The latest in a series of Australian scandals over child molestation by
Roman Catholic priests and teachers came to court on Wednesday, October
26. In Geelong, Victoria, a magistrate ordered Alan Edward Swingler, a
former Catholic school teacher, to face trial on twelve charges of sexual
offenses. The 53-year-old is charged with 8 counts of unlawful and indecent
assault, 3 charges of gross indecency, and one charge of "buggery."
The offense took place against four males between 1968 and 1979 while
Swingler taught at St. Joseph's Christian Brothers College, Newtown, Geelong.
-- Source: Australian Associated Press (Received: 10/27/94 06:09pm)
Ellis Harsham, the former head of the Catholic campus ministry at Wright
State University, resigned from the priesthood on Friday, October 14.
Harsham was named in a $10 million suit filed last year by Steven Cook. The
suit contended that Harsham and Cardinal Joseph Bernardin repeatedly engaged
in sexual acts with Cook, then a student. In February, Bernardin was dropped
from the suit, which was later settled out of court. -- Source: Reuter News
Service (Received: 10/27/94 06:09pm)
Copyright 1995 IFAS
The Freedom Writer / ifas@crocker.com
Linda Rozar, director of the Lake County chapter of the American Family
Association, recently pleaded guilty to one count of child abuse and two
counts of tampering with a witness, according to published reports.
Rozar, 46, was sentenced to a year of probation and ordered to see a
psychiatrist after entering her plea. The charges against her stem from
an incident that occurred with a child in her home. Meanwhile, Rozar's
husband Jerry is being charged for a second time with violating the terms
of his probation. He was convicted of child molestation in 1986. Linda
Rozar also served as president of Concerned Citizens for Florida, another
radical right-wing organization.
18-May-94 Denver Post:
Holding Groups Responsible 'violates religious freedom.' By Virginia Culver
Attorneys for three local church organizations that recently lost court
cases involving sexual misconduct by clergy claim that holding churches
accountable for ministers' conduct robs them of their religious freedom.
In "friend of the court" briefs filed this month with the US
Supreme Court, attorneys in two Denver United Methodist cases and a third
involving Denver's Bear Valley Church of Christ say lower-court rulings
making churches liable for ministers' actions violate the First Amendment
by restricting the churches "free exercise of religion".
The attorneys said that telling churches how to "select, assign,
supervise and discipline clergy, and how religious organizations may
conduct their administration and how a clergy person does pastoral
counseling" violates the First Amendment.
Questioning how churches operate "directly interferes with the
institutions' free exercise of religion," the attorneys charge.
The legal arguments were filed in defense of the Colorado Episcopal Diocese
and its appeal of a sexual misconduct case. In that case, the diocese is
appealing to the US Court of Appeals a $728,000 judgment to Mary Moses
Tenantry. She alleged that a sexual relationship with her priest, the Rev.
Paul Robinson, cause her extreme, psychological and spiritual harm.
Tenantry and Robinson became involved when he was an associate past of St.
Philip and St. James Episcopal Church in southwest Denver.
A jury awarded her $1.2 million from the diocese in 1991. The diocese
appealed that decision to the Colorado Supreme Court, which reduced the
judgment to $728,000.
The United Methodist cases, both this year, involved Dianne R. Winkler of
Aurora and Christa Bohrer of Denver.
Winkler was awarded more than $163,000 in January by a Denver District
Court jury in her civil suit against the Rev. Glenn Chambers, former pastor
of Grace United Methodist Church in southeast Denver. She alleged sexual
harassment. Chambers and the church appealed the verdict to the Colorado
Court of Appeals this month.
Bohrer was awarded more than $700,000 in her civil suit in Denver District
against former minister Daniel DeHart and the United Methodist Annual
Conference (the equivalent of a diocese). She alleged DeHart seduced her
into a sexual relationship when she was 13 and he was youth minister at
First Methodist Church in Greeley.
In the Church of Christ suit in 1992, a Dever woman and her son were
awarded $450,000 by a Denver District Court jury. The woman, who son was
a minor at the time, claimed the minister, Homer Wolfe, inappropriately
massaged and fondled him during counseling sessions for five years. That
case is before the Colorado Court of Appeals.
In all three judgments, juries concluded church officials failed to
properly screen, hire and supervise the ministers. All three juries also
ordered the church or conference to pay at least half the damages.
Friend of the court briefs are filed by parties who stand to be materially
affected by the outcome of a pending decision--in this case, the high
court's decision about whether to review the Tenantry case. In their
briefs, the church attorneys threaten to appeal their judgments--to the
US Court of Appeals, if necessary.
But an expert in constitutional law at the University of Dever said he
doubts the First Amendment claims will get anywhere.
Stephen Pepper, BU law professor, said for the government to say how a
religion chooses it rabbi or priest "gets into the freedom of
religion."
Religious groups do have the right to the free exercise of their religion,
he said, in all matters of administration, "but if your minister
hurts someone, you'll have to pay." said Pepper.
He called the First Amendment defense "a live issue" that has
been used in other church cases, particularly those involving
discrimination. "It's kind of a knee-jerk defense."
"But it's pretty hard to defend against statutory rape and sexual
harassment," he said.
The attorneys filing the friend of the court briefs are Neil Quigley, who
represented the United Methodists in the Bohrer and Winkler cases and the
Church of Christ in the third case; and Jim Johnson, attorney for Homer
Wolfe.
The attorneys say in the briefs that they have been "involved in many
lawsuits in Colorado for almost ten years where religious institutions
have had claims against them for sexual improprieties."
Devern attorney Joyce Seelen, who represented Tenantry, Winkler, Bohrer
and the woman who sued on behalf of her son, yesterday refused to comment
about the recent briefs. Two others briefs supporting the Episcopal
diocese and citing the First Amendment argument have been filed with the
US Court of Appeals.
The American Association of Pastoral Counselors, headquarters in Virginia,
said the lower court "did not understand that pastoral counseling and
supervision of parish clergy is not the equivalent to employment
supervision."
The other brief was filed by a coalition of Colorado religious groups,
including Catholics and Protestants.
Courier Journal, Monday, December 27, 1993
(Scribe Ortho-Priapulus MetaQuincunx)
OK, here are some basic references, for those who haven't
picked up a newspaper, or heard a news broadcast for the last 10 years:
Berry, Jason. "Lead Us Not Into Temptation: Catholic Priests and the
Sexual Abuse of Children." Foreword by Andrew M. Greely. Doubleday,
New York, 1992
Father Andrew Greely says that Berry has uncovered "an incredible mass
of corruption...the greatest scandal in the history of religion in America
and perhaps the most serious crisis Catholicism has faced since the
Reformation." Greely also says that his reporting is "accurate
and restrained, indeed if anything almost too conservative."
Berry won the 1986 Catholic Press Association Award for his coverage of
clerical sex abuse. He documents many things that people have been saying
here:
Some quotes:
page 38: "No one knows how many more there may be, since Church
officials deny keeping any centralized records. But bishops in dioceses
where one or two priest molesters have been sued or prosecuted speak openly
about the three, four, or five or six other cases they have handled in
private. And they themselves know that they are unaware of the many --
probably the majority -- which are never reported."
page 43: "Reverend Margaret Graham, [is] an Episcopal priest who also
serves as the president of the National Committee for the Prevention of
Child Abuse. She point out that what has happened among priests and the
Catholic Church is not an isolated phenomenon."
page 43: Out of 100 priests in Newfoundland, 7 priests plus 2 ex-priests
were indicted for sexually abusing young boys.
"In province after province, Canadian priests were exposed as
molesters in the early 1990's, forcing the Canadian Conference of Catholic
Bishops to create yet another special commission."
When Dutch Catholic Television dared air a special on the growing scandal
of child sexual abuse by priests in the US, more than 200 victims from
Amsterdam to Rotterdam called in with their own stories of molestation by
men in collars."
James Porter had at least 125 victims that we know of.
The St. John's, Newfoundland case had somewhere around 130 victims; I
will look it up.
200 victims called in when Dutch TV showed their special.
That's 455 victims right there. As you can see, it's not going to be
hard for me to reach my "thousands."
Heggen, Carolyn. Sexual Abuse in Christian Homes and Churches. Herald
Press, Scottsdale, PA 1993
Shows among other things that while the best predictor of sexual abuse of
a child by his/her parent is alcoholism, the second best predictor is
conservative religious belief.
By Stephen Franklin
MOUNDSVILLE, W. Va.--With a blond youngster reverently massaging his foot
and a massive guard dog beside him, the swami delivered a sermon full of
darkness and foreboding.
"Get ready for war. We are going to fight for Krishna,"
Kirtanananda Swami Bhaktipada, seated on his gold-covered throne, declared
to his hushed followers.
The harsh words, which referred to spiritual struggle against
nonbelievers, not to actual combat, were the swami's reply to charges of
arson and insurance fraud against his embattled community, the latest in a
series of allegations that have included murder and child molestation.
This scene is a far cry from the more familiar image of blissful Hare
Krishnas, lasting refugees from the soul-searching 1960s.
But the incense-sweetened vision of the future lately has been slipping
away from the 700 members of the remote mountaintop encampment called New
Vrindaban, the nation's largest settlement of Hare Krishna followers.
Each new charge by law officials, or from others within the Krishna
movement, has stirred the same defiant response from those in this 4,000-
acre compound: We are victims of "a religious inquisition."
Earlier this month, a federal grand jury indicted the 50-year-old
Bhaktipada, known previously as Keith Ham, and Thomas Drescher, a 38-year-
old follower, on arson charges in connection with the burning of a building
in 1983, allegedly to collect $40,000 insurance.
Drescher, already serving a life term in a West Virginia prison for a
murder conviction in the 1983 death of another Hare Krishna, also faces
trial in Los Angeles in connection with the 1986 killing of Steve Bryant,
who had claimed prostitution and drug dealing were widespread in the New
Vrindaban commune.
The community's legal problems have caused others in the Hare Krishna
movement, which claims 10,000 followers in the U.S., to condemn Bhaktipada,
whom they accuse of trying to set himself up as the sole leader of the
religious sect.
In March, Bhaktipada was expelled by the governing board of the
International Society of Krishna Consciousness.
"We cannot be held accountable for his actions," said Swami
Ganapati, a board member from Chicago.
Because of the frightening reputation Bhaktipada has acquired, some
Krishna members outside his group are afraid to criticize him publicly.
"Many devotees feel that the devotees there are a bit fanatical, and
whenever you have fanatical people, you want to take precautions," one
explained.
Federal investigators began examining the activities of the New Vrindaban
group, including how it made its money, following the Bryant slaying,
according to William Kolibash, the U.S. Attorney in nearby Wheeling.
In January, about 50 state and federal agents raided the commune's offices
and searched for evidence that members had violated copyright laws by
selling thousands of bumper stickers and caps bearing the names of football
and baseball teams without permission.
No charges have been filed as a result of the raid, however.
At first view, New Vrindaban seems quite peaceful as Hare Krishna chants
echo from loudspeakers over mist-covered hillsides.
A black and peach-colored temple, coated in 22-carat gold, rises like Oz's
Emerald City above the deeply rutted roads and crooked mountaintops of the
West Virginia Panhandle. The Krishna proudly claim that the temple, called
the Palace of Gold, is the state's second biggest tourist attraction,
drawing 250,000 visitors yearly. Each visitor is asked to donate $5 for a
brief tour of the building.
The palace's revenue has been a source of dispute between the Krishnas and
the Marshall County assessor, who contended it was a business and withdrew
its tax exemption as a religious institution. Commune leaders have sued for
reinstatement of the exemption.
The community originally was established in 1966 in a storefront on
Manhattan's Lower East Side by the late Swami Prabhupada, an Indian-born,
charismatic figure who preached a 5,000-year-old Hindu-based philosophy.
Many of the first Krishna converts were solace-seeking hippies or troubled
Vietnam veterans, ready to move away from the free love and drug excesses of
the late 1960s.
In an effort to escape urban problems and temptations, Prabhupada led the
group to West Virginia in 1968. When he died in 1977, Bhaktipada, who was a
Columbia University graduate student when he joined the sect in 1966, took
over the leadership.
Many of Bhaktipada's followers are fanatical in their devotion. Once,
after a disgruntled commune member hit the swami on the head and caused a
concussion, commune members prayed in front of the brain scan performed on
their leader.
Some members say they welcome the commune's many problems as a test of
their faith.
"We are reaching out for the most fallen," and these people are
likely to get in trouble, reasoned Mukunda, a 27-year-old from Wilkes-Barre,
Pa.
At daily 5 a.m. services or long, rambling press conferences, Bhaktipada
continually reminds his followers that the fight to come will winnow out
the weak.
Commune members blame many of the group's difficulties on "fringees,"
former members who live nearby, but no longer adhere to an austere lifestyle
that bans drinking and gambling and imposes vegetarianism and celibacy for
single people.
Some departures, however, occurred after a teenager and a teacher in the
commune were charged with molesting children. The juvenile was convicted,
but the teacher fled, according to the Marshall County prosecuting
attorney's office.
Bhaktipada, the son of a fundamentalist minister from Peekskill, N.Y.,
likes to quote from the Bible on how a "time of tribulations"
soon will face all religions.
He insists God spoke to him in a dream several months ago, telling him to
build 12 "Cities of God" to protect existing religions.
Also as it happens, the religion with a PROVEN RECORD of child sexual
abuse by its officials is CHRISTIANITY, not Satanism. I am talking not
about mere allegations, but about PROSECUTIONS and CONVICTIONS - and
also about official policies to cover up such crimes when they have
occurred. To take just the Catholic Church as an example: In the December
30/31, 1988 SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, court records and sworn testimony in
civil and criminal cases involving 35 priests in dioceses across the U.S.
over the past five years - most since 1985 - show that in one or more
cases Catholic Church officials have:
* Ignored parental complaints that a child has been molested.
* Failed to inform authorities, even though most states have laws requiring
that such complaints be passed along to police or child welfare agencies.
* Transferred the offending priest to another parish or other church-owned
facility, such as a hospital or school, without warning parents in the new
location of the trouble in the old parish, and often without even requiring
the priest to stay away from children.
* Refused to help priests who have asked for psychological help.
* Attempted to discredit parents who complained, even when parish
officials knew of earlier complaints against the priest in question.
* Fought, usually with success, to make sure that the files in civil
lawsuits against the church are sealed and that settlements remain
secret even after the payment of millions of dollars in claims
* Failed to seek out probable victims and declined to turn over files
containing information about accusations of other molestations to
attorneys suing the church.
Catholic Father Thomas Doyle, a Washington, D.C. priest and canon lawyer
who has looked into the issue of pedophiliac priests, told the MERCURY
NEWS he knows of about 200 Catholic priests who have molested children in
the past 4-5 years. He said that as many as 3,000 priests could be
pedophiles. F. Ray Mouton, a lawyer working with Doyle, added:
* In 1986 priest Andrew Christian, Diocese of Orange, California received
5 years' probation on condition he go to a treatment facility after being
found guilty of 26 counts of child molestation. The church never told
authorities of abuse reported 3 years earlier, when it sent Christian to
counseling and did not remove him from supervising boys. When the
counseling stopped, molestings began.
* In 1986 priest William O'Connell, Diocese of Providence, Rhode Island
was sentenced to 1 year in prison and 2 years in a treatment center after
pleading no contest to 26 counts of sexually abusing 12 boys.
* In 1985 priest Paul Leech, Diocese of Providence, Rhode Island was
sentenced to 3 years in prison for molesting 3 boys.
* In 1986 priest Timothy Slevin, Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. was
sentenced to 3-12 years after pleading guilty to four counts of
sodomizing a boy at Sacred Heart Catholic School. Slevin told police he
sexually abused 6 other boys aged 10-16.
I can go on and on about Christians molesting children, but these
three messages are enough of a start. -- drice
A few newspaper clippings from a list of many hundreds:
That's just a small sample from a vast collection. Missing from the above
are the killings, maimings, and assorted inhuman atrocities Christians
have inflicted upon American citizens in the past five years. Also missing
are the tens of hundreds of Christian Catholic priests convicted of
molesting children.
Take note: the above are not mear alligations or hearsay: they are CRIMINAL
TRIALS THAT RESULTED IN CONVICTIONS.
Clearly, their occult beliefs in Jesus didn't prevent them from abusing
innocent, helpless children.
Here's a great question for you. Why does the Christian god permit people
who are obviously unrepentant sinners to assume authority in its church(es)?
Some examples:
From today's Chicago Tribune:
A couple who believed that prayer can heal should not be prosecuted in
the death of their teenage daughter because they did not intend for her
to die, their attorney said Monday.
Lorie and Dennis Nixon of Altoona went to trial on involuntary
manslaughter charges in the death of 16-year-old Shannon Nixon last year.
She died of a heart attack brought on by untreated diabetes. The couple,
who belong to the Faith Tabernacle Church, also lost a son to illness
several years earlier.
"This case is not about the prosecution of criminals. This case is
about the persecution of well-intended, well-meaning parents," defense
attorney Steven Passarello told jurors in Blair County Court.
District Atty. William Haberstroh said doctors will testify this week
that "there is absolutely no reason why this child should have
died."
State law requires parents to protect children who are younger than 18, he
said. He pointed out that Shannon had been to a doctor as a requirement for
her drivers' license and had seen a dentist.
Shannon had complained to her parents for several days that she wasn't
feeling well, she vomited repeatedly and was constantly thirsty, the
parents told police at the time.
She asked for a healing ceremony from the church rather than a doctor.
She was unconscious for several hours before she died, with a minister and
her parents praying over her.
Five years earlier, the couple's 8-year-old son, Clayton, died of an
inner-ear infection. That time, they pleaded no contest and were sentenced
to probation. They also were ordered to perform community service in a
hospital at the request of Haberstroh, who wanted them to see the positive
effects of medicine.
But no hospital would accept them as volunteers, so they performed their
community service elsewhere, he said.
The couple have eight surviving children and Mrs. Nixon, 44, is pregnant
again. Haberstroh has said he would not seek more than a year in prison if
they are convicted.
The Nixons are the latest members of the Faith Tabernacle to go up
against the state in the treatable deaths of their children. The Nixons
are clinging to the belief that prayer rather than medical treatment can
heal.
Two other members of the Philadelphia-based sect have been convicted, in
1983 and 1992, of involuntary manslaughter for allowing their toddlers to
die.
In 1991 in suburban Philadelphia, five more children died during a
measles outbreak, and in the 1970s, a Faith Tabernacle couple in suburban
Philadelphia lost five children before age 2 to untreated cystic fibrosis.
In church Sunday, pastor Charles Nixon, Dennis Nixon's father, told the
biblical tale of David and Goliath in his sermon as his daughter-in-law
listened. Mrs. Nixon sat calmly, flanked by female relatives as her
father-in-law spoke.
The biblical David "left the battle in the hands of the Lord, so he
didn't need to worry about winning it," the pastor told the 80
worshipers.
Called "baby killers" by some, the Faith Tabernacle refuses to
elaborate beyond pamphlets in the church foyer about its beliefs.
REUTERS, March 11, 1997
ORLANDO, Fla. - A popular Florida minister was in jail without bond
Tuesday charged with kidnapping and pistol-whipping a man during an
argument over money.
The Rev. Charles Evans, 45, has led the 2,500-member Trinity Assembly
of God church for 15 years. From the pulpit, he has crusaded against
abortion and gay rights.
Last month Orlando television stations began showing a videotape
purportedly of Evans in a Daytona Beach strip club, fondling a stripper
and slipping money into her garter.
Evans denied he was the man on the tape but strippers at the club said
Evans was such a frequent customer he was nicknamed Furniture.
Evans stepped down from his position as head pastor while his
denomination's governing body investigated the tape.
But one of those who identified Evans from the videotape was Jason
Wheeler, 25, who told police that Evans was the man he had known as Chad
and who pistol-whipped him five months before.
Evans was arrested after investigators corroborated Wheeler's statement,
said Orlando police spokeswoman Cheryl Degroff-Berry.
was charged with aggravated battery, aggravated assault and kidnapping,
Degroff-Berry said. According to a police report, Wheeler told them Evans
forced him into a car, bound his wrists, beat him with a gun and
threatened to kill him Oct. 29, 1996.
The Rev. Terry Rayburn, superintendent of the Assemblies district
council, said he questioned Evans regarding Wheeler's complaint and
Evans admitted being in Wheeler's apartment. Evans said he was there on
church business.
Rayburn said Evans remained popular at his church where an overflow
congregation gave him a standing ovation during his last Sunday sermon
before stepping down.
"He's our preacher and he's a good man," said Wanda Simpson.
"He's a man of God and it's going to take more than this to bring
him down."
But Cindy Zender, a former member of the congregation who gave the
videotape to Orlando television stations, said: "It's long overdue.
I'm just thankful justice is being done."
CLEARWATER - The Easter weekend, the holiest time on the Christian calendar,
will bring to Clearwater what many will consider an ungodly event: A meeting
of an Idaho church group that believes white Europeans are the true
Israelites and Jews have conspired to control the American economy.
Among those scheduled to speak: a tax-protesting minister from Missouri, a
Holocaust revisionist from Idaho and a Nebraska pastor whom one human-rights
activist describes as "a hardcore racist and anti-Semite."
America's Promise Ministries, of Sandpoint, Idaho, has been linked to a
series of bombings in the Pacific Northwest in 1996. But its pastor said
Friday the group was not involved.
"We're good people. We're Christians," pastor Dave Barley said.
"We're promoting the Christian Gospel, which I think is a benefit to
anybody of any race, of any nation, of any community."
Why is the group meeting in Clearwater? "Florida is a nice place. We
like to visit there, and that's the end of the story," Barley said.
Tampa Bay religious leaders were shocked to learn of the meeting.
"Holy cow! They're having their conference here?" said Roy Kaplan,
director of the Tampa office of the National Conference, which seeks
to strengthen relationships among religious groups. "They have a right
to have their conference. I just wish they would go somewhere else."
America's Promise Ministries will meet next Saturday and Sunday at the
Holiday Inn Select, 3535 Ulmerton Road. About 100 people are expected, hotel
general manager Richard Maslar said.
Maslar said the hotel was not aware of the group's beliefs when Barley booked
the room, using the name Gideon's Outreach. Maslar plans to honor the
reservation. "It's just another group that's having a meeting here, as
far as we're concerned," he said.
America's Promise Ministries is the outreach arm of the Lord's Covenant
Church, the Idaho congregation of which Barley is pastor. Barley said the
church "believes like any other fundamentalist church out there. . . .
We believe in salvation for all races, and that no man can be saved except
through Jesus Christ."
Although church members believe that northern European whites are the
Israelites described in the Bible, Barley denied that the church preaches
racism or anti-Semitism.
Asked if he thinks there is a conspiracy among Jewish people to control the
government - a commonly held belief among so-called "Christian
Identity" groups - Barley said, "I do believe there is a
conspiracy among Jews to control the money system, yes."
Coalition for Human Dignity, a Seattle organization that monitors hate
groups, said that the Lord's Covenant Church is more malignant than Barley
lets on. Among Barley's associates is Richard Kelly Hoskins, whose book,
Vigilantes of Christendom, forms the basis for the Phineas Priesthood,
according to CHD research director Robert Crawford.
"The Phineas Priesthood is an honor that is bestowed on a Christian
Identity believer who commits a racist or anti-Semitic or anti-gay
murder," Crawford said. Hoskins' book is available through America's
Promise Ministries' World Wide Web site for $20.25, but Barley denied that
his church has anything to do with the Phineas Priesthood.
"I've never been to a Phineas Priesthood meeting, and I've never
heard anybody call themselves a Phineas priest," he said.
Other titles available on the Web site: The Anti-Federalist Papers; Did
Six Million Really Die? America, Free, White & Christian; and The Way Home
(Beyond Feminism & Back to Reality).
Church leaders in Tampa Bay said they were not inclined to disrupt the
Christian Identity meeting.
"I would not ever go on record as saying that a group doesn't have a
right to meet and do its own business," said the Rev. Manuel Sykes,
pastor of Bethel Community Baptist Church in St. Petersburg. He invited
Barley and his followers to join the effort "to reconcile and to heal
- with equal justice for everyone."
From the CONCHR-L (Conservative Christian List) --
Donald Ray Anderson of McKinney shot up the Baruch Ha Shem Messianic
Congregation in Dallas yesterday as people arrived for services, while
shouting "Die, Jews, die! Kill the Jews!" He had a SKS assault
rifle.
Praise God nobody was killed, but the building sustained $300 in bullet
damages.
Later, he claimed he didn't intend to hurt anyone but wanted to "expose
the Jews." He claimed to be a KKK member, but didn't have any proof
thereof.
Police arrested him as he tried to reload.
~*~
A rifle-wielding man wearing army fatigues fired shots at a Far North
Dallas synagogue while repeatedly shouting "Die, Jews, die," as
hundreds gathered for a service Saturday morning, police said.
Members of the Baruch Ha Shem Messianic Congregation, in the 6300 block of
Belt Line Road, said it was a miracle that nobody was injured. But the
incident is a reminder of the senseless hate and anti-Semitism that
continue to plague the nation.
"I don't know if he wanted to kill anybody or just wanted to instill
fear in people," said Sheryl Selk, 37, who sat in her car as she
watched the man shoot at the synagogue and clench his fists in a Nazi-like
salute. "He could have killed somebody if he wanted to."
Donald Ray Anderson, 48, was arrested at the scene and was being held at
Lew Sterrett Justice Center on Saturday afternoon. He was charged with
aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and deadly conduct. His bail was
set at $200,000.
"It is a real eye-opener that it could happen in Dallas, but it
did," Ms. Selk said. "It was scary."
The FBI has opened a civil-rights investigation, said Special Agent
Marjorie Poche.
An official at the synagogue, who asked not to be identified, estimated
that between 250 and 300 members, including children, were in the building
at the time of the incident. Members took cover by getting on the floor,
but nobody panicked, she said.
"He was right in front of the door shooting," she said.
"Praise God nobody was killed. . . . It could have been much
worse."
The incident occurred shortly after 10:30 a.m. Children would normally have
been playing outside but were inside the building at the time because of
the rain, members said.
"We don't know what would have happened if the kids were outside,"
Ms. Selk said.
Authorities estimated damage to the building and the synagogue's sign
totaled about $300. Bullets shattered glass and holes could clearly be
seen near a Star of David on the building.
Ms. Selk said she saw the gunman attempt to reload as police were arriving.
Arriving officers found the gunman standing in the parking lot holding the
rifle. He threw down the rifle when an officer drew his weapon, police said.
One witness told police that she was walking in the courtyard when she
noticed a man walking behind her carrying the rifle. She began walking
faster when she looked over her shoulder and saw him raise the rifle in
the air and fire five times.
He was shouting, 'Die, Jews, die," over and over, the woman told police.
Hal Yablon, who arrived at the scene about an hour after the incident, said
the service was uplifting.
"The idea of fear or what took place did not really manifest itself
after we got there," said Mr. Yablon, 63. "You really wouldn't
have known that something had happened by the mood. We went into rejoicing
the Lord through hymns and song."
Mr. Selk said she too noticed how spiritual the mood was following the
incident.
"We just continued on like it was a normal Saturday," she said.
"But we will never be the same."
Mr. Yablon said one woman told him that she could see the hate in the
gunman's face.
"The lady in front of me said, for whatever it's worth, the look on
the guy's face was terrible, just hateful, almost demonic," Mr. Yablon
said. "It could have been a blood bath."
By Michael Saul / The Dallas Morning News
Church, U.S. Priest Ordered to Pay $102 Million
Reuters
24-JUL-97
By Kieran Murray
DALLAS, July 24 (Reuter) - A U.S. jury on Thursday ordered the Roman
Catholic diocese of Dallas and a former Catholic priest to pay more than
$100 million in damages to 10 former altar boys and the parents of
another who were sexually abused by the priest.
It was the largest cash penalty ever imposed against the Catholic church
in a sexual abuse case.
A jury of 10 women and two men said in the civil proceedings that the
diocese was guilty of gross negligence, malice, conspiracy and fraud in
failing to stop the Rev. Rudolph Kos from abusing the children over an
11-year period ending in 1992, and in covering up evidence when the
victims came forward.
The jury awarded the plaintiffs, who included 10 victims and the family
of another who committed suicide in 1992, a total of $102 million in
actual damages. The individual awards ranged from $5.9 million to $17.2
million for the parents of the dead victim.
Tom Economus, head of a Chicago-based victim support group called ``The
Linkup: Survivors of clergy sexual abuse,'' said it was the largest
penalty ever in a church sexual abuse. The previous high was $13 million
in a Florida case last year, he said.
After the verdict was announced, the jury began to hear new testimony in
order to fix additional punitive damages. The plaintiffs had sought total
damages of $146.5 million.
Kos, who was suspended from the priesthood in 1992 and is now facing
criminal charges of sexual abuse of a child, did not attend the trial. He
is 52 and lives now in San Diego, California.
Kos was accused of abusing boys as young as nine-years old on hundreds of
occasions at three different Dallas-area churches, even having regular
``sleepovers'' in his rectory room.
The former altar boys testified that Kos was like a father to them, but
drew them into sexual relationships that began with foot massages and
then escalated to masturbation and oral sex. They said he gave them candy
and video games and plied them with sedatives, alchohol and marijuana.
In an emotional 11-week trial, plaintiffs' lawyers said diocese officials
were so intent on avoiding a scandal that they ignored a ``mountain of
evidence'' that Kos was abusing children, and then destroyed documents
when his victims began to come forward.
``This diocese is more concerned about concealing the truth than
protecting children,'' attorney Silvia Demarest said in closing
arguments.
But the diocese said Kos had deceived everyone for years and pointed out
that he was removed as a priest as soon as a first youth complained about
sexual abuse.
Return to the Clergy Abuse Index page.
Section 4:
Burkett, Elinor, and Bruni, Frank. "A Gospel of Shame: Children,
Sexual Abuse, and the Catholic Church." Viking, Penguin Books, NY,
NY 1993
Chicago Tribune
I have consulted with dioceses and Catholic religious orders from
every part of this country, and it is my impression that there is
not one single, solitary bishop or vicar in this country who has
not dealt with the problem of a pedophiliac priest under his
supervision. Conservatively I would estimate that in the last
several years, hundreds of priests and other clerics have been
discovered as pedophiles, leaving a trail of thousands of Catholic
child victims.
Had enough yet? These individual examples are selected from a list of
over 100 cases of "black collar crimes."
COUPLE'S FAITH IN PRAYER AN ISSUE IN DEATH
Associated Press
Dateline: HOLLIDAYSBURG, Pa.
ST. PETERSBURG TIMES, March 22, 1997
Reputation for racism taints church's welcome
By MIKE WILSON
From The Dallas Morning News Online --
MAN SHOOTS AT SYNAGOGUE BEFORE SERVICE
No one injured; suspect is charged on 2 counts
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