85 "Unique" Jews! April is National Autism Month!

Severe Abuse in Childhood may Treble Risk of Schizophrenia!

The risk of developing schizophrenia and other forms of psychosis increased in line with the amount of abuse or trauma a child went through.

Children who experience severe forms of abuse are around three times as likely to develop schizophrenia and related psychoses in later life compared with children who do not experience such abuse, according to a study that has brought together psychiatric data from almost 80,000 people.

The results add to a growing body of evidence that childhood maltreatment or abuse can raise the risk of developing mental illnesses in adulthood, including depression, personality disorders and anxiety.

Prof Richard Bentall of the University of Liverpool's Institute of Psychology, Health and Society, who led the study, showed that the risk of developing psychosis increased in line with the amount of abuse or trauma a child had gone through, with the most severely affected children having a 50-fold increased risk compared with children who had suffered no abuse. He also showed that the type of trauma experienced in childhood affected the subsequent psychiatric symptoms later in life.

Schizophrenia occurs in around 1-3% of the population and is defined by psychiatrists as one of the most severe types of mental illness. It is characterised by hearing voices, bizarre beliefs and loss of motivation.

Bentall's team analysed 36 published studies that contained data on childhood maltreatment (including sexual, physical and emotional abuse, death of a parent, school bullying and neglect) and psychiatric symptoms in almost 80,000 people, collected over the course of 30 years. People who experienced these types of trauma in childhood were between 2.7 and 3 times as likely to develop schizophrenia as adults, the team found. The research is published in the journal Schizophrenia Bulletin.

In cases where someone had suffered sustained abuse or several types, their risk of developing schizophrenia in later life was increased further. "People who had severe and multiple traumas in their lives, in some of their studies they'd go up to an odds ratio of 50 times greater risk of psychosis [in later life]," said Bentall. "There is nothing in genetics which looks as strong as this in terms of effects and it's consistent across the different studies, so it's a highly robust effect."

The latest results add to recent evidence that childhood abuse can lead to serious problems in later life.

 In 2011, scientists at the Institute of Psychiatry (IoP) at King's College London found that people with a history of abuse or maltreatment during childhood were more than twice as likely to have recurrent episodes of depression in adulthood and also 43% more likely to experience a poor outcome when it came to psychological or drug-based treatment. They examined data from 16 epidemiological studies involving more than 23,000 people in total and 10 clinical trials involving more than 3,000 people

The mechanisms behind the link between childhood maltreatment and schizophrenia are not yet understood. Earlier this year, psychiatrists at Harvard University found that being sexually or emotionally abused as a child correlated with reduced volumes of three important areas of the hippocampus, which is involved in the control of memory and regulation of emotions. Volumes were reduced by up to 6.5%.

"It's entirely possible that these changes in the brain that we see in patients are the results of their life experiences," said Bentall. "But we don't know if that's the case."

Louise Arseneault, a senior lecturer at the IoP, said it was encouraging to know that so many different studies were coming up with similar conclusions on the relationship between childhood adversity and psychotic symptoms. "We already know that trauma and harmful experiences in childhood bring their share of difficulties, whether it is mental health or physical health problems. But it is striking that these adversities extend to mental health as disabling as psychosis, which has been thought to be highly influenced by genetic factors."

Andrea Danese, a researcher in child and adolescent psychiatry at the IoP, said: "These tragic findings may help us uncover new solutions. If we can understand how childhood adversities influence risk for psychosis, we will have new hopes for developing interventions to prevent and treat mental illness."

READ ARTICLE:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/apr/18/severe-abuse-childhood-risk-schizophrenia?newsfeed=true

Senate Considering Outlawing Anonymous Online Speech That’s Supposedly “Intended to Harass” the Person Being Criticized

by Eugene Volokh • April 24, 2012 - Professor of Law - UCLA School of Law

This is happening in § 1003 of the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2011, which is apparently being debated tomorrow. Here’s the deal: 47 U.S.C. § 223(a) currently criminalizes

(C) mak[ing] a telephone call or utilizes a telecommunications device, whether or not conversation or communication ensues, without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person at the called number or who receives the communications; [or] …

(E) mak[ing] repeated telephone calls or repeatedly initiat[ing] communication with a telecommunications device, during which conversation or communication ensues, solely to harass any person at the called number or who receives the communication.

This law already has some problems, I think, given the vagueness of terms such as “annoy” and “harass,” and it’s been held unconstitutional as applied in a case in which a man was prosecuted for leaving racist voice-mail for then-U.S. Attorney and now-Attorney General Eric Holder; it might therefore be unconstitutionally overbroad. But it has generally been upheld in most cases, and such a result may be defensible precisely because the statute deals with calls or messages to the person who is being harassed. Restricting such unwanted one-to-one speech (with a properly crafted and narrowed statute) should be permissible, because it leaves people free to communicate with willing listeners. See generally Rowan v. United States Post Office Dep’t (1970).

But now the Senate is considering replacing “harass any person at the called number or who receives the communication” with “harass any specific person.” This appears to be a deliberate attempt to remove the language that could be read as limiting the current statute to one-to-one communications. (The proposal would also remove “annoy” from item (C), but it would keep “harass.”)

So say that someone started to post anonymous (or pseudonymous) blog posts — or Twitter messages or online newspaper articles — criticizing Attorney General Holder, a local official, a police officer, a businessperson, a religious leader, or anyone else. The posts aren’t threatening or false, just harshly critical. And say a prosecutor decided that the speaker was partly motivated by a desire to “badger, disturb or pester” the target of his messages. The speaker could then be prosecuted, on the theory that he was
utiliz[ing] a telecommunications device … without disclosing his identity and with intent to … harass any specific person [added text italicized].

And this is so even though the speaker is talking to the public at large, not just to the target: As I said, the proposal would expressly delete the statutory language that could now be used to try to limit the statute to one-one unwanted messages.

The intent to harass would not have to be the sole intention. Subsection (E) specifically limits itself to situations where the speaker has the sole intention to harass, and while that’s problematic enough on its own terms (since it’s so hard to tell what’s a speaker’s “sole” intention), it makes clear that subsection (C), which lacks such limiting language, applies even to cases where the intent to harass is one of the speaker’s intention.

Say a speaker thinks Congressman Joe Schmoe (or Officer Joe Schmoe or Reverend Joe Schmoe) has done bad things and therefore (1) intends to communicate to the public why he thinks Joe Schmoe should be reviled, and (2) wants Joe Schmoe to feel reviled and embattled. Harsh and, especially, repeated anonymous criticism of Schmoe would then reasonably be seen as having an “intent to harass” as well as an intent to communicate to the public. Note also that the word “harass” is not defined in the statute, but the definition I gave above, which is to “badger, disturb or pester,” is taken from a case interpreting another criminal prohibition on things done with “intent to harass,” and reflects that court of appeals’ judgment of the dictionary meaning of the word. I have no reason to think that “harass” would be interpreted any more narrowly (or more clearly) than “badger, disturb or pester.”

And of course there’s every reason to think that the revised statute could be used not just to go after criticism of private individuals — though I think it would be unconstitutional even then — but also government officials. As you can see in these posts, these sorts of broad “harassment” statutes have recently been used to silence, prosecute, or try to unmask critics of prominent religious leaders, city commissioners, police officers, and candidates for elective office. Why is the Senate considering broadening federal speech restrictions to make such prosecutions easier?

Note also that the bill would also remove the limiting language from the provision (§ 223(E)) that covers even nonanonymous speech that’s said “solely to harass.” Under the bill, a signed blog post, online newspaper article, or Twitter message could lead to a prosecution if the prosecutor thinks the purpose of the message is “solely to harass” the person being criticized in the article. I would argue that statements to the public always have the intention to inform, persuade, entertain, or something else, even if they also have the intention to harass. But the bill is deliberately expanding the subsection to cover not just speech said to a person, but also speech said to the public about the person. And given the human tendency to assume the worst motivations in those whose views one disagrees with, it’s quite plausible that prosecutors, judges, and jurors might find someone guilty of publicly speaking “solely to harass” the person whom he is harshly criticizing, even when the speaker also has the purpose of informing or persuading the public.

 READ BLOG: http://volokh.com/2012/04/24/senate-considering-outlawing-anonymous-online-speech-thats-supposedly-intended-to-harass-the-person-being-criticized/

TELL CONGRESS STAY OUT OF MY INBOX!

CLICK: https://action.eff.org/o/9042/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=8609

COMMENTS SECTION ON UOJ REOPENED!

I Recently Watched a Series on the Brain on PBS, Hosted by Charlie Rose

   CLICK: http://www.medicinenet.com/dementia_pictures_slideshow/article.htm

 The various doctors and scientists added their thoughts on illness, dementia, Alzheimer's in the aged, mental retardation, depression and various other illnesses that healthy folks never think about --- of course until illness strikes them or people close to them.

What I always believed, that scientists are always either finding out how right they are, or on the flip side, how misunderstood the initial data was. Recently, I read in the WSJ, how for years medical researchers misunderstood the data they thought were for particular forms of cancer, people were treated with these misdiagnosed treatments, and many people died because of these serious, honest misreadings. I'm not talking about the charlatans who sell bogus treatments to cancer patients, or people with MS, I'm talking about professionals who erred.

CLICK: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203721704577159280778957336.html

One thing is certain....either the brain is functioning on all cylinders (excuse the street language), or the malfunctioning part of the brain, causes the person to be ill without knowing it, and/or the illness can be discreet, disguising itself as healthy behavior until the body breaks down perhaps - or more importantly, the person lives a long life never knowing how ill they really are, even fooling the people closest to them.

A simple lack of appropriate levels of any brain chemicals, will distort a person's view of what they see, think or feel. Their ability to process information will be distorted; think Charles Manson at one extreme, and think the typical sociopath/psychopath who you probably interact with on a daily basis in one form or another, either knowingly or not.

So when I recently read the protocols issued by the Bais Yaakov of Baltimore how a teacher must interact with their students - I was struck with the depraved society that I knew we live in - but now right in front of me -- in black and white -

 " A JEWISH RELIGIOUS ORTHODOX TEACHER MUST NEVER MAKE ANY INAPPROPRIATE SEXUAL GESTURES OR SEXUAL TOUCH TO THEIR STUDENTS - OR SHOW THEM PORNOGRAPHY....."

 I went numb! A rebbe, morah, or teacher in our yeshivas have to be instructed not to show pornography........ to their students?!!!

CLICK: http://www.baisyaakov.net/scpbs - bais_yaakov_school_conduct_policy[1].pdf

Scapegoating is always used by corrupt people in positions of power as a form of circling the wagons around their devotees as a way of "protecting" their cowboys from the bad-guy Indians. Yesterday it was the bad White Police in Florida; Sharpton & Co. blaming the White Boys across America for the death of a black teenager in Florida. Nothing new here at all....after 45 years of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society and hundreds of billions of dollars poured into anti-poverty programs --- the poverty level among the blacks are the same 45% as it was 45 years ago. Of course it's the whiteys...If the entire Senate, House, Supreme Court and government staffers were comprised of black Americans it would still be the slave that Thomas Jefferson had that is at fault for the plight of the Blacks today.

So too is it the Bloggers' fault that today's silent (and not so silent) vast minority of Jewish teenagers are finding Judaism devoid of meaning. Let's ban all New Technology -- the problem gets fixed immediately. More gatherings by imbeciles for imbeciles are needed to spell out the ills of the Social Media, Blogs and Smartphones. Yesterday it was the PC in the house, before that it was the TV in the closet, before that it was the radio, and before that, the telephone....I'm waiting for a ban of kids going to the doctor's office in case they pick up a People's magazine.

Yes, these ghastly ill demented sociopaths among us are the folks calling these gatherings, they can get away with the charade of looking normal, speaking eloquently, and have large followings. But so did every charismatic, demented dictator and televangelist, now and then....

If there are no role models today that we can point our children to -- to emulate, not some nonsense Baal Shem Tov stories that are not only fairy tales, but mock our intelligence; our kids will indeed get lost to the new technology.... and of course we the Bloggers would be at fault. Not the rebbes, not the rosh yeshivas, not the bankrupt Jewish leadership, not our failed educational system, not the horrible parenting, not the misguided value system of our communities,  but "the guy in his underwear in the basement of his house who has nothing else to do......"

Torah Live - The Beauty of the Internet!

 

                                              FOR MORE INFORMATION:

                              http://torahlive.co.il/index.php?movieID=10047571

Its Our Kids!!! - 4 Suicide Notes!

Rabbi Ronald Greenwald Talks Tachlis! A Must For Every Jewish Parent! Watch In Its Entirety!

"God Loves Him and Everything Will be OK!"

"Evil Men Being Held Accountable For Their Criminal Behavior" - Philadelphia District Attorney.

Catholic Church says child abuse cases rose in 2011

In a related story, the Gedolim of Agudath Israel declared in their new flick that child rape never happens by the Jews!

Perlow, Kaminetzky and Zwiebel get a new look!

CHICAGO (Reuters) - The number of credible allegations of sexual abuse of minors committed by Roman Catholic priests or deacons in the United States rose 15 percent last year, and the church spent $144 million to deal with the ongoing scandal, according to a church-sponsored audit released on Tuesday.

A total of 489 people reported credible allegations of abuse by priests or deacons in 2011, the bulk of them involving adults victimized when they were children decades ago by now-deceased clerics, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said in a report on its ninth annual audit of the issue.

Twenty-one of the victims were younger than 19 and victimized more recently. Attorneys for victims say there are likely tens of thousands more victims who have never come forward since the scandal erupted in Boston in 2002.

"We renew our promise to strive to the fullest to end the societal scourge of child sexual abuse," Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the conference, said in an introductory letter to the report.

Critics of the church's handling of the sex abuse crisis scoffed at the audit saying it minimized the extent of the abuse and the culpability of the church hierarchy.

The yearly audit for the bishops identified credible allegations against 406 priests or deacons. In 2010, there were 428 credible allegations against 345 offenders. More than one-third of the alleged perpetrators had never been charged before.

The figures for victims and offenders were twice as high earlier in the decade, then dropped off beginning in 2008.

Twelve accused clerics remained active in ministry pending the outcome of investigations. Eleven percent of new allegations were deemed false.

Altogether, U.S. dioceses and religious institutes spent $144 million on abuse settlement-related costs, which included $50 million for settlements, $37 million in attorneys' fees, $6 million on therapy for victims and $10 million on support for offenders. About a quarter of the settlement amount was covered by church insurance policies.

The church spent another $33 million on child protection efforts last year. Nearly all church employees have undergone training on the issue, the bishops' audit said, and a majority of children in parishes have been instructed how identify when they are being "groomed" for abuse and what to do........


READ ENTIRE ARTICLE:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/10/us-usa-catholic-abuse-idUSBRE8391HF20120410

Coaches Face New Scrutiny on Sex Abuse

Since the Penn State scandal came to light in November, lawmakers in more than a dozen states, including New York, California and Pennsylvania, have introduced bills adding coaches, athletic directors or university officials to the list of “mandated reporters” of suspected child abuse or neglect. In the past month, such bills have been signed in Virginia, Washington and West Virginia, with several other states expected to follow suit.

While the bills vary, some would impose significant punishments, including fines, felony charges and potential prison time for coaches or officials who violate the new laws that require the authorities to be notified.

Taken as a whole, the bills are meant to guard against what critics of Penn State said was a lax response by officials there — including the late coach Joe Paterno — that may have allowed Mr. Sandusky to continue his contact with children for years after suspicions of abuse arose.

“What we saw in Penn State was a conspiracy of silence, and that’s what my bill is directly aimed at,” said State Representative Kevin Boyle, a Democrat who introduced a bill in Pennsylvania in mid-November. “I want to stop institutions that keep sex abuse under wraps.....”

READ ENTIRE ARTICLE:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/15/us/new-scrutiny-on-coaches-in-reporting-sexual-abuse.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

To Replace Bin Laden on Most Wanted List, a Teacher in a Pornography Case!

Eric J. Toth, a teacher from the Washington area, was added to the F.B.I. list on Tuesday.

 Mr. Toth, the fugitive added to the list on Tuesday, was arrested in 2008 after child pornography images were found on a camera in his possession. He disappeared shortly thereafter.

Mr. Toth, 30, attended Cornell for a year before transferring to Purdue University, where he graduated with an education degree. He “has often been described as a computer ‘expert’ and has demonstrated above-average knowledge regarding computers, the Internet, and security awareness,” according to information released by the F.B.I. on Tuesday.

The F.B.I. said that Mr. Toth “possesses an education background conducive to gaining employment in fields having a connection to children” and that he might advertise himself as a tutor. Since 2008, he is believed to have traveled to Virginia, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Arizona.

The authorities believe they have a good chance of catching Mr. Toth because he has distinctive features. “He has a mole under one of his eyes. He is tall and lanky,” Mr. Perkins said. “He is the type of person that I hope, with a little exposure from being on the Top 10 list, will lead to individuals calling in, saying, ‘That guy works in a day care center,’ or is a teaching assistant or works down the street.”

Osama bin Laden, his predecessor on the list, was pictured with other fugitives in October 2001.

The choice is more complicated than simply finding a violent criminal who has committed a high-profile crime. In recent years, bureau officials have also tried to select other dangerous fugitives who may have been hiding in plain sight but could be recognized by the public because they have distinctive physical features.

On Tuesday, the F.B.I. finally filled bin Laden’s place on the list, adding Eric J. Toth, a schoolteacher from the Washington area accused of possessing child pornography. It was the first time since 2009 that the F.B.I. had added a fugitive to the list.

“We have had a couple of vacancies on the list that we’ve been trying to fill,” said Kevin L. Perkins, the F.B.I.’s acting executive director for criminal and cyber operations, referring to the spots left by bin Laden and the Boston crime boss James (Whitey) Bulger, who was arrested last June.

In fact, just last month, officials were preparing to ask the bureau’s director for approval to choose a fugitive accused of killing three police officers in Puerto Rico. But then that person was caught.

Using most-wanted posters to enlist the public’s help in catching criminals dates to the early part of J. Edgar Hoover’s tenure as the head of the F.B.I. in the early 1930s, when the face of the notorious bank robber John Dillinger was on a “public enemies list.”

In 1950, the bureau began using the list of 10 Most Wanted Fugitives. The first, Thomas Holden, was accused of killing his wife and two brothers-in-law. A little more than a year later, he was caught and ultimately sent to prison on Alcatraz Island in San Francisco.

Since then, the F.B.I. has caught 464 of 494 fugitives on the list. Some have been captured quickly: Billie Austin Bryant, wanted for the murder of two F.B.I. agents, was apprehended in 1969 just two hours after being added. A suspect in an armed robbery, Victor Manuel Gerena, has evaded authorities since 1983.

As American society has changed, so too has the list. For decades, the F.B.I. list was displayed in post offices. But as the number of postal patrons has dropped, the bureau has put the list on social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, and on billboards.

“It’s a big country, and you can easily hide if you are a fugitive,” said Thomas W. Repetto, the author of several books on crime and policing. “But when you get on the list, you are pretty close to getting caught. Sometimes it takes time, but if you are a fleeing criminal it is not a good place to be.”

The types of “most-wanted” criminals have also changed. Instead of highlighting just the most violent and high-profile criminals, “every once in a while we break the mold,” Mr. Perkins said, referring to the choice of physically distinctive fugitives.

That said, six of the fugitives on the current list are accused of murder.....

READ ARTICLE: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/11/us/osama-bin-laden-replaced-on-fbis-most-wanted-list.html?src=twrhp

יעקב שוואקי ויונתן רזאל - והיא שעמדה

Chazak!

Oy Goyta Please - Please Come Back!

Passover Tells Us: Teach Your Children Well

By Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks.Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth

Passover Tells Us: Teach Your Children Well

As one nation after another in Africa and the Middle East engages in a fight for freedom, Passover, which begins this week, still has much to teach us about the nature of that fight.

The Jewish festival of freedom is the oldest continuously observed religious ritual in the world. Across the centuries, Passover has never lost its power to inspire the imagination of successive generations of Jews with its annually re-enacted drama of slavery and liberation.

It is vivid, replete with direct experiences like eating matza, the unleavened bread of affliction, and tasting maror, the bitter herbs of oppression. It is a ritual performed not in the synagogue but at home, in the midst of the family, reminding us that, in Alexis de Tocqueville's words, "As long as family feeling is kept alive, the opponent of oppression is never alone." Perhaps its single most striking innovation is that from beginning to end, it is designed to engage and enthral the mind of a child.

The rabbis who developed the ritual were guided by the Bible itself and the highly counterintuitive narrative it tells in the 12th and 13th chapters of Exodus. Here is the scene: Moses has assembled the people to tell them they are about to go free. Exiled, enslaved, threatened by a Pharaoh who has commanded that every male Israelite child shall be killed, the people have witnessed a series of wonders performed on their behalf. Moses is now about to tell them that soon they will leave and begin their long walk to freedom.

I sometimes ask people what they would speak about if they were in Moses' shoes? Some say they would talk about freedom, others that they would speak about the destination that lay ahead: the "land flowing with milk and honey." Yet others, made of sterner stuff, propose talking about the arduous journey that lay ahead, the march across the wilderness with all its hazards.

Any of these would have been a great speech by a great leader. Moses did none of these things. That is what made him a unique leader. If you examine the text in Exodus carefully, you will see that three times he reverted to the same theme: children, education and the distant future. "And when your children ask you, What does this ceremony mean to you?" (Exodus 12:26). "On that day tell your son, I do this because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt" (13:8). "In days to come, when your son asks you, What does this mean?" (13:14).

Moses spoke not about freedom but about education. He fixed his vision not on the immediate but on the distant future, and not on adults but children. In so doing he was making a fundamental point. It may be hard to escape from tyranny but it is harder still to build and sustain a free society.

In the long run there is only one way of doing so. To defend a country you need an army, but to defend a civilisation you need education. That is why Moses, according to Rousseau, the world's greatest architect of a free society, spoke about the duty of parents in every generation to educate their children about why freedom matters and how it was achieved.

Freedom is not won by merely overthrowing a tyrannical ruler or an oppressive regime. That is usually only the prelude to a new tyranny, a new oppression. The faces change, but not the script. True freedom requires the rule of law and justice, and a judicial system in which the rights of some are not secured by the denial of rights to others.

Freedom begins with what we teach our children.

That is why Jews became a people whose passion is education, whose heroes are teachers and whose citadels are schools. Nowhere is this more evident than on Passover, when the entire ritual of handing on our story to the next generation is set in motion by the questions asked by a child. In every generation we need to cultivate afresh the habits of the heart that Tocqueville called "the apprenticeship of liberty."

The message of Passover remains as powerful as ever. Freedom is won not on the battlefield but in the classroom and the home. Teach your children the history of freedom if you want them never to lose it.

Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks

Child Inc.

The mission of Child, Inc., founded 29 years ago by Rita Swan, a college English professor, is focusing on religion based medical neglect of children, which is more common than we might think, here in America. Ms. Swan has testified before many state legislatures, successfully advocating that religious exemptions for medical care and vaccinations for children be rescinded. Their most recent newsletter focuses on the child sex abuse problem in the ultra-orthodox Jewish community. The Officers and Directors of Child, Inc. are prominent physicians, lawyers, academics, and other thinkers and activists throughout America. The link to the newsletter is below.

MUST READ-CLICK: http://childrenshealthcare.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/2011-03finallayoutrev2.pdf

Please Speak to Your Kids About Safety and Personal Space Today!

Estimates of the number of frum people convicted of child abuse currently in the criminal justice system in New York State, range from 40 to 90 perpetrators. Depending on whose statistics you read, the average child molester abuses 50-200 children in his lifetime.

 By: Rabbi Yakov Horowitz

We are all busy before Yom Tov, so let's get right to the point.

If you haven't done so already, please see to it that you speak to your children about child safety before Pesach, and give them a refresher talk if you already have.

It is literally a matter of life and death that you do so.

Year after year, we get a significant spike in abuse-related calls right before, during, and after the Pesach and Succos Yomim Tovim. Why? Because our kids are in a less structured environment at home, in Shul and at play, and are exposed to a wide range of children, teenagers, and adults who they don't have contact with all year round. If you need convincing -- just tally the number of people your kids interact during with during a regular school week, and then do the same for the week of Pesach.

Thankfully, there is now an unprecedented awareness of the importance of child safety in our community and we have come to the painful understanding that our community is not immune to the ravages of abuse and molestation.

But, to be perfectly frank, the average person in the street (that's probably you) has no idea of how bad things really are. Estimates of the number of frum people convicted of child abuse currently in the criminal justice system in New York State, range from 40 to 90 perpetrators. Depending on whose statistics you read, the average child molester abuses 50-200 children in his lifetime. Mind you, that is in the general population, where adults have a fraction of the access to children, than our community members have.

Taking the two lowball numbers above and doing the simple math reveals that there are 2,000 frum victims of child abuse in NY State alone - and that is only counting victims of predators who were caught, prosecuted, and convicted of the crime. So the real number is, shall we say, much much higher than that.

Untreated abuse victims are far more likely to go on and eventually abuse others, so there will continue to be an exponential rise in the number of children molested, until all our children are educated to help protect themselves, and until all predators are reported to the authorities and locked up.

I plead with you to take this matter seriously and do everything in your power to keep your kids safe. There are two steps you need to take to accomplish this:

1) Have safety talks with your children - using effective, research-based techniques that will educate and empower your children without frightening them.

2) See to it that they are properly supervised over Yom Tov.

There are four basic messages that children need to internalize in order for any abuse prevention program to be truly effective:

Your body belongs to you
No one has the right to make you feel uncomfortable
No secrets from parents
Good touching/bad touching

Please educate yourself before speaking to your children so that your discussions generate light and not heat. Additionally, it is important for you to know - and to share with your children - that although "stranger danger" is a genuine concern, the vast majority of molesters are family members or people well-known to the children.

As Teaneck Police Chief Michael Bruno brilliantly said during a talk he gave on child safety, "We need to train our children to consider the "it" (the inappropriate action being done to them) not the "whom" (regardless of the relationship or stature of the individual who may be doing it).

There are free resources available on our website http://www.kosherjewishparenting.com/

at the Los Angeles-based Aleinu Safety Kid Program website: http://www.aleinu.net/AleinuChildSafetyInstitute/safetykid.aspx

Here are links to two videos released to educate you, and help you have these discussions with your children:

Video: Speaking to your Kids about Personal Safety: http://www.blogger.com/goog_1596520739

Video: InYiddish - Speaking to your Kids about Personal Safety: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFFHI0NZmns

 CLICK:http://www.rabbihorowitz.com/PYes/ArticleDetails.cfm?Book_ID=1512&ThisGroup_ID=238&Type=Article&SID=2

Thanks for reading these lines, and kindly take a minute to forward this to others - for the only way our children and grandchildren will be safe, is when each and every one of us is well educated about child safety.

Best wishes for a Chag Kosher V'samayach and much Nachas from your family.

Yakov Horowitz

Summer Camps Must Be Scrutinized!

 PHILADELPHIA — A victim of alleged sexual abuse by a Roman Catholic priest told a court on Tuesday that church officials took more than 10 years to resolve his complaint that he had been molested at a summer camp.

Walter J. Daly, 64, told jurors at the landmark trial of a senior church official and another priest that he wrote to the Archdiocese of Philadelphia in October 1992 complaining that he had been abused by the Rev. John Cannon, a priest who ran the camp in Lancaster County, Pa., where Mr. Daly went as an elementary and high school student.

In response, Mr. Daly was invited to a meeting in November 1992 with three church officials, including Msgr. William J. Lynn, the former secretary for clergy at the archdiocese and the first senior church official in the United States to be tried on charges that he endangered children by placing priests in positions where they were able to molest them.

The officials listened to Mr. Daly’s description of having been abused an estimated 25 times over successive summers at the camp but did not appear to resolve his complaints and did not seem very sympathetic, he told the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas.

“Was defendant Lynn asking a lot of questions?” asked an assistant district attorney, Jacqueline Coelho.

“It was a very formal business meeting,” Mr. Daly replied.

Mr. Daly said he spent parts of his summers at the camp between 1956 and 1965, first as a camper and then as a counselor.

When he was in seventh or eighth grade, he said, Father Cannon would come to his bed in the middle of the night. “I would be awakened in the night by the fact that someone would be touching me inappropriately,” Mr. Daly said in a sometimes shaky voice.

Asked by Ms. Coelho whether the priest would do “more than just touching,” Mr. Daly replied, “He would take my hand and put it on his penis to force me to fondle him.”

Mr. Daly said he signed a statement for church officials confirming what had happened to him but did not hear anything more, so in 2002 he made another complaint, this time to the bishop of Harrisburg.

“In 10 years, you would expect to hear something,” Mr. Daly said. “In my mind, it was never resolved.”

In 2003, he was finally approached by an archdiocese investigator who appeared to be taking his complaints seriously. Asked by Ms. Coelho whether there was a difference between his meeting with the investigator and that when he made his first complaint in 1992, Mr. Daly said, “I felt that there was a willingness to listen to me.”

Father Cannon retired in 2004.

Under questioning by Thomas Bergstrom, a lawyer for Monsignor Lynn, Mr. Daly said that he recalled first being abused as a fifth grader, and that he had the same experience every year for 10 years at the camp but did not tell his parents or anyone else in authority.

In testimony earlier Tuesday, Mr. Bergstrom sought to establish that the church’s response to abuse allegations was directed not by Monsignor Lynn, now 61, but by the late Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua or other officials more senior than the defendant.

After investigating allegations of abuse by another priest, the Rev. Stanley Gana, Monsignor Lynn recommended that any decision to allow him to resume work as a priest would depend in part on the cardinal’s acceptance of a report on Father Gana’s treatment at a rehabilitation center in Ontario, Mr. Bergstrom said. Confidential memos outlining allegations against Father Gana were read to jurors.

Church officials, including Bishop Edward Cullen and the cardinal, decided that the archdiocese would not prevent Father Gana taking a post in another diocese, but that policy was not the responsibility of Monsignor Lynn, Mr. Bergstrom said.

“Monsignor Lynn did not recommend that the archdiocese shift Father Gana to some other diocese,” Mr. Bergstrom said. “The recommendation came from Bishop Cullen and was approved by Cardinal Bevilacqua.”

The trial, now in its second week, is also hearing the case of the Rev. James J. Brennan, 49, who is accused of trying to rape a 14-year-old boy in 1996.

READ: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/04/us/philadelphia-archdiocese-put-off-abuse-complaints-jurors-told.html?ref=us

How can herpes simplex spread to an infant?

HSV can  be spread to the baby if he or she is kissed by someone with an active cold sore.

In rare instances, HSV may be spread by touch, if someone touches an active cold sore and then immediately touches the baby.

How can herpes harm a baby?

HSV can cause neonatal herpes, a rare but life-threatening disease. Neonatal herpes can cause eye or throat infections, damage to the central nervous system, mental retardation, or death. Medication may help prevent or reduce lasting damage if it is given early.......

 READ: http://health.act.gov.au/health-services/canberra-hospital/our-services/medical-services/sexual-health/sti-factsheets/genital-herpes-in-pregnancy

Herpes Simplex Virus Type 1 and Alzheimer's

Summary: A British scientist, Dr. Ruth Itzhaki, has shown that the combination of latent Herpes Simplex Virus Type 1 (HSV1) in the brain and the type 4 form of the APOE gene could account for 60 percent of all cases of late onset Alzheimer’s disease. Almost all elderly brains are infected with HSV1, which often causes no symptoms. Dr. Itzhaki’s lab found the virus in areas of the brain most damaged by Alzheimer’s, and has data relating HSV1 to plaques and tangles.....

For almost twenty years, Dr. Ruth Itzhaki, Professor of Molecular Neurobiology at the University of Manchester in England, has been exploring possible links between viruses and Alzheimer’s. Viruses are tiny infectious particles that attach themselves to and penetrate cells, then use the capabilities of those cells to reproduce. They can cause diseases like colds, flu and AIDS, or they can just sit there, remaining dormant or latent for long periods of time. A latent virus can become active when triggered by stress, other infections or environmental factors.

For a virus to contribute to the development of Alzheimer’s, Dr. Itzhaki reasoned, it would have to be very common in humans. And because Alzheimer’s appears to develop over a long period of time, it would make sense to look for a virus that has long periods of latency, but could periodically be reactivated and cause damage.

One family of viruses fits her criteria: herpes. There are over 100 types of herpes, of which eight infect humans, causing diseases ranging from chickenpox and shingles to cold sores and mononucleosis. Most people have some type of herpes, even though they may have no symptoms.

When Dr. Itzhaki and her colleagues examined the brains of older people, they found signs of latent Herpes Simplex Virus Type 1 (HSV1) in the areas most affected by Alzheimer’s. Traces of the virus were present in both Alzheimer’s and non-Alzheimer’s brains. Because HSV1 is not prevalent in the brains of younger people, the researchers hypothesize that the virus infects the brain in older age (or in infants - where they have extremely weak immune systems), as the immune system declines.

HSV1 is especially common in humans. The virus, which can be transmitted via skin contact and saliva, infects approximately 58% of people between the ages of 14 to 49, and in older people, almost everyone. Often, there are no symptoms.

 READ: http://www.tangledneuron.info/the_tangled_neuron/2007/04/herpes_simplex_.html

READ HERPES FOR BRAINLESS JEWISH IDIOTS: http://archneur.ama-assn.org/cgi/search?fulltext=herpes+simplex+1&quicksearch_submit.x=10&quicksearch_submit.y=7

HERPES FOR BIG DUMMIES:   http://www.thesmokinggun.com/file/herpes-dummies-0?page=0

The History of a Cover-Up!

by Amy Neustein & Michael Lesher

In 2006, New York magazine and ABC's Nightline both featured stories dealing with rabbis who had abused children entrusted to them. Then, at the start of 2007, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency published a five-part series on sexual abuse by rabbis who led congregations, taught religious studies, and ran youth groups. The series soon was picked up by Jewish newspapers nationwide. Despite this spate of media coverage, there has been a dearth of scholarly material investigating sexual abuse within the Jewish clergy.

Tempest in the Temple brings together fifteen practicing rabbis, educators, pastoral counselors, sociologists, mental health professionals, and legal advocates for abuse victims, each of whom offer insights into different facets of the problem.

This book is divided into three sections. The first section, "When the Vow Breaks," describes rabbis who break their "vows" through active pedophilia. The second section, "Sacrificing Victims," illuminates the community dynamics surrounding abuse: how a community unwittingly contributes to the cover-up of abuse; why victims of abuse are all too often ignored or cast off by their religious communities; and the mechanisms by which powerful religious institutions protect their own. The third section, "Let Me Know the Way," addresses how Jewish communities can overcome the ignorance, bias, and corruption associated with clergy sexual abuse. Solutions--some already successful, others yet to be tried--are explored here.

Tempest in the Temple offers an open discussion of some of the most deeply rooted fears in the Jewish community. While it is the first book to bring child sex scandals in temples and synagogues to light, its purpose is not to blame or shame Jews but to examine this horrific problem with as much clarity and precision as possible so that the best remedies can be offered to the community as a whole.

I urge my readers and 100,000 + followers to read this very important chapter of this very important book - available at: amazon.com. CLICK: http://cdn.intechopen.com/pdfs/33665/InTech-What_went_wrong_at_ohel_children_s_home_and_what_can_be_done_about_its_failure_to_protect_jewish_children_from_abuse_.pdf

Jewish American History!

MAKING A DIFFERENCE FOR THE GENERATIONS - FOR ALL OUR CHILDREN: http://www.jewishamericanhistorymonth.com/judaism/unorthodox-jew-a-critical-view-of-orthodox-judaism-cant-take-it.php

Dear Paul,  I would greatly appreciate your posting of my attached letter.  Michele

A Happy Passover Greeting To All My Many Friends In The Pro-Israel Community;

Dear UOJ,

As millions around the world begin to celebrate the feast of Passover at sundown on Friday, April 6, it is important to remember why this celebration exemplifies God’s mercy on His people. When the children of Israel cried out to the Lord because of their great suffering at the hands of the Egyptians, we know "God looked upon the children of Israel, and God acknowledged them (Exodus 2:25)."God responded with 10 plagues sent to do unimaginable damage on Egypt in order to deliver His people.

When the first nine plagues did not soften the heart of Pharaoh, the Lord sent his tenth and final plague: the slaughter of the first-born males in each family. By believing and obeying specific instructions from the Lord, the Israelites were spared this horrific plague and ultimately the destruction led to their freedom from Egyptian tyranny. God foretold the liberation of the children of Israel when he told Moses "I am the Lord; I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, I will rescue you from their bondage (Exodus 6:6)."

These promises to the ancient Israelites were near to my heart as I grew up, which is why I took the first opportunity to go to Israel when I was a young woman. The day after I graduated from high school in 1974, I took a flight to Israel. I went to work for the summer on Kibbutz Be’eri near Beer Sheva. Aside from the beauty of the country and deep cultural and spiritual appreciation of the Jewish people, the experience gave me a clear realization: Israel is under a constant external threat. During my time, we worked on the kibbutz from four in the morning until noon, and at all times we were accompanied by soldiers carrying machine guns. While we were working, they were making sure there were no land mines in the fields. As a recent high school graduate, I knew very little of the complex geopolitical threat that Israel faced from all sides of its borders. Today, Israel still faces those threats and more. For this reason, the United States must declare, in no uncertain terms, that it is our policy to utilize all military strength to support and defend our strongest ally in the Middle East, Israel.

On March 4 of this year, President Obama made the case that diplomatic sanctions are working in Iran. His words, "Now is the time to let our increased pressure sink in, and to sustain the broad international coalition we have built,"point to the need to let diplomacy take its course. These are powerful words and I certainly commend both the Bush Administration and the Obama Administration for the increasing economic sanctions on Iran. However, has any evidence surfaced that these sanctions are hindering the development of a nuclear weapon? If Iran had years instead of months, sanctions would certainly be advisable under the circumstances. Unfortunately, report after report seems to lend credence to the fact that Iran is growing dangerously close to having nuclear capability.

Furthermore, there are those that wrongly believe that Iran can be contained or that Iran is strictly Israel’s problem. Make no mistake; a nuclear Iran threatens the safety and security of a region that directly affects the interests of the United States. If Iran were to obtain a nuclear weapon, many surrounding Arab states, including Saudi Arabia and Jordan, will most likely do everything in their power to obtain one that begins a deadly nuclear arms race. Additionally, Iran has made clear through their intrusion into our own hemisphere that they will not only provide support to rogue nations south of our border, they could also provide secrets of nuclear capability. Just imagine the devastation of a nuclear Cuba or Venezuela.

To Israel, the threat is real and very close. Just over 950 miles away from Jerusalem (roughly the distance by air from Washington D.C. to Miami) is Tehran and their fanatical leadership. The chilling escalation of tensions between Israel and Iran leaves the United States with but two choices: stand with our long time democratic ally or marginalize their position leaving them even more vulnerable to attack. I write this not to express the obvious, but to urge the American public to stand up and demand that our elected officials clearly explain their policies on stopping a nuclear Iran.

The President mentioned "too much loose talk of war"in his March 4 speech. I recognize some may wrongly see this as a call for military action against Iran. Nothing could be further from the truth. Military action should only be utilized when all diplomatic means have been exhausted. However, even with rapid implementation of sanctions on every aspect of the Iranian economy, I am concerned that Iran has more than enough capabilities to not only complete a nuclear weapon, but to use it, if necessary.

In the 38 years since I worked in Israel, I have been privileged to visit the country many times. I always return with a stronger reality and greater concern for Israel's safety and security. However, having returned just two weeks ago from an House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence trip to the country, and having met privately with numerous Israeli leaders including Prime Minister Netanyahu, the dangers our great friend Israel faces today are more acute and more serious than ever.

Friends, feel assured and confident this Passover Holiday, I pledge to do everything in my power to protect and secure one of our most precious allies, the great State of Israel.

A Happy Healthy Pesach,

Congresswoman Michele Bachmann

Monsey man faces 40 counts of criminal sexual acts - GEVALD!!!



Dovid Kohn AKA Avrohom Perl

RAMAPO — A 59-year-old Monsey man has been charged with 40 counts accusing him of having oral sex with a girl when she was between the ages of 12 and 15, police said Friday.

Dovid Kohn, also known as Avraham Perl, is being held on $1 million cash bail in the county jail in New City on 40 counts of second-degree criminal sex act and first-degree sexual conduct against a child.

The girl is now in her mid-20s, Ramapo Detective Lt. Mark Emma said Friday.

The woman came forward March 19 to file a complaint against Kohn, who runs a video business in Monsey that covers events for businesses.

“This happened over three years when she was between 12 and 15,” Emma said. “I wouldn’t question the motive of any victim who decides to come forward.”

Emma said there is no statute of limitations on sex crimes. The sexual-conduct charge is applied when the alleged abuse lasts at least three months. Authorities would not say how the suspect and the woman knew each other.

The reason for the high bail from Justice Rhoda Schoenberger was because he uses two names, police said. The judge set bail at $5 million bond or $1 million cash. His legal name is Avraham Perl and he has lived in the Monsey community for 30 years, said his lawyer, Kenneth Gribetz. He is married with three adult children. Gribetz said his client will plead not guilty and will provide the court with documentation showing his legal identity.

“We will review the facts and circumstances of the case when the police and District Attorney’s Office provide us with the details,” Gribetz said.

Emma said anyone with information can call the Ramapo Police Department at 845-357-2400 and ask for the detective bureau.

READ ARTICLE:
 http://www.lohud.com/article/20120331/NEWS03/303310068/Monsey-man-jailed-40-sex-charges-involving-girl

Behind Every Harassed Child? A Whole Lot of Clueless Adults!

“Bully,” Lee Hirsch’s moving and troubling documentary about the misery some children inflict upon others, arrives at a moment when bullying, long tolerated as a fact of life, is being redefined as a social problem. “Just kids being kids” can no longer be an acceptable response to the kind of sustained physical and emotional abuse that damages the lives of young people whose only sin is appearing weak or weird to their peers.

Lee Hirsch, the director of “Bully,” spoke about his film when it screened during the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival (and, at that time, was called “The Bully Project.”)

And while the film focuses on the specific struggles of five families in four states, it is also about — and part of — the emergence of a movement. It documents a shift in consciousness of the kind that occurs when isolated, oppressed individuals discover that they are not alone and begin the difficult work of altering intolerable conditions widely regarded as normal.

The feeling of aloneness is one of the most painful consequences of bullying. It is also, in some ways, a cause of it, since it is almost always socially isolated children (the new kid, the fat kid, the gay kid, the strange kid) who are singled out for mistreatment. For some reason — for any number of reasons that hover unspoken around the edges of Mr. Hirsch’s inquiry — adults often fail to protect their vulnerable charges.

Alex, a 14-year-old in Sioux City, Iowa, whose daily routine includes being teased, humiliated and assaulted (especially on the school bus), cannot bear to tell his parents what is going on. He even sticks up for his tormenters, who he says are “just messing around” when they stab him with pencils and call him vile names.

“If not for them, what friends do I have?” he asks his distraught, confused mother.

It’s a heartbreaking moment. Equally sad — and also infuriating and painfully revealing — is a scene in which an assistant principal at Alex’s middle school tries to settle a conflict between two boys who apparently had been fighting at recess. When she insists that they shake hands, one eagerly obliges, with a smile and an apology. The other sullenly resists, and as she scolds him for his noncooperation (letting his antagonist go), it becomes clear that this boy is the victim, and that the assistant principal’s rushed attempt to be fair is in fact perpetuating a terrible and continuing injustice.

Later, after this same well-meaning, clueless educator has similarly mishandled a meeting with Alex’s parents — showing them pictures of her grandchildren; chirpily insisting that the bus where Alex has been terrorized is “good as gold” — Alex’s mother says “she politicianed us.”

There is more “politicianing” on display in “Bully” than actual bullying, though Mr. Hirsch’s camera does capture a few horrifying episodes (one of them so alarming that he shared it with parents and school officials).

 In spite of its title, the film is really about the victims, their parents and the powerful grown-ups who let them down.

A school superintendent in Georgia denies that bullying is a big problem in her district, in spite of the suicide of Tyler Long, a 17-year-old student who took his life after enduring years of harassment and ostracism. A sheriff in Yazoo County, Miss., tallies, with dry, bureaucratic relish, the 45 felony counts faced by Ja’Meya Jackson, a 14-year-old girl who pulled out a gun on a crowded school bus. Nothing can justify such a crime, he says.

That may be true, but his insistence on a narrow, legalistic understanding of Ja’Meya’s case betrays a profound lack of concern about the sustained and systematic abuse that she experienced at the hands of her schoolmates.

It gets worse. In a small town in Oklahoma, Ty Smalley’s suicide left behind loving parents and a devoted best friend, a self-described former bully whose insights are among the most accurate and devastating in the movie.

After Kelby Johnson, a high school student in another part of Oklahoma, came out as a lesbian, she and her family were shunned by neighbors and former friends, and Kelby was taunted by teachers as well as fellow students.

Mr. Hirsch weaves together these stories with compassion and tact, and he wisely refrains from making scapegoats of the bullies who cause Alex, Ja’Meya, Tyler, Ty and Kelby so much pain. “Bully” forces you to confront not the cruelty of specific children — who have their own problems, and their good sides as well — but rather the extent to which that cruelty is embedded in our schools and therefore in our society as a whole.....

READ ENTIRE ARTICLE:
http://movies.nytimes.com/2012/03/30/movies/bully-a-documentary-by-lee-hirsch.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120330

MOVIE TRAILER:
http://youtu.be/W1g9RV9OKhg

Can't Take It Anymore!!!

“What has not happened up to now is for church officials to be held criminally accountable...”

The landmark trial of a senior official of the Philadelphia Archdiocese who is accused of shielding priests who sexually abused children and reassigning them to unwary parishes began on Monday with prosecutors charging that the official “paid lip service to child protection and protected the church at all costs.”

The defendant, Msgr. William J. Lynn, 61, is the first Roman Catholic supervisor in the country to be tried on felony charges of endangering children and conspiracy — not on allegations that he molested children himself, but that he protected suspect priests and reassigned them to jobs where they continued to rape, grope or otherwise abuse boys and girls.

One of Monsignor Lynn’s lines of defense was indicated in an opening statement when his lawyers suggested that he had acted responsibly and reported allegations of abuse to higher officials, including a recently deceased cardinal. (BLAME THE DEAD GUY DEFENSE)

The trial is a milestone, legal experts said, in the legal battles lasting decades over sex abuse by priests. For years, many Catholic dioceses have been battered by civil suits seeking monetary damages for failing to stop errant priests. More recently, prosecutors have brought criminal charges against abusers.

“What has not happened up to now is for church officials to be held criminally accountable,” said Timothy D. Lytton, a professor of law at the Albany Law School and an expert on Catholic abuse cases.

Whatever the outcome, he said, this trial “will dramatically increase the pressure on diocese officials to fulfill the church’s promises to be more transparent and accountable.”

More immediately, the trial promises to further roil the 1.5 million-member Philadelphia Archdiocese, which was convulsed by grand jury reports in 2005 and 2011 alleging that it had not responded forcefully to dozens of credible abuse complaints and had allowed known offenders to have continued contact with children.

From 1992 to 2004, Monsignor Lynn, who maintains he is innocent, was secretary of the clergy in the archdiocese, directing priests’ job assignments and handling complaints about their behavior.

An assistant district attorney, Jacqueline Coelho, told the jury that Monsignor Lynn had repeatedly played down credible reports of child abuse, stashing them away in secret files.

“The victims are met with skepticism, and the priests are believed at all costs,” Ms. Coelho said in a 58-minute opening statement in Common Pleas Court.

The scathing grand jury report released in January 2011, which led to the charges, described examples in which Monsignor Lynn “knowingly allowed priests who had sexually abused minors to be assigned to positions where unsuspecting parents and teachers would entrust children to their care.”

The report alleged that Monsignor Lynn had acted with the leader of the archdiocese at the time — Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua, who died in January — to shield the archdiocese from scandal and financial liability.

As the trial began, Monsignor Lynn, sitting between two lawyers and dressed in a black suit with a clerical collar, answered “not guilty” to all charges. He could face up to 28 years in prison if convicted of the two counts of endangerment and two counts of conspiracy.

Thomas Bergstrom, a defense lawyer, said in his opening statement on Monday that his client had reported abuse allegations to senior, clergy including Cardinal Bevilacqua.

“Everything that Monsignor Lynn did with respect to the allegations of abuse was put in writing and sent up the chain,” Mr. Bergstrom said.  (BLAME THE DEAD GUY DEFENSE)

He also attacked prosecution assertions that Monsignor Lynn had been responsible for appointing suspect priests to positions where they could prey on more children. “The only man in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia that could appoint a priest to any location is Cardinal Bevilacqua,” Mr. Bergstrom said.

Mr. Bergstrom also said the cardinal had directed the shredding of a list of suspected or actual sex offenders Monsignor Lynn obtained from a “secret archive file.”

The trial is likely to feature the videotaped testimony of Cardinal Bevilacqua, who died of cancer and dementia at age 88.....

READ ENTIRE ARTICLE:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/27/us/supervising-priest-goes-on-trial-in-philadelphia.html?src=recg



 

The defendant, Msgr. William J. Lynn