【2023. 4. 6 USA】
The Sexual Abuse File in the American Catholic Church: The Hidden Truth of Over 600 Victims Over 80 Years
“Another sex scandal in the Catholic Church, but the names of the perpetrators have been erased, but the truth cannot be traced?” The US Maryland Attorney General’s Office released an investigation report on April 5, accusing 156 priests and clergy of the Catholic Baltimore Diocese of sex. abused and abused more than 600 children and teenagers; the 463-page report revealed misconduct that began in the 1940s and spanned 80 years, and the church’s efforts to help cover up scandals and help clergy escape accusations for decades have also surfaced . After several years of large-scale investigations into the report, the Attorney General stated that “today is the day of truth and accountability” and encouraged more survivors to come forward. However, the names of many priests and officials who assisted in concealment were still included in the report. Erase, the process of transparency and accountability of the American Catholic Church remains unfinished.
Maryland prosecutors launched an investigation into clergy misconduct in the Diocese of Baltimore in 2018. After more than four years of investigation, they called witnesses and reviewed hundreds of thousands of documents, including diocesan personnel records, medical and psychological treatment records, personnel transfers Order and church policy; the attorney general’s office also has a hotline dedicated to reporting abuse, which Brown said was contacted by more than 300 people during the investigation.
Baltimore Diocese Child Sexual Abuse ReportAt 463 pages, much of it is about abuse victims recounting what happened and how parish officials and priests covered up the allegations, and many of the incidents follow a similar pattern: Angry survivor parents report abuse to church The incidents did not help, the alleged clergy were transferred to other dioceses or received medical treatment, and then re-offended, the church did not report to law enforcement, and the painful impact of the incident on the victims. This approach shows that suppressing scandals is more important to the church than protecting children.
Many of the victims were altar boys, choir members, or students of Catholic schools (from elementary school to high school to university, both genders), and the reports describe events in great detail, such as a 1988 Father John Joseph Mike, who was transferred from Maryland, was accused of abusing at least seven teenage boys. One of the victims wrote in his diary: “I was hung in the air with my hands tied to the backboard. The bullwhip left me with a scar that will forever be on my body.”
In addition to the disturbing details of individual cases, the report also reveals how the Catholic Church has knowingly covered up the misdeeds of the clergy for decades. Officials dismissed the case as “not involving sexual encounters”.
Another example is Father Lawrence Brett, who admitted to abusing a boy in Connecticut in 1964, but the church’s treatment of Father Brett was to send him to New Mexico for psychological treatment. He continued to commit crimes in New Mexico. , and then Father Brett was transferred to Baltimore’s Calvert Hall College High School (Calvert Hall College High School), where at least 20 boys were abused by Father Brett.
Even the report states that, in addition to the church system, there have been police officers, prosecutors, the news media, and at least one judge who over the past few decades chose to cooperate with the church when they knew the abuse existed, such as the Baltimore Diocese in 1958. Father Gerald Tragesser was accused of abusing a 13-year-old girl. Bishop Francis Keough won the assistance of a Baltimore court judge in order to promise to send Father Tragesser to treatment and transfer from Maryland. In exchange for the case being kept private; and when the victim’s mother wanted to make the case public, Keogh suppressed the relevant reports through the assistance of a “high-ranking reporter”.
Few of the abusive clergymen listed in the report were criminally prosecuted, and many were simply excommunicated or transferred from Maryland. Most of the perpetrators are now deceased.
The current Bishop of Baltimore, William E. LoripublicExpressing regret for the content of the report and apologizing to the survivors, he pointed out that “these unimaginable evils did happen” and promised to continue to support the survivors from trauma. Lowry said the report revealed “a reprehensible period” in the history of the Baltimore diocese, and said the diocese began reforming in 1993 without ending the abuse of children by clergy. The exposure of the abuse record was one of them, Lowry said. He also emphasized that today’s parish organizations are completely different from those in the 1960s and 1970s when abuses were common.
“Washington post”The Diocese of Baltimore did not object to the release of the report and cooperated with prosecutors in providing numerous subpoena documents, but also admitted to paying legal fees for a group that lobbied a Maryland judge in 2022 to stop the release of the report. Some of the names in the report, and continued lobbying against a bill that would eliminate the civil lawsuit deadline.
In fact, out of the 156 names of clergy listed in the report, 10 were blacked out, and the names of other officials who knew about the case but allowed or assisted in the concealment were also blacked out. Called by the code names of A, B, C, etc. – In mid-March 2023, Baltimore Circuit Court Judge Taylor (Robert Taylor Jr.) ordered that the original report be amended in order to protect some of them who have never been publicly accused before. Names and identifiers were redacted from the report, and the names of 37 other people accused of “assisting the concealment and condoning of the abuse” were temporarily masked. Taylor decides.
In the past, the Baltimore diocese released a 2002 report on clergy accused of sexually abusing children.listas part of transparency reforms, however, the list published at the time did not include those accused after death, on the grounds that “the diocese can no longer question and the accused are no longer a danger to children”; until 2019 this was the case before changing.
Maryland’s report is the latest in nearly two decades of efforts by civil authorities across the U.S. to document and expose child abuse by Catholic clergy; according to Catholic advocacy group Bishop Accountability, there have now been 19 child abuse cases nationwide. sharesuch reportsthe survey area spans several large cities.
When Maryland Attorney General Anthony G. Brown released the report on April 5, he said: “Today is a day of truth and accountability in Maryland” and encouraged more survivors to come forward; “The only form of justice available right now is publicity,” Taylor said in approving the release of the report, which said the abusers had passed away and the report did not name any of the abusers who were still in the priesthood.
However, the blacked-out names and words in many places in the report still show that the process of transparency of public church misconduct is still unfinished. In addition to the release of the report, the Maryland state legislature also passed a bill on April 5 that would allow all victims of child sexual abuse to sue agencies that shelter their perpetrators, a bill that would effectively eliminate access to justice for many victims as adults Obstacles to the law — The Washington Post notes that similar bills have been introduced and failed every year since 2019, but reports of child sexual abuse in the Diocese of Baltimore helped push the bill forward this year, against Catholic lobbyists It was passed despite the opposition, and only needs to be signed by the governor to take effect.
However, Maryland Senator William C. Smith, who supported the bill, said in an interview on April 6 that pushing the bill to pass as soon as possible has nothing to do with the Baltimore diocesan report, but because the bill “is a way to bring such cases to justice.” Chance.”