On Nov 6, 9:30 am, hotac <hochim
...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Nov 4, 1:42 pm, "Julie (English only!)" <jjs
...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Source: Database of publicly accused US Catholic Priestshttp://app.bishop-accountability.org/member/index.jsp
> > 1. Father Vincent Cao Dang Minh (Oregon)
> > 2. Father Michael Doan Trong Son (Los Angeles, California)
> > 3. Father Joseph V. Hoang (Tillamook, Oregon)
> > 4. Father Dominic Nguyen (Garden Grove, California)
> > 5. Father Joseph aka 'Edwards' Nguyen (Memphis, Tennessee)
> > 6. Father Paul Nguyen (Riverside, California)
> > 7. Father Tran Dinh Nhi (Arlington, Virginia)
> > 8. Seminarian Kevin Phan (Chicago, Illinois)
> > 9. Father Tran Van Tan (Desmoines, Iowa)
> > 10. Father Joseph Nguyen Ngoc Tu (Arlington, Texas)
> > 11. Father Ignatius Tuoc (Tampa, Florida)
> "Father Ignatius Tuoc came to the St. Petersburg Diocese 4/76 from a
> diocese in Vietnam. In 2003, Tuoc was temporarily removed from his
> assignment after a female parishioner accused him of abuse in early
> 1990s when she was a minor. After investigation by review board,he was
> asked to step down from assignment pending a more in-depth
> investigation. May have been returned to ministry because allegation
> could not be proved. He is an active priest per diocesan website
> accessed 7/08."
######################
Vicent Cao Dang Minh (Oregon)
######################
Claims in court far outnumber Oregon church listing
Archdiocese - Abuse accusations in bankruptcy documents involve
religious order clergy, seminarians, nuns and others in addition to
priests
Sunday, November 12, 2006
ASHBEL S. GREEN and STEVE WOODWARD
The Oregonian
Far more people in Oregon say they were abused by priests, clergy and
other Catholic workers in the past 70 years than has been publicly
known, a review of the Portland Archdiocese bankruptcy files shows.
The archdiocese's decision to seek bankruptcy protection in 2004 gave
it some control over a flood of priest abuse litigation. But the move
also revealed allegations that have remained secret for decades. In
some cases, documents and letters that the archdiocese possessed have
been entered into the file. In other cases, people are making sex-
abuse allegations for the first time.
Bankruptcy records show that people filed 368 legal claims of abuse
and that 46 other reports of abuse were made informally. To date, more
than 50 claims have been dismissed or withdrawn. Accusations have been
made against 133 priests, religious order clergy, nuns, seminarians
and other lay Catholic workers or volunteers.
In 2004, Archbishop John G. Vlazny said the archdiocese had counted 37
accused priests and 181 accusers between 1950 and 2003.
Archdiocese spokesman Bud Bunce said there are several reasons for the
discrepancy. Many of the accusations came as a result of the
bankruptcy and well after Vlazny announced his calculations, Bunce
said. Several others were the responsibility of Catholic organizations
other than the archdiocese, such as a teacher at Jesuit High School,
he said.
"Many of these persons are wrongly alleged to be archdiocesan agents,"
Bunce said in a written response to questions.
Regardless of religious order, the magnitude of the alleged abuse
surprised a longtime critic of the archdiocese.
"I never would have thought it was that high for Oregon," said Bill
Crane, director of the Oregon Survivors Network of those Abused by
Priests. "Now here we are in bankruptcy, still peeling away the layers
of this onion. And that's a pretty big onion."
Bankruptcy documents also show how far the archdiocese has come in
child-abuse reporting since the Rev. Thomas Laughlin's 1983 conviction
for sexually abusing two altar boys. The documents show, however, that
complete transparency is not the rule.
Laughlin-era documents indicate that church officials ignored internal
whistle-blowers and seemed to place a higher premium on containing
scandal than confronting priests.
Since then, church officials have far more aggressively investigated
complaints of sexual abuse. There is no known case of the archdiocese
ignoring a sex abuse accusation since Laughlin's arrest. And a recent
audit found that the archdiocese had complied with the policy on the
books since 2002 that any priest accused of sexually abusing a child
must be immediately removed from public ministry.
Transparency is another matter.
Although the archdiocese publicly responds to charges in lawsuits,
some accusations are still handled quietly, bankruptcy files show.
The Rev. Vincent Minh, the spiritual leader for many Southeast Asian
Catholics in Oregon, departed in 2001 under what was described at the
time as routine circumstances.
Undisclosed was the fact that prosecutors considered sex-abuse
accusations against him credible, but chose not to pursue charges
because too much time had passed since the assaults in the 1980s.
And as extensive as the bankruptcy records are, they only hint at the
complete record on child sex abuse within the Catholic Church in
Oregon.
Nationwide study
Two years ago, the John Jay College of Criminal Justice released an
exhaustive study on priest abuse. It was commissioned by the United
States Conference of Catholic Bishops, and dioceses and religious
orders were expected to open their files on priest abuse accusations
and settlements.
The study discussed only national numbers, but Portland and some
dioceses decided to release their figures. In addition to the 37
accused priests, Vlazny said the archdiocese and its insurers had
spent $53 million settling the cases.
Bankruptcy documents describe those settlements in detail that was
previously unknown. For instance, the archdiocese and its insurers
paid nearly $30 million to settle claims against the Rev. Maurice
Grammond, Portland's most-accused priest.
Crane said the additional information in the bankruptcy files
supported his claims that the archdiocese has not been completely
candid about past abuse.
"Once again, there's a continual pattern that takes place that they
always minimize," Crane said. "Now we're finally getting more
information."
Bunce said the archdiocese has been as candid as possible.
"We have tried to be open about the number of claims and number of
those accused," Bunce said. "We published numbers very publicly in the
past. Since entering the bankruptcy process this has been more
difficult for a multitude of reasons."
How cases were handled
The bankruptcy documents reveal more details about how accused priests
were handled and how the archdiocese has changed its approach to child
abuse allegations.
In fits and starts, records show, the archdiocese progressed from a
culture in which some priests abused children with few consequences to
one in which any priest accused of abusing a minor is reported to
authorities and removed from ministry.
The Laughlin case demonstrates how poorly priest accusations used to
be handled.
In a 1986 deposition filed in the bankruptcy, Laughlin described
meetings with Archbishop Robert J. Dwyer and his successor, Archbishop
Cornelius M. Power. He said that both men, now dead, knew he had
abused boys, but never forced him into treatment or restricted his
access to children.
He recalled being summoned to Dwyer's office in 1970 after someone
reported him for abusing a boy when he was a pastor in Corvallis.
"He expressed terrible concern for the boy involved," Laughlin said,
"reprimanded me severely, actually cried because of what I had done to
the boy, the church, myself, and said, 'You've got to stop this
completely right here and now,' and asked me specifically, 'Do you
think you need professional help?'
"And I said, 'No.' "
About two years later, Dwyer confronted Laughlin a second time on
similar accusations.
"It was similar to the first, but far more serious," Laughlin said in
recalling the meeting. "And he said, 'I will have to move you now.' "
Dwyer transferred Laughlin to pastor of All Saints Parish in Portland.
In another example found in the bankruptcy file, a former president of
the University of Portland, the Rev. Theodore J. Mehling,moved at
least one abusive priest.
In a 1958 letter to the Rev. Archibald M. McDowell, who has faced two
claims in Oregon, Mehling discussed his heartbreak over reports that
the priest fondled two high school boys.
"When, for God's sake, are you going to learn to keep your hands to
yourself?" wrote Mehling, who by then had moved to Indiana.
"We can move you, but where I don't know, at the Easter vacation,"
wrote Mehling, who noted that McDowell already had two canonical
warnings about his conduct and could face expulsion for a third.
"Change of place seems futile. Perhaps we can find an institution
where you can get psychiatric treatment."
Psychological evaluation is now routine for accused pedophiles and
ephebophiles, the term for adults who are sexually attracted to
adolescents.
Laughlin forced a change in the rules. After the priest's 1983 arrest,
the archdiocese adopted new rules about when and how to investigate
sex-abuse claims.
The rules were tougher, but not as strong as the landmark policy
adopted by Catholic bishops nationwide in 2002.
During his 1986-95 tenure, former Archbishop William J. Levada removed
at least four priests and sent at least two into treatment, bankruptcy
records show.
But in a move that would not be allowed today, at least two accused
priests later returned to churches, records show.
And under those rules, parishioners were largely left in the dark when
priests were removed because of an accusation, the Rev. Charles
Lienert said in a deposition.
Levada publicly discussed the removal of the Rev. John Goodrich from
St. John Fisher Church in Southwest Portland after he was accused of
molesting a boy starting in 1974. But under a later archbishop,
members of Assumption Catholic Church, Lienert said, weren't informed
in 1996 that their new pastor, the Rev. Joseph Baccellieri, was an
accused child molester
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