"The Darkest Two Years of My Life" The Story of a Priest Falsely Accused

August 28, 2012 By TheMediaReport.com 

"Walking on air": Rev. Eugene Boland is thrilled after being exonerated

Very few priests speak publicly about their horrifying ordeals of being falsely accused of child sex abuse, but Rev. Eugene Boland is doing so after a jury in Derry, Ireland, unanimously found him not guilty in June of the flimsy claim that he had somehow "inappropriately touched" a girl over two decades earlier.

The verdict brought an end to what the priest now calls "the darkest two years of my life."
From "a priest's worst nightmare" to victory

On March 31, 2010, Fr. Boland received the phone call that every priest fears. His bishop was on the line, and he told him to contact the diocese's child safeguarding leader the next day.

"That was a bleak day," Boland told the Irish Independent. "It just came out of the blue … I was shell-shocked. I'm sitting in my home on my own. I didn't know what the allegation was, or who was making it."

"I didn't sleep that night," says the priest.

The popular priest was eventually ripped from the ministry he so loved and forced to withstand screaming front-page headlines about his case, aggressive police tactics, and a high-profile criminal trial.

Throughout the ordeal, however, Boland felt a sense of "relief" over the fact that he knew he was innocent and there would be an opportunity to publicly make his case.

When the jury returned the unanimous "not guilty" verdicts, the priest could not have been more ecstatic. "I could have skipped down the street outside the courthouse. There was an overwhelming feeling of relief – that I had been heard and I had been vindicated.

"I have been walking on air ever since," says Fr. Boland.

And even though the priest's parishioners have been "extremely angry" at the accuser for lodging her completely bogus allegation, Boland has told the Derry Journal that he has "forgiven that person because to hold bitterness or anger would weigh me down … I always believed the truth would come out in the end."

Issues still unresolved
Although this story has a happy ending, there are still some aspects are troublesome.
Even though Rev. Boland was exonerated two months ago, he has yet to return to his parish assignment, as he still awaits official word from Rome for permission to return to ministry. Why the long wait?

In addition, the media still have not addressed the patent unfairness of Catholic priests being forced into having to prove that they didn't do something decades earlier. Think about it. How does one go about this? As Joe Maher, president of Opus Bono Sacerdotii ("Work for the Good of the Priesthood"), once said, "If you think it's tough proving an allegation from 30 years back, try disproving it."

The platform for accused priests is literally "guilty until proven innocent," yet very few people seemed too worked up about this unjust predicament, especially those in the media. And if there any evidence of men from other professions having to endure these same ordeals of trying to disprove allegations from so long ago, we haven't seen it.

Our world's priests remain very vulnerable targets, as this case amply demonstrates.

The Catholic Sex Abuse Crisis in Ireland That Isn’t

June 5, 2012 By TheMediaReport.com 

If one were to believe the mainstream media, the Catholic Church in Ireland is reeling from a burgeoning and active network of pedophile priests relentlessly preying on innocent children.
However, the recent release of the annual report from the Catholic Church's National Board for Safeguarding Children (NBSC, Ireland) tells a radically different story.
While even a single abuse allegation is upsetting, from April 1, 2011, to March 31, 2012, of 237 total allegations of abuse against Catholic priests, only six accusations alleged abuse within the past dozen years, since 2000. This represents one allegation every other year in all of Ireland in recent memory.
In other words, as in the United States, the abuse of children by Catholic priests in Ireland is a tragic era from years past.
However, don't look for these facts to be reported the next time the New York Times reports about the Catholic Church and sex abuse in Ireland.

The False Accusation Scandal

Written by John Horvat II

When talking about the enormous decline in sexual abuse cases inside the Catholic Church in recent years, it is customary to preface the remarks by saying that even one case of the clerical abuse of minors is too many. Such a qualifier is completely justified. The sacred dignity of the priesthood demands that priests be held to high standards. The innocence of children (so destroyed by our hypersexualized culture) must be safeguarded at all costs. Even a single case of sexual abuse of minors is one too many.

However, a second qualifier should also be made when talking about the scandals. In the cases of sexual abuse accusations against priests, a single false accusation is one too many. There must be an equal zeal to defend the honor of reputable priests whose lives are being ruined by fraudulent claims and unscrupulous accusers. It cannot be tolerated that to the scandal of clerical abuse of children is now added the scandal of Catholic priests being falsely accused.

However, this is exactly what is happening. David F. Pierre’s latest book Catholic Priests Falsely Accused: The Facts, The Fraud, The Stories is an incredible account of this great unreported scandal. He tells not just a few isolated cases but documents a systemic disregard for the reputation of priests, a hostile judicial review of cases and a marked media bias against the Catholic Church.

It is a tale that needs to be told. Countless priests have been falsely accused of committing horrific child abuse. This creates a climate of psychological terrorism which forces priests to live in the knowledge that a single phone call from the most flimsy witness about the most distant past can lead to a priest being banished from his flock and ministry immediately — sometimes within hours. He can expect no support from media.

David F. Pierre, Jr.

Sometimes, even his own bishop assumes him guilty until proven innocent. When a priest’s reputation is finally cleared, the stain of the abuse claim lingers long afterwards.

David F. Pierre’s prior book Double Standard: Abuse Scandals and the Attack on the Catholic Church dealt with the media mistreatment of the scandals. This book puts a human face on the false accusations as he tells the stories of those who have suffered injustice at the hands of the unscrupulous. The author tells in detail the personal sufferings of several innocent priests and how the false claims impacted their lives. One case he cites is a monsignor who waited five years to

be exonerated of abuse charges even though his alleged victims denied having been molested.

Equally shocking is the extent of the false accusations based on flimsy evidence. The author tells, for example, how a recent and reliable report reveals that one third of accused Catholic priests in one major archdiocese were accused falsely. Estimates of false claims made against the Church in America from credible sources range from 17 to 50 percent. Mr. Pierre also shows how accusers have retained huge monetary settlements even though their allegations later proved to be false.

This book is fast-paced, informative, and impeccably researched. The false accusations are a scandal that must be exposed. As long as there is one false accusation, it is one too many.

Guilty Until Proven Guiltier

by John Horvat II

No one denies that some priests have terribly abused minors, and some bishops failed to act properly to stop this unspeakable harm. This is the qualifier that must be placed before any rational discussion of the sexual abuse scandals.

However, there is a story that is not being told. In the hysteria surrounding these scandals, many innocent priests are being falsely accused. No one tells their story. David F. Pierre’s book Double Standard: Abuse Scandals and the Attack on the Catholic Church is a book that does much to expose this grave injustice.

The book is incredibly focused. It does not seek to enter into the details of many of the cases he cites. His message is simple: There is a double standard involved in the prosecution of abuse cases. There is a one-sided bias that assumes any priest who has been accused is “guilty until proven guiltier.”

The author cites case after case of media mistreatment of the scandals. One finds total publicity for those making accusations and little exposure for the priests to proclaim their innocence. The slightest charge receives a media uproar whereas the rampant abuse in the public schools and administrative cover-up get almost no coverage. Decades-old cases involving deceased priests are treated as if they happened yesterday and are constantly rehashed by the media. One often sees all the efforts the Church has made to remedy the situation ignored by activists and reporters.

However, the worst part of this attack is that the priests themselves are marked forever as an accused. When priests are exonerated, their innocence is rarely reported and some are taken out of their ministries “just in case.” Some of these are priests with excellent records of decades of parish work without incident. The priest who has every right to his good reputation is not given this right. A number of priests have even refused to plea bargain and admit to a guilt they do not have. One of these chose to go to prison until he can establish his complete innocence.

Mr. Pierre cites numerous cases of false accusations – and false settlements which again are rarely reported. Many dioceses without the resources to get involved in many lawsuits simply make a joint settlement which assumes guilt on decades-old cases and besmirches the good names of the dead who have no defense. At times diocesan officials did not even ask for specifics about the time and place of alleged abuse, turning the settlement into something similar to “a trip to an ATM machine.”

Indeed, there is a double standard which the book well documents. In the name of one scandal, another one has been created by those leading the charge to associate every Catholic priest with abuse. There should be one standard – the standard of justice where everyone is innocent until proven guilty and not “guilty until proven guiltier.”



To purchase Double Standard: Abuse Scandals and the Attack on the Catholic Church by David F. Pierre, Jr., please click here for our Amazon.com link. A percentage of what you pay will benefit the TFP.

Abuse Victims Refuse to be Victimized Again

Last April, the National Catholic Reporter ran a story on the so-called "Victims' Summit," a gathering of alleged victims of priestly sexual abuse scheduled to take place in St. Peter's Square on October 31. At that time, Bernie McDaid, one of the organizers, predicted they would amass 50,000 people in a massive show of anger against the Catholic Church.

Such rallies are often used by those who wish to push a liberal agenda upon the Church. By politicizing the abuse issue, these activists hope to promote changes like the acceptance of married priests and women "priests."

Yesterday, the dissident Catholic newspaper reported that a grand total of 60 protesters showed up near St. Peter's Square.