Curia council halted Bishop Cauchi from reporting clerics to police
Karl Stagno-Navarra Reporting sex abuse scandals by clerics to the Police was an option considered by Maltese Bishops almost 20 years ago, however a Presbyterian Council had recommended the Curia to be ‘diligent’ and protect ‘its sons’ by investigating them internally.
A Response Team was set up in 1999 as a result of a lengthy discussion within the Presbyterian Council that confronted former Gozo Bishop Nikol Cauchi who had originally proposed reporting clerics to the police when cases of sex abuse were brought to the attention of the Curia.
Speaking to MaltaToday, Bishop Emeritus Nikol Cauchi said: “I told the Presbyterian Council that the easiest way for Bishops was to refer the cases to the police, but the council members replied that it was a matter of looking deeper into the issues, and putting it at par to a situation where a father, learning about his sons’ evils, would turn him in to the police.”
As the Response Team was formed, Cauchi explained that the Curia had asked the Vatican for guidance: “We informed the Vatican about the Response Team and they stressed that we still send the findings from the investigations to the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith.”
Bishop Cauchi categorically denied that he or former Archbishop Joseph Mercieca had ever hidden guidelines laid out by the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith from the Response Team, as was suggested to MaltaToday by senior officials within the same team.
The guidelines – prepared in 2001 and updated in 2003 by then Cardinal Jozef Ratzinger – were issued by the Vatican for the exclusive consumption of Bishops worldwide.
The guidelines were reproduced last Monday on the Holy See’s website, in what appears to have been an attempt to quell international criticism over the response by the Church to cases of alleged sex abusers that have tarnished the Papacy of Pope Benedict XVI who this morning will concelebrate mass on the Granaries in Floriana.
Senior Vatican sources told MaltaToday that the guidelines “only oblige Bishops to immediately report abuse cases to the police, where it is obligatory, such as in the United States.”
The source explained that in the case of Malta, where a police report would necessitate a victim to come forward and give evidence to support a case in Court, such an obligation on Bishops was not necessary by law.”
However the anomaly remains on how to treat such cases, and how the local Church reacted to such allegations throughout the years in Malta.
Three clerics are in fact under prosecution before a Criminal Court because the victims made a police report and followed their allegations with evidence before a magistrate.
But while the Vatican guidelines remain open to interpretation, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi has reportedly sounded Home affairs minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici on the possibility of amending the laws that would permit the police to act on reports of sexual abuse without the need for a victim to come forward.
While many argue that the Response Team was a positive move from the Church to counter an increasing number of allegations of sex abuse by priests, legal experts stressed that the directives in force since 2003 could have made the Response Team “dysfunctional” as it allegedly acted ‘outside’ of its remit.
Speaking to MaltaToday – Wednesday edition – Judge Victor Caruana Colombo, the Head of the Curia’s Response Team, warned that under these directives (whereby bishops must report such crimes to the police), spells “an end” to the same Response Team.
But he explained that under Canon Law, any investigation conducted by the Response Team is protected by absolute confidentiality and cannot be reported to the police. He added: “I am definitely bound by confidentiality, hence I cannot report to anybody, neither the police nor to anybody else.”
According to Caruana Colombo, “the investigation would have to remain secret unless Canon Law is changed.”
Caruana Colombo still has to discuss the latest developments with the Archbishop and a decision on the future of the Response Team remains in the balance, as the directives have opened the door to a myriad of legalistic problems for both Church and State.
When asked how this dichotomy between Canon Law and the Vatican’s directive was going to be solved, Caruana Colombo replied: “it is up to them to solve it.”
When asked to explain the responsibilities of a Bishop when dealing with cases of sex abuse by clerics, Mgr. Nikol Cauchi talked about the trauma suffered by the Church leaders, the victims and their families in cases like these, and stressed that it is now up to the Vatican to clarify the way forward of how to tackle such cases.
“The Church always acted correctly, in good faith and most importantly always kept the victims in their sights for support and compassion,” Bishop Cauchi said.
Meanwhile, German bishops announced last Thursday that they would revise their abuse guidelines to bring in prosecutors early to investigate.
Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger told the head of the German Bishops Conference, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch, that internal church investigations must not hinder prosecutors’ work.
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