Child Abuse Enablers - Christians and Jews

 

[Part One]

I have just returned from a business trip to the USA. While there, I picked up on two angles on campaigns in the USA for justice against child abuse enablers.

One is Catholic (big time campaign) and the other is Jewish (small time campaign).

The word “enabler”, by the way, is used to describe people who provide a conducive environment for pedophiles to operate. It’s a secondary act, rather than the direct act of abuse against the child.

Some types of "enabling" are illegal in the USA and in Israel, such as failure to report child abuse, when this reporting is required/mandated by law; or where the enablers interfere with the course of justice.

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An American Catholic friend of mine told me that the number one issue in the Catholic Church today is the church’s mishandling of child abuse cases.

You have surely hear about the Catholic campaign, which is targeting both Catholic clergy who have abusing children, and the secondary enablers, being the church authorities who implemented various policies which enabled the child abusers to continue their crimes against children and protected them from criminal investigation and process.

While I was in the USA, the New York Times ran (at least) two front page articles on the Pope’s personal role in enabling child abuse. The current edition of the Economist (which I read on the plane) also had a major article about the Pope’s role in alleged mishandling of child abuse cases by clerics.  

The latest twist in the tale, in the New York Times, is that a US lawyer is seeking to subpoena the Pope himself to give testimony in a case of child abuse carried out in the USA, but apparently covered up by orders from the Vatican.

The image of the Pope being required to give testimony in a US court, could only be out-done by the Pope facing criminal charges himself. (Which, given the mounting evidence against the Pope’s personal role as an alleged enabler of child abuse, can no longer be discounted as wild fantasy).

Meantime, in the Jewish community, there has been an important development in the campaign to bring enablers of child abuse to justice. Here’s the story from Lakewood NJ….

A separate indictment, also handed up by an Ocean County grand jury late last week, charges Shaul Luban, 30, of Twin Oaks Drive in Lakewood with witness tampering.

That indictment stated on/or about Aug. 7, Luban engaged in conduct to induce a witness to withhold testimony in an investigation.

Pierro alleged Luban was trying to rally members of the Orthodox community in Lakewood to embark on a telephone campaign to get the father of Kolko's victim to drop the charges. He sent text messages to people urging them to put pressure on the father…

http://www.app.com/article/20100630/NEWS/6300356/Ex-Lakewood-camp-counselor-indicted-on-child-sex-assault-charges

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In Ocean County, Yosef Kolko, the nephew of the notorious child sex abuser, Rabbi Yehudah Kolko (of Torah Temima), is facing a 60 year sentence, if convicted of all the horrifying child abuse charges against him.

But, unfortunately, in the rash of ghastly child abuse cases throughout the Jewish community, the younger Kolko’s alleged crimes are no long considered unusual.

What is unusual in this case, is the lesser charges of witness interference (harassment), against Shaul Luban. If convicted, Luban is facing five years in prison.  

[Part Two, focusing on Enablers in Ramat Bet Shemesh, coming soon..].

Comments

  1. Anonymous13 July 2010 at 18:02

    Yes! This is such an important topic. enablers who try to silence victims should be prosecuted. Thank you for posting this!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Seven Star Hand15 July 2010 at 07:29

    Hi David,

    More evidence that religion is not what it appears to some. I am the proverbial horse's mouth and I am now gifting you with the Vatican's worst nightmare, now realized.

    The Vatican is being set up for a much bigger fall than most are expecting. Some amazingly damaging information about pivotal religious assertions is about to become widely available and understood. This child abuse scandal is merely proof of their absolute lack of veracity, before the real controversy is unsealed. Here's an early peak.

    Following is a link to a draft-preview of my upcoming new book for parties like yourself, who are more likely to make good use of the information. The next update is due out later this month.

    Finishing the Mysteries of Gods and Symbols

    Peace and Wisdom,

    Seven

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous15 July 2010 at 16:23

    Hi David,

    FYI, the title of your post *appears* to imply that all Christians and Jews are child abuse enablers. I clicked on the link (I was doing a google search re: Catholicism and child abuse) because I was a bit confused why a Hebrew titled blog would have such a post.

    I'm not sure if English is one of your first languages and/or you meant the blog title to read like it does, but just in case you didn't, I wanted to mention it.

    Cheers!
    Janet

    ReplyDelete
  4. David Morris15 July 2010 at 18:33

    Hi Janet

    Thank you for your feedback.

    I'm sorry you found the title to be ambiguous - of course I did not mean in any way to imply that ALL Christians and Jews are child abuse enablers!!! Such a suposition would clearly be outrageous!

    Can you suggest a different title for the article which would remove the possibility for such a misunderstanding?

    By the way, English is my first language/mother tongue. I spent my first twenty-something years in the UK.

    Cheers
    David

    ReplyDelete

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