Bill Donohue comments on the way New Jersey newspapers and politicians are reacting to cases of clergy sexual abuse:
A priest gropes a teenager 12 years ago while wrestling and is told not to be around minors unless supervised. He breaks the agreement. Here’s how New Jersey newspapers and politicians responded.
Calling for the resignation of the priest’s boss, Newark Archbishop John J. Myers, are the following: the Newark Star-Ledger, the Asbury Park Press, Sen. Joseph Vitale, Sen. Barbara Buono, Sen. Stephen Sweeney, and Assemblywoman Valerie Vainieri Huttle. This wasn’t good enough for The Record: it called upon lawmakers to tax church property.
An Orthodox rabbi forces an 11-year-old boy to have sex, and over the course of two years he molests him in the woods, in a storage room, in his car, and in the basement of a synagogue. The boy’s father, a rabbi, brings this to the attention of a prominent rabbi in the Lakewood Orthodox community, seeking justice in a rabbinical court. Nothing is done. No cops are called. This goes on for two years. The boy is taken to a therapist, but she also refuses to notify the authorities. The boy’s father finally reports this to law enforcement, and for this he is punished by his community, loses his job, and is forced to move his family out of state. Yesterday, the raping rabbi pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting the boy.
None of the newspapers or politicians who called for Archbishop Myers to resign have said a word about the raping rabbi.*** None has called for a lawsuit against the Jewish leaders who protected the raping rabbi. None has even identified who the “prominent rabbi” is in Lakewood who allowed this to happen. And none has called for lawmakers to tax the property of synagogues. They are too concentrated on the groping priest. ***The Asbury Park Press ran an editorial on May 7 condemning what happened. We regret the error.
The disparate treatment can only be called corruption. These editorial writers and politicians are an absolute disgrace. Their credibility is shot.
Contact the person who started this journalistic malpractice, Tom Moran of the Star-Ledger: tmoran@starledger.com
