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MEXICO CITY — The Roman Catholic Church in Mexico confirmed on Friday that it has suspended seven priests, including one accused of abuse while serving in Los Angeles, from its diocese in the border city of Tijuana pending an investigation into alleged sexual harassment and abuse. The Archdiocese of Tijuana didn't reveal the names of the priests but it did confirm to The Associated Press that Rev. Jeffrey Newell was among them. Newell was first mentioned as being a part of the priests under investigation in a statement by the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, which is the...

The sexual abuse scandal at Cardinal Wuerl North Catholic High School has widened to at least 22 alleged victims, as the Diocese of Pittsburgh said on Wednesday that three more have come forward. The latest allegations implicate Marianist Brother William Kiefer, who was at the school from 1956 to 1962 and is now deceased, said diocese spokesman the Rev. Ron Lengwin. The number of accused Marianists is now nine, he said. The oldest allegation dates to the 1940s, Lengwin has said. Read more: http://triblive.com/news/allegheny/6305786-74/catholic-north-diocese#ixzz358XDTqJf Follow us: @triblive on Twitter | triblive on Facebook

A Catholic priest in northern Mexico is still nowhere to be found after 19 people filed a sexual abuse criminal complaint against him with authorities late last month. Eduardo Córdova, a clergyman and legal representative for the church in the state of San Luis Potosi, is accused of using his clout to prey upon minors over the course of his 30-year career.

ST. LOUIS (AP) - A Catholic priest from St. Louis is facing a court hearing on charges that he had sexual contact with a 14-year-old boy. The Rev. Joseph Jiang faces two counts of statutory sodomy. Jiang worked at the Cathedral Basilica and is accused of sexually abusing a student at St. Louis Cathedral School. His lawyer has said Jiang denies the allegations.

Calling slain civil rights hero Harvey Milk a “predator” on its website this week, the fundamentalist Christian group American Family Association (AFA) urged members to refuse any mail postmarked with a recently-released commemorative stamp featuring the late San Francisco supervisor. “Harvey Milk was a very disreputable man and used his charm and power to prey on young boys with emotional problems and drug addiction,” reads the AFA’s press release. “He is the last person we should be featuring on a stamp.”

Pope Francis told reporters on Tuesday that “three bishops are under investigation” for misdeeds related to the sexual abuse of minors and that “one has already been condemned and his penalty is being studied.” The Pope’s statement during the news conference aboard his flight from Israel back to Italy came after he was asked what he would do if a bishop did not observe church norms regarding a moral, and often legal, obligation to report allegations of sexual abuse against a member of the clergy.

A defrocked Catholic priest and convicted child molester was held without bail Thursday after being arrested in Chicago a day earlier for a sex crime that authorities say occurred in 2005. Officials said in court Thursday a 10-year-old victim was attending an after school program at St. Agatha's church, where McCormack was a priest. Prosecutors allege that McCormack took the boy to a White Sox game, and after the game hugged the boy and reached into his pants and fondled him, ordering him not to tell anyone. Source: http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/defrocked-priest-daniel-mccormack-sex-abuse-charges-court-260272101.html#ixzz332JU8F00 Follow us: @nbcchicago on Twitter | nbcchicago on Facebook

Six men with links to a notorious Irish Catholic brotherhood have been arrested and charged in connection with multiple allegations of child abuse at a residential school in Fife during the 1970s and 1980s. The six men, now aged between 60 and 76, were spoken to by police as part of an investigation into allegations of sexual abuse, beatings and mental torture at the former St Ninian’s School in Falkland.

Editor's Note: This column was co-authored by Jerome Elam.Behind the green curtain is where my world began to end. It was where my innocence was forever washed away in a porcelain pan filled with developer. Grainy images brought into strong relief on white paper that would become forever etched on my soul. It all began at the age of eight when my mother enrolled me in an after school program. My parents were divorced at that time, both with demanding careers, and the time we spent together was subject to the requirements of their jobs. An after school counselor began...

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — A suspended priest of the Diocese of Caguas, Puerto Rico, was arrested May 13 by federal authorities for allegedly transporting a minor with the intent to engage in criminal sexual activity and sexual trafficking of minors. Father Israel Berrios, 58, was arrested at his home in Naranjito without incident, according to a May 14 press release by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations unit, which conducted the investigation. The Associated Press reported that Father Berrios has been accused of sexually abusing an altar boy from the time he was about 8 until he...

The clergy sex abuse lawsuit against the Twin Cities archdiocese headed northwest Monday, when documents related to child abuse by five monks at St. John’s Abbey in Collegeville, Minn., were released and a lawsuit was filed to pry open the abbey’s files. The letters and internal memos were among the thousands of pages of documents the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis provided to attorneys as part of a lawsuit. They covered five monks previously identified as abusers — including the Rev. Richard Eckroth, who brought hundreds of students to an abbey cabin for overnight trips.

In August of 2011, the former child actor Corey Feldman made a stunning assertion to ABC News: "I can tell you that the No. 1 problem in Hollywood was and is and always will be pedophilia. That's the biggest problem for children in this industry ... It's the big secret." The rest of the media said nothing. Almost three years later, it's happening again. The Los Angeles Times reported on April 18 that "X-Men" director Bryan Singer "has been accused in a federal lawsuit of drugging and sexually assaulting an aspiring teenage actor in the 1990s." Michael Egan III...

Bryan Singer, director of X-Men and other Hollywood blockbusters, has been hit by another legal suit alleging he sexually assaulted a minor, The Daily Beast can reveal. Singer was already accused by the lawyer for Michael Egan, 31, of allegedly sexually assaulting and physically abusing Egan in a series of incidents in Hawaii and California as a teenager. The new lawsuit filed by Egan’s attorney, Jeff Herman, alleges that Singer and Broadway producer Gary Goddard sexually assaulted a British teenager. He is known in the lawsuit as “John Doe No. 117,” fearing “further psychological injury” if his name is disclosed.

Lawsuits alleging the sexual abuse of minors in a Hollywood pedophilia ring were filed in Hawaii Monday against three prominent Hollywood executives: David Neuman, Gary Goddard, and Garth Ancier. The suits were announced at the Four Seasons Hotel by Jeff Herman, the attorney representing Michael Egan, the man who alleges he was sexually abused by "X-Men" director Bryan Singer as a teen. Variety reports that: Ancier is the former president of BBC Worldwide America and headed the Fox entertainment group while Neuman is the former president of Disney TV. Goddard heads a design firm in Los Angeles which has created...

Famous Hollywood director Bryan Singer has been accused in a new federal lawsuit of sexually abusing a 15-year-old boy. The suit, filed Wednesday in federal court in Hawaii, accused the 48-year-old “X-Men” filmmaker of first preying on the 15-year-old aspiring actor at a party at a California mansion where underage boys were plied with drugs and alcohol and taken advantage of. “The stories that I’ve heard of what went on at the estate are truly despicable,” the accuser’s lawyer, Miami attorney Jeff Herman, told the Daily News Wednesday night. Herman identified the accuser as Michael Egan III. Egan, who is...

A week ago, Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco, head of the Italian Episcopal Conference, defended the Vatican’s policy of not requiring clergy to report child sex abuse to the authorities. “The Vatican requires national laws to be respected, and we know that there is no such duty (to report abuse) under Italian law,” he told reporters. It was a disappointment because Pope Francis had just appointed a commission to advise him on sex-abuse policy. Bagnasco’s comments sounded like business as usual.

Claims of widespread child sex abuse at four Christian Brothers-run WA boarding schools will be investigated as part of a nationwide inquiry. The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse will hold its first WA public hearing at the end of this month. It will hear from dozens of former boarders who spent time as young boys at Castledare Junior Orphanage in Wilson, St Vincent’s Orphanage in Clontarf, St Mary’s Agricultural School in Tardun, and Bindoon Farm School.

The Archdiocese of Chicago agreed to pay $1.68 million to $2.1 million to settle a lawsuit that alleged former priest and convicted sex offender Daniel McCormack sexually abused a former fifth grade student at Our Lady of the Westside School, the plaintiff’s attorney announced Wednesday. The agreement settles a suit brought against the archdiocese and Cardinal Francis George in December, 2011. The suit was filed by a male Chicago plaintiff, now 23, who chose to remain anonymous and is identified as John Doe. It alleged that at various times in the 2000 to 2001 school year, McCormack “inappropriately sexually touched,...

Bishop Frank Caggiano has agreed to meet with representatives of national and local victim support groups who Wednesday called for him to hire an outside firm to investigate two priests who have been accused in the past of sex abuse -- one who admitted he hid more than 40 years of abuse complaints. But Barbara Blaine, president of the Chicago-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said although she is willing to meet with Caggiano, she would prefer to do so after he agrees to the investigation. "History has shown that meetings don't always bear fruit, but actions speak...

A 61-year-old Catholic priest has been jailed for seven years for systematically sexually abusing a boy in Co Wicklow over a five year period beginning in 2007 when the boy was 12. Denis Nolan, with an address at Carrigmore, Tinahely, pleaded guilty to sexual assault at that address between 1 January and 30 June 2007. He also pleaded guilty to a total of ten counts of defilement of a child between 1 July 2007 and 25 August 2011.