Recently, the RELIGIOUS CIRCLES IN THE UNITED STATES HAVE BEEN EXPOSED AGAIN BY THE CLERIC SEX SCANDAL. According to the Associated Press reported on November 4, the Nebraska Department of Justice reported that it confirmed that 258 victims had filed sexual abuse allegations against 57 Catholic Church officials in the state for decades, more than 90 percent of the victims were boys and minors at the time of the incident. Most church leaders were aware of it but did not report it to the authorities. As the statute of limitations has expired in most cases, it is not possible to bring charges against the relevant church personnel.
Screenshot of the Associated Press report
The 182-page, three-year investigation covered all cases of sexual assault against clerics between 1930 and 2000.
There were 57 well-documented church personnel involved in the investigation, including 51 pastors, 4 deacons and two teachers.
The investigation said the victims were usually teenagers serving as Catholic altar attendants. Of the 258 victims, 236 were men and 22 were women.
There were 158 people from the Diocese of Omaha, 97 victims in the Diocese of Lincoln and 3 from the Diocese of Grand Island. Of these, in the Diocese of Omaha, 163 victims were male and 15 were female; in the Parish of Lincoln, 92 victims were male and 5 victims were female; in the Parish of Ilha Grande, 1 victim was male and 2 victims were female.
Most of the 258 victims were minors at the time of the assault. In the Diocese of Omaha, most victims were between the ages of 11-13: In Lincoln, most victims were 20 years and older. In the Parish of Ilha Grande, 2 people are less than 10 years old and 1 person is over 20 years old.
The 258 cases occurred between 1960 and 2000. In the Diocese of Omaha, most cases occurred in the 1970s, with several of them occurring in the 1960s and 1980s: in Lincoln, most were in the 1990s. All three of the cases reported by the Diocese of Oshima occurred in the 2000s.
Some of the allegations received in the Parish of Lincoln were against Pastor James Benton, who retired in 2017.
The pastor's nephew alleges that his uncle molested him in a parish dormitory in 1990, when he was a minor.
Jeffrey Hoover, another Lincoln Parish victim, said he was molested around 1980 when he slept in the same bed with the priest on a camping trip.
Church leaders had known about pastor James Benton's sexual abuse allegations as early as 15 years ago, but did not address the matter, the report said.
The Associated Press reported that on Nov. 4, Shult, a victim of the Parish of Lincoln, attended a news conference held by the Department of Justice and charged the church with responsibility for malfeasance. Schulte said he might never be harassed if the church had properly dealt with Hoover's allegations against Benton. He argues that the church's current leadership is not doing enough to protect the public and that they should be removed.
Schulte said the alleged pastors were still allowed to live near elementary schools or children's camping areas. The church did not monitor them or tell the public. Schulte said: "If the current leadership is not down, there will be no real change. ”
Peterson discussed the findings of a statewide Catholic Church sexual abuse investigation at the Justice Department office on Nov. 4. The allegations date back decades. Pictured from The Associated Press
State Attorney General Doug Peterson reported on November 4 that "the physical and psychological harm caused by the perpetrators to the children is immeasurable, and it is extremely sad that the Church has failed to protect so many victims," Omaha Television reported on Nov. 4. ”
Peterson said that in almost every case, the offender engaged in some form of premeditated act before committing sex. Such behavior involves building trusting relationships and emotional connections with the victim or the victim's family. Peterson said they used alcohol, camping or other road trips, video games, food and other temptations to win the trust and favor of their victims.
The most troubling finding, Peterson said, is that in many cases, church authorities have chosen to put the church's reputation ahead of protecting children. In order to cover up the crime, those in power would transfer the offender to other parishes and remove him from the priesthood with little or no de-listing. Some offenders are sent to psychotherapy and then allowed to come into contact with children again. "This is not only the sorrow of the church, but also of our nation," Peterson said.
Peterson was frustrated that prosecutors could not bring charges against the church personnel involved (there was a case in which charges could be brought, but the plaintiffs refused to participate in the prosecution). He believes that the old statutes, which are time-sensitive for such crimes, should be abolished.
Senator Rich Pahls of Omaha said in response to the matter that he wants to remove the statute of limitations in child sexual abuse cases, "which effectively deprives these victims of their right to justice." He noted that the state removed the statute of limitations for sexual assault in 2004. However, this does not include cases that occurred before 1997. Pars promised to introduce a bill at next year's legislative session "to address this heinous and unacceptable situation.".
In response to the findings, bishops of the three dioceses of Nebraska jointly issued a statement apologizing to the victims and their families and saying they had taken steps to protect children and vulnerable adults.
The bishops of the three diocese issued a statement jointly.
"The report also points to the mistakes made by the diocese in accepting, reporting and responding to allegations of sexual abuse in the past," the bishops said. "In recent years, we have been committed to taking comprehensive measures to protect children and vulnerable adults, prevent abuse, heal victims of abuse in the past, and fully cooperate with the civil service on these issues."
State Attorney General Doug Peterson said the Catholic Church was cooperative in collecting the report, the Omaha World Herald reported on Nov. 4.
Peterson launched the Nebraska investigation in 2018, asking three Catholic bishops in the state to give him records of related incidents he has received over the past 40 years and a list of clergy involved in juvenile cases.
In early 2019, Peterson asked Catholic parishes, churches and schools across the state to provide records of victims' allegations of sexual assault by clergy. At the time, the bishops argued that they had complied with the request, but according to the summons, they handed over more records.
The vast majority of sexual abuse cases occurred before the implementation of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Youth in 2002 (hence the drafting of the document at the 2002 Annual Meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Dallas after dozens of cases of sexual abuse in the former Boston area to address the crisis of sexual abuse of children in the Church), Peterson said.
According to public media reports, the American church has been in a continuous sexual abuse scandal in recent years. In 2002, dozens of sexual abuse scandals broke out in the Archbishopric of Boston. The diocese eventually compensated $10 million to 86 victims of former cleric John Chogan; the diocese of Tucson, Arizona, paid about $15 million in damages for 11 lawsuits, and two years later the diocese declared bankruptcy.
In 2003, the Archbishopric of Louisville, Kentucky, paid $25.7 million to 243 victims, and the Boston Archbishopric reached an $84 million compensation agreement with 552 victims.
In 2004, the Diocese of Orange, California, agreed to pay $100 million in damages to 87 lawsuits.
In 2005, the Diocese of Sacramento, California, compensated $35 million to 53 victims and the Parish of Oakland compensated $56 million to 56 victims.
In 2006, the Parish of Covington, Kentucky, reached an $84 million compensation agreement with more than 350 victims. Faced with such huge compensation for sexual abuse lawsuits, five parishes have filed for bankruptcy protection.
In 2007, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Los Angeles reached a settlement with victims of clergy sexual abuse, and the diocese will pay more than 500 victims a total of $660 million in damages. That's the record for the highest compensation paid by the Catholic District of the United States to date for a sex scandal.
In 2018, the U.S. state of Pennsylvania released its latest report on child abuse by Catholic clerics in the state, saying that more than 1,000 children have been sexually abused by more than 300 "predator priests" over the past few decades.
In addition to the United States, France and Germany have also been exposed to similar incidents. In September 2018, a survey by the German Catholic Church showed that 3,677 children in Germany were sexually abused by clergy in 68 years from 1946 to 2014, according to the Observer Network. In October 2021, the Independent Catholic Commission of Inquiry into child abuse in the French Church released an investigation report saying that about 3,000 people in the French Catholic Church had been pedophiles since 1950, resulting in at least 216,000 children being sexually assaulted.
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