Tuesday, January 03 2012
Billings Gazette, Billing, Montana
BILLINGS — A Northern Cheyenne woman has filed a lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Great Falls-Billings, contending she was sexually abused as a young girl by a popular priest at the St. Labre Mission School in Ashland between 1955 and 1962.
The lawsuit seeking unspecified damages was filed Friday in Cascade County District Court in Great Falls. It also names as defendants the Order of Friars Minor, the Capuchin Order and the school.
Rev. Emmett Hoffmann is not named as a defendant but is identified as the reason for the lawsuit. The 85-year-old Hoffmann retired in 1993 and lives in Ashland.
Hoffman did not return a call Saturday from The Associated Press, and a message left at the retirement home where he lives was not returned. A message left at the Roman Catholic Diocese of Great Falls-Billings was also not returned.
The Billings Gazette reports that Hoffmann was sent in 1954 to close the mission, but instead revived it. It had a $50 million endowment when he retired. He is one of only two white men ever to have been made an honorary chief of the Northern Cheyenne.
He is also the subject of a book by Billings author Renee Sansom Flood titled "Renegade Priest of the Northern Cheyenne."
Attorney Vito de la Cruz, who filed the lawsuit, said in news release that Hoffmann's stature "certainly makes it more difficult for victims to muster the courage to come forward."
De la Cruz said the statute of limitations prevents his client from pressing criminal charges. He said Hoffman is not named in the lawsuit because the diocese and the order placed him at the mission. He also said, based on his past experience in dealing with similar lawsuits, it's better to go after those who should have acted.
"If you find a rattlesnake in the backyard, you don't just throw it over the fence into the neighbors' yard so somebody else gets hurt," he told the newspaper. "You do something about it."
The lawsuit also seeks the diocese and the Capuchin Order to publicly acknowledge the alleged wrongdoing.
The lawsuit describes an escalating pattern of abuse that began when she was a preteen and ended before she turned 18.
De La Cruz said the woman, now in her 60s, is not being named because of concern for her safety. In the lawsuit she is identified as Jane Doe.
"Tribal children molested in remote areas had nowhere to turn," de la Cruz said in the news release. "When a perpetrator threatens a child with death or the death of a family member if they tell, as Hoffman did, the secrets remain buried for years."
The newspaper published a profile of Hoffman in 2004 after Flood's book came out. Hoffman freely acknowledged his struggle with alcoholism, the newspaper reported, and also said he struggled in the mid-1960s when his superiors ordered him to dismiss a young female volunteer who worked as his secretary.
The profile also said that in Flood's book, "Hoffmann freely talks of being in love with the woman, but says there was no physical relationship."
Wednesday, November 23 2011
By Jennifer Sullivan
Seattle Times staff reporter
Eight people who spent a portion of their childhoods living in a Jesuit school in Omak as wards of the state filed suit against the state Department of Social and Health Services on Tuesday for placing them under the care of people they say abused them.
Eight people who spent a portion of their childhoods living in a Jesuit school in Omak as wards of the state filed suit against the state Department of Social and Health Services on Tuesday for placing them under the care of people they say abused them.
In March, the Jesuits in the Northwest agreed to pay $166.1 million to about 500 victims who were abused for decades. Most victims of the abuse, which occurred in remote Alaskan villages and boarding schools on Northwest tribal lands, were Native American, and their abusers Jesuit priests or people supervised by the priests.
Yakima attorney Blaine Tamaki, who represented dozens of victims in the Jesuit settlement, is now representing eight alleged victims from St. Mary's Mission and Boarding School in Omak.
Three of the alleged victims at St. Mary's boarding school told their stories during a news conference in Seattle on Tuesday.
Dwayne Paul, 53, of Omak, said that he kept memories of the assaults bottled up inside until recently. The sexual abuse he said he experienced started almost immediately after he arrived at the school, according to Paul and the civil complaint for damages filed in the case.
"The physical abuse started from the time I was in first grade and got worse from then on," said Paul, who was at the school until eighth grade.
The multimillion-dollar settlement reached by the Jesuits earlier this year was part of a bankruptcy agreement. Of the 500 victims, about 470 suffered sexual abuse. About two dozen others were physically abused. Insurance companies were asked to pay $118 million of the settlement, with the Jesuits paying $48.1 million.
The settlement was one of the largest monetary payouts nationwide in the Roman Catholic Church's sexual-abuse crisis.
Tamaki said victims of the massive settlement did not receive much money because it was split among so many people. He said he hopes victims can get the money they deserve by suing the Department of Social and Health Service (DSHS).
The eight alleged victims filing suit against DSHS are Native American and lived at the school in the 1950s through the 1970s. Most of the eight say they were abused by the Rev. John Morse. Tamaki said Morse can be linked to nearly 100 instances of abuse.
Morse has denied the allegations.
Theresa Bessette, 53, of Omak, said the sexual abuse caused her devastating emotional problems — for a long time she couldn't trust men, couldn't trust anyone caring for her and was tremendously overprotective of her own children.
"Father Morse was supposed to be my protector. He allowed me to be hurt and not to be safe," Bessette said.
Morse now lives in a private retirement facility financed by the Jesuits in Spokane and is under 24-hour supervision, Tamaki said. Morse has never been charged criminally because of statute-of-limitation requirements.
Paul said he tried, as a young child, to tell authorities about what was going on at St. Mary's and get help. But, he said, the state social worker he met with didn't ask him to elaborate about the "bad things" he was talking about.
"She said everything is going to be all right. She told me that I shouldn't be making up stories," Paul said, adding, "Who was going to believe a little kid?"
Officials at DSHS declined to comment Tuesday.
Information from Seattle Times archives and The Associated Press is included in this report.
Jennifer Sullivan: 206-464-8294 or jensullivan@seattletimes.com. On Twitter @SeattleSullivan.
Saturday, October 29 2011
Kristin M. Kraemer, Tri-City Herald
PASCO -- A Pasco mother who claims her child was sexually assaulted twice on the playground at James McGee Elementary School is suing the school district for its alleged negligence and failure to supervise students and staff.
The lawsuit against the Pasco School District was filed Friday in Franklin County Superior Court.
The child was 7 and in first grade when allegedly assaulted by other students on two separate occasions in February 2010. School playground supervisors were on duty at the time of both incidents and should have seen it, yet either didn't notice or did nothing to stop it, the lawsuit claims.
The lawsuit names the mother and child by their initials, but the Herald isn't using those under the newspaper's policy not to identify people who report being sexually assaulted.
The child, whose gender is not specified in the civil complaint, has been appointed a litigation guardian ad litem, Richard L. Mathieu.
"Every child deserves a school environment where they feel safe and protected by those entrusted with their care," said Megan L. Chang, a Kennewick attorney with Tamaki Law representing the mother. "Our client is pursuing this case to prevent this violation of her child's safety and trust from happening to other children."
It was not clear Friday if there had been a criminal investigation by Pasco police into the sexual assault allegations at the North Horizon Drive school, or if the child is still a student there.
The Pasco School District received a notice-of-claim regarding an alleged student-on-student assault at McGee in 2010, but wasn't aware of a pending lawsuit arising from the allegations until calls Friday from reporters, said spokeswoman Leslee Caul.
The district had not yet been served with a complaint or a courtesy copy, she said.
"The safety of students is of critical concern to the district," Caul said in a written statement. "As this matter involves apparent pending litigation and the district has not received any further details in the complaint, the district cannot offer any further comment at this time."
According to the complaint, the first incident was Feb. 19, 2010, on the playground during recess. The alleged assailant was another student, and other students reportedly watched.
Then on Feb. 22, the child was sexually assaulted and molested by several students during recess, the lawsuit states. And again other students saw it happen, but employees of the school district didn't report seeing it and did not stop it, the lawsuit states.
The school district "had a duty to exercise ordinary care, including a duty to ensure the safety of its students on its playgrounds, supervise the activities of students on its playgrounds, and develop, implement and enforce policies and procedures to protect the safety of its students on playgrounds," the complaint cites.
By law, the mother can't specify a damage amount. The lawsuit only asks for judgments against the school district "in an amount that will fairly compensate" the mother and child "for all damages sustained," along with reasonable attorney fees and costs.
* Staff writer Jacques Von Lunen contributed to this report.
Wednesday, October 12 2011
By SHANNON DININNY
Associated Press
YAKIMA, Wash. —
A Yakima Valley man has filed suit against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Yakima alleging he was sexually abused decades ago by an associate pastor.
The lawsuit filed Oct. 3 in Yakima County Superior Court marks the fifth pending case involving clergy abuse against the Yakima diocese, which serves more than 80,000 Catholics across a sprawling seven-county area in central Washington.
The lawsuit claims that the Rev. Ernest Dale Calhoun sexually abused the victim, identified only as S.K., when he was a 15-year-old altar boy at St. Paul's Cathedral Parish in the early 1970s. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages from the diocese, but does not name Calhoun as a defendant. He is no longer an active priest and is believed to be living in Texas.
The man's lawyer, Vito de la Cruz, said the lawsuit specifically named the church because it permitted Calhoun unrestricted access to vulnerable youths.
"They are the ones who hired him. They are the ones who transferred him in and out and ultimately are responsible for what happened to the victim," he said.
A telephone number for Calhoun could not be located, and he could not be reached for comment.
Calhoun was ordained a priest in Beaumont, Texas, in 1968. The lawsuit alleges that he sexually abused a teenage boy there before transferring to the Yakima diocese. Calhoun also was a minister in Kennewick, Benton City and Ephrata before going to work in Seattle.
The Yakima man, now in his mid-50s, is undergoing treatment for colon cancer and does not want to risk dying "without telling the story of what happened to him," according to de la Cruz.
Calhoun was the subject of at least one other clergy abuse lawsuit, which the diocese settled for undisclosed terms in 1994, according to the Rev. Robert Siler, a spokesman for the diocese. Siler said the name of the man who filed the latest lawsuit came up in the course of that case, but only as a witness.
Siler said he was surprised Calhoun was not a defendant in the case.
"We're certainly sorry for any abuse the victim has suffered at the hands of Father Calhoun," he said. "Obviously, if the diocese is at fault then it should be held accountable, but I would think the victims and the attorneys would want to hold the priest accountable as well."
Founded in 1951, the Yakima diocese stretches from the Cascade mountains east to rolling fruit orchards, wine grape vineyards and fields of hops, potatoes and wheat. Parishioners include long-standing farm families and recent immigrants who've moved to the area for farm work.
The diocese already has paid out more than $1 million to resolve claims and spent at least $1.5 million in legal fees in response to abuse claims. Most costs have been paid by insurance.
Tuesday, September 27 2011
By GWEN FLORIO of the Missoulian | Posted: Tuesday, September 27, 2011 10:45 pm
Nuns who taught decades ago at the St. Ignatius Mission's Ursuline Academy on the Flathead Indian Reservation came under fire for sexually abusing the children under their care in a lawsuit filed Tuesday against the Catholic Diocese of Helena.
The suit, filed on behalf of 45 people who were pupils at the mission's boarding and day school in the 1940s through the early 1970s, also names six Roman Catholic priests and one brother, and includes allegations of abuse at St. Mary's Catholic School in Helena.
The suit comes just a week after a separate legal action was filed on behalf of 32 people who accuse the Helena Diocese of covering up for pedophiles in its midst.
What sets the suit filed Tuesday apart from the landslide of cases in the United States and Europe alleging decades of sexual abuse by priests is the fact that at least four nuns also are accused, said Blaine Tamaki of the Tamaki Law Offices of Yakima, Wash.
"The individual perpetrators of sexual abuse who preyed upon plaintiffs were pedophiles and child predators," the suit reads. "The Helena Diocese and the Ursuline Sisters knew or should have known that the individual perpetrators were committing acts of sexual abuse against plaintiffs."
About 10 of the people identified in the suit as John Doe or Jane Doe joined Tamaki and other attorneys Tuesday morning in front of the Missoula County Courthouse at a news conference announcing the suit.
The abuse "is always going to be in the back of my mind. But getting it public makes it feel like something is being done and it's not being forgotten," said Francis "Franny" Burke, one of those who agreed to speak publicly. Burke, now in his 50s, attended the St. Ignatius Mission's boarding school for two years, starting when he was 6.
"What makes this intolerable," Tamaki said, "was that these were some of the most vulnerable children, Native Americans, who were trapped at these residential schools."
***
Burke and some of the others involved in the suit filed against the Diocese and the Ursuline Sisters of the Western Province also were among some 500 people - nearly all of them Native American or Alaskan Native - who prevailed in March in a $166.1 million bankruptcy reorganization against the Oregon Province of the Society of Jesus, better known as Jesuits.
But Tamaki said that action never held the Ursulines, who were supervised by the Jesuits, accountable.
Helena Diocese spokeswoman Renee St. Martin Wizeman told the Associated Press that the alleged abusers in both lawsuits were not diocesan priests and nuns, but belonged to the Ursuline and Jesuit orders.
The suit details the allegations by each of the plaintiffs, who tell of being fondled, abused and raped in the school, dormitory and even the church's bell tower.
"Instead of being taught how to read and write, these children were taught distrust and betrayal," Tamaki said.
The suit names Mother Superior Loyola, Mother Cecelia, Sister John, Sister Marion "and other unknown Ursuline nuns and sisters." It also names Father Bernard Harris (Father Harry); Father William Burke, Father A.J. Ferretti (Father Freddy), Father Joseph Balfe, Father Delaney and Father Sullivan, along with Brother Rene Gallant (Brother Charlie).
The suit seeks damages and attorney's fees and "relief that will ensure that the diocese and the Ursuline Sisters publicly acknowledge the sexual abuse that the plaintiffs suffered, the pain and suffering that they continue to suffer," and policies to ensure the "physical, spiritual and emotional" safety of people in their care.
"How do you change conduct unless you hold the perpetrators accountable? ... In our society, money changes conduct," Tamaki said.
Reporter Gwen Florio can be reached at 523-5268, gwen.florio@missoulian.com, or CopsAndCourts.com.
Thursday, July 14 2011
ZILLAH -- The Yakima Diocese is once again being sued over sex abuse by a priest.
This time a former Yakima County man claims he was raped by a deacon. The alleged victim was 17-years-old at the time. He claims Reverend Aaron Ramirez invited him to the Resurrection Catholic Church in Zillah back in 1999.
The teen showed up under the guise of receiving guitar lessons, but says the deacon got him drunk and raped him when he passed out. The alleged victim says he went to police immediately but couldn't remember exactly what happened, so Ramirez wasn't prosecuted.
People in Zillah told KIMA they're shocked and upset.
"For anyone who does anything like that, there needs to be some kind of punishment,” said Tyler Wellner. “However you feel about the justice system of the judicial system there needs to be some kind of punishment for that."
The civil suit is being handled by Tamaki Law which has successfully sued over priest sex abuse before.
KIMA TV - Yakima/Tri-Cities
Thursday, July 07 2011
By Bryan Denson, The Oregonian
A U.S. bankruptcy judge in Portland today said she would confirm Chapter 11 reorganization of the region's Jesuits, paving the way for 534 creditors to begin receiving payments this summer for abuse suffered at the hands of Jesuit clergy.
The Portland-based Society of Jesus Oregon Province -- the formal name of the Jesuits in Oregon, Washington, Montana, Idaho and Alaska -- is expected in early August to put $48.1 million in a settlement trust for creditors. Later this summer, insurers for the Oregon Province will send payments to the trust of nearly $120 million, according to attorneys for the parties.
A last-minute objection to the bankruptcy plan by a lawyer for four high schools -- Beaverton's Jesuit High, Tacoma's Bellarmine Preparatory, Spokane's Gonzaga Preparatory and Seattle Preparatory -- nearly put a halt to today's long-awaited conclusion to the bankruptcy plan.
A lawyer for the schools wanted an agreement written into the plan that would release them from any legal claim that they were part of the Oregon Province. The province and the committee of creditors appointed in the case had recently reached such an agreement with Seattle University. However, the creditors committee argued against the high schools getting the same deal.
Lawyers huddled privately during a break in today's proceedings to reach a compromise: the settlement trust was given a deadline of up to nine months to commence any litigation against the high schools. The trust would also be required to file one lawsuit, and it would be limited to a pair of Portland venues: U.S. District Court or U.S. Bankruptcy Court.
Kathy Mendez, one of 525 creditors who accused the region's Jesuit priests of sexual abuse, sat in on Thursday's bankruptcy hearing with her lawyer, Blaine Tamaki, of Yakima, Wash. Tamaki said his client was relieved that the long, emotional process of negotiating a settlement, commenced by the Feb. 17, 2009, bankruptcy filing, had come to an end.
"It was time to get this put to rest," Tamaki said. "Because there's a lot of attorneys' fees being charged, and it's time to put a stop to the legal fees and get the claimants their money."
Lawyers have estimated they will receive roughly 33 percent to 40 percent of the $167.8 million settlement from the Jesuits, an order of the Catholic Church.
Mendez, a 56-year-old resident of Wapato, Wash., accused Father John Morse of sexually abusing her at St. Mary's Mission boarding school in Omak, Wash., in the mid-1960s. Before Thursday's hearing, she described the day at age 11 when she got into trouble and was sent to Morse, the school's principal, for discipline. He took her into his office and molested her, she said.
Tamaki said about 60 people claim Morse sexually abused them during the 1960s. The priest, now living in a Jesuit home in eastern Washington, abused boys and girls, ages 5 to 15, in violations ranging from fondling to rape, he said.
"He would bring in students into his principal's office and sexually molest them on a systematic and routine basis," Tamaki said. "He was there for at least 6 to 8 years."
The senior official of the Oregon Province, the Very Rev. Patrick Lee, apologized in a news release to the victims of abuse.
"On behalf of the Oregon Province, I want to express our most sincere sorrow for the pain and hurt caused by the actions of a few men who did not live up to their vows," Lee said. "We will continue to pray for all those who are hurting and hope that today's announcement brings all involved one-step closer to the lasting healing they so richly deserve."
Chief Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth L. Perris announced her decision to confirm the Jesuits' bankruptcy plan during a two-hour hearing in her downtown Portland courtroom. She lauded a room full of lawyers -- and those taking part in the proceedings by speakerphone -- for the marathon of negotiations and mediation that resulted in the agreement.
Perris pointed out that the bankruptcy plan wasn't a cure-all for the harm done to claimants. But, she said, "It's the best we've got."
-- Bryan Denson
Monday, June 06 2011
By GWEN FLORIO of the Missoulian | Posted: Monday, June 6, 2011 6:00 am
Editor's note: Today, the Missoulian concludes a two-day look at the legacy of abuse at the Jesuit-run school and mission on the Flathead Indian Reservation.
ST. IGNATIUS - The recent $166.1 million settlement for people who were sexually abused in Jesuit-run schools and missions on Indian reservations and Alaskan villages made international headlines.
But here, where so much of the abuse occurred, the silence surrounding the case is as cold and deep as the stubbornly lingering snow on the Mission Mountains.
That's partly a measure of time: The settlement plan covers a half-century of abuse. What's news to the larger world is business as depressingly usual to people who've been living with the effects of that abuse for decades, said Jera Stewart, clinical supervisor and neuropsychologist for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes.
It's partly a measure of legality: The 500 claimants involved in the settlement must vote to approve it and the votes won't be tallied until July. Until then, said the Rev. Andrew Maddock of the St. Ignatius Church, he can't address the issue specifically with parishioners. "I've just talked about (the fact) that we need to heal."
And it's partly an unfathomable measure of pain: "You're talking about layers of trauma that happened over generations," said Salish educator Julie Cajune.
Genocide. Dislocation. Cultural obliteration. Children kidnapped into boarding schools. And, as is now being widely revealed, the extensive sexual abuse of those children.
"That this kind of violence happened to children, the worst kind of violence ... ," Cajune said. "It's such a horrific thing that people don't want to talk about it."
***
The bankruptcy settlement against the Northwest Jesuits will - if approved - do everything possible to make sure that the 500-some claimants can get help for many years hence without having to talk publicly about it, even as the religious order takes public responsibility.
About $6.5 million of the $166.1 million paid by the Jesuits and their insurers would be set aside to fund future claims, as people continue to come forward about sexual assaults experienced decades ago, said Bryan Smith, an attorney with Tamaki Law, the Yakima, Wash., firm that represents the largest number of claimants in the Lower 48 states in the Northwest Jesuits case. That money would be available until it ran out.
Still, payments averaging about $300,000 could go to those whose claims already have been verified by adjudicators after the settlement was announced in late March, Smith said. Nearly all of the claimants are Native American or Alaskan Native.
"That significant sum of money is paid to acknowledge wrongdoing," said Blaine Tamaki. "They are apologizing for their abuse."
Francis "Franny" Burke, 58, of Elmo, is one of the people represented by Tamaki's firm.
"Speaking for all the Indian people involved with these priests, we would like an apology. That would be nice," said Burke. "But something that could really help the Indian people out is to help restore the culture and language."
As in other boarding schools around Indian Country, the last of which closed in 1968, students in the St. Ignatius school had their hair shorn and were punished if they spoke their own languages or practiced their traditions. The result was generations who feel, as Burke said, lost in an uneasy world between the two cultures.
The settlement doesn't address that issue. Perhaps it never could. But it does include several provisions designed to provide the accountability and apology many victims say they badly want.
Among them:
• For the next decade, the Oregon Province of the Society of Jesus, better known as the Northwest Jesuits, must post on its website's home page the names of all its members verified as perpetrators.
• For the next two years, the website must provide a place for victims who want to tell their stories.
• The Rev. Patrick J. Lee, who heads the province, will send personally signed letters of apology to all the claimants, stating that the abuse wasn't their fault, and that the province takes responsibility.
• During the next five years, Lee will travel to Anchorage, Seattle, Spokane and other places for private conferences with people who were abused.
• The Northwest Jesuits cannot refer to those who were abused as "alleged" claimants, victims or survivors.
• And, Lee will post on the website, and place ads in regional publications including the Missoulian, "a statement of gratitude for the survivors of sexual abuse who have had the courage to speak about the sexual abuse they endured and continue to live with every day."
***
Along with "alleged," Cajune would prefer to get rid of the word "victims," too.
"I think it's important to see Indian people as actors and not victims," she said.
Take those who endured the abuse by Jesuit priests, as well as nuns who worked under their supervision, in Jesuit missions and schools on Indian reservations around the Northwest and in Alaskan Native villages. The Oregon Province covers Oregon, Montana, Washington, Idaho and Alaska.
"It's a very brave and courageous act of resistance for these people to come out and do this," Cajune said. "It's not going to be popular."
In addition to the general squeamishness regarding public discussion of sexual abuse, there's the fact that the St. Ignatius mission - home to some of the most egregious abusers - is also a revered institution for many in the community, said Stewart, who works for the tribal health program in St. Ignatius.
"The church is still a force that people use," said Stewart. After all, she said, only a few people among the mission's religious leaders were abusers.
Most, she said, "are healers. People go there all the time for confession and absolution and to get some help."
Indeed, Josephine Paul Quequesah, who is 74, said that while revelations about abuse at the boarding school her older sister attended surprised and saddened her, she remains a devout Catholic and volunteers at the church as a Eucharistic minister.
"All my children, my grandchildren and my great-grandchildren are baptized," said Quequesah, a member of the Salish-Pend d'Oreille Culture Committee, whose offices are near the church.
"I don't think they need to do it," she said of the lawsuits.
Leland "Jimi" Hewankorn, 59, said he heard similar remarks from friends and family members critical of his decision to join the legal action against the Northwest Jesuits.
And he knows people who also were abused, but who have kept silent.
"I'm speaking for a lot of people who are afraid to speak out," Hewankorn said.
***
The Northwest Jesuits' website - not its home page, but in the "contact" section - provides a confidential number for people to report sexual abuse by a Jesuit, or get information on counseling if they've suffered abuse.
In St. Ignatius, Stewart said that Tribal Health offers counseling to both people who have been abused and to abusers, although no program specifically addresses those involved in the Jesuit case. Publicity about that case can be helpful for people who've suffered in silence for years, believing themselves alone in their experience, she said.
"Even if they're not speaking out, they can experience healing vicariously," she said.
Dixie Trahan Brabender of Ronan, one of the first to publicly come forward in the case against the Northwest Jesuits, wanted to provide a safe place for such people.
The 56-year-old Ronan resident, who is not a trained counselor, started a support group in her home for other abuse survivors. But it fell apart after just a few meetings, she said.
"It's still hard to talk about it," she said. "They stole something from us. They stole our innocence from us."
She said she'd revive the group if people wanted.
And groups like SNAP - Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests - also offer support.
For all the considerable resources, financial and emotional, provided by the settlement, it lacks the one thing some survivors wish they'd seen: personal accountability by the priests and nuns who abused them.
But criminal charges in such cases are nearly impossible, said Smith of Tamaki Law, both because the statute of limitations has passed in many cases, and because most of the perpetrators have died.
For instance, the Rev. Augustine J. "Father Freddy" Feretti, named by victims in St. Ignatius and Idaho, died in 1982. Mother Loyola, an Ursuline nun who was a prefect at the boarding school in St. Ignatius, went from there to a mission in the Yukon before returning to the Ursuline Centre in Great Falls, where she died, said Sister Francis Xavier, the center's archivist. Both of Mother Loyola's legs were amputated before her death, said Sister Francis, who knew Mother Loyola.
"She had a very, very hard death, "she said. "She suffered a lot."
Cajune said that in Lame Deer, on the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation in southern Montana, elders speak of the people who survived the genocide as heroic. She suggested the same term might be applied to those taking the Jesuits to task about their abuse.
It won't undo the damage.
Most of the abusers got away.
And there will always be naysayers.
But the Northwest Jesuits can't act as though it never happened, because those who suffered fought back.
Now the world knows what was done to them.
"We stood up to some powerful people," Franny Burke said, "and I feel good about that."
Reporter Gwen Florio can be reached at 523-5268, gwen.florio@missoulian.com, or CopsAndCourts.com.
Sunday, June 05 2011
By GWEN FLORIO of the Missoulian | Posted: Sunday, June 5, 2011 6:30 am
ST. IGNATIUS - The small brick mission is a jewel, stunning in its setting at the foot of the Mission Mountains.
"I want to be here," says Garry "Bob" Salois, "the day an earthquake brings this place down."
Its 58 striking frescoes, painted by an Italian Jesuit who was self-taught, include a life-size image of St. George slaying a dragon with a hideous human face.
"The dragon's face," says Francis "Franny" Burke, "should be Mother Loyola."
The church has been a focal point of religious life in the Mission Valley since the 1830s, when the local Salish tribe sent repeated delegations to St. Louis, asking that the Jesuit "black robes" establish a mission here.
"People hate us belittling our town and our church," says Leland "Jimi" Hewankorn, "but they don't know what hell we went through."
Salois, Burke and Hewankorn are among some 500 people - nearly all of them Native American or Alaskan Native - who prevailed in a $166.1 million bankruptcy reorganization against the Oregon Province of the Society of Jesus, better known as Jesuits.
Claimants reported abuse either by Jesuit priests or nuns under Jesuit supervision, starting in the 1950s at boarding schools and parishes on remote reservations and tiny, far-flung villages around the Northwest and Alaska. The Oregon Province covers Oregon, Montana, Washington, Idaho and Alaska.
The settlement, announced in March, is the largest against a Catholic religious order and one of the biggest involving abuse by Catholic clergy.
For the past several weeks, claims adjudicators have been verifying accusations. Last week, ballots went out to claimants, who have until June 30 to approve the reorganization plan.
In August or September, those victims - many of them approaching old age - should start receiving large cash settlements for the anguish inflicted upon them as children.
A half-century after the abuse began, Salois, Hewankorn and Burke say that anguish lingers.
"For over 50 years, those guys have messed up my head, the way that I think," said Salois. "It's like they stole my whole damn life."
******
The three men, now in their late 50s, said they still avoid the St. Ignatius mission church.
But recently they returned to tell their story, lingering uncomfortably outside before going in, pointing out where the dormitory and other mission buildings, now long gone, once stood.
"The only thing left is the church," said Burke.
"And," added Salois, "the bad memories."
They never wanted to go to the school. They didn't have a choice.
"My mom said they threatened to put her in jail if they didn't send me," Burke said.
They arrived speaking little English. They learned some words fast.
"Dirty."
"Pigs."
"Dumb Indians."
And to Salois, who is Salish-Cree and French - "a little, redheaded, chubby, good-looking half-breed," he described himself - "You aren't even a real Indian. You look like a white guy."
This, they said, from a woman who supposedly was "civilizing" them.
Mother Loyola was the Ursuline nun in charge of the boys' section of the boarding school.
"A big woman," Hewankorn recalled.
"German," said Burke. Salois' older brother, also at the school, theorized that she was a Nazi war criminal hiding within a nun's habit.
"We thought she was a man," Burke said. "We used to peek through the keyhole to see."
Later, said Salois, "we found out she wasn't. The hard way."
******
Most of the sexual abuse cases against the Catholic church involve priests.
Of nearly 3,500 accused Catholic religious leaders whose names have been released, only 82 - about 2 percent - are nuns, according to Bishop Accountability, a group that tracks church sexual abuse cases.
An extensive study by John Jay College of Criminal Justice for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, released last month, focuses solely on priests. (One of its conclusions, tying the incidence of abuse to more permissive social mores of the 1960s, has been widely criticized.)
"People don't believe females are capable of abusing, and they surely don't think these good nuns would abuse," said Steve Theisen, director of the Iowa chapter of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, or SNAP. As the group's name indicates, abuse by nuns is so little recognized that there's not even a support group for its victims - who include Theisen.
"It's really one of the last taboos to try to break," he said.
In the Northwest Jesuits case, the Pfau Cochran Vertetis Amala law firm of Seattle crunched numbers of the accused and the allegations against them, and came up with a list of the Top 10 worst offenders.
St. Ignatius' Mother Loyola is No. 7 on a list that includes Father Augustine J. "Freddy" Feretti and Brother Rene "Charlie" Gallant, both of whom also served at the St. Ignatius mission.
"The focus has certainly been the priests, but the nuns play a real interesting role. ... We see a lot of complicity by the nuns in the priest abuse," said attorney Michael Pfau.
Sister Francis Xavier, the archivist at the Ursuline Centre in Great Falls, knew Mother Loyola personally and remembers her reputation as a "rather severe disciplinarian." But she dismissed as rumor the possibility that Mother Loyola strayed into sexual abuse. "She may have - we used to call it spanking. But fondling is something I find hard to believe," she said.
That's a common reaction to accusations of abuse by women, said Bryan Smith, an attorney with Tamaki Law in Yakima, Wash., which represents about 90 of the people in the Northwest Jesuit case. The Tamaki clients, who include Salois, Hewankorn and Burke, make up the largest group of those in the lower 48 states.
"It was shocking for me to hear" the allegations about Mother Loyola, said Smith, who took depositions from many of the claimants.
"It wasn't until I heard multiple accounts that were remarkably similar from people who didn't know each other that I started to realize, ‘This is real stuff that was happening.' "
*****
The accounts were similar and so were the victims, at least during the late 1950s and early 1960s in St. Ignatius.
"I think they looked everybody over and picked on the ones that didn't talk English," Burke said. "The ones who came from traditional families," added Salois.
The three fit the bill. Burke and Hewankorn spoke mostly Kootenai, Salois a mixture of Salish and Cree. Besides, they were boarding students. Unlike the "day scholars" who went back to their families at night, the boys were far from their homes on the reservation's northern border. (The boarding program closed in 1962.)
Their heads were shaved. Verbal abuse escalated to physical, meted out for supposed infractions - say, speaking their own language.
"We'd have to pull down our pants to our ankles and get hit with a 2-by-4," said Hewankorn. "And also hold out our hands, palms up, and get hit with a 2-by-4. I always wondered how they could be so mean."
Strict regimens forbade little kids from getting up in the middle of the night. If a boy wet his bed, said Salois, he would be forced to stand with the soaked sheets draped over him until they dried, then wash the sheets and stand again, ghostlike beneath them, until the clean sheets dried.
Separately, they ran away. When he was in second grade, Hewankorn made it to Elmo, more than 40 miles away, before police brought him back. Burke got as far as a barn, visible from the dorm, and realized he'd never make it home to Elmo. He sneaked back, but was found out, and his head shaven anew as punishment. Salois ran repeatedly. "I was always bald," he said.
Physical abuse turned sexual.
When the Rev. Joseph Balfe asked Burke to assist him with Mass, Burke went to the sacristy, only to be confronted with Balfe standing naked. During confession, Balfe asked Hewankorn what bed he slept in.
"They looked at us like we were animals. Like we were their playthings," said Burke.
They quickly learned to hide when Mother Loyola came around, looking for a boy to help a priest with "chores."
But at night, when she came into the dormitory, there was nowhere to go, they said.
"I'd see Mother Loyola go to different beds," Hewankorn said.
"She'd put her hand over your mouth," said Salois. "Grab you by the ear and take you back to her room" for sex.
Another nun, elderly, would coax boys onto her lap and force their heads to her bared chest.
"Sister John was a pervert, but she was senile," Salois said. "She tried to breast-feed you and say, ‘My poor baby.' But at least you'd get a hug and not get hurt."
They tried to tell, they said. As youngsters, they wrote a letter to the bishop in Helena, and even to the Pope.
"We complained about how we were being treated. ... We said, ‘Come and save us,' " Burke said.
"I guess that letter never made it."
******
The settlement could bring as much as a half-million dollars to some victims, depending upon the length and severity of the abuse.
So what, said Hewankorn. "All that money, they could give it all to me and it still wouldn't be enough for the abuse that I went through."
Money won't make up for his shattered life, his three marriages, he said. "I can't hold onto relationships," he said. He is immersed in "shame, shame."
Salois tried three times to kill himself, once before he was a teenager.
"I turned violent, into a drug addict and an alcoholic," said Salois, who has "L-O-V-E" tattooed on the four fingers of one hand and "H-A-T-E" on the other.
He said he got into the habit, for a while, of going into Catholic churches and waiting until Mass was over before confronting the priest.
"I'd yell at him, cuff him a couple of times. Ask them why they did it."
Burke likewise drank and drugged through years of his life. He said he's been sober 10 years now. He's only recently begun to discuss his childhood with his grown children. "They saw me cry," he said.
But until last month, the only times he'd been inside the St. Ignatius church since third grade involved mandatory events like wakes or funerals.
"My knees are shaking," he said. "It's really hard. You know, this is supposed to be a good place."
He paced past the murals, barely looking at them. He, like the others, turned his back on Catholicism as a little boy, and never looked back. None of his eight children is baptized.
"I feel like I'm lost," he said. "I don't know my heritage. I can't speak English very good, and I can't speak my own language."
Salois also refused to baptize his children and won't allow his grandchildren to be baptized. "It took me 40 years to separate the Catholic religion and belief in God," said Salois, who despite his palpable anger took off his cap when he entered St. Ignatius church. "I believe there's got to be a creator of all things. But if Jesus Christ and his bunch are a true religion, he's forsaken me a long time ago."
Hewankorn has worked to reclaim his tribal heritage, turning to traditional ways.
"I don't go to church no more," he said. "I confess to Him only. I don't confess to a human being."
The men said they're waiting for something more valuable than money.
"I got over being angry," Burke said. "But I want an apology. Not for myself, but the whole Indian race."
Salois hopes the Rev. Patrick Lee, the leader of the Oregon Province, comes to St. Ignatius to apologize in person - although at the thought, his anger flashed anew.
"I'd tell him, I don't accept your apologies. It's too damn late," he said. But a moment later, he added, "I'd go and see what kind of apology he gives. If it's a real one, I'll accept it. But if it's one of their old phonies, I'll spit in his face and go away."
And Hewankorn wants to ask the old, unanswerable question.
"Why? Why did you do that to us?"
Reporter Gwen Florio can be reached at 523-5268, gwen.florio @missoulian.com or CopsAndCourts.com.
Friday, March 25 2011
YAKIMA, Wash. -- In a settlement that's being called historic, an order of Roman Catholic priests has agreed to pay $166.1 million to roughly 450 Native Americans who were sexually abused by priests.
It’s the largest settlement in history between a single religious order and victims of sexual abuse, according to attoneys involved in the case.
In the settlement, the Oregon Province of the Society of Jesus, also agreed to issue written apologies to each victim and produce documentation that the religious order was aware of the abuse.
Attorneys from across the Northwest representing the victims, a handful of whom are Yakama tribal members, announced the settlement this morning.
Yakima attorney Blaine Tamaki is representing the largest group of complainants — 90. That group will receive $30 million from the settlement.
According to the lawsuit, victims suffered sexual abuse at boarding schools run by the religious order in Washington, Idaho and Montana over a period spanning the 1950s through the 1970s.
"This is by far the worst case I’ve been involved in," said Tamaki, whose lead complainant, Kathy Mendez of Wapato, initiated the case more than two years ago.
The lawsuit was filed in February 2009 in U.S. District Court after Mendez, a Cowlitz tribal member and Yakama descendent, came forward.
Mendez, 53, attended St. Mary’s Mission near Omak when she was 11 years old. She said sexual abuse by a particular priest led her to run away several times.
She said she was called into his office, and how spankings with her panties down quickly led to sexual acts by the priest.
Eventually, more than a year later, she was able to leave the mission and live with her adult sister in Yakima.
She said she felt compelled to come forward after reading newspaper reports about other victims of sexual abuse at the hand of priests.
"I thought I was the only one," she said. "I was just in shock."
She said the settlement will allow her and other victims to finally begin putting the abuses behind them.
"I’m really relieved that it’s finally over," she said. "It was really drawn out. It was hard going through that."
The Society of Jesus operated St. Mary’s Mission and School for more than 60 years. Although the Society filed bankruptcy after being hit with the lawsuits, it will sell off assets to pay $48.1 million toward the settlement while its insurer will pay the remaining $118 million.
Tamaki said the abuse suffered by Native Americans has received little attention.
"This is the first time that it has been revealed that these atrocities happened to Native American students," he said.
— Phil Ferolito