US Bishop Charged For Not Reporting Priest's Child Porn To Police

PolygamousRanchKid writes "Kansas City's Catholic bishop was charged Friday with not telling police about child pornography found on a priest's computer, making him the highest-ranking U.S. Catholic official indicted on a charge of failing to protect children. Finn has acknowledged that he and other diocese officials knew for months about hundreds of 'disturbing' images of children that were discovered on a priest's computer but did not report the matter to authorities or turn over the computer."

Comments

Pretty Terrible Story

[thepainguy]

The parishoners knew for months, if not years, that something strange was going on, but the diocese refused to do anything. There's a letter out there that the principle sent to the Bishop that's quite damning (and that the bishop supposedly never even read).

http://www.nbcactionnews.com/dpp/news/crime/a-newly-released-letter-by-snap-shows-that-parents-were-concerned-about-father-shawn-ratigan

The church still doesn't appear to be taking this stuff seriously and parents should be concerned.

Re:Slashdot has outdone itself.

[couchslug]

The response has been documented to have AGGRAVATED the problem, and continued over decades.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/25/christian-brothers-abuse-payout [guardian.co.uk]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23521616/ns/us_news-faith/t/catholic-sex-abuse-payouts-top-million/ [msn.com]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1557479/Roman-Catholic-Church-agrees-sexual-abuse-payout.html [telegraph.co.uk]

http://life.nationalpost.com/2011/08/18/clergy-abuse-payouts-pushing-dublin-archdiocese-toward-bankruptcy/ [nationalpost.com]

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Catholic+Church+seeks+limit+abuse+payouts+Germany/3605154/story.html [montrealgazette.com]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/jun/24/usa.danglaister [guardian.co.uk]

http://vivekajyoti.blogspot.com/2011/03/catholic-jesuits-in-166-million-abuse.html [blogspot.com]

http://www.vaticancrimes.us/2011/01/catholic-abuse-victims-offered-firm.html [vaticancrimes.us]

Re:Not just the RCC

[couchslug]

Have a few numbers:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/25/christian-brothers-abuse-payout [guardian.co.uk]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23521616/ns/us_news-faith/t/catholic-sex-abuse-payouts-top-million/ [msn.com]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1557479/Roman-Catholic-Church-agrees-sexual-abuse-payout.html [telegraph.co.uk]

http://life.nationalpost.com/2011/08/18/clergy-abuse-payouts-pushing-dublin-archdiocese-toward-bankruptcy/ [nationalpost.com]

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Catholic+Church+seeks+limit+abuse+payouts+Germany/3605154/story.html [montrealgazette.com]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/jun/24/usa.danglaister [guardian.co.uk]

http://vivekajyoti.blogspot.com/2011/03/catholic-jesuits-in-166-million-abuse.html [blogspot.com]

http://www.vaticancrimes.us/2011/01/catholic-abuse-victims-offered-firm.html [vaticancrimes.us]

Re:Is that how that works?

[domatic]

Any child porn with live actors IS documentation of abuse. Anyone who has it is fueling that abuse. It isn't something you just let go.

I don't agree with hounding people because of nasty cartoons with children but the real thing is another beast altogether. Kids can't give consent. Servicing the market for it is a crime. Being a part of the market for it is a crime.

And anyhoo this creepazoid wasn't just getting his jollies from horrible pix....

Re:Is that how that works?

[Artifakt]

because the abusive images came from somewhere and by collecting them, you are providing the "customer demand" for more abuse of children.

More specifically than the general principle of demand, when it comes to child porn, there are boards and servers where people must provide some new content to get access to an inner core of photos or video showing the most explicitly pornographic images. To get new content to swap for access, the visitor just about has to commit the actual acts necessary to create new child porn. While I can imagine cases where somebody photographs a simulated rape to access rape porn, or photographs a person over the age of consent to gain access to images of, say, 15-16 year olds, some of these sites, when raided by the FBI, were specifically insisting on penetration images, obviously pre-pubescent children, and other such rules where there's simply no way the original act was not criminal.

Re:Is that how that works?

[hairyfeet]

Oh bullshit. You think a guy that fucks 8 year olds is gonna go "Oh well, nobody will pay me so I'll let little Suzy go" horseshit. I asked my friend from his experience busting these scum how it works and he broke it down for me and in ALL of it? Money didn't mean shit except long AFTER the fact.

1.-Child rapist meets other child rapists in backroom bulletin board. The way they have this thing set up it is damned near impossible for cops to get in BTW, as the entrance fee is video of you raping a kid with an object THEY tell you to insert in the video and you have X amount of time, not enough to Hollywood it and these freaks have all the stuff floating around the net. 2.-Rapists begin exchanging encrypted DVDs through mail. One of them digitizes the faces out if they haven't already been done. Here is where they fuck up as seeing the kid's face gets them off so they NEVER digitize over the kid's face, the most they do is have her/him wear a mask. 3.-Someone in the group uploads it to one of the backroom sites and HERE is where those that sell CP get it. There are a few that "rent" kids in third world countries for filming, but that is rare, mostly it is gotten from these backroom sites. 4.-Video then hits P2P and HERE is where the retards get it.

Notice how money didn't play shit in this exchange? According to my friend while there are sites in third world countries making money off this shit they are exploiting what is already out there and the retards almost never spend a dime, its all P2P and crap they get off back alley sites. He says he sees the same CP stuff day after day after day and some of it is as old as the 1960s, it has just been passed around and around. The few new ones they find on social retards are from the sites I mentioned above where a REAL rapist has loaded up his video for BRAGGING rights NOT for pay. For these guys its "look what I've got!" not "how much will you pay me?" which is why he said tracking these guys down is a bitch. Money leaves a pretty big trail to follow, anon uploads? Not so much.

So please spare us the same tired old meme they used for alcohol and drugs before it, as like in those cases its bullshit.