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SNAP FACT SHEET: Recent Italian Predator Priests

PRIEST: Fr. Vijay Vhaskr Godugunuru

PRIEST: Fr. Mario Pezzotti

  • WHERE HE’S FROM: A city near Brescia in Italy
  • LAST KNOWN LOCATION: At a church facility in Via San Martino, 8 Parma, Italy (as of April 2010)
  • IS CHARGED WITH: Sexual assault, sodomy and rape of a child in three civil lawsuits in the US
  • DISPOSITION OF CHARGES: Settled in 1993. In a handwritten letter, he apologized to one of his victims.
  • CRIMES ALLEGEDLY HAPPENED: Holliston, Massachusetts (USA), in the Boston Archdiocese
  • CURRENT WHEREABOUTS: At the Xaverian Missionary ‘motherhouse,’ Via San Martino, 8 Parma, Italy
  • MOST RECENT DEVELOPMENT: In April, the Associated Press ran recent photos of him with nearly-naked kids in the Amazonian missions. He was quickly transferred back to Italy.
  • HIS COLLEAGUES/SUPERVISORS INCLUDE: Rev. Rino Benzoni, the superior general of the order, Father Emilio Baldin, rector of the motherhouse in Parma
  • LINKS: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/36523444/ns/world_news-world_faith/
    http://parma.repubblica.it/cronaca/2010/04/15/news/saveriano_condannato_per_pedofilia_dopo_gli_abusi_in_usa_isolato_a_parma-3372873/

PRIEST: Fr. Fernando Lopez

  • LAST KNOWN LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
  • IS CHARGED WITH: Four counts of felony lewd acts with a child, one felony count of sexual battery by restraint, two misdemeanor counts of child molestation and one misdemeanor count of sexual battery.
  • DISPOSITION OF CHARGES: Convicted and sentenced in 2005 for six years in a state prison.
  • CRIMES HAPPENED: Los Angeles, CA (USA)
  • CURRENT WHEREABOUTS: Unknown, but was deported back home to Colombia.
  • MOST RECENT DEVELOPMENT: A suit, filed last year, also accuses Catholic officials, including LA’s Cardinal Roger Mahony, of "destroying and manipulating evidence" of the molestations. Lopez was a visiting priest from the Tivoli (Rome) Diocese.
  • HIS COLLEAGUES/SUPERVISORS INCLUDE: Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony, Tivoli Bishop Mauro Parmeggiani
  • LINKS: http://articles.latimes.com/2005/mar/17/local/me-priest17
    http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news2009/05_06/2009_05_07_Helfand_LawsuitAccuses.htm

PRIEST: Fr. Joseph John Henn

PRIEST: Father James Tully

PRIEST: Fr. Yusaf Dominic (a.k.a. Dominic Yousuf)

  • WHERE HE’S FROM: Pakistan
  • LAST KNOWN LOCATION: Italy
  • IS CHARGED WITH: Molesting two young boys & was arrested in late 1996
  • CRIMES ALLEGEDLY HAPPENED: At a parish in the Westminster Archdiocese in the 1980s
  • CURRENT WHEREABOUTS: Italian Diocese of Savona-Noli (as of 2004)
  • MOST RECENT DEVELOPMENT: As of 2004, he works as assistant pastor in Albissola Marina and leads a small parish in the nearby village of Ellera.
  • HIS COLLEAGUES/SUPERVISORS INCLUDE: Rev. Tony Brunning – bailed Dominic out of jail in England; Rev. Ralph Brown, who was the diocese's vicar general at the time – authorized Brunning’s payment for bail; Bishop Andrew Francis, leader of the Multan Diocese (Pakistan) eventually allowed him to become pastor, but then sent him back Lahore (Pakistan); Father Field- the priest who worked with him at St. Francis of Assisi in Ridgefield Park in Newark Archdiocese; Rev. William Fadrowski - executive director of clergy personnel in 2002 who said he had never heard of the priest and didn't understand how he could have been allowed to work at St. Francis; Newark Archbishop John Myers - said he, too, did not recognize Father Dominic's name and called his presence in a parish "odd"; Archbishop Saldanha- head of the priest's home diocese in Pakistan; Rev. Domenico Calcagno – bishop of Savona-Noli Diocese
  • LINKS: http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news/2004_06_23_DMN_TheWanderer.htm
    http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news/2004_06_23_Egerton_SafeHarbor.htm

PRIEST: Father John Baptist Ormechea

PRIEST: Monsignor Bernard Prince

  • WHERE HE’S FROM: The Catholic Diocese of Pembroke, Ontario (Canada)
  • LAST KNOWN LOCATION: In 2005, he was at the Vatican, but is now in Canada
  • CHARGED WITH: Sexually assaulting at least one boy (He was close to Pope John Paul II and travelled the world for years as a high-ranking Vatican official, so could have molested kids in several countries.)
  • DISPOSITION OF CHARGES: In 2008, he was sentenced to four years in a federal penitentiary for sexually abusing 13 boys.
  • CRIMES HAPPENED: In the late 1960s at a Canadian church where the boy was an altar server
  • CURRENT WHEREABOUTS: Unknown, perhaps still behind bars
  • MOST RECENT DEVELOPMENT: A church letter from a Pembroke bishop in 1993, made public just a few weeks ago, showed that Vatican and Canadian church officials knew Prince molested several altar boys a decade before police did.
  • HIS COLLEAGUES/SUPERVISORS INCLUDE: The Pope
  • LINKS: http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news2006/01_02/2006_02_02_McArthur_ExVaticanOfficial.htm

(SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, is the world’s oldest and largest support group for clergy abuse victims. We’ve been around for 22 years and have more than 9,000 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, 314-645-5915 home), Barbara Blaine (312-399-4747), Peter Isely (414-429-7259), Barbara Dorris (314-862-7688 home, 314-503-0003 cell)


Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests
www.snapnetwork.org