Press
release
Court of appeals (Cassazione).
Sentence of 6 years and 8 months for father Marco Cerullo, paedophile priest, confirmed.
The seventh criminal division of the Court of Cassazione (Supreme Court of Italy) has confirmed the sentence of 6 years and 8 Months of incarceration of father Marco Cerullo.
The priest of Casal di Principe (in the Italian province of Caserta, in the Campania region) and teacher of religion at Villa Literno, was arrested on 19 December 2007, when caught flagrantly in the act of raping an 11 year- old pupil of his. When he saw the policemen, the priest attempted to flee in his car, but was arrested.
The victim explained that father Marco had taken him away from school with the excuse of going to buy paints for the crib. He added that he had been abused by him several times in the past, also at the child’s home.
Immediately, the bishop of Aversa, mons. Milano declared that he preferred to wait for the course of justice.
Not one Euro of the damages, set to 50,000 € by the court, has been paid to the victim.
Like I commented in some interviews to the Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/mar/2...e-priests-italy and Le Figaro
http://www.lefigaro.fr/flash-actu/2010/04/...406FILWWW00468-italiepedophilie-130-pretres-impliques.php and Il Fatto Quotidiano
http://ilgiornalieri.blogspot.com/2010/04/...i-italiani.html (and repeated by hundreds of Italian and foreign press agencies) father Cerullo is only one of the few cases (about 130) of paedophile priests mentioned by the Italian press. The tip of the iceberg because of the church turning a blind eye to the problem, because of the widespread omertà (code of silence), because of the fear and the shame of the victims, because of a press that is distracted and fearful of the church hierarchy.
Cardinal Sordano, congratulating Benedict XVI, proudly announced that the people of God “would not be impressed by the gossip of the moment”. To cardinal Sordano this is merely gossip. Cardinal Schoenborn accusing cardinal Sordano of covering up, for 15 years, the scandal of the paedophile cardinal Groer, is only gossip. Gossip also accusations of protecting the paedophile founder of the Legion of Christ, father Marcial Maciel.
Justice has run its course but mons Milano has not spoken a word. Not one word of pity for the victim in these last two years and five months. But he was, on the contrary, concerned with the fate of father Marco, “a promising theologian”. He was able to spend more than two years of house arrest, safely within a religious community. We do not know if father Cerullo will continue to say Mass, because of the confinement. We do not know if in his hiding place he has abstained from “any office or service frequented by minors”, like the court prescribed on November 19 2008.
Father Milano did not comment on “the gossip” from the press about the transferring of father Cerullo from parish to parish, nor on “the gossip” about the notorious “game of the boot” that was practised in the minor seminary of Aversa, where father Cerullo studied and worked as a “spiritual assistant of the young seminarians”.
Now the family of the victim, assisted by its lawyers Sergio Cavaliere and Costantino Puocci, will turn for damages to the Civil courts. But no amount of money will compensate for a destroyed childhood, nor for the silence of mons Milano nor for the “gossip” of the hierarchy of the church.
We do not want to hear any more small talk from them, actually. We want the bishops to denounce these crimes to the courts. We want them to open the archives of the diocese, of the religious congregations and of the Vatican. We want the names and surnames. We want inquiries and trials. We want prohibition for paedophile clergymen to become priests. We want tangible actions for repair. No excuses on television or small talk meant for hushing the public.
We want paedophile priests to be treated in psychiatric institutions, because paedophiles are repeated offenders, who cannot be healed by prayers or regaining “spirituality”. The clergy want us to believe paedophilia, also in the church, is a result of the perversion of society.
We want prescription to be extended, because 10 years is too short a period for a victim to denounce abuse that happened in his childhood. The victim needs decades to deal with abuse and to find the courage to talk about it. Too many crimes remain unpunished, too many criminals remain free.
It is time the walls of omertà are destroyed, as they are the best allies of paedophile priests.
Who knows should talk! For the sake of our children.
Casal di Principe, May 10, 2010
lawyer Sergio Cavaliere
