City prosecutors had charged Lynn with felony child endangerment, but the state Superior Court ruled that the law that existed at the time did not cover people who did not directly supervise children.

Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams this week said he would appeal the ruling.

Williams criticised the archdiocese for helping Lynn post his $250,000 bail.

David Clohessy, director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests also criticised Chaput.

"Here's the message Chaput sends ... by bailing out Lynn: 'No matter how egregiously you misbehave and how many kids you endanger, we in the church hierarchy will continue to support you even if you're found guilty at trial,'" Clohessy said.

Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput defended his postion.

In a letter to clergy and parishioners Chaput said that helping Lynn come up with $25,000 to post 10 percent of his bail was "both reasonable and just."

Chaput described the appeals court decision as a matter of legal substance rather than technicalities.

Lynn "presents no danger to anyone," the archbishop wrote.

"He poses no flight risk. The funding for his bail has been taken from no parish, school or ministry resources, impacts no ongoing work of the church and will be returned when the terms of bail are completed. Nor does it diminish in any way our determination to root out the possibility of sexual abuse from the life of our local church."

Lynn remains on administrative leave and may not function in public as a priest.

Lynn recently won an appeal of his landmark conviction in the priest-abuse scandal was released from custody Friday after being fitted with an electronic monitoring device.

Lynn is the first U.S. church official to have been charged for hiding complaints that priests were molesting children.

He has spent the last 18 months in prison.

Source

• U-T San Diego

Ralph Cipriano, formerly religion reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer, suggests that Monsignor William Lynn "is sitting in jail for a crime that never happened".

Monsignor Lynn, formerly Philadelphia's vicar for clergy, was the first official of an American diocese to be convicted for transferring a known abuser priest from one parish to another. He was sentenced to serve three to six years in prison.

Cipriano says Monsignor's Lynn's conviction — and the related convictions of an other Catholic priest and a school teacher — came in "a couple of show trials shrouded in official secrecy and staged for political benefit".

He claims that the prosecution's cases relied on the testimony of "the least credible prosecution witness", a man with a long history of drug abuse who repeatedly changed his testimony about the abuse he claimed to have experienced.

Cipriano, a long-time critic of archdiocesan officials and their cover-up of sexual abuse, says: "I'm the last person to defend the Philadelphia archdiocese."

His article about the dubious circumstances of Monsignor Lynn's conviction was published in the National Catholic Reporter, a publication that is also frequently critical of Church officials.

He reports that a grand jury investigation in 2005 concluded that archdiocesan officials could not be charged with endangering children. But a new grand jury, convened by a prosecutor with an aggressive attitude toward the Church, produced a different result and opened the way for the trials.

The veteran reporter also notes that while pressing the case against Monsignor Lynn, the prosecutor chose not to bring charges against more prominent archdiocesan officials — including the late Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua and two former auxiliary bishops — who were never questioned about their involvement in, or knowledge of, plans to cover up evidence of sexual abuse by priests.

He says: "The two bishops were never questioned about what they knew about the shredding of incriminating documents ordered by Bevilacqua in 1994, including a memo and a list that Lynn compiled of 35 abuser priests then in active ministry."

Source:

National Catholic Reporter

Catholic World News

Image: Chronicle Herald

Bill Lynn was my classmate. I have known him for forty years. He is a good man and a good priest. Unfortunately, he was also a good soldier who did what Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, his archbishop at the time, told him to do.

This essay is not designed to exonerate Monsignor Lynn. It is however an attempt to help people understand why he acted as he did. It is also a proposal to prevent such behavior from happening again.

Bill is part of a hierarchical church that imposes obedience to the diocesan bishop on Her priests. It encourages priests to be team players. And it forces priests to seek affirmation and support within a diocesan structure. This system does not encourage challenges. As the old seminary saying goes, "You keep the rules and the rules will keep you."

From the moment of ordination a priest becomes intimately bound to his bishop and the presbyterate of his diocese. The bishop has complete control over a priest's life, materially - for sure, and often times spiritually on account of the decisions he makes in the priest's regard. Because of this priests look to their bishop as a father figure. They want to believe that his decisions are wise.

A great sign of success for a priest is to be invited to join the Diocesan Curia, the bishop's circle of collaborators in the administration of the diocese. The position of Vicar for the Clergy, the post held by Lynn from1990 - 2002, is just such a sinecure.

In this elite environment there are few priests who are willing to oppose the bishop's wishes for fear of falling out of favor.

Being a team player is important for any organization. It is a vital part of the clerical lifestyle. Camaraderie is strongly impressed upon priests.

Lynn is not innocent. He failed in his duty of care to children. His punishment is harsh, and I pray that it will be reduced. It serves, however, as a necessary message to bishops throughout the country that the system needs fixing. Continue reading

Image: Gloria TV

A jury found Monsignor William J. Lynn, the former archdiocesan secretary for clergy under Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, guilty on a charge of child endangerment.

He was acquitted on two other charges, including one of conspiracy. Another conspiracy charge was dropped during the trial.

Monsignor Lynn is the highest-ranking United States Church official to be charged with crimes relating to clergy sexual abuse.

The 61-year-old priest, who was not accused of abuse himself, faces up to seven years in prison. He is scheduled to be sentenced on August 13.

The jury found that, as the archdiocese's chief investigator of clergy misconduct, Monsignor Lynn ignored credible warning signs about a priest who later sexually assaulted a 10-year-old altar boy.

The prosecution argued that his response to claims of abuse against over 20 priests showed he focused on protecting the Church instead of children. They said he lied to some victims and did not seek out others.

The prosecutors also said he suggested to some sexually abusive priests that they may have been seduced by their accusers.

Monsignor Lynn said that prosecutors misconstrued his words and memos. He said medical experts had advised him not to seek out other possible victims because the victims might not want to discuss the abuse.

The verdict in the Philadelphia abuse case followed years of investigation and a trial that put a spotlight on thousands of confidential Church records and decades of complaints of child-sex abuse by priests in the region.

Many files were locked away in the archdiocese's secret archives, cataloguing decades of misconduct allegations against priests.

Sources:

• CNA
• CNS
• Philadelphia Inquirer
• Image: Ppnnfe.com

The lawyers contend that the real criminals are Bevilacqua and his advisors, and they are either dead or have not been charged in conjunction with this case.

Lynn, who's accused of keeping predator priests in ministry and transferring them from parish to parish, wants his child endangerment case dismissed because of new evidence turned over by the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, including his list of 35 accused priests.

Lynn took it upon himself to review secret church files after becoming secretary for clergy in 1992, and he later gave a list of accused, still-active priests to his superior, Monsignor James E. Molloy.

Bevilacqua had Molloy shred four copies of the predator priest list, according to a memo signed by Molloy and a witness. But Molloy kept a copy in a locked safe at the archdiocese, where it was found in 2006, after Lynn had moved on, according to his motion.

"It is clear from the Molloy memo, and (its) belated production, that Monsignor Lynn has been `hung out to dry,'" the defense motion says.

"Unbeknownst to anyone else and in violation of the cardinal's directive, Monsignor Molloy preserved a copy of this list in a different place - a safe to which no one else had a combination," the court documents said.

"The manner in which this memo was discovered is as shocking as its contents," the court filing said.

"As this newfound memorandum proves, the District Attorney's Office is entirely correct in its belief and assertion that an overarching Archdiocesan conspiracy existed in Philadelphia in the 1990s," said the court documents filed by Lynn's lawyers, who are paid by the Philadelphia Archdiocese.

"Its participants were Cardinal Bevilacqua, Bishop Cullen, Bishop Cistone and Monsignor Molloy," the court papers said. "Appallingly, none of these individuals is on trial."

Bevilacqua, who was to have been a witness at the trial, died on 31 January after suffering from dementia and cancer.

Sources

• The Tablet
• Reuters
• The Seattle Times
• Phiadelphia Inquirer
• Image: Bilgrimage blog