Watching survivors sign their stories in Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House of God left me hanging in anticipation on their every word. As I watched the Premiere of I was at once deeply saddened, moved, angered, and inspired.
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Much like the layers of an onion which make you cry more with each successive layer, the convictions of Father Charles Englehardt, an Oblate of St. Francis DeSales priest, and Bernard Shero, a lay teacher, expose a painful and tangled conspiracy of abuse and silence that was previously covered by a thin veneer. Independent orders of priests like the Oblates of St. Francis DeSales often operate in multiple jurisdictions and multiple dioceses allowing their perpetrators increased access to children and increased mobility to thwart public detection. With multiple assignments working w…
While better late than never as the saying goes, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles today continued to preserve its own reputation at all costs. Simultaneous to releasing 12,000 damning documents that illustrate decades of concealment, cover up and deliberate, reckless disregard for the safety of children in the Archdiocese, the Archdiocese made public the resignation of Bishop Curry and Cardinal Mahony from any public ministry. After fighting in court against the release of these documents for over six years, it is incredibly disingenuous of the Archdiocese to now make news of the…
Yesterday stands as another great moment in the child protection movement and the search for justice for survivors of clergy sexual abuse. A Philadelphia jury convicted Rev. Charles Engelhardt, a priest, and Bernard Shero, a teacher, on several counts arising from the childhood sexual abuse of a 24-year old man. Both men now face more than a decade in prison. This important moment comes on the heels of the June conviction of Monsignor William Lynn, former Secretary for Clergy in the Archdiocese, for felony child endangerment, stemming from his role in moving predator priests …
Once again, our most trusted and most powerful religious and social institutions are fighting to keep their secrets and their sins safe from disclosure. Luckily, courts continue to recognize how important the exposure of secrets is to accountability and child protection. On Monday, California Superior Court Judge Emilie Elias ordered the Archdiocese of Los Angeles to release the names of priests and church officials contained in the Archdiocese’s internal records on the sexual abuse of children. The records were originally ordered to be released as part of a groundbreaking…
On a Saturday night in the summer of 1998, an undercover officer logged in to a child-pornography chat room using the screen name Indy-Girl. Within minutes, a user named John introduced himself and asked her, “Are you into real life or just fantasy?” Indy-Girl said that because of the “legality of it” she had never acted on her fantasies. But she soon revealed an adventurous spirit. She was a bisexual college sophomore, she said, and had learned about sex at an early age. “My mother is very European,” she explained. John, a thirty-one-year-old soldier stationed in Fort Campbell, Kentucky,…
On December 13, the Forward published an explosive story by our Paul Berger detailing how Yeshiva University for years ignored students who claimed that they were sexually abused by two former staff members at Y.U.’s high school for boys in Manhattan. For that story, Berger spoke to four students who voluntarily offered their accounts. Since then, about 20 former students have called or written, and the number keeps growing. Most of the allegations occurred in the 1970s and 1980s, and the statute of limitations prevents these men from suing the school, so they aren’t looking for money or othe…
Not unlike the scandals and cover-ups recently revealed at Penn State and Poly Prep Country Day School, another prominent school, this one in New York City, has recently come under fire for its failures to report sexual abuse. Yeshiva University High School for Boys, despite being regarded as one of the most prominent Jewish high schools in the country, has its own dark secrets involving sexual abuse dating back decades. Two staff members at the school, former principal George Finkelstein and former teacher, Rabbi Macy Gordon, were both recently outed as having been accused of sexually abusi…
This week, Joseph Ostrowski, the former head football coach at Holy Redeemer High School in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, pled guilty to producing child pornography. The U.S. Attorney charged with prosecuting the case said that Ostrowski engaged in “sextortion” of his victims by tricking them into sexual acts that he viewed over video chat. Ostrowski then shared the sexual conduct and pictures via Facebook. “Sextortion” is loosely defined as “a form of sexual exploitation that employs non-physical forms of coercion to extort sexual favors from the victim.” Like extortion, sextortion is the…
A lawsuit filed last week sued William Airey and accused the CEO of Moose International of grooming and sexually abusing Jason Peck when he was 12 years old. News about allegations of abuse by Penn State coach Jerry Sandusky inspired Peck to come forward and disclose his own abuse by Airey, which took place more than 30 years ago.Moose International is a fraternity organization, describing itself on its website as “an international organization of men and women, dedicated to caring for young and old, bringing communities closer together and celebrating life.” Jason Peck met William Airey…