Church covered up Iowa priest's abuse of 50 boys for decades

[Omaha Steve]

Source: Omaha World Herald-AP

FORT DODGE, Iowa (AP) — A Roman Catholic diocese has hidden for decades a priest's admission that he sexually abused dozens of Iowa boys, a silence that may have put other children in danger, The Associated Press has learned.

The Rev. Jerome Coyle, 85, was stripped of his parish assignments in the 1980s but has never been defrocked or publicly identified by the church as a pedophile, even though the Diocese of Sioux City has been aware of his conduct for 32 years.

With diocese assistance, Coyle recently moved into a retirement home in Fort Dodge, Iowa, across the street from a Catholic school attended by hundreds of students.

In 1986, Coyle reported his "history of sexual attraction to and contact with boys" to Sioux City's bishop, revealing that he had victimized 50 youngsters over a 20-year period while serving in several Iowa parishes, according to a private letter written in February by the diocese vicar general and obtained by the AP.

FULL story at link below.

Read more: https://www.omaha.com/news/iowa/church-covered-up-iowa-priest-s-abuse-of-boys-for/article_4dfd29c6-3df6-56d6-bcf4-bca6e82c1e2e.html

[Bernardo de La Paz]

1. Duplicate of your own article just below on Home LBN column. . . nt

[Omaha Steve]

2. Thanks

Somehow the system did that. I killed the other post.

OS

[ZZenith]

3. God damn these people.

“a silence that may have put other children in danger.”

YA THINK?!!!

Yeah, that’s kind of the problem all decent people have been having with the RCC - they have put A LOT of children in danger and when they discovered it they just moved the danger to a new parish to harm even more children.

Where does the evil end?

[rurallib]

4. He's in the Sioux City diocese where my old HS principal escaped to

as Bishop during that time frame: (from your article)

The bishop to whom Coyle reported his abuse, Lawrence Soens, retired in 1998. A review board later found that Soens himself had abused students when he was a priest and parochial school principal.

As a member of the clergy, Soens was not a mandatory reporter — someone obligated to tell police about child abuse allegations — under Iowa law. But critics said he still should have called authorities, sought to have Coyle defrocked, alerted the public and asked victims to come forward. Soen's whereabouts are unknown.

My old high school principal. While he did not abuse me, he did abuse friends of mine. One friend had a long standing lawsuit against him. So much like Trumpco, you had one criminal covering another.

You can imagine how much my blood is boiling right now. I was abused by another priest in that town.

[cyberswede]

6. ...

[keithbvadu2]

5. Many states don't allow pedophiles to live near a school but it's OK with CC.

Many states don't allow pedophiles to live near a school but it's OK with CC.