WHAT:
At a sidewalk news conference, clergy molestation victims (including one from southern California who was molested by a high-ranking Stockton priest) will
- provide copies of newly released letters from a former Stockton bishop who essentially helped a pedophile priest avoid arrest and prosecution,
- challenge Stockton Catholic lay people and officials to work harder to notify Mexican friends and family about two priests who worked and abused in northern California but are now believed to be in Mexico
- release a new letter from Stockton’s current bishop who pledges to contact church and governmental officials about a serial predatory priest from Ireland
WHEN:
Wednesday, Oct. 25, 10:30 a.m.
WHERE:
Outside the Catholic headquarters/chancery office, 1105 North Lincoln, Stockton CA
WHO:
A former Stockton man who was abused by a priest who was close to Mahony and left the US and at least one other clergy molestation victims who belong to a support group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAPnetwork.org)
WHY:
Newly released documents from a civil child sex abuse settlement show that in the 1980s, former Stockton Bishop Roger Mahony told a Mexican bishop that an abusive Stockton priest should stay in Mexico to avoid facing criminal prosecution. (Two other pedophile priests from Stockton during Mahony’s reign there also fled the US after being accused of child molestation while under Mahony’s supervision.)
Increasingly, reports are surfacing about abusive Catholic clerics moving abroad. (Just last month, in an unprecedented lawsuit, both Mahony and his Mexico City counterpart were named as defendants in a case involving Fr. Nicholas Aguilar, who molested dozens of boys in both countries.) SNAP wants Blaire to use his considerable resources to do more to alert vulnerable Mexican families to US pedophile priests living there and help US authorities extradite these dangerous clerics. SNAP also wants lay Catholic parishioners in and around.
Last week, the group wrote to Blaire urging him to alert church and government authorities in France and Canada about former Stockton predator-priest Oliver O’Grady who recently fled his Irish homeland. Today, SNAP will provide copies of an unusual letter they just received from Blaire in which the bishop agrees to warn Catholic and immigration authorities in two countries about O’Grady.
Mahony’s mishandling of sexual abuse cases in Stockton is receiving more attention lately due to an award-winning documentary “Deliver Us From Evil” which opened last week. It includes extensive interviews with O’Grady, a former Stockton priest and serial predator who was convicted of molesting kids and later deported. Under oath, Mahony swore O’Grady was the first pedophile priest he supervised. Later, he admitted O’Grady was the third but claimed he’d forgotten about the previous two, both of whom ended up in Mexico after being accused of child molestation.
http://www.pe.com/ap_news/California2/CA_Church_Abuse_259301CA.shtml
CONTACT:
David Clohessy of St. Louis MO, SNAP national director 314 566 9790
Joey Piscatelli of Martinez CA, SNAP bay area director 925 262 3699
Mary Grant of Long Beach CA, SNAP western regional director 626 419 2930 |
