German nuns ‘rented’ orphaned boys to businessmen for ‘gang bangs & orgies’ – suppressed report seen by media
3 Feb, 2021 12:33
A report being withheld from the public documents horrific acts of rape and sexual abuse against young boys that were facilitated by nuns belonging to the Catholic Archdiocese of Cologne in Germany, according to the Daily Beast.
The investigation’s findings, which concluded last month and stemmed from a lawsuit brought against the archdiocese by victims, have not been publicly released, but the contents of the report are said to have been leaked to several media outlets.
Sections of the 560-page report purportedly seen by the Daily Beast detail how nuns who ran a convent in Speyer, Germany between the 1960s and 1970s “rented” orphaned boys to businessmen and clergy, who abused the children, sometimes for weeks at a time, before ‘returning’ them.
According to the outlet, some of the orphans were forced to participate in “gang bangs and orgies” before being returned to the convent where the nuns would discipline them for having “wrinkl[ed] their clothes or being covered in semen.”
The report concluded that 175 children, most of them boys between the ages of 8 and 14, were abused over two decades. Some of the children were intentionally barred from being adopted or taken into a foster home so the nuns could continue to hire them out, the probe allegedly found.
However, the investigation declined to directly blame the nuns involved in the sick scheme, arguing instead that the abuse was the result of “systematic” management errors and the “leniency” accorded to those accused of taking part in the abominable crimes, the Beast reported.
The details were leaked to the press after the archdiocese refused to make the report public, demanding that journalists who viewed the documents sign a confidentiality agreement (2nd story on link). All those who attended a press conference announcing the conclusion of the investigation reportedly walked out, refusing to abide by the Church’s terms.
The Archdiocese of Cologne said it had withheld the report because it had failed to fully explain its methodology. However, Bishop Karl-Heinz Wiesmann, who leads the archdiocese, told the media the abuse report was “so gory,” it was not suitable for public viewing. The bishop claims he was so disturbed by the report, he had to take a month away from his duties after reading it.
The shocking revelations come less than a year after a separate investigation found Berlin’s educational authorities and senate had supported and defended placing foster children into the care of known pedophiles. The 30-year policy, which ended in 2003, led to a number of serious cases of abuse, the investigation discovered.
Former Jacksonville bishops failed to report sexual abuse allegations
..
Archives show church didn’t tell state about allegations against retired priest
during its investigation
ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. – Since the early 1990s, at least four women have repeatedly come to the Diocese of St. Augustine with complaints of how now-deceased priest William Malone molested and fondled them, impregnating at least one of them, in the 1980s.
His victims were young girls, the youngest just 11 years old.
The Diocese of St. Augustine told its parishioners in 2019 — for the first time — it knew of credible allegations against Fr. Malone. Church leaders didn’t specify how many victims came forward or what they knew.
The archive records, provided by the Diocese of St. Augustine to the Florida Attorney General’s Office of Statewide Prosecution, reveal the diocese — specifically late Bishop John Snyder — knew about Fr. Malone’s problems at least starting in 1991.
In 1991, the parents of a young parishioner set up a meeting with Snyder after learning their daughter was repeatedly molested by Malone in the early 1980s when she was 11 years old. The abuse happened during confession.
The family later told diocese investigators the allegations were dismissed during the 1991 meeting as “conjecture” and “not credible” because their daughter didn’t want to meet with diocese officials.
The allegations were not brought to police by the diocese, but that same year Rev. Malone was moved to a different parish within the Diocese of St. Augustine. Malone was assigned to be the associate pastor at St. Elizabeth Seton Catholic Church in Palm Coast where he stayed for a year.
In 1992, diocese records show, Bishop Snyder became aware of a young parishioner Rev. Malone got pregnant. By this time, Rev. Malone had transferred back to the Holy Ghost Order in Long Island, New York, but child support was being paid to his daughter’s mother.
In a 1994 letter, the Pastor of Sacred Heart updated Bishop Snyder on how much child support was sent to the mother of Rev. Malone’s child to that point. The payments began in Dec. 1992. By August that year, the diocese had provided $5,529 to the mother of Fr. Malone’s child.
Letter detailing financial support provided (Provided to WJXT)
A letter between Bishop Snyder and Rev. Brian McLaughlin with the Holy Ghost Order in Dublin in 1993 laid out the arrangement. The Diocese of St. Augustine would forward $3,000 every year to the Holy Ghost Order to be paid to Rev. Malone’s child. Diocese records show the payments continued under Bishop Victor Galeone and ended in 2010.
“Father Malone should understand that our involvement and willingness to assist shall remain confidential,” Bishop Snyder wrote in that 1993 letter.
In letters between Bishop Snyder and McLaughlin in 1993, McLaughlin also addressed the allegation Rev. Malone sexually abused a child. McLaughlin wrote to Bishop Snyder: “He says he does not recall the incident(s) related to possible child abuse but accepts that something must have happened.”
Gee! I wonder what?
The abuse allegation was not reported to police at the time.
In 2003, the woman who was molested by Fr. Malone at age 11 wrote a letter to then Bishop Victor Galeone. In it, she detailed the abuse and the meeting her parents had with Bishop Snyder in 1991. She wrote: “I was abused by a man of God at 11-years-old and ignored by men of God who were supposed to protect His flock.”
According to diocese records, the woman met with Bishop Galeone in 2003 about the abuse. At this point, the Diocese of St. Augustine hired a victim advocate coordinator and appointed a Diocesan Review Board to investigate sex abuse allegations. But the Diocesan Review Board was not called to investigate the allegations made against Fr. Malone in 2003, records show. Neither were police.
In 2018, the woman came forward for the third time to report Fr. Malone molesting her when she was 11 years old. The Diocesan Review Board met and requested a review of the allegations by an independent investigator and based on the report, the review board found the allegations to be credible.
The diocese private investigator shared the allegations with law enforcement in February 2018. It was five months after the diocese learned — for the third time — of the allegations.
The diocese told parishioners about credible allegations against Fr. Malone in March 2019. A deluge of allegations against Malone followed. In total, three more women came forward with complaints about how Malone sexually abused them at Sacred Heart.
In March 2019, a woman reported Fr. Malone molested her once a week for six weeks during counseling sessions with the priest in 1982 when she was 15 years old. She told investigators her husband reported the abuse to diocese officials in 1994, but he was told she needed to meet with a diocese attorney and staff by herself to discuss the allegations.
The diocese contacted another reported victim in January 2019. The woman told the diocese private investigator Fr. Malone sexually assaulted her in the rectory. She was 18 or 19 at the time. She told the investigator her family notified the pastor of Sacred heart church — Msgr. Madden — within a week of the abuse happening.
In March 2019, another woman reported Fr. Malone sexually assaulted her sister in the late 1980s. Her sister was an adult parishioner of Sacred Heart at the time. She reported that during a session with Fr. Malone, he “grabbed her [sister's] breast during prayer for healing and redemption.”
In an internal report, the private investigator for the diocese wrote: “the details of the molestation are consistent with the other credible allegations” including location, physical contact, and the age and characteristics of the victims.
The attorney and communications director for the Diocese of St. Augustine declined repeated requests for an interview to discuss Fr. Malone’s case and other cases detailed in the formerly secret archives, and provided this statement instead. The records, says the diocese, speak for themselves.
“The timing of those events should be readily ascertainable from the records you have. The way in which the allegations were handled is also readily ascertainable from the summary contained on the website as I have described in previous communications with you. If you need additional information please let us know,” attorney Tom Bishop said via email.
There is much more on this story at News4Jax.
Bishop England High faces $300M lawsuit over windows
that let staff watch kids change
By Sara Coello and Rickey Ciapha Dennis Jr.
The Post and Courier
Feb 4, 2021
MOUNT PLEASANT, S.C. — A lawsuit filed Feb. 3 is asking for $300 million from South Carolina’s largest Catholic high school, saying an ill-conceived locker room design allowed staff to watch underage students undress.
The lawsuit, filed on behalf of students and parents at Bishop England High School, seeks tuition refunds and damages for every child who might have been seen. The Daniel Island school, which is overseen by the Diocese of Charleston, boasts several hundred students each year.
When the school was constructed at its current location in the late 1990s, a large window was placed in each locker room, separating it from a staff office. School leaders have said it was designed for student safety, but did not cover it until a staff member used the opening to illegally record video of young students.
But attorney Larry Richter, who has represented victims in previous lawsuits against the diocese, said at a news conference in his Mount Pleasant office on Feb. 4 that perspective is shortsighted at best. After decades of sex-abuse allegations, he said leaders should have known they were setting children up for exploitation.
The diocese said it feels the class-action claims, which were filed in circuit court in Moncks Corner, “have absolutely no merit.”
“The plaintiff’s claim that the windows were installed for the sole purpose of exploiting students is simply ludicrous,” said Maria Aselage, a spokeswoman for the Diocese of Charleston.
For over 20 years, leaders considered the window a safety aid, not a liability. Until a young student using a school device found exploitative video of her peers in May 2019, the school said it had no reason to believe the glass could hide a predator.
The window
The diocese said the windows were a safety feature for the building’s three locker rooms.
“Their purpose was to allow coaches to monitor for fights, bullying, smoking or any type of inappropriate activity that might occur within the locker rooms,” Aselage said.
Each locker room had a glass window, about 4 by 4 feet, embedded into a wall that leads to a staff office. Blinds on the office side of the glass allowed for some privacy, but enabled employees to peer in.
Each window was visible from within, but students can’t see through the blinds, Richter said. They had no way of knowing whether they were watched, he said, until learning of the illicit recording in May 2019.
That day, school officials quickly covered the windows, Aselage said, and have since replaced them with a brick wall.
Richter took the swift action as proof that the windows were never necessary, and said the school should repay any student who was forced to use the locker room beforehand.
Employee arrested, fired
In May 2019, a student using a school device found video that had been shot through one of the windows, showing underage students changing. Authorities arrested the sports information director, Jeffrey Alan Scofield, now 34, and the school promptly fired him.
A year later, Scofield pleaded guilty to a single count of voyeurism, saying his crime was a one-time occurrence. He was sentenced to two years in prison, which was suspended to 18 months of probation, then ordered to register as a sex offender and undergo mental-health treatment.
“While I definitely understand the severity of what I did, I can assure you … that the video never did go anywhere else,” Scofield said at his bond hearing.
Richter hopes that’s true, but said anyone who may have fallen victim to a predator using the window should be entitled to compensation, even without video evidence.
At that bond hearing, a Charleston police victim advocate said the victims’ families were shocked that a trusted staff member had recorded their children.
“A teenager should be focusing on academics and other after-school activities,” the advocate said, reading a letter from one of the victim’s families. “They should not have to worry about a grown man videotaping them for his sick pleasure.”
While some of the students who were identified from recordings have been contacted individually, Richter said it’s possible thousands of former students and their families should be eligible.
He’s trying to certify two different groups to go forward with class-action litigation: anyone who had paid tuition to the school while the windows were in place and anyone who had to use the locker rooms during that time. If successful, the plaintiffs will ask for tuition refunds — totaling about $150 million, by Richter’s calculations — and another $150 million in damages for the slew of students who could’ve been seen undressing for gym class or athletic games.
Bishop England High students, who are all required to take a gym class, will automatically be qualified. But Richter also is worried about students from other schools who used the locker room before games. He’ll represent them along with attorneys from Solomon Law Group; Slotchiver & Slotchiver; and Brent Souther Halversen LLC.
History of sex abuse cases
The diocese has faced several sex-abuse accusations dating to the 1950s and 1960s, with victims accusing priests and parochial school employees of abuse. In several cases, victims also blamed church authorities for ignoring warning signs and, in at least one instance recorded in court documents, retaliating against a survivor who spoke out.
The diocese has a publicly available list of 45 names of South Carolina priests who have credible allegations of child sexual misconduct — three more than what was released in 2019.
None of the persons named still serves as a priest.
Bishop Robert E. Guglielmone said in 2019 the list was released “in the spirit of transparency” and hoped publishing the names would bring healings to victims and their families.
Guglielmone submitted his resignation for retirement in December on his 75th birthday, as required by the Vatican. His final year as bishop included fending off a lawsuit filed in New York in 2019 that alleged Guglielmone sexually abused an 8-year-old boy while pastoring on Long Island in the late 1970s.
Guglielmone denied those accusations and said the Roman Catholic Church headquarters had cleared him any wrongdoing.
Aselage said the diocese takes the protection of children “very seriously.”
But it takes the protection of paedophile priests, bishops, and the Church's name far more seriously!
The religious organization mandates that every teacher, other employee, and volunteer who has regular access to children undergo a background screening, attend a child abuse-prevention education program, and sign a code of conduct governing their interactions with minors, Aselage said.
The Missouri-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests said the legal system — not the church — should determine the legitimacy of the claims.
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