National Catholic Reporter
Sep. 05, 2012
By Joshua J. McElwee
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The first Catholic bishop criminally charged in the decades-long clergy sex abuse crisis will not go before a jury, instead facing judgment from a local judge Thursday, according to court documents filed Wednesday.
The change indicates that Bishop Robert Finn, his Kansas City-St. Joseph, Mo., diocese, and county prosecutors have negotiated a set of “stipulated facts” they will present to the judge, who could rule the same day, said Mike Mansur, a spokesperson for the Jackson County, Mo., prosecutor’s office, where the bishop and diocese are charged.
Finn and the diocese had been set to go to trial by jury Sept. 24 on misdemeanor charges of failing to report suspicions of child abuse for their handling of Fr. Shawn Ratigan, a Kansas City priest who pleaded guilty earlier this month to federal charges of producing and attempting to produce sexually graphic material of minor girls.
“The parties in the case have been negotiating stipulated facts and testimony that will be presented tomorrow to the judge,” Mansur said. Following that presentation, he said, “we would expect then that the judge might rule in the case.”
The trial Thursday will come before Jackson County, Mo., Circuit Court Judge John Torrence. The trial could bring an abrupt end of sorts to a 15-month ordeal that has rankled the local Catholic community and has left many area Catholics questioning how the legal proceedings would affect them, their bishop and life in their parishes.
Jack Smith, the interim director of communications for the Kansas City diocese, said the diocese would have no comment on the matter while the case is pending.
Finn and the diocese each face two separate counts of failing to report suspicions of child abuse. Each charge against Finn carries a maximum penalty of one year in jail and a $1,000 fine. The diocese faces a fine of up to $5,000 for each charge.
While Ratigan was arrested in May 2011 on the child pornography charges, prosecutors say both Finn and the diocese should have reported Ratigan to police as early as December 2010, when they acknowledge becoming aware of lewd images of children on his laptop.
Finn and the diocese have pleaded not guilty to the charges.
A source inside the Kansas City diocesan chancery said Wednesday that Finn had been meeting with his lawyers for three days behind closed doors before the date change was announced.
That source, who asked not to be named, also said there has been anxiety at the chancery offices in the time leading to the trial.
“The general atmosphere is just one of anxiety,” said the source. “The closer we get to the trial, the more anxious people are. It’s just eating everybody up. It affects everything we do.”
On Aug. 2, Ratigan pleaded guilty to five of 13 federal counts of producing and attempting to produce sexually graphic material of minor girls. He has yet to be sentenced, but each charge separately carries between 15 and 30 years in prison.
Ratigan still faces similar charges in an ongoing case in Clay County, Mo., where the parish he last served as pastor is located.
In a separate agreement with prosecutors in that county in November, prosecutors suspended misdemeanor charges against Finn in the case as long as the bishop agreed to give the prosecutors immediate oversight of the diocese’s sex abuse reporting procedures in their county.
As part of the agreement, Finn agreed to monthly meetings with Clay County prosecutor Daniel White to discuss all reported suspicions of abuse in the county, one of 27 the diocese spans in western and northwestern Missouri.
A report commissioned by the diocese on its response to the Ratigan matter, released in August 2011 and conducted by former U.S. Attorney Todd Graves, found that “individuals in positions of authority reacted to events in ways that could have jeopardized the safety of children in diocesan parishes, school, and families.”
[Joshua J. McElwee is an NCR staff writer. His email address is jmcelwee@ncronline.org.]
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Case against bishop, diocese going to bench trial
The Sacramento Bee
The Associated Press
Published: Wednesday, Sep. 5, 2012 – 1:34 pm
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Jackson County prosecutors and attorneys for Bishop Robert Finn and the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph have agreed to have a judge hear their case weeks before their scheduled jury trial date.
Finn and the diocese are each charged with a misdemeanor count of failing to report suspected child abuse to the state. The charges stem from the Rev. Shawn Ratigan’s child porn case, in which church officials knew about photos on the priest’s computer but didn’t turn him in until six months later.
Finn has argued that he was not the diocese’s mandated reporter. He and the diocese also have challenged the constitutionality of the reporting law.
Judge John Torrence will hear the case at 2:30 p.m. Thursday and is expected to reach a verdict later that day.
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Judge to try misdemeanour case against Kansas City Bishop Finn, Catholic diocese on Thursday
The Montreal Gazette
The Associated Press
September 5, 2012 8:30 PM
By Bill Draper, The Associated Press
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The criminal case against the highest-ranking Catholic official in the U.S. to be charged with shielding an abusive priest is headed for a swift ending after prosecutors and the bishop’s lawyer agreed Wednesday to let a judge — not jurors — decide the case.
Attorneys for Kansas City Bishop Robert Finn and prosecutors will have their case tried by a judge Thursday, weeks ahead of a scheduled Sept. 24 jury trial on misdemeanour charges that Finn and the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph failed to report suspected child abuse. The judge is expected to reach a verdict later that day.
The charges stem from the Rev. Shawn Ratigan’s child porn case, in which church officials knew about photos on the priest’s computer but didn’t turn him in for six months. Finn has argued that he was not the diocese’s mandated reporter under the law — at the time, the responsibility rested mainly with Vicar General Robert Murphy — so Finn should not face charges.
Mike Mansur, spokesman for Jackson County prosecutor Jean Peters Baker, said his boss and attorneys for Finn and the diocese have negotiated a set of stipulated facts that will be presented to Judge John M. Torrence on Thursday.
A computer technician found child pornography on the Rev. Shawn Ratigan’s laptop in December 2010, and reported it to the diocese. Many of the hundreds of images of small children were focused on the crotch areas of the clothed children. One series showed the exposed genitals of a girl believed to be 3 or 4 years old.
Finn has acknowledged he was told in December 2010 about the images. The bishop also has acknowledged that a parochial school principal raised concerns about Ratigan’s behaviour around children in May 2010, half a year before the photos were found.
Murphy confronted Ratigan about the photos, and the next day, Ratigan was found in his garage with his motorcycle running and a suicide note that apologized for any harm he had caused. Ratigan was hospitalized but recovered.
Instead of contacting the state Division of Family Services as required by law, Finn sent Ratigan out of state for a psychological examination, and then ordered him to stay at a convent in Independence, Missouri, where he could say Mass for the nuns. Finn also ordered Ratigan to avoid contact with children.
Later, after the diocese received reports Ratigan had attended a St. Patrick’s Day parade and a child’s birthday party, Finn ordered that police be given copies of the photos recovered from Ratigan’s laptop.
Ratigan pleaded guilty last month to federal charges of producing and attempting to produce child pornography, admitting to taking photos of children 2 to 9 years old. Prosecutors said they will request that he spend the rest of his life in prison. A sentencing date has not been set.
The reader who sent me a link to this news posed the question: “Another sweet deal???”
It has that look, doesn’t it? I’m wondering if he has agreed to a guilty plea to something-or-other and hence the agreed upon statement of facts? and perhaps in exchange a “Tut Tut bad boy”?
It’s really quite bizarre. The last we heard was that the staffer who testified under oath that, after hearing of the lewd photos on Father Shawn Ratigan’s computer, Bishop Finn said “Boys will be boys” essentially recanted her testimony. At that time trial was scheduled to start 24 September.
Now it’s all going to be over and done with in one day? Tomorrow by the sound of it? No testimony? No witnesses? An agreed upon statement of facts? How can a judge determine guilt or innocence if there is no testimony and no cross-examination of witnesses – unless there is an agreement to a guilty plea? That’s the only thing which makes sense to me, but I suppose we shall see soon enough, and we will find out then if there is some other angle which allows this strange turn of events.
Another thought: Perhaps the prosecutor has decided he/she erred in laying the charges? Could that perchance be another scenario?