ALTOONA, Penn. (ChurchMilitant.com) - A grand jury report is accusing multiple Pennsylvania government officials of complicity in a massive sex abuse cover-up, and one official has resigned from a Catholic school board position.
The report prepared by the Pennsylvania state Attorney General's office and released at the beginning of March is exposing multiple law enforcement officials as having worked to protect dozens of homosexual clerics accused of molesting hundreds of boys.
Among the accused mentioned by name is Cambria County judge Patrick Kiniry, who stepped down from his position on the board of a Catholic school following the revelations. The 147-page grand jury report accuses Kiniry — then acting as assistant district attorney — of working to protect Msgr. Francis McCaa after complaints began emerging in the mid-1980s charging the priest with molesting numerous post-pubescent altar boys.
Described as "a monster," McCaa, who died in 2007, is believed to have molested "hundreds" of victims; according to testimonies he would make altar boys "take their pants off under their cassocks" to allow for discreet molestation and presented himself as a "formidable figure" in order to discourage the abused from speaking up.
A documented meeting between Kiniry and then-Bp. James Hogan of the Altoona-Johnstown diocese took place in November of 1985, with both parties agreeing to remove McCaa from his parish and, following time spent in psychiatric counseling, place him back in the diocese rotation. He went on to work in various parishes and schools, accompanied by "glowing" recommendations from Bp. Hogan, until retiring from ministry in 1993.
When questioned by the attorney general's office in January, Kiniry admitted that "back then, the diocese moved the problem ... that's just how it was." To date, Kiniry has made no indication he will resign from his position as judge but claims he is "reading and digesting" the grand jury report. (more...)
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