Pope seeks immunity in alleged pedophile coverup
author: remix
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Houston Chronicle has a little blurb on Pope Benedict XVI, then Cardinal, alledging his role in a pedophile coverup. Some wikipedia background follows.
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The Vatican says he has immunity and wants US intervention.
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The Vatican has sought the intervention of the U.S. State Department to declare Pope Benedict XVI immune from a sexual abuse lawsuit filed here, according to court documents.
A church official contacted the State Department May 20, asking it to notify a Houston federal court of the pope's immunity as the head of a foreign state, according to the defense motion. Vatican attorneys requested a delay on the matter Thursday.
A spokesman for the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, which also was named as a defendant in the suit, could not be reached for comment Friday.
The lawsuit filed by plaintiffs identified as John Does I, II and III accuses the pope, then acting as a cardinal, of conspiring to cover up the alleged abuse about a decade ago. The suit names a former seminary student as the alleged abuser.
 http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/metropolitan/3201751
Wiki:
Response to sex abuse scandal
Regarding the Roman Catholic Church sex abuse scandal, he was seen by critics as at best, indifferent to the abuse and at worst, complicit in covering it up, both in specific cases and as a matter of policy. As prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), such abuses were ultimately his responsibility to investigate within the Church after 2001, when that charge was given to the CDF by Pope John Paul. [9]
On May 18, 2001, Ratzinger, as part of the implementation of the norms enacted and promulgated [10] on April 30, 2001 by Pope John Paul II, sent a Latin language letter [11] to every bishop in the Catholic church reminding them of the strict penalties facing those who revealed confidential details concerning enquiries into allegations against priests of certain grave ecclesiastical crimes, including sexual abuse, reserved to the jurisdiction of the CDF. The letter established a prescription (statute of limitations) of ten years for these crimes. However, when the crime is sexual abuse of a minor, the "prescription begins to run from the day on which the minor completes the eighteenth year of age." [12] According to Catholic News Service, "One bishop who is well informed on the issue and asked not to be named said the secrecy demanded by the new norms gives the appearance of a ?cover-up? by the church." [13] Lawyers acting for two alleged victims of abuse in Texas claim that by sending the letter the cardinal conspired to obstruct justice. [14] However, the letter did not discourage victims from reporting the abuse itself to the police; the secrecy related to the internal investigation. "The letter said the new norms reflected the CDF?s traditional ?exclusive competence? regarding delicta graviora?Latin for ?graver offenses.? According to canon law experts in Rome, reserving cases of clerical sexual abuse of minors to the CDF is something new. In past eras, some serious crimes by priests against sexual morality, including pedophilia, were handled by that congregation or its predecessor, the Holy Office, but this has not been true in recent years." [15] The promulgation of the norms by Pope John Paul II and the subsequent letter by the then Prefect of the CDF were published in 2001 in Acta Apostolicae Sedis [16] which, in accordance with the Code of Canon Law [17], is the Holy See's official journal, disseminated monthly to thousands of libraries and offices around the world. [18]
In 2002, Ratzinger told Catholic News Service that "less than one percent of priests are guilty of acts of this type." [19] Opponents saw this as ignoring the crimes of those who committed the abuse; others saw it as merely pointing out that this should not taint other priests who live respectable lives. [20] A report by the Catholic Church itself estimated that some 4,450 of the Roman Catholic clergy who served between 1950 and 2002 have faced credible accusations of abuse. [21] His Good Friday reflections in 2005 were interpreted as strongly condemning and regretting the abuse scandals, which largely put to rest the speculation of indifference. Shortly after his election, he told Francis Cardinal George, the Archbishop of Chicago, that he would attend to the matter. [22]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Benedict_XVI
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Fuckers.