PA--Catholic officials exploit technicality; Victims respond

For immediate release: Thursday, April 14, 2016

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 503 0003 cell, [email protected])

Three Catholic officials are trying to exploit Pennsylvania’s archaic, predator-friendly laws to evade responsibility for a child molesting cleric who molested more than 100 kids. Shame on them, their colleagues and their supervisors.

http://www.post-gazette.com/local/region/2016/04/14/Former-student-testifies-about-Franciscans-in-Altoona-abuse-case/stories/201604140166

Just like predators, Br. Giles A. Schinelli, Br. Robert J. D’Aversa and Br. Anthony M. Criscitelli want to take advantage of legal loopholes to hide their wrongdoing with Br. Stephen Baker, a shrewd, serial predator.d

Rather than prove their innocence on the merits, they’re fighting on the technicalities, like complicit Catholic officials have done for decades and keep doing at virtually every opportunity.

Bishops and priests want us to believe they’ve “changed” and deal differently now with child sex cases. But look at this one: the accused clergy wrongdoers are hiding behind statutes of limitations, like they have for ages. Their colleagues and supervisors are keeping quiet, like they have for ages.

Every single cleric in Pennsylvania and in the Franciscans could show courage and denounce these three colleagues or show cowardice and stay silent. They’re all – hundreds of them – staying silent, just like hundreds of thousands of priests, nuns, bishops, seminarians and other Catholic employees have for ages about clergy sex crimes and cover ups.

Yet they’ll all tell us “we’ve reformed!” Baloney.

No matter what lawmakers or church officials do or don’t do, we urge every single person who saw, suspected or suffered child sex crimes and cover ups in Catholic churches or institutions – especially in Pennsylvania – to protect kids by calling police, get help by calling therapists, expose wrongdoers by calling law enforcement, get justice by calling attorneys, and be comforted by calling support groups like ours. This is how kids will be safer, adults will recover, criminals will be prosecuted, cover ups will be deterred and the truth will surface.

(SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, is the world’s oldest and largest support group for clergy abuse victims. SNAP was founded in 1988 and has more than 20,000 members. Despite the word “priest” in our title, we have members who were molested by religious figures of all denominations, including nuns, rabbis, bishops, and Protestant ministers. Our website is SNAPnetwork.org)

Contact - David Clohessy (314-566-9790 cell, [email protected]), Barbara Dorris (314-503-0003 cell, [email protected]), Barbara Blaine (312-399-4747,[email protected])

Former student testifies about Franciscans in Altoona abuse case

April 14, 2016 11:21 AM - By Peter Smith / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

HOLLIDAYSBURG, Pa. — A 30-year-old man testified that he was sexually abused by a Franciscan brother during a preliminary hearing for three Franciscan leaders charged with conspiring to endanger the welfare of children.

Lawyers for the three men put in motions to dismiss the charges on the grounds of statute of limitations in the cases.

A statewide grand jury, saying that the three men enabled  . . .

Read full article here