Pennsylvania Supreme Court Prevents Release of Grand Jury Report On Clergy Sex Abuse

Yesterday the Pennsylvania Supreme Court issued a brief 2-paragraph Order (full text) barring release of an extensive Grand Jury report detailing sexual abuse and misconduct by priests in six Pennsylvania Catholic dioceses. The report, stemming from two years of testimony before a Cambria County grand jury, was expected to be made public shortly. According to the Morning Call, the six dioceses involved have pledged not to file legal challenges to prevent release of the report.  It is unclear who filed objections with the Supreme Court. Its Order indicates that more than one application seeking to prevent release were filed.

Florida Appeals Court Upholds Priest's Objections To Testifying About Statements Made In Confessional

In Ronchi v. State of Florida, (FL App., June 15, 2018), a Florida state appellate court held that it would violate Florida's Religious Freedom Restoration Act to require a Catholic priest, Fr. Vincenzo Ronchi, to testify about a sex abuse victim's statements made during a confession, even though the victim had waived the priest-penitent privilege.  The alleged abuse occurred when the victim was 7 and 13. She was 18 when the trial of her abuser was to take place. In quashing the trial court's order that the priest testify, the appellate court said in part:

.. [I]f Ronchi complies with the State’s demand that he testify as to his communications with the alleged victim during the Sacrament of Reconciliation, Ronchi would be forced to engage in conduct that is prohibited by the Catholic Church (and, indeed, would subject him to possible excommunication from the Church). Thus, the trial court’s order can only be upheld if the State establishes that coercing Ronchi’s testimony furthers a compelling governmental interest and is the least restrictive means to further that interest.

Here, it is undisputed that the State has a compelling governmental interest in prosecuting sex offenses perpetrated against children.... 

However, we disagree with the State’s contention that coercing Ronchi to testify ... would be the least restrictive means to further its compelling governmental interest of prosecuting Burton. First, as the State acknowledges, the testimony of Ronchi would, at most, be corroborative evidence.... Second, this case does not involve a child victim who, because of his or her tender age, might be unable to adequately testify as to the alleged sexual abuse. The alleged victim in this case is now an adult, and there is nothing in the record that suggests that she would be unable to testify as to the relevant events.

Settlement Reached In Minnesota Catholic Diocese Bankruptcy

The National Catholic Reporter last week detailed a $210 million settlement with over 400 sexual abuse victims reached by the Diocese of St. Paul- Minneapolis in its bankruptcy reorganization.  $170 million will come from insurers, and $40 million will be paid by the archdiocese and parishes.  It is the largest settlement reached so far in any of the Catholic diocese bankruptcy cases around the country. [Thanks to Steven H. Sholk and Tom Rutledge for the lead.]

Former Vatican Official To Stand Trial In Australia On Some Sex Offense Charges Against Him

In Australia yesterday, a Melbourne Magistrate's Court ruled that Cardinal George Pell must stand trial on some of the sex offense charges lodged against him.  Crux reports:

Following a four-week committal hearing last month, an Australian magistrate on Tuesday dismissed some of the most serious charges of “historical sexual offenses” against Cardinal George Pell but also ruled that the 76-year-old prelate will stand trial on at least three different complaints....

Pell is currently on a leave of absence from his post as the Vatican’s Secretary for the Economy, and he becomes the most senior Church official ever to face criminal charges of sexual abuse in a civil court of law.

Suit Charges FLDS Leaders With Ritual Sex Abuse of Minors

In a lawsuit filed yesterday in Utah state court, a young woman sued the FLDS Church and various of its leaders alleging that she was a repeated victim of ritual sexual abuse when she was between the ages of 8 and 12.  The complaint (full text) in R.H. v. Jeffs, (UT Dist. Ct., filed 12/27/2017), alleges in part:

25. The practice of having sexual relations with underage girls has been consistently sustained by members of the Priesthood Work and participants in the UEP Trust since their inception....

28. The practice of having sexual relations with underage girls continued after Warren S. Jeffs assumed control of the UEP Trust and FLDS Church and after he later became the President of both entities.

29. However, a new practice of having sex and sexual relations with underage girls in the FLDS Temple and other undisclosed FLDS Church and UEP Trust owned properties with girls, ages eight (8) to 14 years old, was initiated by Warren Jeffs, along with leadership of UEP Trust and the FLD Church....

30. Plaintiff was subject to this horrific religious doctrine and religious rituals....

36. This religious ritual abuse continued on a regular basis, between five and six times a week, from the age of 8 years-old until the Plaintiff turned 12 years-old.

37. Once Plaintiff turned 14, she was required to become a witness and scribe to these religious rituals between other young girls and defendants....

Fox13 News reports on the lawsuit.

Dismissal of Claims Against Church For Sex Abuse by Youth Director Is Upheld

In B.B. v. Methodist Church of Shelbina, Missouri, (MO App., Dec. 19, 2017), a Missouri appellate court upheld the dismissal of a suit for damages against a church growing out of the sexual molestation of appellant by the church's youth director.  The molestation occurred in 2006 when appellant was 12 years old.  The court summarized its holding in part as follows in an accompanying Opinion Summary:

(1) The Establishment Clause ... bars Appellant’s negligence-based claims and his claim for breach of fiduciary/confidential relationship against Respondents because we cannot resolve these claims without interfering with and interpreting the doctrine, policy, polity, practice, and administration of the Respondents.

(2) Appellant has not and will not be able to present sufficient evidence to prove an element of his claim for intentional failure to supervise.... Specifically, Appellant failed to establish the sexual abuse he suffered occurred on property possessed by the Church.

(3) Appellant’s claims for child sexual abuse and battery against the Church fail ... because: a. [The youth director's] misconduct was completely outside the course and scope of his employment with the Church; b. Appellant’s argument the trial court erred in not imposing liability on the Church based on its employee’s failure to act on information given to her ... is nothing more than a reconstituted claim of negligence against the Church, which is not cognizable pursuant to precedent from Missouri courts....

Republican Senators Call For Roy Moore To Withdraw From Senate Race After Sex Charges

According to the Washington Post, a number of Republican senators are calling for Roy Moore, Alabama candidate for the U.S. Senate, to withdraw if charges in an earlier Washington Post article today are true.  The article, based on detailed interviews with named accusers, says that Moore engaged in improper sexual contact with a 14-year old girl nearly 40 years ago when Moore was a 32 year-old assistant district attorney.  Three other women say Moore tried to date them when they were between 16 and 18 years old.  Moore, well known for his battles defending a Ten Commandments monument and opposing same-sex marriage, says that the charges "are completely false and are a desperate political attack by the National Democrat Party and the Washington Post."  The special election in Alabama in which Moore faces Democratic nominee Doug Jones is scheduled for Dec. 12.

UPDATE: Defending Moore, Alabama State Auditor Jim Zeigler told the Washington Examiner:  "[T]ake Joseph and Mary. Mary was a teenager and Joseph was an adult carpenter. They became parents of Jesus. There’s just nothing immoral or illegal here. Maybe just a little bit unusual."

Santa Fe Diocese Releases List of Priests Found Guilty of Sex Abuse

On Tuesday, the Catholic Archdiocese of Santa Fe released the names of 74 priests, deacons and brothers who have been found guilty of sexually abusing a child, either by the Church (canon law), the State (criminal law), or both. The list also includes those who were laicized after being accused of sexually abusing a minor, and those publicly accused where criminal proceedings were not completed (often because of death).  AP, reporting on the release, says that it comes after decades of pressure from victims and their families.

New Mexico Paramilitary Christian Group Members Arrested In Child Abuse Investigation

Earlier this week, New Mexico authorities raided the Fence Lake (NM) compound of the paramilitary Aggressive Christianity Missions Training Corps in a child abuse investigation.  They arrested sect co-leader Deborah Green and two other group members, while another member was arrested in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. According to People, the defendants are variously charged with child abuse, criminal sexual penetration, failure to report a birth, and bribery of a witness. Peter Green has been charged with 100 counts of criminal penetration of a child.

Four more sect members were arrested yesterday on charges of failing to register the births of their 11 children.  They were apprehended as they were allegedly trying to flee the state in two vans filed with children. Fox News, reporting this, says that the group describes itself as "revolutionary for Jesus" and provides a free spiritual "ammo pack" to anyone requesting one.  Its website includes anti-Semitic and anti-same sex marriage language.

Discussing interviews with ex-members of the sect, AP reports that:

[L]eaders of the Aggressive Christianity Missions Training Corps exercised control over followers by forcing them into hard labor and refusing to give their children medical care. When members complained, sect co-leader Deborah Green would hold "trials" against them for questioning her authority.... The trials led to banishment to isolated sheds without toilets and from the sect's compound without being allowed to take their children....

Tolling Provision Applies While Priest Is Outside State On Orders of Church Superiors

In Commonwealth v. McCormick, 2017 Mass. App. Unpub. LEXIS 791 (MA App., Aug. 15, 2017), a Massachusetts state appeals court upheld the convictions of a Catholic priest on five counts of rape of a child.  The court rejected defendant's argument that the statute of limitations tolling provision violates the federal Establishment Clause and his free exercise rights under the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights. The state statute of limitations excludes from the computation of time under the limitations period any time during which the defendant is not "usually and publicly a resident" of Massachusetts.  Plaintiff was outside the state during periods in which he was working at a camp on the orders of his superiors in the Catholic church.

Australian Commission Recommends That Child Sex Abuse Learned In Confession Must Be Reported To Authorities

Australia's Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse yesterday issued a release  (which includes links to full text) announcing its publication of a report titled Criminal Justice.  The report puts forward 85 recommendations for reforms aimed at providing fairer responses to victims of institutional child sexual abuse. Here is the Commission's summary of its recommendations on disclosure of abuse learned by clergy during confessions:

The report recommends making failure to report child sexual abuse in institutions a criminal offence. This recommendation extends to information given in religious confessions. Clergy should not be able to refuse to report because the information was received during confession.

Persons in institutions should report if they know, suspect or should have suspected a child is being or has been sexually abused.

The Royal Commission heard of cases in religious settings where perpetrators who made a religious confession to sexually abusing children went on to reoffend and seek forgiveness. The report recommends there be no exemption, excuse, protection or privilege from the offence granted to clergy for failing to report information disclosed in connection with a religious confession.

AP reports on the Commission's action.

Catholic Order Files For Bankruptcy In Settlement of Sex Abuse Claims

The Minneapolis Star Tribune and Premier report that yesterday the Crosier Fathers and Brothers, a Roman Catholic order, filed for bankruptcy in a Minnesota federal Bankruptcy Court. Along with the filing, the Order agreed to a $25.5 million settlement with 43 plaintiffs who have filed sex abuse lawsuits against the Order.  The sex abuse by 19 members of the Order occurred from the 1960's to the mid-1980's. The settlement is one of the largest per victim payments among the 14 Catholic Church bankruptcies around the country so far.

Priest Sex Abuse Suit Filed Against Guam Archdiocese

On Monday, a 49-year old man filed suit in a Guam federal district court against the Catholic Archdiocese of Agana seeking $5 million in damages for sexual abuse he suffered in a Guam church in 1982 when he was an altar boy.  The offending priest, Fr. John Niland, died in 2009.  The complaint (full text) in Charfauros v. Roman Catholic Archbishop of Agana, (D GU, filed 5/22/2017), alleges in part:

12. ... [D]isguising the scheme to have sexual access to young boys was the ritual of requiring altar boys to spend the night at the church rectory, ostensibly to facilitate preparation for the following morning church services.... These seemingly routine practices ... served the predatory priests with a steady supply of victims under the auspices and pretense of formal church protocol, which allowed the Church to continually operate a veritable harem of young boys who were readily available to pedophiles who utilized the stature of the church into deceiving the community to regard them as high-level officials.

13. The systematic and ongoing pattern of sexual abuse of young children was characteristic of an internal society within ... [the] Archdiocese ... whose norms were based on pedophilic conduct disguised by the rituals and pageantry of liturgical services ... which caused Catholic parishioners.to place the highest level of confidence and trust in the church and its clergy. This internal society of sexual corruption sustained itself through a conspiratorial arrangement between priests and higher officials in the Agana Archdiocese whereby they all understood and agreed to remain quiet about each others sexual abuse misconduct....

Pacific News Center reports on the lawsuit. As reported by Crux, last year Pope Francis in effect replaced Agana Archbishop Anthony Apuron after allegations that the Archbishop sexually abused altar boys in the 1960's and 1970's.

$20M Awarded In Sexual Abuse Suit Against Rabbi and His Yeshiva

The New Haven Register reports that yesterday a federal district court jury in Hartford, Connecticut awarded $15 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages to plaintiff for sexual abuse he suffered from 2001 to 2005 while a student at Yeshiva of New Haven, an Orthodox Jewish day school. The jury found both Rabbi Daniel Greer and his Yeshiva liable.  According to the lawsuit, the abuse began when plaintiff was 15 and Greer was in his 60's.

1st Amendment Requires Dismissal of Some Priest Sexual Abuse Allegations

In Roy v. Norwich Roman Catholic Diocesan Corp., 2017 Conn. Super. LEXIS 774 (CT Super., April 24, 2017), plaintiff sued claiming that from 1990 to 1996 when he served as an altar boy at a Pomfret, Connecticut Catholic church he was sexually assaulted hundreds of times by a now-deceased priest, Fr. Paul Herbert.  While the trial court permitted plaintiff to move ahead on a number of his claims, it dismissed three of them on the ground that these would impermissibly entangle the court in matters of discipline, faith, internal organization, or ecclesiastical rule, custom, or law. The allegations that were dismissed were that the church failed to adequately evaluate the mental fitness of Herbert to serve as a Catholic priest, and the allegation that plaintiff suffered emotional and spiritual loss, substantially affecting his belief in his faith. The court held that plaintiff's other claims, such as the failure to adequately train and supervise Herbert, can be decided by applying neutral principles of law.

Suit Claims Bishop Tried To Coerce Withdrawal of Clergy Abuse Charge

A suit was filed this week in a Minnesota state trial court against the Catholic Diocese of Crookston and its Bishop Michael Hoeppner.  The complaint (full text) in Vasek v. Diocese of Crookston, (MN Dist. Ct., filed 5/8/2017) alleges that plaintiff, who was studying to be a deacon, was told by Bishop Hoeppner that he must withdraw his previous charges of decades-old sexual abuse that he had previously made against an Ohio priest.  Hoeppner allegedly told plaintiff that if he did not, "the Bishop would have difficulty ordaining Plaintiff as a deacon for the Diocese of Crookston and that Plaintiff s son's priesthood in the Diocese of Crookston would be negatively impacted." Minneapolis Star Tribune reports on the lawsuit.

8th Circuit: Abuse Victim's Defamation Suit Is Untimely

In Couzens v. Donohue, (8th Cir., April 18, 2017), the U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed dismissal on statute of limitations grounds of a defamation suit against the Catholic League for Religious Liberty.  In the suit, plaintiff alleged that defendants published false information to discredit and humiliate him in retaliation his public allegations that he was sexually abused by priests. The court likewise affirmed dismissal of plaintiff's invasion of privacy and negligent infliction of emotional distress claims. Kansas City Star reports on the decision.

Montana Diocese Files for Bankruptcy

As reported by the Great Falls Tribune, the Diocese of Great Falls-Billings (Montana) yesterday filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.  The filing grows out of settlement negotiations in a suit that was filed in 2012 by 72 survivors who suffered sexual abuse as minors from priests over the course of several decades. A press release from the Diocese says in part:

On March 31, 2017, the Diocese is filing a chapter 11 reorganization case before the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Montana to fulfill a pre-bankruptcy mediated negotiated agreement with known abuse survivors and the Diocese’s liability insurance carrier.

Bishop Michael W. Warfel and the Diocese have chosen a pastoral approach which provided the basis for its having entered this confidential mediation process. The recent mediation resulted in the beginning stages of general parameters of proposed settlements with the victims and the insurance carrier. The details of that comprehensive agreement are still being worked on by the parties. Under the supervision and ultimate approval of the Bankruptcy Court, the diocese and its insurance carrier would both contribute to that comprehensive settlement, which would compensate the currently identified victims. There will be additional settlement funds for additional and unknown victims. The process of obtaining Bankruptcy Court approval included the opportunity for victims and creditors to vote on the proposed settlement. The Diocese expects that its reorganization will be expedited by the pre-bankruptcy negotiations with all the affected parties.

Pennsylvania Diocese Reaches Agreement With Prosecutors On New Child Protection Measures

As previously reported, a year ago a Pennsylvania Grand Jury filed a lengthy Report on sexual abuse of children by Pennsylvania Catholic clergy. On Monday, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Pennsylvania and the Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown announced a memorandum of understanding on reforms by the Diocese, summarizing the core reforms as follows:

• The creation of an independent, multidisciplinary oversight board;
• The retention of an outside expert to develop a new, comprehensive child abuse prevention program;
• A reporting protocol that requires the Diocese to report allegations of child sexual abuse to law enforcement within twelve hours after receipt; and
• Counseling and support services for victims by qualified and independent mental health professionals chosen by the victims.

Reporting on the new agreement, AP says that it also requires the Diocese to immediately take priests accused of abuse out of positions where they have contact with minors, and place them on leave within 24 hours.

Survivor Resigns In Protest From Pontifical Commission On Protecting Minors

In a written statement yesterday, Marie Collins announced that she has resigned in protest from Pope Francis' Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors.  As reported by National Catholic Reporter, Collins was one of two clergy sex abuse survivors appointed to the Commission in 2014.  The other abuse victim member was placed on leave last year because of friction with other Commission members. The only other abuse survivor on the Commission, Englishman Peter Saunders, took a leave of absence last year after friction over his criticisms of the Pope.  In her statement yesterday explaining her resignation, Marie Collins said in part:

The reluctance of some in the Vatican Curia to implement recommendations or cooperate with the work of a commission when the purpose is to improve the safety of children and vulnerable adults around the world is unacceptable....

The last straw for me, on top of the refusal to cooperate on the Safeguarding Guidelines, has been the refusal, by the same dicastery, to implement one of the simplest recommendations the Commission has put forward to date.

Last year at our request, the pope instructed all departments in the Vatican to ensure all correspondence from victims/survivors receives a response. I learned in a letter from this particular dicastery last month that they are refusing to do so.