The Worthy Adversary

Tag: priest sex abuse

  • New Lawsuit Filed Against Convicted Ontario Priest Jose Alejandro “Alex” Castillo

    Ontario priest named in new sex abuse suit

    Convicted cleric faces at least 5 victims

    He was even sent sent back to jail for violating parole

    Church officials knew he gave kids full-body massages, but 

    Crimes were not reported to law enforcement

    For 20 years, priest molested kids in Latino communities

    Come forward and report abuse, victims ask

    Priest must be defrocked, they say

    Jose Alejandro “Alex” Castillo

    What: Holding signs and photos of themselves when they were abused, abuse victims and their supporters will disclose a new child sex abuse and cover-up lawsuit against the San Bernardo Catholic Diocese and a convicted predator priest. The suit charges that now-convicted priest Jose Alejandro “Alex” Castillo:

    • sexually abused an Ontario teen in 2003,
    • had a 20-year history of known and unreported predatory behavior, and
    • was intentionally put in poor, Spanish speaking communities where children are less likely to report

    Victims will also urge San Bernardino’s Bishop Gerald Barnes to:

    • reach out to every person who encountered the child-molesting priest,
    • turn over all evidence of abuse to law enforcement,
    • beg the priest’s supporters to keep their kids away from him, and
    • ask anyone who saw, suspected or suffered abuse to call police, not church officials.

    Where: Outside of Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish, 710 S Sultana St. (corner of Mission), Ontario

    When: Tuesday, September 18 at 11:45 am

    Who: Two – three victims of sexual abuse and their supporters who are members of a self-help group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.

    Why: This week, an attorney for a former young catechism student filed a sex abuse and cover-up lawsuit against the Diocese of San Bernardino and a convicted predator priest/parole offender, Fr. Jose Alejandro “Alex” Castillo.

    The lawsuit charges that in 2003 when the boy was a 15- and 16-year-old student in the parish, Castillo would isolate the boy from other adults and children and sexually abuse him. The victim currently lives in Mexico and is under the age of 26.

    The suit also says that church officials had reports that Castillo was molesting kids all the way back in the 1970s, when Castillo was a seminarian in Mexico and the 1980s and ’90s, when he was a priest of the Order of the Divine Word. Castillo left the order and joined the San Bernardino Diocese in approximately 1996. Before the victim in this case was abused, San Bernardino church officials knew that Castillo was taking kids into his room and giving them full-body massages.

    In April 2011, Castillo pleaded guilty to lewd acts with a child under the age of 14.  After his release in 2012, Castillo was sent back to jail for violating the conditions of his parole when he attended a party where children were present. The party was thrown by his supporters and former parishioners. Church officials, who knew of Castillo’s predatory behavior, did nothing to reach out to the group and explain the insensitivity of their actions.

    This is the third sex abuse lawsuit filed against Castillo. In September 2011, two victims, one of whom was the victim in Castillo’s criminal conviction, filed lawsuits against the priest and diocese. According to court documents, there are at least five victims who have come forward to say that Castillo molested them.

    According to the sentencing report, Castillo has little to no understanding of the severity of his crimes.

    The lawsuit also says that Castillo used his position as a priest to have unlimited access to the children. San Bernardino church officials have known for years about Castillo’s predatory behavior, yet let him work in a parish with a school and spend long amounts of time with families with young children, the suit maintains.

    To date, there has been no announcement that San Bernardino Bishop Gerald Barnes has moved to defrock Castillo. The cleric’s last known address was in Ontario.

    Castillo’s victims are represented by Pasadena attorney Anthony DeMarco.

  • Wikipedia or PR? You be the judge

    On a lark, I looked up the Wikipedia entry for Orange County Bishop Tod Brown.

    I was inspired after I saw that Bishop Accountability had just completed a newer edition of Brown’s assignment history. Bishop Accountability included details of the sex abuse allegation against Brown, as well as the fact that Brown had refused to disclose the allegation, calling it “very embarrassing and very painful.”

    I admit that I am guilty of using Wikipedia for references on my own blog posts. But after reading Brown’s entry, I’m going to have to rethink that practice.

    The Wikipedia entry – no doubt edited by Brown’s PR people – makes NO mention of the $100 million settlement with 97 victims of abuse in 2005. It makes NO mention of the 1997 allegation against Brown (which was front page news); NO mention of the 2007 settlements with four women who were sexually abused as children; NO mention of the fact that Brown was charged with contempt for allowing John Urell to flee the country in order to avoid a deposition; and NO mention of last month’s $2 million settlement with a victim of Michael Harris.

    His entry has been scrubbed so cleanly of the facts, that it shines as brightly as his new glass cathedral.

    Too bad Brown can’t be just as transparent.

     

  • BREAKING: Former Hawaii bishop accused of molesting boy

    For immediate release: Wednesday, June 13, 2012

    Hawaii bishop accused of molesting boy

    New sex abuse and cover-up lawsuit is filed

    This is the 2nd victim to name Ferrario as offender

    Diocese knew and covered up allegations, lawsuit says

    New state law lets victims expose abusers & protect kids

    In a new civil lawsuit using an unusual new state law, a former Hawaii bishop and one of his priests are accused of molesting a boy and Catholic officials are accused of ignoring or concealing their crimes.

    A California man says he was sexually violated as a ten-year-old in 1973, first by Fr. Joseph Henry and then by former Honolulu Bishop Joseph Ferrario. At the time, the boy attended mass at St. Anthony’s parish in Kailua. Both alleged wrongdoers are now deceased.

    The lawsuit is one of the first filed under a new Hawaii law that lets child sex abuse victims use the courts to expose predators, protect kids and seek justice, even decades after they were assaulted.

    The victim, who grew up in Hawaii and now lives in California, is suing the Honolulu Diocese, which employed both clerics.

    The suit says that after being sexually victimized by Henry, the confused and scared boy was placed in religious education classes with Joseph Ferrario. Ferrario was a new priest at the parish who allegedly “counseled” the victim and began abusing the boy himself. The abuse reportedly continued after Ferrario was made an auxiliary bishop and continued until 1978.

    Before Ferrario came to the parish, boy reported the abuse by Henry to two other priests, who told him to keep quiet, the suit maintains

    This is the second victim of Henry and Ferrario to come forward.

    In 1991, David Figueroa of Hawaii filed a similar suit against both clerics. In 1991, it was dismissed because the statute of limitations had passed .

    The victim in the new suit came forward to a church lawyer in 1991 to report his abuse, but allegedly, Honolulu church officials offered no help and launched no investigation (or did so secretly).

    “This is a perfect example of how Hawaii’s new civil window law can being justice and accountability to victims,” said Joelle Casteix of Newport Beach, SNAP Western Regional Director. “Here’s a victim who did everything ‘right,’ but church officials silenced him and kept kids at risk. But because of this smart new law, the public will be able to learn which diocesan staff ignored or concealed these heinous crimes.”

    “The new Hawaii law is especially important in situations like this one, when the power of an accused bishop is one of the factors that has prevented justice from being done,” said Terence McKiernan, president of BishopAccountability.org. “We know of 22 bishops in the U.S. who have been accused of abuse, including Bishop Ferrario, and as bishops, they have a crucial role in the clerical culture of abuse and the enabling of abuse.”

    The new law, Act 068, sponsored by Sen. Maile Shimabukuru and signed by Gov. Neil Abercrombie in April gives child sex abuse victims a two-year “window” to use the civil courts to expose their perpetrators and those who may have ignored or concealed the crimes. This is the second known case filed under the new law. The first, against Damien High School chaplain Gerald Funcheon, was filed in May.

    In California and Delaware, civil window laws exposed hundreds of predators and help law enforcement put predators behind bars.

    Henry, who died in 1974, also went by J. Michael Henry and Joseph M. Henry. Ferrario died in 2003 and spent part of his clerical career working in Hawaii and California. You can see his entire history here

    Copies of the lawsuit are available on the website http://www.abusedinhawaii.com

    The lawsuit was filed in the Hawaii’s First Circuit Court and seeks unspecified damages.


  • Disconnect, Pt 2: Subpoenas are for the little people

    Earlier this year in Kansas City, SNAP’s David Clohessy was ordered to give a six-hour deposition in a child sex abuse lawsuit. Neither SNAP nor David himself were a party or even knew the victim. Critics piled on Clohessy, calling him evasive and a con-artist. In the end, the deposition has nothing to do with the lawsuit. It was instead a legal maneuver on behalf of a group of bishops to bankrupt SNAP through legal fees.

    This week in Stockton, California, former Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony was called to testify in court in the case of Father Michael Kelly, a priest that a civil jury found had molested a boy in the 1980s. Mahony decided to go to Rome instead. Lawyers are pushing for the judge to cite Manhony with contempt.

    And legal fees? No worries: the Diocese of Stockton and the Archdiocese of Los Angeles are always more than happy to pick up his legal fees. Collection baskets from poor parishes in vulnerable communities never seem to fail. Besides, what does Mahony care that he is costing taxpayers thousands of dollars in unnecessary court costs?

    So who’s the con artist now?

    Read Disconnect Part I here

     

  • Another Lay Review Board Thrown Under The Bus …

    Serve on a Diocese lay review board, and you can go to jail. Or at least that’s what Kansas City-St. Joseph Bishop Robert Finn says.

    Bishop Finn and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph are each being charged with one misdemeanor of failure to report suspected child abuse. The charges stem from the case of Fr. Shawn Ratigan, a priest in the diocese who now faces 13 federal counts of child pornography. According to legal accounts, whistleblowers, and media reports, Bishop Finn knew about Ratigan’s suspicious behavior for at least a year, possibly more, and sat on Ratigan’s child pornography collection for six months before turning it over to the police.

    Finn also didn’t inform his own lay review board until six months after Finn learned of the pornography and a month AFTER he finally notified the police. This is a year after the school principal wrote Finn a detailed letter outlining Ratigan’s suspicious behavior, including the facts that parents had found toys in his house and children’s underwear in his bushes.

    The lay review board learned about the principal’s letter in the media. Not from Finn.

    Yesterday, lawyers for Finn stated that charges should be dropped because he is NOT a mandatory reporter. According to the Associated Press:

    Finn claims Vicar General Robert Murphy and a diocese review board — not the bishop — were responsible for reporting suspected images of child pornography to the state.

    Wait. Did I miss something? Now it’s the review board’s fault? Even when Finn keeps them in the dark (on purpose) or gives them incomplete and faulty information?

    I have written about the utter failure of law review boards in the past. These boards were expressly created to have NO power. Don’t believe me? From the 2001 Essential Norms (revised):

    4. To assist diocesan/eparchial bishops, each diocese/eparchy will also have a review board which will function as a confidential consultative body to the bishop/eparch in discharging his responsibilities. The functions of this board may include

    a. advising the diocesan bishop/eparch in his assessment of allegations of sexual abuse of minors and in his determination of suitability for ministry;

    b. reviewing diocesan/eparchial policies for dealing with sexual abuse of minors; and c. offering advice on all aspects of these cases, whether retrospectively or prospectively.

    See that part about “confidential and consultative”?  That means that the bishop can tell them whatever he wants and doesn’t have to take their advice. As a former board member myself, I know.

    How else do bishops keep lay review boards as powerless as possible? In Los Angeles, members of the review board admitted only knowing about “hypothetical” cases (while an admitted perpetrator was a board member). In Philadelphia, review board members had no idea about more than two dozen accused clerics still in ministry, until a grand jury report exposed them.

    The head of the Philadelphia Lay Review Board, Ana Maria Catanzano, went so far as to say that they were chartered to only review cases where civil or criminal litigation were not involved.

    So they weren’t even given cases to review that fell under the reporting statute.

    Who is supposed to report? The bishop. In fact, if you carefully review the norms, under #11, you will see this:

    11. The diocese/eparchy will comply with all applicable civil laws with respect to the reporting of allegations of sexual abuse of minors to civil authorities and will cooperate in their investigation. In every instance, the diocese/eparchy will advise and support a person’s right to make a report to public authorities. (from the footnotes: The necessary observance of the canonical norms internal to the Church is not intended in any way to hinder the course of any civil action that may be operative)

    That means that a criminal report must be made before ANYTHING else is done.

    But Norm #9 is my favorite:

    9. At all times, the diocesan bishop/eparch has the executive power of governance, within the parameters of the universal law of the Church, through an administrative act, to remove an offending cleric from office, to remove or restrict his faculties, and to limit his exercise of priestly ministry.

    Because sexual abuse of a minor by a cleric is a crime in the universal law of the Church (CIC, c. 1395 §2; CCEO, c. 1453 §1) and is a crime in all civil jurisdictions in the United States, for the sake of the common good and observing the provisions of canon law, the diocesan bishop/eparch shall exercise this power of governance to ensure that any priest or deacon who has committed even one act of sexual abuse of a minor as described above shall not continue in active ministry

    So, Bishop Finn, the buck stops with you. You have the “executive power of governance” over an institution required under law and moral obligation to report child sexual abuse. And you blew it.