Don't Let Us Forget About Our Brothers and Sisters Worldwide (Main Forum)

by Ann Free Spirit , Whangarei New Zealand, Saturday, April 14, 2012, 16:01 (407 days ago) @ Oh Yet We Trust

Canon law expert: Shredding list of 35 accused Phila. priests 'obstruction of justice cubed'

PHILADELPHIA — An expert on "canon" law angrily called it "obstruction of justice, cubed" for a Roman Catholic archbishop to have shredded a list of 35 active priests accused of molesting children.

Defense lawyers for Monsignor William Lynn say he prepared such a list in 1994 based on secret archives at the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and gave it to the late Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua. Bevilacqua ordered his top aides to destroy it, according to church documents aired in court.

The Rev. Thomas Doyle, an expert on Roman Catholic law, testified at Lynn's child-endangerment trial Thursday. Lynn, 61, is the first Catholic church official in the U.S. charged with child endangerment for allegedly failing to protect children from suspected priest-predators.

Church law requires church officials to investigate the complaints, Doyle said. And the archbishop — following the teachings of Christ — should have sought out victims to offer pastoral care, he added.

"He's got a list of men who are sexually abusing children, and he's going to shred it?" an incredulous Doyle asked on cross-examination from defense lawyers.

His advice to Bevilacqua, a friend and fellow canon lawyer, would have been to take off his ring, robe and other clerical garb "and go and see these families." But Bevilacqua never called for that advice, he said.

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