SPARTANSBURG, Pa. — The mayor of a small Pennsylvania town is standing by its volunteer fire company’s re-election of a registered sex offender as its fire chief.
Chief Roger Gilbert Jr. pleaded guilty in 2001 to sexual intercourse with a 4-year-old girl and is listed in the state’s Megan’s Law database, The (Corry) Journal reported Saturday . Court records show Gilbert is a felon who completed a five- to 10-year sentence for “involuntary deviate sexual intercourse.”
Mayor Ann Louise Wagner says she and firefighters have been aware that Gilbert, an unpaid volunteer with the department since 2010, is a sex offender. He was just elected to his second term.
“I support the fire department and their decision to have him as chief,” Wagner told the Journal. “The firemen have always elected their own officers and that’s how it’s always been done. We don’t question their decisions.”
The victim’s mother told the newspaper that she doesn’t believe he should be in a job where he could interact with children.
But Gilbert, now 43, told the Journal he has changed his life for the better since committing the crime in 2000 in the nearby city of Corry.
“That was 20 years ago,” Gilbert said. “You know, the story you are telling kids is once you make mistake, you will be punished for the rest of your life. I’ve changed my life for the better. Every day I get up and try to do good.”
State police said it is up to each individual community to decide whether to allow sex offenders who have completed their sentences to serve in an office at the local level.
About 300 people live in Spartansburg, which is about 40 miles (65 kilometers) southeast of Erie, Pennsylvania.
An HIV-positive former Maryland school aide and track coach pleaded guilty Friday to sexually abusing students and filming child pornography, prosecutors said.
Carlos Deangelo Bell, 30, of Waldorf, signed a plea agreement admitting guilt on 27 counts, including sexual abuse of a minor, porn charges and attempted transmission of HIV, the state’s attorney for Charles County, Tony Covington, said.
“You really can’t imagine what had to be gone through when investigating this case,” he said, alluding to the hours of video in the case that “nobody ever wants to see.”
Covington said one of his goals was maintaining the privacy and anonymity of the victims in the case, something made easier by avoiding a trial that would have been open to the public.
The charges cover conduct that spanned from May 2015 to June 2017, and the 42 victims range from 11 to 17 years old, Covington said.
Bell, who was originally facing 206 counts, will be sentenced March 28. Prosecutors said they will recommend up to 190 years in prison. Covington said another of his goals was to make sure that Bell spends the rest of his life in prison.
Bell also faces federal charges and is due in court again later this month.
“Based upon the evidence that the state presented it was in his best interest to enter into this negotiated guilty plea,” defense attorney James Crawford said, adding Bell would also plead guilty in federal court.
Covington said investigators are not aware of any victim testing positive for HIV, or human immunodeficiency virus. HIV is a virus that can destroy the immune system if left untreated.
The investigation started in December 2016 when detectives received a tip about “possible inappropriate behavior with a student while he was coaching track,” the Charles County Sheriff’s office said in a statement.
“A student’s parent observed suspicious text messages on their child’s phone that were sexual in nature,” Charles County Sheriff Troy Berry said.
Investigators sent Bell’s electronic devices from work and from home to the Maryland State Police crime lab, which recovered sexually explicit images involving the boys, Richardson said.
“Some of the evidence … included graphic images of Bell sexually assaulting victims. Some of the crimes appeared to have been committed on school property, and others at his home in Waldorf,” Berry said.
After a six-month investigation, Bell was arrested June 30 on charges of assaulting at least seven boys, mostly of middle school age, Charles County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Diane Richardson said at the time.
He was removed from his jobs as an instructional assistant at Benjamin Stoddert Middle School and as a track coach at La Plata High School late in 2016 when the investigation began. He began working for the school system in 2014.
Charles County Schools Superintendent Kimberly A. Hill applauded the plea deal and said, “Since learning of the charges against Mr. Bell we have focused on supporting the students affected.”
She said school district staff members were also getting additional training.
“We are taking every precaution that we can to make sure our employees are aware of the signs” of sexual abuse, she said.
Cardinal Bernard Law, symbol of church sex abuse scandal, dead at 86
Cardinal Bernard Law, the former Boston archbishop who resigned in disgrace during the Catholic Church’s sex abuse scandal, has died, the Vatican confirmed. He was 86.
Law died in Rome, where he had served as archpriest of the Papal Liberian Basilica of St. Mary Major after he was forced to resign in 2002 as archbishop of Boston.
Law’s name became emblematic of the scandal that continues to trouble the church and its followers around the globe after it was revealed the he and other bishops before him had covered for pedophile priests in the Boston Archdiocese.
Law at the time apologized during a news conference to victims of abuse by a priest, John Geoghan, who had been moved from parish to parish, despite Law’s knowledge of his abuse of young boys. Law insisted Geoghan’s abuse was in the past.
Cardinal Bernard Francis Law looks on as Pope Francis celebrates Mass in 2016 in Vatican City.
Geoghan was eventually convicted of indecent assault and battery on a 10-year-old boy.
Law never faced criminal sanctions for his role in allowing abusive priests to remain in church parishes. The scandal reverberated through the church, exposing similar allegations worldwide that compromised its moral authority and led to years of multimillion-dollar settlements.
The Vatican early Wednesday issued a one-line news release, reading, “Cardinal Bernard Law died early this morning after a long illness.”
Survivors recount betrayal
To his detractors, Law’s second career at the Vatican was a slap in the face to victims of church sex abuse, one that further undermined the church’s legitimacy.
“Survivors of child sexual assault in Boston, who were first betrayed by Law’s cover-up of sex crimes and then doubly betrayed by his subsequent promotion to Rome, were those most hurt,” according to a statement after his death from Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “No words can convey the pain these survivors and their loved ones suffered.”
The group advised the Vatican to keep the abuse survivors in mind when planning Law’s funeral. It asked: “Every single Catholic should ask Pope Francis and the Vatican why. Why Law’s life was so celebrated when Boston’s clergy sex abuse survivors suffered so greatly? Why was Law promoted when Boston’s Catholic children were sexually abused, ignored, and pushed aside time and time again?”
Law’s successor as Boston’s archbishop, Cardinal Sean O’Malley, said Wednesday that Law “served at a time when the church failed seriously in its responsibilities to provide pastoral care for her people, and with tragic outcomes failed to care for the children of our parish communities.”
“I recognize that Cardinal Law’s passing brings forth a wide range of emotions on the part of many people. I am particularly cognizant of all who experienced the trauma of sexual abuse by clergy, whose lives were so seriously impacted by those crimes, and their families and loved ones,” O’Malley said.
“To those men and women,” O’Malley added, “I offer my sincere apologies for the harm they suffered, my continued prayers and my promise that the archdiocese will support them in their effort to achieve healing.”
Widespread child abuse by the Catholic clergy in the Boston Archdiocese was uncovered by The Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigative reporting team, which won a Pulitzer Prize for its efforts. A big-screen dramatization of the team’s investigation in the 2015 movie, “Spotlight,” won the 2016 Best Picture Academy Award, bringing the story to a much wider audience.
Rise of Boston’s spiritual leader
Law was born in Torreon, Mexico, on November 4, 1931, to Helen and Bernard Law, an Air Force colonel. He completed his postgraduate studies at St. Joseph’s Seminary in Louisiana and at the Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus, Ohio. He was ordained as a priest on May 21, 1961, in the diocese of Natchez-Jackson, Mississippi, and became vicar general of that diocese in 1971.
In 1973, he was appointed bishop of the Springfield-Cape Girardeau diocese in southern Missouri. He served as chair of the Bishops’ Committee on Ecumenical and Interracial Affairs, and in 1976, he was named to the Vatican Commission on Religious Relations with Jews.
The posts were stepping stones to his becoming the spiritual leader of Boston’s large and influential Catholic community. In 1984, Pope John Paul II appointed Law to be the archbishop of the Boston Archdiocese, with its 362 parishes serving 2.1 million members. That same year, Law received a letter from a bishop expressing concerns about then-Rev. Geoghan. Law assigned Geoghan to another parish despite the allegations.
In 1985, Pope John Paul II elevated Law to cardinal, one of just 13 Americans holding that office at the time.
Calls for resignation
Law attempted to resign as Archbishop of Boston in April 2002, but Pope John Paul II rejected his request. In 2002, a judge presiding over the child rape case of Rev. Paul Shanley ordered Cardinal Law to be deposed by lawyers of one of Shanley’s victims.
Law testified about his supervision of Geoghan in 2002, saying he relied on his assistants to investigate charges of abuse. In May 2002, he apologized for his role in the clergy abuse scandal in a letter distributed throughout the archdiocese. But he denied knowledge of sexual abuse allegations against Shanley until 1993.
In August 2002, Law appeared in court to testify about a settlement reached between the archdiocese of Boston and victims of clergy abuse. The archdiocese rescinded the monetary offer shortly afterward.
That December, as calls grew for him to resign, Law was subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury investigating “possible criminal violations by church officials who supervised priests accused of sexually abusing children.” Days later, he resigned as chairman of the board of trustees of the Catholic University of America, followed by his resignation as archbishop of Boston.
Catholic Church abuses under scrutiny
The breakdown of trust in the Catholic Church continues to reverberate around the world.
This month, the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse delivered, after five years of work, 189 recommendations to address what it described as a “serious failure” by Australia’s institutions to protect its most vulnerable citizens.
The country’s senior Catholic leaders, however, rejected recommendations by the wide-reaching investigation, declining to end mandatory celibacy for priests and break the secrecy of confession.
Of survivors who reported abuse in a religious institution, more than 60% said it occurred in a Catholic organization, the report found.
Hypocrites support Conyers. Whitewashed sepulchers as fake as hell
Monday rally planned to support U.S. Rep. John Conyers
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi also has called for an investigation into the allegations by the House Ethics Committee.
But people around Conyers have begun to push back against he allegations, calling one of the accusers an “opportunist” who allowed her daughter to also work in Conyers’ office. And now, the rally on Monday will feature some of Detroit’s most influential leaders, including the Rev. Charles Adams of the Hartford Memorial Baptist Church, where the rally will be held, NAACP Detroit chapter President Rev. Wendell Anthony, as well as several members of the Wayne County Commission and the state House of Representatives.
Gay-Dagnogo said she was particularly disheartened to see some members of the Michigan delegation, including: U.S. Reps. Bill Huizenga of Holland, Debbie Dingell of Dearborn, Sander Levin of Royal Oak and Dan Kildee of Flint Township, calling on Conyers to resign.
“They don’t live here. They haven’t asked us,” she said. “For the delegation from Michigan to not even check in with folks of the district and automatically take the position of Nancy Pelosi is just wrong.”
She also said the people in the district are dismayed by the differences in the way other members of Congress accused of sexual misconduct, such as U.S. Al Franken, D-Minnesota, are being treated.
“We always see a difference when the leader is a person of color. There’s a rush to judgement,” Gay-Dagnogo said. “It tells us that African Americans are disposable and that’s why people are not engaged in the political process. We’re just used to help carry the vote and we’re not going to accept that anymore.”
Conyers’ wife, Monica Conyers, is also expected to be at the rally, which will begin at 11 a.m. at the church, 18700 James Couzens in Detroit.
Conyers has been hospitalized since last week, after complaining of shortness of breath and dizziness. His attorney, Arnold Reed, said Friday that the congressman will make a decision in the next few days on whether to resign, stay in office through the end of his term at the end of 2018, or run for reelection next year.
A Missouri man has been charged with statutory sodomy of a 1-year-old he was babysitting.
Jayson Newlun, 26, has been charged with taking advantage of a little girl he was babysitting.
Probable cause documents in this case show that Newlun was a family friend of parents with a 1-year-old girl.
Newlun stayed at the family’s home the night of June 29th.
Documents show that on June 30th, the parents left the 1-year-old girl, who was napping, in the care of Newlun while they went to the store.
After arriving at the store, the mother realized she’d left her WIC folder at home — and they returned to retrieve it.
Went they got home, the child’s mother noticed Newlun was not on the couch anymore, and her daughter’s bedroom door was open. The mother walked in and said she saw Newlun take an inappropriate photo of her child before touching the little girl’s genitals while masturbating himself.
The mother ran and got her husband who immediately confronted Newlun.
Court documents state Newlun screamed before he was tackled by the girl’s father. The father reportedly hit Newlun with a dresser drawer and punched him several times.
A neighbor stepped in and stopped the father from attacking Newlun.
The mother told police while she was waiting for officers to arrive, she asked him why he would do something like this. He told her he didn’t know. She reportedly told him “I hope you go down for this.” He replied “I do, too.”
Family members told police they had only been gone for five or ten minutes.
Newlun was detained and taken to the Clay County Detention Center.
