Andrew Ba Tran
November 11, 2015
Father James Porter had been convicted in 1993 and sent to prison on 41 counts of sexual assault against children in several parishes.
Church officials had shuffled him from one parish to another, and the Fall River diocese had agreed to pay more than $7 million to Porter’s victims.
Retired in 1993 after 28 years as a priest
Column abbout Geoghan's sealed case files:
Either the church was ignorant of the kind of sexual abuse with which Geoghan is charged, or it knew enough to send its priests to treatment centers to try to curb their pedophilia.
If the latter is true, why didn't Law err on the side of caution and assign Geoghan to duties other than the parish work that put him in daily contact with children?
And why won't he tell his flock the extent of his supervision of Geoghan after he sent him back to work?
How could there have been at least 25 more victims after 1984 if the cardinal and his agents were being vigilant in efforts to protect children from a suspected sexual predator?
Spotlight began its investigation to determine:
Matt Carroll: The only member with more than a year on the team, specializing in computer-assisted reporting.
Walter “Robbie” Robinson: Started late 2000. 25 years at the Globe as a city political reporter, White House correspondent, and Middle East bureau chief.
Michael Rezendes: 11 years at the Globe. City Hall bureau chief, national reporter.
Sacha Pfeiffer: Court reporter who had already written about the Geoghan case.
How do you find out if the scandal went beyond a single priest?
How do you find out if the scandal went beyond a single priest?
A national trend. Remember Porter in Falls River?
The first case to become national news had occurred in 1985 in Lafayette, Louisiana, where 11 boys said they had been abused by their priest, Reverend Gilbert Gauthe.
A 93-page report was written by a priest, laywer, and psychiatrist predicting future scandals could cost the church a billion dollars.
But then it was shelved.
New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago had more Catholices.
But Boston had a higher percentage of Catholices in the region.
Church oversaw a huge network of parishes, schools, seminaries, convents, charities, and hospitals.
Pfeiffer had a reputation as a skilled and patient listener.
She made victims feel comfortable enough to tell their stories.
Victims sometimes were off-putting or incoherent.
It was one thing to suspect that sexual abuse in the church was “an epidemic,” quite another to hear the stories.
Carroll was the “keeper of the data.”
Kept a spreadsheet to keep track of the information.
The Catholic Directory gave the status and locations of all priests in the archdiocese.
Geoghan had been put on “sick leave” between church assignments.
Looked at 17 years' worth of directories.