UK- Catholic friar admits downloading child pornography, SNAP responds
For immediate release: Monday, March 17, 2014
Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314-862-7688 home, 314-503-0003 cell, [email protected])
A Catholic friar from Camden has pleaded guilty to possession of thousands of extremely graphic child pornography images. We are glad that that he is facing justice, but concerned about potential victims.
Timothy Gardner was a religious education teacher at Maria Fidelis Catholic School. It is always extremely troubling when child abuse allegations surface, but it is even more worrisome when that person has worked directly with children. There are hundreds of potential victims.
We hope that anyone who saw, suspects, or suffered abuse by Gardner will contact police. And we hope that Catholic Church officials will aggressively reach out to any possible victims or witnesses.
(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 25 years and have more than 15,000 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 (314-862-7688 home, 314-503-0003 cell, [email protected]), Barbara Blaine (312-399-4747,[email protected]), Peter Isely (414-429-7259, [email protected]), Joelle Casteix (949-322-7434, [email protected])
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