Could there be a larger, more-organized ring of child molesters than the Catholic Church? Lord, I hope not. The Catholics seem to have a thing for young boys; the other denominations spread the love all around.
Compiled by the Freedom From Religion Foundation.
Arrested / Charged
Geody M. Harman, 37, Fromberg, MT: 1stdegree rape. Harman is "Firsi Counsel of the Holy Ghost" of the Church of the Firstborn of the General Assembly of Heaven. The Utah charging affidavit said that Harman "had an impression from God" that the 15-year-old girl was to have sex with him.
There's also an outstanding warrant for Terrill Dalton, 43, president of the church, which is a Mormon splinter group. Dalton is accused of raping the same girl as Harman after telling her "that it she had sex with him three times, [she] would be blessed." Source: Billings Gazette, 8-18-10
Rev. Daniel Valentine, 45, New Miiford, CT. 5 counts of 1st-degree larceny and 2 counts of 2nd-degree larceny. Valentine, former executive pastor at Faith Church in Danbury, is accused of embezzling $221,000 from Squeaky's Car Wash, a business he and other church leaders started to make money for the church.
The arrest warrant said his partners got suspicious when they learned he had encumbered the car wash to get a personal loan. He allegedly wrote checks to fictitious contractors or to builders who had done work for Squeaky's, then endorsed them and deposited them into his own account. Source: Danbury News-Times, 8-1710
Joshua Wisdom, 37, Rogers, AR: Sexual solicitation and loitering. Wisdom resigned as a student pastor at the Church at Pinnacle Hills after the church asked for his immediate resignation. He was arrested with several others as part of an online prostitution sting by Bentonville police. Source: KFSM News, 8-13-10
Rev, Timothy Parker, 40, Westgate, IA: 2 counts of lascivious acts with a minor and 1 count of 3rd-degree sexual abuse. Parker, pastor of St. Peter Lutheran Church, is accused of fondling and oral sex on a female victim on 3 occasions when she was age 1 2. Source: Waterloo-Cedar Fails Courier, 8-4-10
Rev. William Casey, 76, Greenville, TN: Forcible sodomy and indecent liberties with a child. Casey, who was removed from the Catholic ministry in April, was indicted in Scott County, VA, for alleged incidents in 1978 with a male minor at Natural Tunnel State Park.
Casey pleaded guilty in July in McDowell County, NC, to crimes against nature involving the same victim and received 24 months of supervised probation. Source: Knoxvitte News Sentinel, 8-4-10
Enoc "Tito" Sotelo, 50, Kinston, NC: 32 counts of 3rd-degree theft by deception. Sotelo, former Salvation Army pastor in Plainfteld, NJ, is accused in a scheme to defraud illegal immigrants out of tens of thousands of dollars by promising but not delivering "green" cards. His wife, Vereli Sotelo, faces 8 theft counts. Source: Somerville [NJ] Courier News, 8-2- 10
Rev. Valentine Tsaralunge. Taul, MOLDAVA: Reckless imprudence. Tsarafunge was suustituting for another priest who was supposed to baptize Laurentiu Gaydeu, 6 weeks. "He dipped the baby in the water without even covering the baby's mouth with his hand to prevent him from drowning," Dmitry Gaydeu, the boy's father, told Komsomolskaya Pravda. "He put his hand on his stomach and dipped him in the water three times."
The newspaper said Laurentiu's godparents tried to intervene when the boy didn't seem well, but the priest insisted he knew what he was doing. His son died of "asphyxia from drowning," Gaydeu said. The maximum sentence is 3 years in prison. Source: USA Today, 7-29-10
Harvey A. Zeek, another Muskegon County Scouting administrator, was sent to prison in 2008 on child porn convictions involving young girls. He was also convicted in 2009 of criminal sexual conduct that started when the victim was 6. At sentencing, the judge called Zeek "a monster." Source: Muskegon Chronicle, 7- 13- 10
Regina DaSilva, 41, Union, NJ: 11 counts of grand larceny, 12 counts of offering a false instrument for filing, 12 counts of making an apparently sworn false statement and 1 count of 1st-degree scheme to defraud. DaSilva, treasurer of the Pentecostal Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, is accused of filing petitions with false information with two state agencies and a bank to obtain $22 million in mortgage loans for her employer. Source: N. Y. Daily News, 7-10-10
Pleaded / Convicted
Douglas Perita, 40, Eagle, CO: Pleaded guilty to 1 count of traveling with the intent to engage in illicit sexual contact. Perita is a graduate of Fairfield [CT] University, a Jesuit college. He started a boys' school in 1997 called Project Pierre Toussaint in Cap-Ha�ien, Haiti, with a grant from the Order of Malta, a Catholic charity. Rev. Paul Carrier, former head of Fairfield's campus ministry, and other church officials raised millions for the program.
Perlte was indicted in Connecticut in 2009 on 1 0 sexual abuse counts. The indictment said, "If minors refused to engage in sex acts, Perlitz would at times withhold benefits or threaten to expel them from the program." Although he pleaded to only 1 count, Perlitz did not dispute the state's contention he had sex with as many as 13 boys. Source: Connecticut Post, 8-19-10
Rev. James Blaine, 61, Greenfield, OH: Pleaded guilty to forgery and aggravated theft. Blaine, pastor of Good Shepherd Church, aliegedly forged documents to obtain $250,000 in the church's name for his personal use. The state dropped 1 5 other counts in a plea bargain. Source; Hillsboro Times-Gazette, 8-15-10
He filed a 2003 tax return with income of $101,064 when it was actually $407,062. Source: Akron Beacon Journal, 7-24-10
Rev. Tommy R Snetton, 65, Marion, KY: Pleaded guilty to 2 counts of taking indecent liberties with a child under his supervision. Shelton was pastor of Community Church of God in Dunn Loring, VA, at the time of the alleged incidents involving 2 minor males in the 1990s.
One of the men testified he was 14 when Shelton molested him while telling him their sexual activities were "the type of relationship a father and son had." Source: Washington Post, 7-20-10
Sentenced
Kristina Bibb, 37, Santa Fe, NM: Pleaded no contest to contributing to the delinquency of a minor. Bibb was financial secretary at Christian Life Fellowship, the parent organization of Christian Life Academy.
She admitted having sex with a 17-year-old male student and received 5 years' unsuperv�se� probation. She couid have been charged with a 4th-degree felony for consensual sex between a student and a school employee but wasn't. Her husband, the 2006 GOP nominee for state attorney general, didn't attend the hearing. Bibb's father is former Democratic Gov. Toney Anaya. Source: Santa Fe New Mexican. a-14-10
Melissa B. Jones, 29, Decatur, IL: Pleaded guilty to criminal sexual abuse and was sentenced to 2 years' probation and sex offender registration for 10 years for having intercourse with a boy. 1 6, who attended the Baptist church where Jones' husband was youth pastor.
The boy told police in 2008 that he met Jones at church camp. She began counseling him for addiction to Internet pornography. Phone calls and text messages turned into sex multiple times a week, he said. Source: Decatur Herald-Review, 8-6-10
Plaintiff Teresa Rosson, 48, alleges Kiesle molested her for years, starting in 1973 when she was 11. "He could have been stopped in 1 968, in 1 973, in 1 978, but it went on and on."
The diocese recommended removing Kiesle from the priesthood in 1981, the year Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was appointed to head the Vatican office responsible for disciplining abusive priests. Kiesie was not defrocked until 1987. Source: AP, 8-19-10
Michael Unglo's family is suing the Diocese of Pittsburgh, alleging that Unglo killed himself last May at age 39 after the diocese stopped paying for treatment for the effects of abuse by Richard J, Dorsch, who was defrocked after being convicted of abusing another chiid.
"He needed long-term, continued, inpatient treatment," said Alan Perer, the family's lawyer. "The diocese firmly told the family and Michael that they felt they had done enough and that they would make one last payment and they would make no further payments in the future."
The diocese denied any negligence and said it paid "hundreds of thousands ol dollars" on counseling and residential treatment for Unglo, Source: KDKA/AP, 7-30-10
Gerald Derstine, 31, East Manatee. FL: Derstine, founder of the Gospel Crusade Ministerial Fellowship and operator of several Christian camps, is being sued in Minnesota for alleged sexual abuse of an 11 -year-old girl who called him Grandpa Gerald.
The suit said the abuse took place at Strawberry Lake Christian Retreat when the girl was between 11 and 13. Derstine's son. Phil, said the girl's mother is a disgruntled former volunteer who was fired.
The suit alleged Rev. Fogarty made a lalse and defamatory statement" in which he defined acts of fornication and said, ? have personal knowledge that I will not go into at this time . . . that Angela has committed one of these acts."
The statements were made "to obtain the church congregation's approval of the relationship between James Driver and Rev. Fogarty's daughter," the lawsuit said.
One reason given as grounds to biblically remarry was that James Driver once found Angela wearing a bikini at a swimming pool while with the husband of a mutual friend. Fogarty said that constituted exhibitionism and met the biblical definition of fornication. Source: Mac�n Telegraph. 7-7-10
Appeals ....
It just goes on and on. And that's just a sampling from a two month period in 2010.
More horror stories.
