Boston Injury Lawyer Blog

By refusing to hear an appeal from the Vatican, the US Supreme Court has allowed a sexual abuse lawsuit against the Holy See to move forward. The clergy sexual abuse complaint accuses the Vatican of working with US church officials to transfer a priest to different cities in the wake of allegations that he was abusing a number of young people.

The sexual abuse complaint, John V. Doe v. Holy See, was filed in 2002. The plaintiff, who is now a grown male, says that Rev. Andrew Roman molested him on a number of occasions during the 1960’s. He claims that that the Vatican, the Archdiocese of Portland, and others protected the priest from having to be held accountable for his crimes by transferring him to different locations.

Per the clergy sex abuse complaint, Ronan starting molesting boys in the mid-1950’s when he was a priest in Ireland. He was then sent to Chicago and later transferred to St. Albert’s Church in Portland, Oregon, where he allegedly sexually abused the plaintiff. Prior to Ronan’s passing in 1992, the priest admitted that he molested three boys while in Illinois.

The Vatican’s US attorney has attempted to have the federal courts toss out the complaint on the grounds of sovereign immunity. Under the Foreign Sovereign Immunity Act, sovereign states are immune from lawsuits. However, the lower federal courts have ruled that there may be an exception in this case. One judge ruled that the connection between Ronan and the Holy See was strong enough that under state law he could be considered an employee of the Vatican. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the ruling. Meantime, the Vatican continues to maintain that it should not be held responsible for priests’ individual actions.

Massachusetts Sexual Abuse
Victims of sexual abuse are often left with permanent emotional and psychological scars for life. Sexual abuse is a crime. Over the years, the clergy sex abuse has injured many across the globe. In many cases, the Church looked away, and did not protect the victims—most of them children. Instead, the priests that were the abusers were the ones who were protected, which allowed many of them to continue molesting more people.

Court lets Vatican-sex abuse lawsuit move forward, Washington Post, June 28, 2010

Vatican Bid to Dismiss Suit On Abuse Won't Get Review, The Wall Street Journal, June 29, 2010

Related Web Resources:
Abuse in the Catholic Church, Boston Globe

John V. Doe v. Holy See, C9uscourts.gov (PDF)

Vatican: The Holy See

Continue reading "US Supreme Court Allows Sexual Abuse Lawsuit Against the Vatican to Proceed" »

Bob Oliva, a former high school boy’s basketball coach has pleaded not guilty to two counts of child rape and one count of disseminating pornography to a minor. Oliva, 65, is charged with raping sexually assaulting a 14-year-old boy, who was a family friend, at the Boston Sheraton in 1976.

The alleged victim, Jimmy Carlino, is now 48-years-old. He reported the alleged sex crime to Boston police last year. Massachusetts prosecutors can prosecute Oliva for the 34-year-old sex assault case because the statute of limitations stayed frozen as long as the former coach lived outside the state.

Oliva, considered one of the top high school coaches in New York for almost 30 years, won more than 540 games and five city championships while coaching basketball at a high school in Queens.

Boston Sexual Assault Lawsuits
In addition to reporting a sex crime to the authorities, you may be able to file a Boston sexual assault lawsuit against your assailant or the entity that employed your perpetrator. Sexual assault can consist of rape, inappropriate fondling, molestation, unwelcome kissing, or other sexual acts.

Just last week, a jury awarded Kerry Lewis $1.4 million for the sex abuse he experienced at the hands of Timur Dykes during the 80’s. The 38-year-old former Boy Scout sued the Boy Scouts of America for his personal injuries. The jury will determine next week whether to order the defendant to pay up to $25 million in punitive damages. Dykes admitted to molesting 16 other boy scouts in addition to Lewis.

Sexual assault can be painful, traumatic, and may lead to lasting scars that can impede the victim’s ability to lead a normal, healthy, and happy life. The victim may end up with medical and therapy expenses because of physical, emotional, and psychological injuries brought about by the sex crime. Many instances involving Boston sexual abuse involve attackers that the victim knows or trusts, such as a family friend, a relative, a teacher, a priest, a coach, a doctor, a group leader.

Ex-high school coach pleads not guilty, ESPN, April 13, 2010

Former Christ the King coach Bob Oliva indicted on two counts of child rape by Mass. grand jury, NY Daily News, March 25, 2010
Former Boy Scout Kerry Lewis Wins Sex Abuse Case Against Boy Scouts, Gets $1.4 Million, CBS News, April 14, 2010

Related Web Resources:
U.S. courts allow sex abuse cases against Vatican to proceed in rare legal move, Washington Post, March 27, 2010

Child Sexual Abuse, American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry

Continue reading "Boston Sexual Assault: Former High School Basketball Coach Faces Criminal Charges for 1976 Rape" »

Experts are watching to determine the outcome of a clergy sex abuse case involving defrocked priest Paul Shanley. Shanley was convicted of child rape and indecent assault and battery for abusing a 27-year-old man when he was just a young boy.

The victim would go on to receive a $500,000 Boston child sex abuse settlement for his personal injuries. He accused Shanley of repeatedly abusing him when he was a Sunday school student in Newton. He said that the abuse incidents, which began when he was 6, took place in the rectory, the pews, the confessional, and the boys’ room. He said it wasn’t until the clergy sex abuse scandal occurred that he remember what happened to him.

Three other men that Shanley was initially accused of sexually abusing were later dropped from the criminal case. All four men said that they didn’t remember the abuse until years later when they recovered memories they had repressed.

Now, Shanley is questioning his conviction and the validity of repressed-recovered memories. While some experts believe that it is indeed possible to recover memories of child sex abuse, others are questioning whether such memories are reliable.

Yet there are many cases involving victims who were unable to remember the molestation incidents until years after they happened. Some child sex abuse victims were too scared to report the abuse at the time or may have been too young to even understand what was happening to them. As a result, they waited until they were older to come forward.

The Catholic Church in the US has spent over $2.5 billion in clergy sex abuse settlements. Over 550 sex abuse victims were in the Boston archdiocese.

Sexual Abuse
Regardless of how old you were when the sexual abuse happen, sex abuse is traumatic, violating, and can cause serious damage to a victim. Some people may have to spend years in therapy undoing the harm that was done to them. They may turn to drug addition, alcoholism, or suffer from eating disorders to cope. There may be grounds for filing a child sexual abuse lawsuit against the perpetrator.

Convicted ex-priest challenges repressed memories, AP, September 9, 2009

‘Repressed memory’ at issue in defrocked priest’s appealhttp://www.altmanllp.com/lawyer-attorney-1353569.html, Boston Globe, September 9, 2009

Related Web Resources:
Archdiocese of Boston

Differences In Recovered Memories Of Childhood Sexual Abuse, Science Daily, February 4, 2009

Continue reading "Massachusetts Clergy Sexual Abuse: Defrocked Priest Paul Shanley Challenges Conviction for Indecent Assault & Battery and Child Rape" »

A former Buckingham Browne & Nichols student is suing the Cambridge, Massachusetts private school for the sexual abuse he says he suffered during the 80’s at the hands of an ex-English teacher. The man that Daniel Weinreib is accusing of abusing him, Edward Washburn, is now a convicted pedophile. He taught at the school for over two decades.

In his Massachusetts sexual abuse lawsuit, Weinreib, who graduated from the school in 1989, claims that Washburn sexually abused him from 1983 to 1985. He is seeking $1 million from the Cambridge school for personal damages and stress related to the abuse incidents that he maintains could have been prevented.

Last October, Head of School Rebecca Upham issued a public apology for the school's failure to respond appropriately to Washburn’s actions. Weinreib, however, says that BB & N has failed to do enough to put into place preventative measures that would prevent future sex abuse incidents from happening.

Washburn reportedly would make friends with young students in the 80’s and take them to his house in Lexington where he would exhibit pornographic materials and encourage them to engage in sexual acts in front of him. The former English teacher has admitted to engaging in inappropriate sexual conduct with children. He was given a suspended in 1987 after pleading guilty to molesting two boys, and he only had to do community service for the Massachusetts sex abuse crimes.

The Cambridge, Massachusetts private school had to pay a $70,000 settlement because it broke the law by not immediately telling police about Washburn’s abusive acts. Recently, Upham acknowledged that another former teacher, Andrew Goldman, was convicted of two counts of sending pornography to a minor in 2007. A spokesperson for BB & N disagrees with Weinreib’s claims that the school hasn't taken appropriate steps to prevent more incidents of sexual abuse from occurring.

Man seeks $1M from Cambridge private school after alleged sexual abuse, Patriotledger.com, May 11, 2009

Private school on Watertown border says it’s sorry for abuse, Wickedlocal.com, October 15, 2008

Related Web Resources:
Opening BB & N Minds

Sexual abuse by teacher protested, Boston.com, June 8, 2008

In Suffolk County Superior Court in Massachusetts, an unnamed plaintiff has filed a medical malpractice lawsuit suing pediatrician doctor Melvin D. Levine for sexual assault, battery, and abuse from 1980 to 1985. This is not the first time that Dr. Levine has been accused of sexual abuse by a former patient.

Several men have stepped forward claiming that the doctor sexually abused them at Children’s Hospital Boston when they were boys. At least four of the men are suing him in court. All of the men describe similar incidents of being abused by the doctor during medical examinations.

In this latest lawsuit, John Doe No. 5 says that Levine conducted unnecessary physical exams on him when he was a boy and engaged in acts of sexual assault, including masturbation and genital touching. He is also accusing Dr. Levine of making threats to assault him and trying to engage in other acts of sexual assault. The plaintiff says that he repressed the sex abuse memories for years until he took his own son to the doctor for the exam.

Between 1971 and 1985, Dr. Levine spent 14 years as the chief of ambulatory pediatrics at Children's Hospital Boston He is a bestselling author.

Dr. Levine, who has treated over 15,000 child patients, claims he is completely innocent of any allegation. Children’s Hospital says they never received any complaints about him while he was at the hospital.

Sex Abuse
A person who is sexually abused can file criminal charges against the perpetrator. He or she can also sue the abuser in civil court. The charges and lawsuits must be filed within the statute of limitations of the state where the abuse took place.

Sex abuse can result in personal injury to the victim, which can include physical, emotional, and mental injuries that can lead to alcoholism, depression, promiscuity, drug abuse, posttraumatic stress disorder, eating disorders, suicidal tendencies, sexual problems, intimacy issues, and broken relationships. It may be impossible to fully recover from the damages inflicted by sexual abuse, and medical and therapy costs can be very high.

There may, however, be civil remedies available to you for the harm that you or your child has suffered.

Lawsuit targets former pediatrician at Children's, Boston.com, March 31, 2008

Sex abuse claims filed against former Boston doctor, NECN.com, March 31, 2008

Related Web Resources:

Biography of Dr. Mel Levine, All Kinds of Minds

Children's Hospital Boston

The Associated Press says that it has found over 2500 cases of sex abuse involving teachers as perpetrators over a five-year period.

Sexually abusing a child is a crime. In addition to trying a predator in criminal court, however, he or she can be held liable in civil court if the victim or his or her family is willing to file a personal injury lawsuit against the abuser. In certain instances, the school or the school district could also be held liable if they could have prevented the abuse from happening but acted negligently—thereby allowing the abuse to happen.

According to a recent AP investigation, many teacher-student sex abuse cases never get reported and the abusers will often have victimized more than one student. Over the course of its seven month investigation, the AP discovered that from 2001 through 2005, 2570 educators had their teaching credentials denied, revoked, sanctioned, or surrendered because of abuse incidents. At least 1801 of the reported cases involved young people. Over 80% of the victims were students. At least 50% of the educators were convicted for sex crimes connected to these sex abuse cases.

Congress says that about 4.5 million of the approximately 50 million students in American schools will likely be abused by a school employee during their time in school.

In one such incident, involving multiple allegations of abuse, Gary Lindsey finally lost his teaching license in 2004—40 years after he was fired from a teaching post for molesting a little girl. After that first reported incident, he was simply rehired at other schools until Jennah Bramow, now 20, sued the schools in Cedar Rapids Iowa for failing to protect her and other students from being sexually abused.

She first came forward with her complaint in 1995. He was forced to retire following her complaint and complaints by two other girls but kept his license until Bramow sued him for and won her sex abuse lawsuit. She was awarded $20,000.

Other victims who had complained about being molested by Lindsay had accepted settlement deals and signed confidentiality agreements. Many of them say that Lindsey was reprimanded by different principals for his behavior but the records were always filed away.

Teachers, coaches, counselors, psychologists, teaching assistants, superintendents, and principals are not allowed supposed to sexually abuse the students placed under their care. Unfortunately, some of them do. Rape, molestation, distributing pornography, engaging in lewd behavior and making a student watch, sodomy, verbal harassment, inappropriate kissing, touching or hugging, and getting involved in a romantic or sexual relationship with a minor are all forms of sex abuse.

AP: Sexual Misconduct Plagues US Schools, ABC News, October 21, 2007

Related Web Resources:

Teacher Sex ABuse: Hard to Predict, CBS News, February 15, 2007

Child Sexual Abuse, Medline Plus