Posted on 08/25/2003 5:53:12 AM PDT by NYer
BOSTON (AP) _ His crimes ruined young lives, and many say he destroyed their faith in the Roman Catholic church. But even some victims of defrocked priest John J. Geoghan didn't wish for the violent death he met. ``Many victims are disappointed,'' said attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who represents more than 200 alleged victims of Geoghan and other clergy. ``They wish Father John Geoghan had time to be in prison to reflect.''
Geoghan was allegedly strangled and beaten Saturday by Joseph L. Druce, a fellow inmate in the maximum security Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center in Shirley. The former priest molested nearly 150 boys over three decades and became a catalyst for the clergy sex abuse scandal that shook the foundations of the Catholic Church. ``He's never going to hurt anybody again, and at the same time, he still had a lot of penance to do on Earth,'' said Michael Linscott, 45, who claims he was abused by Geoghan from 1967 to 1972.
Geoghan, 68, was serving a nine- to 10-year sentence for assault and battery on a 10-year-old boy. He'd been in protective custody since being transferred to Souza-Baranowski in April, officials said.
Druce, 37, a reputed member of the neo-Nazi group Aryan Nation, is serving a life sentence for a 1988 murder. He also pleaded guilty to sending fake anthrax from prison to lawyers with Jewish-sounding names and was sentenced to an additional 37 months in prison. Worcester District Attorney John J. Conte said Druce will be charged with murder. He said Geoghan appeared to have been strangled, though an autopsy was scheduled for Monday.
An executive of the state corrections union, Robert W. Brouillette, told The Boston Globe and The Washington Post that Druce followed Geoghan into his cell and jammed the electronic cell door to prevent guards from opening it. Druce bound Geoghan's hands behind his back with a sheet and gagged him. He then repeatedly jumped onto Geoghan's body from a bed and beat him with his fists, Brouillette said. State correction officials declined to comment to The Associated Press on the reports. According to the Globe, Druce was in prison for the murder of George Rollo, 51, a bus driver who had picked him up hitchhiking. Druce, who then went by his birth name, Darrin E. Smiledge, attacked Rollo, stuffed him in the trunk of Rollo's car, drove him to a wooded area and strangled him.
Geoghan's abuses cut a wide swath through parishes in the Boston Archdiocese _ and he came to symbolize the horrors of pedophile priests and the exhaustive steps church hierarchy would take to keep the allegations under wraps.
John J. King, who was allegedly abused by former priest Ronald Paquin, said priests like Geoghan and Paquin needed rehabilitation, not death. ``I've been seeking counseling and I wanted the same for them,'' said King, who claims he was abused at 13, when Paquin was a priest working with youths in Methuen.
Geoghan was ordained in 1962, starting a 34-year career that took him to six different parishes. Along the way, he left behind a trail of allegations of predatory abuse. ``Geoghan personified the pedophile priest,'' said Jim Post, president of Voice of The Faithful, a lay reform group formed in the wake of the abuse scandal. Molestation scandals had hit the church in America for nearly two decades, with notorious cases involving priests and dioceses in Lafayette, La., in 1984; Fall River, Mass., in 1992; and Dallas in 1993. But in January 2002, the church's role in the handling of priests, long sealed in the courts, first came to light when a judge ordered the release of documents in Geoghan's civil cases. They showed that Geoghan continually had been allowed to return to pastoral service, despite mounting evidence of compulsive pedophilia. ``It was the first time objective evidence was produced to show that the Archdiocese of Boston, through its supervisors, allowed the abuse to continue,'' Garabedian said.
Geoghan eventually was granted early retirement in 1996 and praised for an ``effective life of ministry, sadly impaired by illness'' by Cardinal Bernard F. Law, who ultimately resigned in December 2002 for his role in the scandal. With legal troubles mounting, Geoghan was defrocked in 1998, and in December 1999 charged with raping and molesting three boys. The archdiocese eventually settled with 86 Geoghan victims for $10 million.
Following Geoghan's trial, lawyers representing hundreds of alleged abuse victims of other priests brought new cases, forcing the church to turn over tens of thousands more documents and revealing over time the previously unknown scope of the church's cover up.
AP-ES-08-25-03 0831EDT
God works in interesting ways. As I pointed out on an earlier thread, some of Geoghan's victims are feeling doubly victimized.
Shades of the old Boston Strangler, Druce has a prediliction for strangling. Someone like him should be watched every minute.
...said Michael Linscott, 45, who claims he was abused by Geoghan from 1967 to 1972.
That's an average of one new boy molested every two to three months for three decades - and some, like Linscott, were molested repeatedly over six years, even while Geoghan was (statistically, anyway) adding new boys to his list. Given the overall number of boys involved, the rate of new additions, and the duration of individual cases, Geoghan's social calendar must have been booked solid. When did this pedophile ever have time to perform any priestly functions?
And just for the irony of it, let's all read Cardinal Law's statement about Geoghan again, shall we?
(with an average of one new boy molested every two to three months for three decades...) "..an effective life of ministry, sadly impaired by illness..''
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.