This weekend CNN will air a documentary about the Pope’s involvement in clergy sexual abuse. What the Pope Knew debuts Saturday at 8 pm EST and runs again Saturday at 11 pm EST and Sunday at 8 pm and 11pm EST. Until now most of the coverage about the Pope and his role in clergy sexual abuse has focused on individual cases. CNN’s documentary takes a much broader look at the Pope’s decisions when he was an Archbishop in Germany and when he was in charge of the Vatican’s department that was supposed to deal with clergy sexual abuse. More information about the documentary is…
News & Events
This weekend CNN will air a documentary about the Pope’s involvement in clergy sexual abuse. What the Pope Knew debuts Saturday at 8 pm EST and runs again Saturday at 11 pm EST and Sunday at 8 pm and 11pm EST. Until now most of the coverage about the Pope and his role in clergy sexual abuse has focused on individual cases. CNN’s documentary takes a much broader look at the Pope’s decisions when he was an Archbishop in Germany and when he was in charge of the Vatican’s department that was supposed to deal with clergy sexual abuse. More information about the documentary is available at CNN’s bel…
Editor’s note: A one-hour CNN special, “What the Pope Knew,” will air Sept. 25 and Sept. 26, 8pm and 11pm ET. This story is drawn from that exclusive report. By Scott BronsteinCNN Special Investigations Unit MILWAUKEE, Wisconsin – Terry Kohut has kept a dark secret for nearly 50 years. Now he is breaking his silence, becoming a key figure in the sex-abuse crisis in the Catholic Church and the growing controversy over what Pope Benedict XVI did about it. When Kohut was barely a teen, and for years afterward, he says, he was sexually molested and assaulted by the headmaster and priest …
An article in today’s Minneapolis Star Tribune about the case of Gregg Larsen and his exploitation of foster children in his care highlights how important our state and county agencies are to protecting our most vulnerable. Much has been written about ways to protect our kids from sexual exploitation. However, what happens to those children who have no one to watch over them. Foster children
An associate of St. Paul attorney Jeff Anderson, who often sues clergy members in sexual abuse cases, says Hennepin County and the state of Minnesota may be liable for actions of a foster parent convicted of producing and possessing child pornography. Attorney Patrick Noaker, who works in Anderson’s firm, served notice to the county and state last month that three foster children and their parents may have a claim involving Gregg A. Larsen, a former special education…
One of the most effective tools in fighting child sexual abuse and protecting kids has been the internet. The internet has been a source of constant information about predators and those who protect predators. Tomorrow I will appear in court in St. Louis, Missouri to represent a website author who created a website to protect kids called http://protectkidsfromclergypredators.com/. This website contains mostly court records from a child sexual abuse lawsuit against Rev. James D. Manning . Manning settled the child sexual abuse suit out of court and then turned around and filed a lawsuit against…
Five years ago, John Doe RG contacted our law firm seeking help. He had been sexually abused by Fr. Harry Monroe, at the time, an unknown Catholic priest/perpetrator in Indianapolis, Indiana. RG was the first to publicly expose Fr. Monroe’s abuse and the Archdiocese of Indianapolis’ concealment of that abuse. Fourteen more boys followed in bringing lawsuits. Last week, RG settled his lawsuit and one of the questions is whether this is the end of this chapter in his life, or just the beginning. One thing for sure is that RG cannot change the fact that he was sexually abused by his priest. He ca…
Five years ago, John Doe RG contacted our law firm seeking help. He had been sexually abused by Fr. Harry Monroe, at the time, an unknown Catholic priest/perpetrator in Indianapolis, Indiana. RG was the first to publicly expose Fr. Monroe’s abuse and the Archdiocese of Indianapolis’ concealment of that abuse. Fourteen more boys followed in bringing lawsuits. Last week, RG settled his lawsuit and one of the questions is whether this is the end of this chapter in his life, or just the beginning. One thing for sure is that RG cannot change the fact that he was sexually abused by his priest.
You can’t knock progress… right? Well, the German Catholic Church has made some this week and you can be the judge. Yesterday, the Church adopted stricter guidelines for leaders to follow when reporting and handling cases of clergy sex abuse. Since 2002, church leaders in Germany have been required to report “established” cases of child sex abuse to law enforcement, unless the victim has other wishes. You can imagine the wiggle room this allowed: not only could church leaders loosely define what constitutes an “established case” in order to suit themselves and their reputations, they cou
A former St. Paul schoolteacher has been sued again – this time by two foster children and their guardians – for allegedly using the children to produce pornography. Gregg Alan Larsen, 49, of Minneapolis worked as a special education teacher at Central High School until he resigned May 4. Two weeks later, he was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of producing child pornography. He pleaded guilty in the criminal case and awaits sentencing. The lawsuit, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court, alleges that Larsen used two brothers, ages 5 and 7, for pornography. He “engaged (them) i
On August 22, 2010, I wrote about misconceptions about child pornographers. Here, I write about misconceptions about victims of child pornography. Today our law firm filed another case involving child pornography against former special education teacher Gregg Larsen. The Plaintiffs are two kids who were ages 5 and 7 when they were exploited. Some might be surprised to hear that children so young are being exploited for child pornography, but it is getting more and more common. The United States Department of Justice estimates that pornographers have recorded
Many people (including me before I began handling child pornography cases) have an image of who consumes child pornography. They picture a forty something year-old man in his mother’s basement at midnight. There is no question that child pornography is growing at an incredible rate and that the problem is far worse than most thought. Estimates that were made even two or three years ago have turned out to be fatally flawed as significant underestimates. This week’s news reveals that the image of the child pornography consumer is equally flawed. For example, an article in
OAKLAND — Survivors of sexual abuse by a local priest have filed two lawsuits against the Diocese of Oakland and church officials who they said allowed abuse by Stephen Kiesle to continue unchecked. “The diocese could have stopped this,” said Teresa Rosson, one of the accusers. Rosson, who is Kiesle’s stepdaughter, said he began sexually abusing her from the time she was 11 years old until 2001. She is now 48. Instead, she said, “They delivered him into our churches with our kids.” She said the abuse began when Kiesle served at St. Joseph’s parish in Pinole in 1972 — the year he was or
It’s working. This is exactly what needs to happen when survivors find the courage to come forward — more must follow. This is the only path to achieving mass shifts in the way child sex abuse cases are handled and the way institutional corruption is punished. The emergence of seven new victims of serial rapist Father Stephen Kiesle is a tragic yet indicative example of how this process works and we applaud them all for their courage. We also applaud those who came before and inspired these new victims to speak up.If you’re unfamiliar with the Kiesle case, it is a hallmark of Vatican sex abus
It’s working. This is exactly what needs to happen when survivors find the courage to come forward — more must follow. This is the only path to achieving mass shifts in the way child sex abuse cases are handled and the way institutional corruption is punished. The emergence of seven new victims of serial rapist Father Stephen Kiesle is a tragic yet indicative example of how this process works and we applaud them all for their courage. We also applaud those who came before and inspired these new victims to speak up.If you’re unfamiliar with the Kiesle case, it is a hallmark of Vatican sex abus