victims'
*******************************

If Fr. Itzaina, and his reckless gang of accused, convicted, and admitted sex offenders ever emerged from their cloud of self pity and denial, they would see that they are their own worst enemy. Itzaina now cries to the media that the Salesians are the victims, and they have to sell their Mansion in San Francisco, that has housed countless child rapists, to pay for their court settlement.

Apparently it has not occurred to the narcissist kingpin that generally, the public does not have sympathy for rapists, deviates, molesters, child sodomizers, and pedophiles who bask in the luxury of a San Francisco Mansion.

Fr. Itzaina has been immersed in a capacious pool of Salesian accused molesters for years on end, and amazingly, and not believably, he “knows nothing.” Predictably, he does not offer an apology in his statement, he typically denigrates the victims, and resumes denial.

********************
Empty files just like their empty souls
******************************

That is the Salesian way. Along with the Salesian “empty files” of their serial molesters histories, they come up empty with remorse for the damage and destruction they have caused to so many children.

Most importantly, as the Salesians continue to wallow in their cesspool of indulgent self pity, they should be reminded that they could have settled the claims against their Mammoth Molestation Machine years ago, and avoided all their court costs and attorneys’ fees.

The price the Salesians have to pay was driven by their vindictive hatred, and their spiteful arrogance for their victims. The next time you go before the altar in front of Jesus Christ, Fr. Itzaina, I want you to light one candle for each of the victims the Salesians have sexually molested in California.

I am sure the light from the candles will illuminate the entire West Coast.

Joey Piscitelli

(Piscitelli is Northern California director of SNAP.)

Correction: Salesian Mansion is not squatty and it IS to be sold along with a camp to pay 17 LA plaintiffs. Plus, the LA Times gets it wrong again

*******
By Kay Ebeling
Good morning, folks, it’s time for some corrections. Re the Salesian mansion, which YES will be sold to pay the LA settlements, the Provincial House in San Francisco only looks "squatty" from the front where the public sees it, a faithful reader tells me. The mansion is “huge” and from side views it stretches w-a-a-a-ay back and takes up an entire city block.

Another correction: The Itzaina letter in the May 22nd post, where the Vice Provincial takes Ray Boucher to task and claims all Salesian priests are innocent, was not written last month as reported here, but less than 48 hours before the May 14th settlement, which included an admission that Titian Miani DID rape four plaintiffs. Also, Itzaina is not just "a Vice Provincial," but THE Vice-Provincial, my source emailed me scolding.

The camp to be sold is likely Camp Salesian, in Middletown, California, north of Santa Rosa, my source, who says he has to stay anonymous as that's how things are with the Salesians, said.

The Salesians have two camps, Camp St. Francis for boys age 7 to 13 featured in a post here last week, and Camp Salesian. “No activities appear to be planned at Camp Salesian in Middletown this summer,” said my source, “whereas a full summer camp program staffed by Salesians is scheduled at Camp St. Francis for this summer.”

So Camp St. Francis, with Salesian brothers running it, will be stock full of vulnerable boys age 7 to 13 along beachfront property outside Santa Cruz again this summer.

From the Camp St. Francis website:

Camp St Francis provides a wholesome Catholic setting for boys ages 7 - 13 to experience a meaningful and enjoyable summer with their peers

Camp Address:
Camp St. Francis
2320 Sumner Ave.
Aptos, CA 95003

I think there should be protesters where the parents drop the kids off for camp this summer every weekend, or at the camp entrance address above.

To warn the parents they are practically feeding their children to preying pedophiles.

The Salesian Religious Order has more pedophiles per capita than any other religious order in the United States.

And you want to send your pre-pubescent boys to be practically imprisoned no way out at summer camp with these predators?

***************
God knows what goes on in those cabins.
*************************

Here’s another idea. Just an idea:

TO GET THE BALL ROLLING toward Congressional hearings about sex crimes in the Catholic Church

Something to Do:
Send letters to:

Lisa Pinto
District Director
Office of Henry Waxman
8436 W. Third St. #600
LA CA 90048

She is in Henry Waxman’s office here in LA.

Henry Waxman chairs the Congressional Oversight Committee.

So write Lisa Pinto and US Rep Waxman a letter and explain the problem of sex crimes in the Catholic Church

Include Evidence with your Letter. Articles from the paper, documents, etc.

Tell them the 140,000 to 500,000 victims of pedohpile priests have yet to experience justice.

Settlements across the country the last 10 years did nothing but further hide the truth, as hierarchy in the church never had to testify.

We need Congressional hearings.

We need guys like Cardinal Roger Mahony to testify, and since the bishops avoided speaking in public under oath with settlements across the country, let the bishops sweat it out in front of national cameras and the teeth and claws of fresh Democrats in the US Congress next year.

We need Congressional Hearings on Sex Crimes in the Catholic Church. And other clergy.

This is a great time to approach Congress for hearings, with the recent FLDS raids in Utah and Texas.

We can start by sending a lot of letters to Lisa Pinto in Henry Waxman’s office at:

Lisa Pinto
District Director
Office of Henry Waxman
8436 W. Third St. #600
LA CA 90048

If you can, cc me your letters.

Please also mention City of Angels blog and A Matter of Truth in Boston, as we are all working together to get national level hearings, either in the Senate or the US Congress, sometime soon.

It starts with small steps.

If Lisa Pinto is inundated with letters, all of them from clergy abuse survivors wanting Congressional hearings, it might help get the ball rolling. Send copies of your letters to me as well, so I can relish in their wordsmithery. . .

It's late I need sleep...

***************
IF THE LA TIMES HAD BEEN THERE
They Would Have Gotten It Right
*************************

No one was there from the LA Times the day of the Salesian settlement hearing last week. However, the Times ran a story the next day and it was obviously written by someone at a desk in an office who, after getting the assignment, spent 15 minutes on the Internet, made a few phone calls, then wrote the story. The reporter may not even have been in Los Angeles, from what I hear about corporate run newspapers today. He could have been in San Francisco, or Arizona, and it would not have made a difference in the story.

AND THE LA TIMES GOT IT WRONG

The Los Angeles Times Insulted the 17 Salesian Plaintiffs, all victims of pedophile priest crimes in Los Angeles, by getting the story wrong.

We Don’t have a newspaper in Los Angeles anymore.
We have blogs.

The Times wrote:

Father Titian Miani, now 81, had been accused of preying on youths when they assigned him to St. John Bosco High School in Bellflower, where he allegedly molested four children

Had the Times bothered to send a reporter to the courtroom that day, they would have known that the Salesians admitted in open court, in front of the jury and the judge and the two reporters who were there, me and a woman from The Daily Journal--

That Titian Miani DID molest the four plaintiffs and that Edward Anthony Rodrigue IS guilty of raping other plaintiffs.

It’s not alleged anymore after they admit their guilt in court.

The LA Times still referred to the crimes of Titian Miani

As "alleged molestation."

That's what happens when you do beat reporting by last minute phone calls after the fact, instead of getting down and dirty and going document diving like we do here almost weekly at City of Angels Network.

An Epidemic of Pedophiles thriving in Southern California Catholic Churches for more than 50 years

And the LA Times is absent and then inaccurate for one of the critical hearings on the issue.

We Do Not have a newspaper in this city anymore.

Just blogs like mine.

(I work in TV. That's why I repeat myself so much.)

Here is the beginning of the LA Times story:

Salesians settle final L.A. Archdiocese priest abuse case for $19.5 million

By Richard Winton,
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
May 15, 2008

The Salesian Society agreed Wednesday to pay $19.5 million to 17 childhood molestation victims, ending the last unresolved case involving the Los Angeles Archdiocese's sexual abuse crisis.

The settlement came after jurors were seated to hear allegations that the Salesians knew Father Titian Miani, now 81, had been accused of preying on youths when they assigned him to St. John Bosco High School in Bellflower, where he allegedly molested four children

AAARGGGGGHHHH

I know, all newspapers always say allege until someone is locked up in prison.

They are more worried about getting sued than delivering the news.
*******
My head is in Chicago already.
I'm going to my perp church to look for clues.
Just Like Nancy Drew pictured at left holding The Clock. As I work here in LA the mind drifts and I'm in Chicago on the Metra, riding from the city out to the western suburbs.

I’ll get off at Bartlett and go straight to my perp church St. Peter Damian, and see what I can find out about Fr. Thomas Barry Horne, did he leave behind more crime victims than me and my sister. . . .

I’ve been looking at Bartlett from Google maps. The Chicago Metra stops downtown Bartlett in exactly the same place as the old train station in the town in the 1950s.

I know exactly how to get from the train station to the church, it’s only a few blocks. I’ll wear walking shoes.

I'm also taking my laptop and camera and the entire story will be here at City of Angels Blog, day to day. . .blow by blow...

I know Father Horne took kid porn pictures of me and my sister.

I know he was a baccanalian type who was doing my mother in order to get to her daughters. Or maybe he just liked doing it with all of us, I don't know, maybe I'll find out. . .

I hope I will find more victims of Thomas Barry Horne, predator priest.

Or some other thing that will help me prove my case, like Nancy Drew.

My head is in Chicago already.

Even the SNAP conference sounds exciting and I don't usually like conferences, as I can't sit still. So I'm going to be squirming and twitching at SNAP in July this year, the first year I've been able to go to a SNAP conference.

The trip to Chicago is happening thanks to hits on my PayPal button.

And I still don't have quite enough, need to raise about $450 dollars more.

Every five dollars helps. Please click my PayPal and help me get to Chicago and stay long enough to do the research I need to write this story and live it at the same time here on the blog.

***************
Life goes on.
************************

Meanwhile, still working on one of the most bizarre reality TV shows in history, called America’s Greatest Dog.

Like so many reality shows, people come and live in a house with a group of strangers with video cameras going all the time.

Except these people are there with their dogs. Now they're fighting over who’s got the best training techniques, and you're abusing your dog, and oh boy.

Wish I could retire and just work on the blog. Maybe next year.

Onward . . . More to Come. . .

By refusing to hear Child Sex Abuse Act and almost passing puppy protection act, PA legistors reveal priorities gone to the dogs

*****
By Mike Ference
(Reporting from PA for City of Angels Network)
State Rep. Lisa Bennington, D-Allegheny County, held a press conference May 12 in Harrisburg, PA, to discuss House Bill 1137, legislation known as the Child Victim’s Act of Pennsylvania, which addresses the statute of limitations and identification of sex abusers.

If the bill passes, it would raise the age at which an accuser could file a civil suit from 30 to 50, bringing the civil statute of limitations in line with the criminal statute. The bill would also suspend the civil statute of limitations for two years in child sex abuse cases, so that people over the age limit or whose SOL has expired could file a suit. The bill allows actions against child sex abusers and their enablers in both public and private institutions. (Rep. Bennington is shown in photo above.)

A 2005 Philadelphia Grand Jury Report uncovered 63 priests in the Philadelphia archdiocese who had abused hundreds of children over several decades. In some cases, archdiocese leaders intentionally concealed the abuse to protect the church.

Bennington stresses her bill does not target the Catholic Church. Rather, “it pertains to all religious institutions, public schools, youth groups and any organization where child sex abuse has occurred. This bill would give all Pennsylvania victims their fundamental right to hold those accountable that afflicted or allowed the abuse to occur.”

Sounds reasonable and seems like a good thing. Similar legislation has passed in California and Delaware in recent years. In California, about 1,000 victims came forward and 300 predators were identified. Yet, there’s one PA lawmaker who strongly opposes the legislation and doesn’t even intend to give the bill a hearing.

State Rep. Thomas R.Caltagirone D., (Berks County), the House Judiciary Committee chairman, says the proposed bill is driven by victims’ desire to win large legal payouts. Caltagirone goes on to say the bill is all about money, not about justice. (Photo of Caltagirone at right lifted freely from Philadelphia Inquirer website, so sue me --ke)

Ironically, Caltagirone was quick to vote with fellow legislators for a 50 percent increase in their pensions in 2001 and the infamous middle of the night pay raise in 2005. The state rep along with other lawmakers chose to take the self-induced pay grab immediately in unvouchered expenses. Many PA residents felt this made the elected officials look like money-hungry crooks, as it was eventually declared unconstitutional.

As expected, the Pennsylvania Catholic Conference deplores the bill, choosing to continue to protect perverted priests, rather than seek justice. Likewise, the Insurance Federation of Pennsylvania is also against the bill.

***************
While Caltagirone has officially declared HB1137 dead, his puppy-protection bill seems to be racing for the finish line.
*************************

Could the PA state Rep. Caltagirone be more concerned about protecting puppies than innocent children abused as sex toys by grown men and women? His recently unveiled, HB 2532 which would forbid dog owners from performing surgery on their pups went before the Judiciary Committee on May 14 and could be voted on as early as June 10.

As someone who has been investigating clergy abuse in Pennsylvania for almost 20 years, this writer can’t help but think that something is amiss.

On the eastern side of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office issued a scathing report on the Archdiocese of Philadelphia recently, for the high level of sexual abuse among Catholic priests and the cover ups and the reassigning of credibly accused Catholic priests by Cardinals Bevilacqua and Krol and their aides. It should be noted that Bevilacqua first served as Bishop of the Pittsburgh Diocese before his transfer to Philadelphia. Insiders claim Bevilacqua left his successor, Donald Wuerl, quite a mess.

For example, while Bevilacqua was still assigned to the Pittsburgh Diocese he agreed to place Fr. John P. Connor, an admitted child molester first within the Pittsburgh Diocese and later, after Bevilacqua took over in Philadelphia Fr. Connor was assigned there.

According to testimony in the Philadelphia Grand Jury the arrangement was based on a “tradition of bishops helping bishops.” Sadly, Fr. Connor went on to abuse others and Bevilacqua was found to be a liar according to the grand jury report.

One has to wonder why the Pittsburgh Diocese voluntarily settled with 32 alleged survivors of clergy abuse. $1.25 million for crimes the Pittsburgh Diocese will never have to admit ever occurred. The settlement would not tarnish the stellar reputation of Archbishop Donald Wuerl who never had to pay a dime to any clergy abuse victims during his tenure as bishop in the Pittsburgh Diocese.

Oddly enough, an underling – so to speak – Auxiliary Bishop Bradley reconciled the situation, only weeks before Bishop David Zubik was to be installed as the new leader of the diocese. So it seems everything fell into place.

So 32 survivors received a few bucks and the diocese is off the hook for any future civil or maybe even criminal suits based on the settlement. Wuerl continues to do in Washington D.C. whatever it is that Archbishops do and Zubik was allowed to get a fresh start in the Pittsburgh Diocese without the interference of those civil suits that were resting in limbo for several years.

The settling of the civil suits certainly allowed for an impressive and dignified installation of Bishop Zubik, no hecklers or demonstrators from any groups with compassion for children sexually abused by Catholic priests.

And, although I have no proof, nor any way to calculate, I would be willing to bet the farm that more money was spent on Zubik’s festivities than was awarded to 32 survivors of sexual abuse by Catholic priests from the Pittsburgh Diocese. No big deal, the worst is over.

Unless of course, somewhere down the road – maybe a year, a few months, a couple of weeks, or perhaps in the next few days – information turns up that the cases of sexual abuse actually occurred and that cover ups were the norm in the Pittsburgh Diocese just like cover ups and shifting priests from parish to parish was the norm in the archdiocese of Philadelphia.

Anyone with a little common sense would be concerned that a man of the cloth might be tempted to hide crimes of clergy sexual abuse of young children only on the eastern side of the commonwealth of PA and not the western side as well.

That’s a lot of ifs ands or buts – only time will tell if Pennsylvania is indeed a pro-pedophile state. For now it’s three cheers for Rep Bennington and HB 1137 as for Rep. Caltagirone – one politician who obviously cares more about dogs than children – maybe it’s time for the law maker to rollover and play dead.

***************

Mike Ference is an entrepreneur, writer, speaker and investigative reporter who has been probing clergy abuse in Pennsylvania for almost 20 years.

Mike Ference may be reached at 412-233-5491 or email him at Ference@icubed.com.

***************

(City of Angels Lady, AKA Kay, will return next week.)

An attack on Ray Boucher, a squatty SF mansion may be sold to pay a settlement, and should the Salesians still be running a summer camp for boys 7-13?

*****
By Kay Ebeling
When the Salesians finally admitted the guilt of one of their pedophile priests, Titian Miani, last week, the buzz around the courtroom was, “They're going to sell the mansion in San Francisco.” But as of yet there’s no settlement in writing, no one really knows how the Salesians will come up with $20 million dollars to pay 17 victims from LA. The Salesians, one religious order among hundreds in California, own about a hundred million dollars in real estate in the state, according to reliable sources.

The “Salesian Mansion” in San Francisco, the architectural squatty-body pictured above, is 15,000 square feet, with 38 rooms and 12 bathrooms on Franklin Street near Geary, which is a nebulous part of The City between the newly gentrified north Tenderloin and aging wealth of Pacific Heights, prime real estate, ready to be developed. They can get $30 million for that property alone, easy cash, considering they got the mansion free, a gift from the bishop of San Francisco 20 years ago.

Meanwhile last week the Pope who last month assured the world the church he leads would finally do something for the victims of its pedophile priest epidemic stood in his window looking out of St. Peter’s Square and said, “Faith is love and so creates poetry and music. Faith is joy and so creates beauty,” and so forth, in other words, he’s forgotten about us.

May 1, another pedophile from Salesian High School in Richmond CA was arrested and the principal posted a letter to parents on the school website saying: “Dear Families and Friends...There are times when adult behaviors by admired and respected guides break a sacred trust… This must be a moment to guide and carefully sort out factual from fictionalized perspectives…All of us have made mistakes….When painful events, surrounded by “whispers in the shadows” – rumors, speculation or gossip – are broadcast on Myspace (sic), discussed in parking lots, confidentiality and privacy can be easily breached.”

“He doesn't want people talking about sex abuse,” said Joey Piscitelli over the phone from the Bay Area where he is Northern California director of SNAP. “I’ve gotten several calls. The reason I went to the police several months ago was I got so many calls from kids that there’s a teacher hitting on girls at Salesian High. I went to the police and said why aren’t you doing something about this.”
************
‘Students were discussing Rickey Bonds sexual aggression and the Salesian faculty were unbelievably ignorant’
***************
Joey sent out a statement Thursday with more information about the arrest of Anatomy and Biology teacher Rickey Bonds at Joey’s alma mater, Salesian High in Richmond, saying:

“The reason this new allegation was investigated by the Police, is that dozens, if not hundreds of Salesian students had been discussing the current sex abuse allegations for months on end, openly, and notoriously, while Salesian faculty were unbelievably ignorant to the landslide of activity surrounding them.”

In 2006 Joey won a case against the Salesians which now sits in appellate purgatory in San Francisco.

“They say they're doing everything possible,” Joey said. “They just had a Salesian teacher arrested at the same high school where I was molested.

“The Salesians say this all happened a long time ago, and we're doing everything possible. The guy was just arrested last week. So what have they done?”

**********
The Salesians Are Deeply Sorry. Their Lawyers Cry At Settlement Hearings.
***************
If they really want to make amends, shown at left in a Google satellite map, the Salesians own a prime piece of beachfront real estate near Santa Cruz, now known as Camp St. Francis, a recreational trap for boys age 7 to 13.

Come on, parents, you're not really going to send your young boys to a camp run by the Salesians, are you?

As it says at the Don Bosco West website under news, although the date says 2004, "The Salesians of Don Bosco are deeply sorry. We are sorry also for any of our failures to adequately respond to allegations."

Those 15 acres of secluded beach front property, with camp type cabin structures already in place, in

APTOS, CALIF.

Could easily be the:

Future Recovery Center for Victims of Sex Crimes in the Catholic Church

The Salesian Camp St. Francis outside Santa Cruz would be perfect as the first of many recovery centers the church could start setting up right now

To start really making amends for the five hundred thousand or so crime victims the Catholic Church left behind after

THE PEDOPHILE EPIDEMIC

An epidemic of pedophilia ran rampant through the Roman Catholic Church and ALL of its religious societies for more than 50 years in the US.
**********
The Salesians hold the record for the highest number of pedophiles in one religious order.
***************
So the Salesians should set a precedent and relinquish the land at Camp St. Francis to be used as a recovery center for the church’s crime victims.

They really need to get rid of the creepy picture they use to advertise the camp shown at right supposedly a rendition of Don Bosco and a young boy he kept around, Dominic Savio.

Unless a parent wants to surrender their sons to the pedophiles out of some sick confusion of sex and spirituality, I can’t see any reason to send kids to Camp St. Francis run by the Salesians the religious order with more pedophiles than any other religious order in America.

In fact someone should start a campaign to stop parents from sending their kids to Camp St. Francis.

“Does this sound like a safe atmosphere for students?” Joey asked? “Does that sound like they've done anything, changed anything?”

**********
Vice Provincial hits the keys and Really Tells Off Ray Boucher
****************
Last month, one little wimpet, a Salesian Vice Provincial, probably a resident of that 38 room mansion near the San Francisco Cathedral, got hold of the computer while the boss was out of town, and maybe distraught at the thought of giving up the mansion, he typed away and produced this:

By Fr. John Itzaina,
Vice Provincial

Confreres,

While Father David is on the mend and spending a few days away on retreat, allow me to fill in for him as his vicar for this issue, of In-Touch (May 2008, official newsletter of the Salesian Society)

In a recent article in the Los Angeles Times, we Salesians were characterized as “a rogue arm of the Catholic Church. They are unrepentant, uncaring and have a culture of secrecy.” Despite the fact that this comes from Raymond Boucher, the attorney for the four plaintiffs in the Father Titian Miani trial, and attorney for hundreds of the cases against the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and religious orders, the extremely uncomplimentary description gives us a teachable moment in the life of our province.

That we should be characterized as “unrepentant” doesn’t surprise me. We seem to be the only religious order to have the temerity to defend our Salesian brothers in court of law. Why should our brothers’ lives be ruined by allegation without proof? For Boucher and for those who have gotten rich on the misery of the abused, “unrepentant” means we believe that in the United States you’re innocent until proven guilty, not the other way around.

In this age of transparency, Boucher calls us Salesians having a “culture of secrecy.” By that he means that he can’t find enough evidence to prove “punitive damages.” He presumes that since the Salesians are guilty, it must be documented in our files; and since there’s nothing in the files, we must be guilty of secretly extracting damaging information.
**********

Ahem.

The Salesians admitted Titian Miani was guilty of pedophilia in LA Superior Court, Department 308, May 14, 2008.

These guys need to lighten up on the sherry.

****************
RANT
ONE REASON I’M GLAD THERE WAS NO TRIAL THIS MONTH

I was having trouble getting to Superior Court at 6th and Commonwealth because of construction going on at the nearest Metro Station. There at Vermont and Wilshire they're building “luxury apartments.” Studios start at $1729 but all the cheap ones are rented. All they have left as of May 1st are the studios that go for $1776. One bedrooms start at $1449 and go up as high as $1993.

While building these luxury one-room apartments in the slums, they didn't even bother to put a pedestrian walkway around construction site. So to transfer from the Red Line subway to a bus on 6th and get to the court, you have to walk out in the middle of the street. There is no little covered walkway, no “Danger Pedestrian in the Middle of the Road” sign. You just have to take a deep breath and dive out into traffic hoping no one hits you for a half block or so until you get to sidewalk on the other side.
**********
Who cares about pedestrians when you're building luxury apartments over a public transit station in the slums?
***************
I'm real familiar with the neighborhood around the Red Line station at Vermont as the transitional homeless shelter where I lived with my daughter in early 2005 is three blocks away. Two blocks away people stand in the street and pat tortillas with their bare hands, selling food on the street to people who sell other stuff on the street, it’s a whole third world economy going on where the LA Times, the Mayor, and most white people fear to tred.

Near this corner where “luxury apartments” construction sends pedestrians into the middle of the street, one does not venture out on the sidewalk in open toed shoes.

No, no, no, you don’t know in what you might step.

Especially on hot days. New strains of bacteria form in the puddles of human detritus you can’t always define, the urine smell could be from a human or a cat, it’s hard to say.

Almost every time I did make the connection at Wilshire and Vermont to go to the courthouse I ran into a raving insane homeless person, or there’d be a guy tearing through the contents of a trash can throwing everything out on the street, or another guy lying directly in the path where he lives on the sidewalk as I came up the hill from Wilshire to LA Superior Court

LA’s way to solve its homeless problem is build luxury apartment buildings over Metro stations. What population of persons will end up filling those high priced apartments over the human urine cloud, I don't know, but I hope they realize that the homeless were there first.

I believe the developments that went above Metro stations were supposed to be affordable housing.

But this is LA, we have short memories here.

The Pope stood in the window and said, “We must not forget that sizeable group of theologians who transformed theology into poetry."

Face it, kids, we're on our own here.

Onward . . .

PS I need $500 more for the trip to Chicago in July. Please click the PayPal button as every 5 dollars helps.
Thank you

Release of perpetrator priest files: Document Protocol begins now and hearings coming. LA Archdiocese still pays legal fees for priests to object

*****
WED: 5.21.08 UPDATE: I am slammed at work, all RUSH jobs (because they are about Britney Spears) so can't even look at the blog for a few days. All will be continued shortly. Hopefully soon. -- KE -
*****
By Kay Ebeling
When I sat in on a meeting between a plaintiff and Roger Mahony this month, she asked the cardinal, “Where are the documents that you're supposed to release as part of the settlement?” The cardinal said she’d have to go to her lawyer and request the files, and then expect objections from the priests, a process which most plaintiffs would find daunting after six years of legal issues.

The cardinal was wrong. What he told the plaintiff, who was meeting with him for healing and renewed trust, was incorrect. The archbishop said the priests on their own object to release of their files, claiming privacy rights (see May 12 post). Mahony told the plaintiff she’d see the priests’ attorney Donald Steier in court if she pursued this legal action.

Cardinal Mahony archbishop of Los Angeles assured my friend, as I sat there listening, that he had nothing at all to do with release of documents on perpetrator priests, which was part of the settlement of the LA Clergy Cases.

For one, the archdiocese pays legal costs for the priests to object to release of their documents. “Steier admitted in testimony in the court of appeals that he was paid by the Los Angeles archdiocese to represent the priests.” Quotes here are from a phone conversation last week with Tony DeMarco, of Kiesel Boucher Larson, lead plaintiff attorneys in the LA cases against the Archdiocese.

DeMarco took issue with Mahony's words; “Steier does not work for free and those priests are not the ones who are paying him hourly. Where do you think the money is coming from?”

“They're trying to say it’s all the priests objecting to release of documents, but the archdiocese is paying the lion’s share of the bill for Donald Steier to represent them.”

Here is the Document Protocol:
“I’ll be doing an en masse request,” DeMarco said last week. “I’m getting all the signatures now, putting together the applications to the court.” Then when and if the priests object, hearings on their objections will be public.

City of Angels will watch for the hearings on release of these documents:

Here is how it will be done:

“We don’t know for sure that it will be Justice Edward A. Panelli (retired from the California Supreme Court), who will review the files, but his name is even written into the settlement agreement.

“First it has to wait for an order from Judge Emilie Elias,” DeMarco said, “then we'll have to figure out the process with Panelli.

The Priests' Objections:

"It’s my understanding, Panelli will hear the legal challenges by the priests," DeMarco said.

I said, that's the kind of hearing a lot of survivors would want to attend.

DeMarco said, “They should. This is what a lot of us were fighting for. The compensation was important, but we had almost every perspective juror in the Salesians cases raising their hand that the church was lying. There’s a lot of details in those files.”

He added: “Depositions regarding these cases are part of the protective order Judge Fromholz issued. He issued a guideline for what has to be under seal. He didn't say each one is under seal, he said everything is under seal.

“So now I have to go back and figure it all out. We'll have hearings with Judge Elias next,” he said, adding they would be in a matter of months.

The motion DeMarco files will mark the first time anyone has compiled and calculated how many perpetrator priests there were in the LA and San Diego settlements last year, and who is connected to which plaintiffs. DeMarco is putting together this “en masse request” by putting together for the first time each perpetrator and the plaintiffs in their cases.

“Then I’ll be the one getting the files to the judge for review." Panelli lives now in Santa Clara, CA.

“We have to make sure there will be public hearings,” DeMarco said.

Again, City of Angels will keep an eye on the calendar and as soon as these hearings on release of documents on perpetrator priests in LA are announced, we'll post the dates here. The first hearings will be in Judge Emilie Elias’ court on Commonwealth and Sixth near Lafayette Park.

The money is already there, DeMarco said: “Enough has been put away to make sure the judge who will be reviewing the files on an hourly basis can be paid.” Panelli, retired from the California Supreme Court, is the name that is actually written into the settlement to review the files, DeMarco said. “Enough money has been put away to make sure the judge who will be reviewing the files on an hourly basis can be paid.”

With the application DeMarco will file shortly, if priests object, there will also be hearings Judge Emilie Elias’ court.

“Once she gives her okay, these files can be sent to Panelli for review,” DeMarco said.

Plaintiff attorney Tony DeMarco will file en masse request, then hearings will be public, re the release of files of perpetrator priests in LA and San Diego cases.

DeMarco said it states in the 2004 Report to the People of God that the Archdiocese will pay for priests’ attorneys, as long as the priest is never convicted of a crime: Of course the priests are conveniently never totally convicted: I think the quote from LA Archdiocese report he’s referring to is this under Legal Expenses:

“In the context of the recent criminal and civil complaints against the priests, the Archdiocese has provided certain individual priests with loans to enable them to obtain legal representation in criminal investigations prior to being charged. Following indictment, the Archdiocese no longer provides legal support and will not provide bail. In civil cases, the Archdiocese provides limited funds for an initial review of the matter and has provided loans when needed by the priest for the assertion of certain constitutional rights prior to trial.

Next: Salesian Real Estate

How many believe Catholic priests will lie under oath to cover up sex crimes? Every potential juror raised their hands

*****
By Kay Ebeling

One of the questions was, “How many of you believe the Catholic Church has covered up sex crimes?” Every potential juror in the first day of voir dire raised their hand, in the Salesian cases which settled before going to trial this week in LA. At another point attorneys asked, how many of you think a Catholic priest will lie under oath to protect the church and, again, every one of them raised their hands.

Emilie Elias is a no-nonsense judge who was really glaring down from the bench just like the picture at left in the settlement hearing Wednesday in LA Superior Court. She presides in a community full of no-nonsense people. I looked at that jury and they were ready, savage with pencils poised to find a hundred reasons to award punitive damages if the cases went to trial. The Salesian defense was not going to be able to do the dance around justice they pulled off in San Francisco in 2006. Wayne Morse slouched home to Texas in tears.

The day before the settlement in LA, a jury in Vermont came back with the largest civil award in the state's history, $7,750,000 in punitive damages against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington, which might have been on the Salesians attorneys' mind Tuesday night when they agreed to settle. One altar boy from Vermont held out, refused to settle with about 18 other cases earlier this year, insisted on a jury trial, and was awarded $950,000 compensatory along with the record breaking $7.75 million award in punitive damages. The Burlington verdict, reached by the jury in less than five hours, is a signal to the Roman Catholic Church. People who serve on juries are ready to award massive amounts to plaintiffs when given the chance to decide punitive damages.

In a phone interview Friday morning, plaintiff attorney Tony DeMarco described voir dire: “The judge’s perspective was, okay, everybody knows about the settlements in LA last year, that's a given.”

The judge instructed the jury: “You've got to ask about the facts of this case, this particular case. The jury has to be fair on the facts of this case, listen to evidence and render on the facts here. Not on the other cases in LA last year.”

It’s likely impossible to find 11 people in Los Angeles who wouldn't find the archdiocese and all its Manchurian responders guilty.

The judge realized the predicament and resolved it with a legal swipe which is apparently Emilie Elias’ style. Earlier I observed that instead of pretrial hearings, Judge Emilie Elias did away with about 27 motions in limine from the defendants for these cases by bringing all the attorneys into her chambers to talk over refreshments, then looking at each of them squarely and saying, Listen. . .

DeMarco said. Sure it was likely there would be a huge award from the jury as in Vermont if we went to trial, but then the cases would spend years in appeals.

In Vermont less than 24 hours after the 7 plus million in punitives to one altar boy, the case was under appeal.

Evidence from the 2008 Salesian cases in LA will dribble out.
And be reported here at City of Angels

In other deposition testimony, Howse had revealed that all the boys at St. Mary's in Edmonton avoided the infirmary. They knew if you went to the infirmary, you were going to be sexually molested by Father Jim Miani or one of the others. (See Lester Howse in the video at top of page.)

Howse said kids would vomit in the closet and have raging fevers but refuse to go to the infirmary because of the sexual abuse at St. Mary’s in Edmonton, negligenty supervised by the Salesians who have to pay $19.5 million to 17 plaintiffs after the decision in LA Superior Court this week.

In the settlement hearing Ray Boucher for the plaintiffs told the jury that their very presence weighed on defense attorneys, just their being there had power in the move to settle the cases.

Me, I saw that jury, and I think they couldn't wait to go for punitive damages in the triple millions, I could see the rage in their faces as they sat there, they were looking forward to passing judgment on the Salesians.

The plaintiff in the Salesian cases that settled spoke to me about sitting in on voir dire:

“I got the feeling immediately that the jury connected with me. Still it wasn’t easy to know that my life was going to be out there.

"All of a sudden you realize what depths they will go to, to not be held accountable, to make me look guilty instead."

“They weren't going to get away with it," she said, "because I said to my family, look I made some mistakes and you're going to hear about them in the trial. I'm not perfect.”

DeMarco said, “Steve McFeely stands up and starts asking questions and he is not someone people like. He was trying to get the jury riled. But then they all raised their hands. I thought he was trying to get the whole jury pool booted.”

DeMarco said, “With the evidence we had, all the evidence we were going to be able to present, and I think Judge Elias would have let all of it in, the jury could have put the Salesians out of business.”

COMING THIS WEEKEND :

The Salesians Society say they will sell the mansion on Franklin Street in San Francisco to pay for the settlement in LA.

What are they going to do with the other several million they'll make on the real estate sale?

ALSO:

Document protocol.

Now that all the cases are settled, DeMarco is preparing a motion for release of personnel documents of every perpetrator in the LA and San Diego cases settled last year.

All to be explained in posts coming up this weekend. . .

Miani came out covering his face, the boy was pulling up his pants, witness from Canada tells what he would have testified in Salesian trial

*****
By Kay Ebeling
Lead plaintiff witness Lester Howse carried a memory for 50 years of Titian Miani coming out of an infirmary red faced, after several boys said he was hurting them from behind, one boy pulling up his pants as Miani left. (Trancript below, watch raw video above.)

Howse traveled from eastern Canada to Los Angeles to testify in the Salesian trial, cases which settled this morning. Below he says what he would have said if he’d testified.

Q: Mr. Howse, what were you going to say in your testimony?

A: I would like to tell the story as best I remember it from 50 years, from A to Z but of course courts do not allow that. After 50 years it’s touch and go remembering everything around the incident that happened.

Q: What was the incident that happened?

A: Why they asked me to come down here was to bear witness to the sexual assault on a part of Father Jim Miani, at the institute I was in in Edmonton, Alberta Canada, and I did witness that he sexually assaulted a young boy.

It took place at St. Mary’s Boys Home, it was a cross section of population, primarily poor Indian and there were also white non Indian white boys, from poor families. That was about it, it was primarily Indian and white.

Q: What was the incident that you observed?

A: Father Miani, it was I believe 1957, we were in an area where you were only allowed for about 10 minutes after coming into the institute from recreation. You had about 10 minutes before what they call a write up, you have a write up if the bell rings.

And in that 10 minutes I was in an area near what you call the sick bay, some would call it, and the priests were right next door, where they were housed, where their rooms were. So I came out of the dormitory which is next to the infirmary. The infirmary is between the priests’ quarters and the boys’ dormitory.

And I heard a noise in there and there was a couple boys, three boys, standing by the door of the infirmary. And I heard them talking, there was something going on it was a half whisper. So I went down to see what was going on I thought it was a fight perhaps. But one of the boys backed up and he said that Father Jim was hurting him from behind. And when Father Jim came first of all the young boy came out because the bell had rung, so we had to be in assembly or lineup. So when I looked I started to move away.

It was Father Jim who came out with his, trying to cover his face and he immediately went into the priests’ quarters. A young boy was walking out pulling up his pants. So we know it was Father Jim. That's, see this is the one, and I know I witnessed, I know it’s Father Jim. There were other incidents that Father Jim’s name came up but I could not verify that one way or the other.

But I do believe those boys who had experienced sexual abuse on the part of Father Jim Miani.

Q: How many others do you know of?

A: That I know of? Well to my knowledge, I was a victim of the late [SOUNDS LIKE] Father Telek at the same school, and he was appointed as Father Confessor. We were forced to go to confession once a week to this man who attacked me sexually.

But I fought him, I fought back. He had me down, he had his hand on my crotch and he was breathing hard. This was right in what they call a sanctuary. I just finished serving his Mass as an altar boy. I still had the cossack on and he still had the cossack on and he attacked me. I kicked him, I fought, I just kept kicking and I know he was bleeding. He never bothered me again, but he did disturb others.

Q: Did boys at the school talk about Father Jim?

A: We did pass the word because at that time I was classified as a medium boy. See there was boys, medium boys, and little boys or small boys. So us medium boys had a ward, we had to take care of the little ones, so we would pass the word among us to watch out for Father Jim, watch out for Father John Telek, watch out for [SOUNDS LIKE] Father Ralph Simioni?

Q: There were three predator priests at the school at the same time?

A: Well Father Ralph I don't know about his sexual activities but he was very mean, he used to beat on people. He’d pull you out of the line and beat on people, he never did me. He’d slap you around a couple of times.

Q: I understand you've done activist work around this issue?

A: Yes I did an interview similar to this in the 1970s and also in 92 and that's how Cheryl (Buchanan, plaintiff attorney) became aware of me.

Q: Who interviewed you in 1972 about this?

A: A journalist from the Edmonton Journal and apparently the article had an effect on quite a few people, people writing in, in favor of and against what I had to say. But for me it was very disturbing in a good way for some of the boys who’d been in there, because they began to write in to the (Edmonton) Journal and respond.

I was so glad to hear from them and read and know that they're still alive.

Q: So in the Edmonton Journal is the archives with that story and the letters to the editor as well?

A: Yes.

Q: What did you have to go through to come to court today for the trial?

A: When the date was set I accepted and I started with a friend to come down and his car messed up, got another friend, crossed the border no problem. It was great. I met my granddaughter in North Dakota along the way, my daughter was there. So it was wonderful, it was a good journey.

Then a friend drove me to Denver to Grand Junction I believe it’s called and from there I took a Greyhound Bus. [LAUGHS]

More coverage in the post below. . .

Cut and pasted:

(Howse mentioned more than one boy.)

Q: How many young boys?

A: To my knowledge there was one. And I know there was others but I was not a witness to any of that, so for me to say any of that would only be hearsay as the court would consider it.

Salesians admit today Fr. Titian Miani DID molest plaintiffs, ending global cases in LA re pedophile priests from 2003 SOL window. More to come

*****
By Kay Ebeling
“The Salesians admit these plaintiffs have been abused by Father Miani.” Ray Boucher spoke to jurors this morning. The lead plaintiff attorney said settlement talks began during jury selection and the jurors' presence, ready to hear the case after four days of voir dire, urged the settlement forward. Having the Salesians admit Father Miani raped these four persons as children and likely others “will have an impact on the plaintiffs’ lives forever,” Boucher said, thanking jurors as the 17 cases settled this morning for $19.4 million dollars.

Wayne Mason, who flies in from Texas to litigate for the Salesian Religious Order was tearful, saying, “the conduct of this particular priest was something awful the men of the Salesians Society were ashamed of.” He turned to the plaintiffs and said, “I’m sorry,” with sadness. Morse added there are so many men in the Salesians who are not like Miani.

The "mansion" in San Francisco, the Salesian Provincial House, will be sold to cover part of the cost of the settlement.

Lead plaintiff witness Lester Howse, came all the way from Winnipeg on the east coast of Canada to LA Superior Court this morning, determined to testify about his knowledge of Miani molesting a boy in 1957. What Lester Howse would have said on the stand, he said to my camera, and the video will be up at City of Angels Network as soon as it processes through YouTube, stay tuned.

The number of witnesses, the amount of evidence, plus the presence of a jury ready after four days of voir dire undoubtedly pressured the Salesians to settle these remaining cases. The same team of attorneys here to defend the Salesians in LA are still fighting plaintiffs in San Francisco, continuing to appeal and delay a settlement that was ordered by a jury to Joey Piscitelli in 2006.

What Ray Boucher was going to say in opening statements was “point out the 1948 letter from Italy” which would have been a key piece of evidence in the trial. The letter proves the Salesians Society knew of Miani's proclivities before sending him to North America in the late 1940s.

The 1948 letter will be attached as evidence in the case files, which City of Angels will dive in and start perusing over the next weeks.

“The Salesians were aware of at least one molestation by Miani as far back as 1948,” Boucher said.

He had more witnesses ready to come down from Canada to testify about “Father Jim” at St. Mary’s School in Edmonton, the number of witnesses who would come depended on how long the trial went on, Boucher said after the hearing, implying the list of witnesses would have gone on and on.

“The Salesians are admitting they need to bring about change,” said Boucher.

This morning’s actions end the global settlement, the 500 plus cases that came about after a window of opportunity opened in 2003. For that one year the state suspended the statute of limitations on child sex crimes, and persons in the state of California who had been raped at any time as children could file civil lawsuits, no matter how far in the past the episodes took place.

The 17 cases that settled this morning are the last of the cases from Los Angeles that resulted from the 2003 window in the statute of limitations in California.

However, several lawyers from Kiesel Boucher Larson said there are more clients coming forward, more cases against the LA Archdiocese coming.

The state of Pennsylvania is currently hearing and considering the Child Victim Act, HB 1137, which will open a similar window for two years for persons raped as children, and permanently put the window for reporting abuse at the age of 50. We'll be reporting more about HB 1137 in Pennsylvania shortly here at City of Angels.

I was saving that picture above of Leila Nourani for the trial. She was one of the defense attorneys who fascinated me, and I was so looking forward to drawing her and Helen and Cheryl, but I really don't have the wardrobe to cover a jury trial. Also I have these two other jobs that pay the bills and they were going to have to go on the back burner.

Don't worry. Now that the Salesians have settled I will be able to access all the documents, even the ones squirreled away by the "research attorney" during most of the pretrial months. All the documents from the Salesians cases will be there in the 6th and Commonwealth courthouse on the 14th floor under the care of Javier.

Will be document diving by next week about Miani and all the rest of them. For now have to go back to work on raw videos for America's Greatest Dog, another brain challenging reality TV show in development here in East Hollywood.

Putting in time codes when they bark...

Onward. . .

Cardboard Cardinal meets with LA plaintiff from 07 civil cases, says her perpetrator George Rucker laicized this year, no one knows where he is, shrug

*****
By Kay Ebeling
When drawing a picture of Cardinal Roger Mahony, the face becomes more lifelike when you begin to erase lines. I sat in on a conference Saturday with the Cardinal and Cindy Falter, one of the LA plaintiffs from last year’s civil cases, in response to Mahony's call for victims of church sex crimes to come to him, meet with him. (Above is raw video, a standup interview with Cindy right after the meeting.) At one point she kept asking the cardinal to answer, “How do you explain George Neville Rucker openly taking children out of the classroom to the rectory to be raped on school days?”

“Well, it’s evil, it’s just pure evil,” was the Cardinal’s response. The room was silent so he repeated, “It was evil pure evil.” That was all he had to say.

Mahony did tell us that Cindy’s perpetrator, George Neville Rucker, was laicized earlier this year, and the archdiocese confirmed to me today by phone, that by a decree from Rome, Rucker was removed in 2008 from the priesthood. Mahony assured us we no longer have to worry about the church expending funds to pay for Rucker’s stay in Nazareth House, where he’s apparently been the past few years.

“He’s on Social Security now,” Mahony told us, which means the pedophile priest George Neville Rucker will have a steady income, he'll stay healthy with MediCare, probably get section 8 housing before long or county funded board and care help until he dies. Rucker was convicted once but the 2003 US Supreme Court Stogner decision released him and a lot of priests from their crimes.

So Rucker won't be on any offenders lists. The archdiocese would not give any information about when or where George Neville Rucker was laicized and turned out for the taxpayers to support.

Where are the documents? Cindy asked, and learned that a lot of plaintiffs ask that question. Apparently they have to get a lawyer and request their perpetrator’s personnel files, then the priest inevitably appeals release of documents claiming privacy issues, inevitably then you have a hearing in front of a judge who finally decides how much of your perpetrator’s documents you can have. So plaintiffs have to take the initial step requesting the documents through lawyers. Mahony held up his hands and flecks of cardboard dust fell to the floor, he is not part of this process.

At one point while Cindy was puking, I took advantage of the break in her talk to pipe in like the ever dreaming flower child I am, seizing the moment to say things I’ve always wanted to say to Cardinal Roger Mahony, who sat unmoved watching Cindy spasm puke after puke into the nearby trashcan.

ME: Cardinal Mahony, you have this golden opportunity. You are in a position to DO SOMETHING and all over the world people are watching you. Look at Cindy’s sister, look at me, there are probably 9 in 10 victims who haven’t gotten settlements or help from the church.

Would God Care About the Statute of Limitations?

I went on and on waving my arms in the air: “Would God even acknowledge the statute of limitations? Why the arbitrary help, where it all depends on what state you live in? This was a national problem!"
**********
A Mother's Confession, at least this Survivor gets an response from her Family during the meeting
*************
At one point Cindy’s mother spoke in tears saying “I think all my life, this is my fault.” Ah, there’s a phrase Mahony is familiar with, he’d been trained for a response.

The Manchurian Cardinal opens his mouth and out comes, “It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault.” Small voice, almost no lilt or life, but the words are professional, like Mahony spent a lot of time with consultants learning listening and responding skills before starting these meetings with the plaintiffs. Another time all three women were begging, how could this happen. Mahony's response:

"It was evil, pure evil."

Vapid.

Now as the woman in her seventies cries to him that she feels like it was her fault, Mahony stares bland faced at her and listens. She talks about Father Rucker coming to their small house in El Segundo, where the single mother supported practically the only non-Anglo family in town and how important it was for her children to go to Catholic school.
**********
The church always guaranteed the young girls’ tuition.
*************
Cindy’s mom in tears said, “He was so tall. He would be holding her and I saw one time his hand go on her in the wrong place. And I reached up and tried to move his hand and he pulled away, and laughed and said, don’t worry it’s all right.”

Over dinner later Cindy got stoic.

“Did you hear my mama admit that?” she said. “Don’t you remember I told you that, that I had this kind of memory of being touched by him even when I was a baby, but I couldn't be sure, and now she just confirmed that.”

So the meetings between Mahony and the plaintiffs can result in progress.

But still there was that sense that Mahony and Suzanne Healy, his new coordinator of the assistance ministry were too practiced in their responses. That “It was evil, pure evil” is so bland and noncommittal. Are you admitting you are evil, the church, that one priest? There was just a lot of evil all around and the church didn't want to be bothered dealing with it?

You’re the Cardinal, do something, say something.

Cindy bent his ear a good 45 minutes. She said, “If you had paid any attention to our stories in the 500 cases the last six years you would not show up here for this meeting with a collar around your neck and wearing that priest dress."

Then she turned her head, grabbed a nearby trash can, and started puking, deep from her gut puking.

Now my intent was to be quiet and just listen, as this was Cindy’s meeting, but I decided to

Seize The Moment

So while Cindy puked, I chimed in:

“You know, Cardinal Mahony, I keep watching you and it’s like you're thinking, well what is it you want me to do.”

Mahony and Healy’s heads turned to me, their eyes watched me, like cardboard characters they listened. Cindy continued to puke in the background. I was ever the flower child thinking I could use this 30 seconds to completely change the Cardinal:

“Someone in your position with your power, you could set up a foundation that we could apply to for grants. Don’t make the parishes pay for it, just sell a statue at the Vatican to create a bank account for victims of sex crimes by priests.

“Because each of us needs something different. I don't want therapy. I want a scholarship for my daughter or something to make up for her having to be raised in poverty.

“Each one of us has one specific thing that would change our lives and make up for 40 years of being a total basket case. I'm not putting down what you've done, but it’s not enough.

"Look at Cindy over there puking right now. These crimes leave physical effects.

“Would God really care about the statute of limitations, or what state a person is in, whether they can have justice?"

Cindy was still barfing, Mahony and Healy were still professionally listening so I found more power in my flower child memory:

“Stop being so officious, Cardinal Mahony, and saying this legal thing here is stopping me from helping. You're the Cardinal. You have power.

“We're almost like holocaust survivors.” We still need attention.

At this Ms. Healy actually nodded. So I went on.

“Maybe we are the last victims, but we're still here and we're damaged and the church did it to us and we still need help, the other 90 percent who can’t file lawsuits.”

My voice was higher and louder and Cindy was starting to wipe her mouth. I sat up halfway in my chair leaning on the table my arm raised in the sky, and I said to the cardinal.

“Do it. Do something.

“You could start a change and stop the church’s demise. You could begin the difference in the church’s image that brings people back.”

I have to admit when I mentioned the church’s image, Mahony did give a glint of response, but for the rest of my speech he sat, expression never changing from when Cindy’s sister was giving details about being raped on an altar to when Cindy’s mom was in tears over letting Rucker touch her daughter, to my tiny tirade about his opportunity to change the church.

**********
Cardboard is the word Cindy’s friend Tony used when he seized a moment to throw in a few words. He started to rail about “cardboard Catholics”
*************

Cindy’s boyfriend standing behind her at one point began railing about organized religion especially the Cardboard Catholics and I saw it then. Cardinal Mahony with his unusually flat head, vapid eyes, one-liners fully practiced, his quiet responses, he is actually part cardboard. How else could his expression hardly change from a skilled practiced gaze as he listened to the story of one family, out of thousands in LA destroyed by his negligence and pandering to the pedophiles in the church over the children over decades. Not until towards the end of the meeting, was there a glint of life in Mahony’s eyes, apparently thinking I can’t wait to get outta here.

We all could tell as we watched Mahony glide up the hallway toward his living quarters behind the cathedral offices that the Cardinal carries this burden.

He probably carries this burden well at cocktail parties. He bows his head and shares with his pals how emotionally draining it is to have to execute these listening sessions with the plaintiffs as they tell their horrid stories. He gets a lot of mileage out of these meetings, we all agreed sitting over dinner later, both in PR and in getting pats on the back from the brothers.

At one point during the meeting with Mahony, Cindy tried to get the Cardinal to see, “It means nothing” meaning the settlement money meant nothing, and she threw a new diamond ring on the table in front of him.

MY NASTY JOKE:

Talking to Mahony is like having sex with a man who’s impotent. You just keep trying and trying and giving and giving, and you know you should be getting a response, but there’s just nothing there, nothing happens.

Keep in mind I come from a life of profound promiscuity after a priest planted sexuality in me at age five with his diddling little fingers on my privates. So my sense of humor is a little sick. At the end of the session I had to repeat to everyone my new joke and I'm repeating it here:

Talking to Roger Mahony about how to handle us victims is like having sex with an impotent man. You keep trying and trying and giving more and more and you never get anything out of him.

*****

At one point all three women, Cindy, her sister and Mother were in tears, wailing in front of the cardinal that he has to do more. Over a good 50 minutes Cindy lashed out at the Cardinal. Her mother, in her mid-seventies, sat straight and back straight proud staring at the cardinal through tears, “I go to mass and communion still, they don’t, but I think it was my fault, this was all my fault.”

At this the cardinal raised his hands from the table and spread them in front of him stating,

“It was not your fault. It was not your fault.”

We’d found another buzz word that ignited a response in the Manchurian Cardinal. When someone says they think it’s their fault, the Manchurian Cardinal turns to them and say with compassion, “It’s not your fault, no it’s not your fault.”

Roger Mahony is the Manchurian Cardinal.

It’s evil pure evil,

A perfect combination of words.

It hints at the religion without putting it in your face, it hints at compassion without really having to give any.
**********
After sitting in on this meeting, I do think the cardinal is made of cardboard. The man has no feelings, no emotions.
******************
How else could he blow with the winds up the hierarchy career ladder in the seventies and eighties in the Southern California Catholic Church, where we see now there was truly an epidemic of pedophilia that started in the seminaries and got transferred from parish to parish in what were then rural parts of the landscape.

Becoming bishop of Stockton where O’Grady festered and then Archbishop of Los Angeles where pedophiles picked freely from the children in the pews from Santa Barbara to Riverside for a good 50 years,

MAHONY CLAIMS to have had no knowledge at all that pedophilia was a problem among priests in California, that he first heard of it only when Fr. Baker confessed to him, or no, when O’Grady first was transferred. He never has quite pinpointed it.

“Mahony’s gay,” says my friend Jay (Not his real name) another LA plaintiff who is tres gay himself so can say, “I have great gay-dar, the man is completely homosexual.” I reply, no I think he’s asexual, there’s just nothing there. So it’s easy for him to be celibate.”

As Cindy railed on in the cardinal’s face to “Do Something” he and his new Assistance Ministry Coordinator Suzanne Healy stared continuously into her eyes, nodded, were totally trained and professional listeners, responding barely at all. Occasionally the cardinal would try to inject the old, look at our great fingerprint and background check but Cindy wouldn't let him, spitting out, so what, every other public school and institution has done that for decades. You have to do something more.
*******
Cindy Takes No Sh---
*************
“Wait a minute hold it right there. To begin with I'm not a victim I'm a survivor.

“Alright, I’ll call you a victim."

The Cardboard Cardinal has a temporary glitch. Cindy's mom says again, "I think it's my fault." Mahony's eyes fixate, he turns, his body slim and straight, his eyes a blunt brown, he stares at Cindy's mom, stares as inside his head, synapses reconnect as programmed.

Flatly, he says, "It was evil, just pure evil."

He's the Manchurian Cardinal.

A LOT MORE LAWSUITS LIKELY COMING:

As the assistance coordinator proudly described the church’s new policy where even the volunteers have to be fingerprinted, background checked, and taught how to report, I was thinking, do you mean you haven’t been doing that at Catholic places for the last 20 years like the rest of American society? Oh boy, there’s going to be a lot more lawsuits. . .

And don’t forget, none of the religious order priests has to be background checked and fingerprinted. The edict for this policy from US bishops did not include religious order priests.

Sigh.

I think I heard this dialogue between Cindy and the Cardinal.

CINDY: How could you not know?

MAHONY: Who not know?

CINDY: How could you not know.

MAHONY: Not know what?

Cindy thinks the church hired FBI guys or maybe Homeland Security to follow her around before the settlements. She was very vocal throughout the lawsuits and said weird things happened.

She said the lawsuits were vicious

And Mahony said, yes, they were, on both sides.

Always deflecting, always deflecting, a cardboard Cardinal sometimes covered in aluminum foil for master deflecting.

ME: Why should somebody have to hire an attorney and go through litigation to get help from the Catholic Church?

Mahony and Healy’s heads turned to the left, their eyes met mine, and they listened to me, then turned back to Cindy.

Cindy’s sister said, she had trouble being touched her entire life. It made her feel bad inside.

Cindy says, I need to go to the rectory. I need to go down below. I need to go back to that space. And I want to know if the altar is changed. I just need to know that the same altar where I was raped is gone.

Next day Cindy called me and said, I did go to the rectory. It’s all so different. But I think going there changed me. It changed me. It's like it is finally over.

I wonder how it will affect me to go to Chicago in July and take the train to Bartlett and see the church where I was raped in 1953. Wonder if I’ll find other survivors of Father Thomas Barry Horne.

PS GREAT NEWS: I’ve raised enough to fly to Chicago, go to the SNAP conference and stay in a hotel for five nights. I want to stay about three weeks, to do my research, so please keep clicking the PayPal button in the top left corner to help fund this trip.

Thank you,
Kay

GEORGE NEVILLE RUCKER
From Bishopaccountability dot org:

Record of abuse began shortly after ordination. First investigated by police in 1967. 1st civil suit filed 1994. Arrested 2002 on charges involving 12 girls. Criminal charges dropped 2003 due to Supreme Court ruling. Named as #1 on list of top 10 abusive priests in LA Archdiocese with 38-41 known accusers. Some claims settled in 12/06 massive $60 million settlement re 22 priests. Other claims settled in massive 7/07 $660 mil settlement by Archdiocese

More to come.
Salesians Jury Trial starts Wednesday morning.

Onward. . .

COMING SOON: For a good 45 minutes Cindy slammed Mahony and the church for taking six years to settle the cases and what that put her family through. It had a lot to do with her losing custody of her child, as she was homeless and destitute for a large part of the time.

We hope to do a story in the near future about how the litigation affected the plaintiffs.

Stay tuned