Former Hilo farmer Jay Ram, who is accused of sexual abuse by five of his sons, has been found living outside of Tampa, where he was finally served with the civil lawsuits.
One of Ram’s neighbors in Odessa, who spoke to the Tribune-Herald on the condition of anonymity, said Ram is living on a five-acre plot with “three young men or boys” whom he doesn’t let out on their own.
He’s also going by a new name. Not terribly surprising.
Ram had most recently been living on the island of Saipan. When the lawsuits became public and news started to spread, Ram sold his house at a loss and disappeared.
Blaire: didn’t even have the decency to put a now-indicted priest on leave (despite MOUNTAINS of evidence that the priest was a threat)
According to the Lodi News/Modesto Bee, “the criminal grand jury indicted Kelly on three counts of lewd and lascivious conduct on a child and one count of oral copulation with a child.”
During five years of civil litigation—which unearthed enough evidence to convince a civil jury that Kelly most likely had abused Travis Trotter—Bishop Blaire allowed Kelly to remain in ministry, working with children and administering sacraments (holding the keys to parishioners’ salvation). After the jury verdict and Kelly fled to Ireland, Blaire said he “urged Kelly to return” but continued to defend the priest‘s innocence. On the eve of a criminal indictment, Blaire declares bankruptcy.
What more do you need to know about Stockton’s child protection policies?
Blaire didn’t even have the decency to put Kelly on leave during the time period up to and during the trial. It’s one thing to support an accused priest, it’s another to flagrantly insult sex abuse victims and parishioners by allowing a credibly accused cleric to continue to work as a priest.
Stockton is also facing the problem of Oliver O’Grady, the serial predator whose victims are continuing to come forward. Blaire could have done a lot of things for these victims—encouraged them to come forward, worked with civil attorneys to get them counseling, or *GASP* been open and transparent with information. But no, he decided to spend his time and efforts supporting Michael Kelly. The victims? He simply didn’t care about them. Until he lost.
Blaire had plenty of money to fight victims … until he lost. Now that he says he broke, he suddenly is becoming very generous.
So, like Gallup, another diocese in the midst of the bankruptcy two-step, Stockton is seeking protection from the bankruptcy courts. Unfortunately for Catholics and victims of abuse, they went morally bankrupt decades ago.
“But the Lord said to Samuel, ‘Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for the Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.” 1 Samuel 16:7
Malcolm Gladwell’s essay in this month’s RELEVANT magazine is worth your time. Read it online here. In it, he discusses how he rediscovered his faith as he was writing his latest book DAVID AND GOLIATH.
Malcolm Gladwell, awesome guy. Same great taste in orange backgrounds.
In both examples Gladwell uses in the essay—parents whose child was murdered and a small town in France whose citizens defied the Nazis in World War II—he discusses the “weapons of the spirit”: the ability, as Samuel says in the verse above, “to look at the heart” and not fear the physical. Unfortunately, most of us “estimate[d] the dangers of action by looking on outward appearances—when they need[ed] to look on the heart.” And hence … faith suffered.
Gladwell goes on to say that finding God’s spirit is not about blind acceptance of the actions of others, but instead is using the “Weapons of the Spirit” to look into man’s heart. Standing up for justice. Doing what is right. And if a non-religious person like me can get it, there is a whole lot of untapped power waiting to be set free.
Bishop Kevin Vann … you listening? What about you, Timothy Dolan, Francis George, or James Wall? Have you wondered why so many Catholics have moved elsewhere to celebrate their faith? Perhaps you should look in the mirror of your heart. Because we have looked into your heart, and we fear for you. But we no longer fear you.
Letourneau, 51, was arrested on suspicion of driving with a suspended license and booked into King County Jail. A year ago, she’d been cited for driving with a suspended license after failing to pay her tickets. She didn’t show up at a “relicensing program” or a court hearing, so a warrant was issued for her arrest.
But this is far more than a story about a woman who “forgot” to pay her parking tickets.
LeTourneau, as I prefer to remember her
When it comes to men and women who sexually abuse children, the predators’ physical anatomies may be different, but their mindsets are very much the same. Child sex abusers are men and women who blur boundaries—sexual, physical, emotional and legal. As they hone their skills over years of grooming and abusing children, predators begin to think that they are above the law in all areas. This is why we see cases of abusive priests who steal from the collection basket, Protestant predators who work as police chaplains, or celebrity molesters who use their power and influence to thwart law enforcement.
LeTourneau is no different. Although she was arrested and went to jail, she essentially got away with child sex crimes. Fualaau, now married to his abuser, has never been interviewed without the woman who began preying on him when he was in the sixth grade. We may never learn the full extent of the damage LeTourneau did to the 12-year-old boy from a troubled home.
But we do know this: she, like many others who molest children, thinks that she is simply above the law. If the parking tickers were just a matter of money (she is an unemployable registered sex offender and Fualaau is a high school dropout who works part time as a DJ), she would have stopped parking in zones where she would be ticketed. If it were a matter of simple neglect, she would have gone to her court hearing and asked for help. But she didn’t.
She instead displayed typical child sex predator behavior: she simply believes that the laws do not apply to her.
