Posted on 06/28/2010 12:23:09 PM PDT by NYer
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court refused on Monday to consider whether the Vatican has legal immunity over the sexual abuse of minors by priests in the United States, allowing a lawsuit filed in 2002 to go forward.
The nation's highest court, asked to rule on a U.S. appeals court decision that cleared the way for the lawsuit to proceed, rejected the Vatican's immunity appeal without comment.
The lawsuit, filed by a plaintiff identified only as John Doe, claimed he was sexually abused on several occasions in the mid-1960s when he was 15 or 16 by a Roman Catholic priest named Father Andrew Ronan.
According to court documents, Ronan molested boys in the mid-1950s as a priest in Ireland and then in Chicago before his transfer to a church in Portland, Oregon, where he allegedly abused the victim who filed the lawsuit. Ronan died in 1992.
The Vatican claimed immunity under a U.S. law, the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976, that allows foreign states to avoid being sued in court.
But the law contains exceptions. The appeals court cited one of those, ruling the lawsuit has sufficiently alleged that Ronan was an employee of the Vatican acting within the scope of his employment under Oregon law.
Pope Benedict met victims of abuse by priests during his April 2008 visit to the United States. The U.S. church has paid $2 billion in settlements to victims since 1992.
In recent months, child abuse allegations against Catholic priests have rocked the United States and Europe, forcing resignations of bishops in Ireland, Belgium and Germany in the biggest crisis in Benedict's five-year pontificate.
In the Oregon case, the Obama administration backed the Vatican and said the appeals court erred in ruling that a victim's claim of sexual abuse by a priest
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
Ping!
This sounds kind of serious.
I think some have it in for the church.
“The Vatican claimed immunity under a U.S. law, the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976, that allows foreign states to avoid being sued in court.”
I might get flamed for this, but I think the Vatican has no business shielding these priests under any law. They should be tried and fried. The Church wasn’t doing diddly to remove and excommunicate these priests and wasn’t protecting the children under their watch. So no, the Vatican has no business claiming immunity. They knew and they deserve to be worse than jailed in my opinion.
Would they lose their property?
Since when is sexual abuse of a minor within the scope of a priest's employment?
Since his employer had actual knowledge of his having abused minors in the past and, with that knowledge, placed him in a position where he could continue his abuse.
It is not. Each Bishopric and each parish are generally separate corportations, with the Holy See being its own soverign nation. The question is whether FISA permits a direct action againsth the Holy See. This case holds it does not, except to the extent that Father Ronan my be considered to be an "employee" of the Holy See.
The interesting part of the case is the extent to which the Holy See will now be required to comply with discovery requests. The barbarian has breached the gate.
Either way, the Vatican needs to open up. They need to tell the law. Too many perverts have hurt too many children and done too much damage.
But the law contains exceptions. The appeals court cited one of those, ruling the lawsuit has sufficiently alleged that Ronan was an employee of the Vatican acting within the scope of his employment under Oregon law.Exactly.
If priests are employees of Rome then how do we explain the fact that they don't answer to Rome? How can priests all over this country refuse to do what the Pope says if they are his employees? If we are going to see priests as such in this nation then I think we should all accept the consequences of that and actually see what would happen if they did work for Rome. Something tells me things would be very different if that were so. I think I might enjoy that very much.
The problem is that they do have foreign sovereign immunity. They would be tried in Vatican courts, not in the US.
That indicates gross negligence, not that sexual abuse of a minor is within the scope of a priest's employment. The phrase "within the scope of employment" refers to duties and required activities, not those activities which are forbidden, and in this case - expressly forbidden.
You wrote:
“I might get flamed for this, but I think the Vatican has no business shielding these priests under any law.”
They’re not shielding priests. The priests are HERE. They’re not in Vatican City.
“The Church wasn’t doing diddly to remove and excommunicate these priests and wasn’t protecting the children under their watch.”
It’s the BISHOPS’ job to do that. It happens in DIOCESE not in Vatican City.
“So no, the Vatican has no business claiming immunity.”
And you’re wrong.
“They knew and they deserve to be worse than jailed in my opinion.”
They didn’t know - as has been proven numerous times right here at FR.
You wrote:
“Either way, the Vatican needs to open up.”
No, it doesn’t.
” They need to tell the law.”
Already did.
“Too many perverts have hurt too many children and done too much damage.”
And none of it happened in the Vatican.
“If priests are employees of Rome then how do we explain the fact that they don’t answer to Rome? How can priests all over this country refuse to do what the Pope says if they are his employees?’
Good question. The Vatican can reassign errant priests wherever they want.
“If we are going to see priests as such in this nation then I think we should all accept the consequences of that and actually see what would happen if they did work for Rome. Something tells me things would be very different if that were so. I think I might enjoy that very much.”
which is why the Vatican should be supported here. What Obama wants to do is destroy the sovereign immunity of the Holy See. Ie, have the lawsuit allow him to pull stuff out of the Vatican, not the diocese in particular. It’s a great argument for them because they have salivated for a long time to sue the church and take all the money away, and to any globalists, the biggest affront is the Vatican.
If there was someone with actual supervisory control over the perp who knew and negligently let it go on, or who functioned as an accessory, and if the law establishes mens rea ---"guilty mind" or "criminal intent" as one of the necessary elements of a crime --- then, whether it be a bishop, or a school principal or a teacher or mother or father ---- let that person be prosecuted to the hilt, to hell and back.
But---if I can fumble toward an analogy here--- I would say a priest's spiritual relationship with his bishop is like that of a son; but in the legal sense, it's somewhat like that of an independent contractor. Functionally, a priest is retained to provide certain services (say Mass, administer the Sacraments, maintain the buildings and grounds, elicit active cooperation from parishioners, etc.) but who is subject to the control and direction of the bishop only as to the end result and not as how he schedules his day.
The individual priest is in no way whatsoever an employee of the Vatican: he gets no salary, wage, or compensation from the Vatican; the Vatican does not define his particular job duties; the Vatican has no supervisory control over him.
The critical point here legally, and what distinguishes an independent contractor and an employee or agent, is that the contractor controls his own schedule, his own day-to-day comings and goings, his own use of the resources for the overall mission, his own "hours," even his own budget.
And the relationship between Bishops and the Pope is similar (not employees, not agents, more lik independent contractors) except that Bishops have much more functional autonomy than a parish priest.
The Church has its own structure, decentralized as to formal oversight and very localized in terms of finance and clergy compensation. Criminal law should land hard not on the "structures," but on the individuals guilty of crime.
And promptly: not wringing blood from the dessicated corpse of a perp who died 20 years ago, concerning a crime that occurred 50 years ago.
As for seizing our parishes, or bashing our dioceses like pinatas, going after the biggest structures they can reach (the Vatican!) so they can scramble for the maximum amount of payout: no.
I really don't think that's right.
Let's slam the criminals. Can I get an amen?
I disagree with Doe to the extent that it granted immuninty based upon FISA Section 16052(a)(2), which excepts commercial activity from immunity:
(a) A foreign state shall not be immune from the
jurisdiction of courts of the United States or of the
States in any case —
. . .
(2) in which the action is based upon a commercial
activity carried on in the United States by the
foreign state; or upon an act performed in the United
States in connection with a commercial activity of
the foreign state elsewhere; or upon an act outside
the territory of the United States in connection with
a commercial activity of the foreign state elsewhere
and that act causes a direct effect in the United
States;
I think soliciting and collecting charitable donations and maintaining anddisciplining an organization to accept them is a commercial activity that subject the Holy See to jurisdiction. Same would be true for Iran, Saudi Arabia, the Palestinina Authority or any other sovereign that gleans the fruit of our bounty as donations and then does harm.
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