Former church pastor admits sexual abuse of children in Miami County

A former Miami County church pastor admitted Thursday that he sexually abused two children last year.
Jay L. Preston pleaded guilty in Miami County District Court to two counts of aggravated indecent liberties with a child. As part of a plea agreement, attorneys will recommend a prison sentence of 13 years.

http://www.kansascity.com/news/local/crime/article130317884.html

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/news/local/crime/article130317884.html#storylink=cpy

A message from Bishop Vincent Long about the Royal Commission

The final hearing involving the Catholic Church at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse commences on 6 February 2017.
For the victims and survivors, for the Catholic community and for many in the wider Australian community, this hearing may be a difficult and even distressing time, as the Royal Commission reviews the evidence it has already received and seeks to understand why and how these tragedies occurred.

http://catholicoutlook.org/a-message-from-bishop-vincent-long-about-the-royal-commission/ 

Victims tell of abuse by notorious Stannies paedophile priest Brian Spillane

Victims of the notorious paedophile priest Brian Joseph Spillane have told of devastating and lifelong effects suffered due to the sexual abuse experienced at a prestigious Catholic country boarding school between the 1970s and 1990s.
Spillane, 73, sat with his back to the public gallery and refused to look at the victims during the harrowing accounts given to the Downing Centre District Court on Friday.

http://www.northerndailyleader.com.au/story/4445332/victims-tell-of-abuse-by-notorious-stannies-paedophile-priest-brian-spillane/?cs=4141 

St Stanislaus College paedophile priest turned children's lives into 'indescribable hell'

Victims of the notorious paedophile priest Brian Joseph Spillane have told a Sydney court about the "indescribable hell" their lives became after being abused as children at St Stanislaus College at Bathurst.

Spillane is being sentenced on 18 offences including buggery and sexual assault after being found guilty after two separate trials last year.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-03/st-stanislaus-college-paedophile-priest-sentence/8238090 

Royal Commission into sexual abuse: Senior Catholic leaders called to give evidence

Every Catholic archbishop in the country except for Hobart is being called to give evidence at a royal commission hearing starting next week in Sydney.
Key points:

•  Most of the Australia’s senior Catholic leaders will front the commission in its final weeks
• Catholic leaders warn parishioners about grim data on child sexual abuse by clergy that will be produced
•  First time the Catholic Church has been so open about this information, victim advocates say.

http://thenewdaily.com.au/news/national/2017/02/04/sex-abuse-royal-commission-senior-catholic-leaders-called-give-evidence-next-week/ 

The Jesuits covered up for an abusive Brother and merely moved him to another school

Jesuit priests and brothers operate some of Australia's most prominent schools, with famous ex-students such as former prime minister Tony Abbott. After Brother Victor Higgs committed sexual offences against boys at one of these schools (St Ignatius College, Adelaide), the Jesuits kept Brother Higgs as a member of the Jesuit Order and moved him to their famous Sydney school (St Ignatius College Riverview). One of the Adelaide victims finally reported Brother Higgs to the South Australian police and, in 2016, Higgs was jailed for some of his Adelaide offences. Now, in 2017, Higgs is being prosecuted by New South Wales police regarding alleged offences by Brother Higgs while he was at the Sydney school.

http://www.brokenrites.org.au/drupal/node/392 

Gov't to aid family of 15-y-o girl at centre of sex abuse case with Moravian pastor

Government has taken steps to assist the St Elizabeth family at the centre of the sexual abuse case involving 64-year-old Moravian minister, Rupert Clarke.
Clarke was arrested and charged for allegedly having sex with a 15-year-old member of the family. Two weeks after the arrest, the then president of the Moravian Church in Jamaica, Rev Dr Paul Gardener along with his deputy, the Rev Jermaine Gibson, resigned their positions amid damning allegations in an email that was made public.

http://jamaica-gleaner.com/article/news/20170122/govt-aid-family-15-y-o-girl-centre-sex-abuse-case-moravian-pastor 

Victims advocacy group announces leader's resignation in wake of lawsuit

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests announced Tuesday that its longtime national director, accused by a former SNAP employee of referring potential clients to attorneys in return for financial kickbacks to the group, resigned at the end of last year.
The announcement that David Clohessy, of St. Louis, left the Chicago-based organization comes a week after he and other leaders were named in a lawsuit filed by a former employee who said she was fired shortly after asking superiors whether SNAP was referring victims to attorneys in exchange for donations to the organization.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/ct-snap-director-resigns-met-20170124-story.html 

What the church can learn from the young

Here is an unsigned editorial titled “What the church can learn from the young” from the Jan. 19 issue of The Tablet, a London-based international Catholic weekly.
Nothing troubles Catholic parents more than the wholesale flight of young people from the weekly practice of the faith. Yet these also are their years of adventure and idealism, when authenticity is at a premium and the world is a mess.

http://superiorcatholicherald.org/blog/guest-columns/church-can-learn-young/ 

Church lawyers to challenge law lifting statute of limitations on child sex abuse suits

U.S. District Court of Guam Magistrate Judge Joaquin Manibusan granted on Monday separate requests of three California-based lawyers from two law firms to represent the Archdiocese of Agana in clergy abuse cases, along with local counsel John C. Terlaje.
They are Attorney Paul E. Gaspari, shareholder at the San Francisco-based law firm of Weintraub Tobin Chediak Coleman Grodin; Attorney Mary McNamara, a partner at the San Francisco-based law firm of Swanson & McNamara; and Attorney Britt Evangelist, an associate also at Swanson & McNamara.

http://www.guampdn.com/story/news/2017/01/31/church-lawyers-challenge-law-lifting-statute-limitations-child-sex-abuse/97271044/ 

After pastor's sex abuse charges, his wife and congregation gather

The arrest of Dallas Center Church of the Brethren's 14-year pastor on child molestation charges tinged Sunday school and a worship service at the church Sunday, although it wasn't explicitly referenced.
About 40 people gathered in the wooden pews for worship, four days after Randy August Johnson, 52, was accused of repeatedly sexually abusing a girl from 2013 to 2014 while she was 12 and 13 years old.

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2017/01/29/dallas-center-church-pastor-randy-johnson-sexual-abuse-charges-response/97215904/ 

Two top public schools attended by Prince Charles and Tony Blair are investigated as part of major inquiry into child abuse.

Two top public schools attended by Prince Charles and Tony Blair are being investigated by a major national inquiry into child abuse.

Gordonstoun, the alma mater of the heir to the throne, and Fettes College – where the former Labour Prime Minister was a pupil – both feature in the statutory probe. Other private schools under investigation include Merchiston Castle School in Edinburgh, Loretto School in Musselburgh and Morrison's Academy in Crieff.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4178568/Two-public-schools-investigated-child-abuse-inquiry.html 

Ex-teacher Mark Frost admits two decades of child abuse

A retired teacher who abused children for decades both in the UK and abroad has admitted 45 sex offences in one of the worst cases to come to court.

Mark Frost, known as Andrew Tracey, pleaded guilty at the Old Bailey to a catalogue of abuse against nine children in Thailand between 2009 and 2012.  After the allegations emerged in Asia, two former pupils of a school in Worcestershire came forward claiming they too were sexually assaulted by the English teacher in the 1990s.

http://news.sky.com/story/ex-teacher-mark-frost-admits-two-decades-of-child-abuse-10751968 

Dylan Voller, former Don Dale youth detainee, granted early release from prison

Dylan Voller, the teenager who was pictured hooded and strapped to a restraint chair, sparking the royal commission into youth detention, has been granted early release from prison by the Northern Territory Supreme Court.

He will be released to the BushMob youth offender rehabilitation program in Alice Springs for four months on the grounds he had been treated badly in prison.  Justice Peter Barr said he accepted the evidence put by Voller's barrister, David Dalton.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-02/dylan-voller-released-early-for-rehab-don-dale-youth-detention/8235848 

The fake cleanup of the IOR: no one touches the “dirty thirty”

(Serena Sartini / Infovaticana) ROME – The Institute for the Works of Religion (IOR): a name synonymous with intrigues, cardinals’ power games, and shady business deals. From the era of Cardinal Marcinkus, the “banker of God”, to this day, the so-called “Vatican Bank” has been awash in scandal, financial and otherwise. To name only a few: the collapse of the Banco Ambrosiano, the ongoing Italian investigation into Benedict-era senior officials and the sentencing of Monsignor Nunzio Scarano for money laundering. With Pope Francis, have things changed? Have the long-awaited cleanup operation and transparency arrived? The auditing of accounts? Has the alignment with international accounting standards been completed?

http://www.pewsitter.com/view_news_id_262374.php