Associations of victims of abuse refuse to participate in the Church's audit
Last Wednesday, the president of the firm Cremades & Calvo-Sotelo, Javier Cremades, presented the members of the Commission that will audit the abuses in the Spanish Church at the request of the bishops. During a massive press conference, Cremades assured that, despite having received only 45 complaints in six weeks of work, they had met with practically all the victims' associations, and that all of them, "except Stolen Childhood", had decided to participate. in the same.
He went further, revealing that from the office they had tried to contact them in various ways. He even pointed out that one of his vice presidents "was going to participate in the audit." "Except for one association, which is Infancia Robada, we have been able to speak with all of them. With Infancia Robada we have had two levels of dialogue: one with the vice president of that association, who has asked us to include his testimony, and our own communication director who He has been with the promoter of that association. We deeply respect what they think and what they do, "said the lawyer.
The lawyer also showed the book written by Manuel Barbero, president of Mans Petites and the first complainant of the Marist case, with whom he would have met last week, with a dedication: "May we know how to open our eyes and see beyond silence". His words have provoked the indignation of several victims' associations, who denounce "falsehoods" and the use of private conversations by the lawyer, a member of Opus Dei.
In a harsh joint statement, both Stolen Childhood and the Associations of Victims of Pederasty in the Navarra Church have shown their "emphasis on Cremades". "We flatly deny that there has been any meeting between our associations (ANIR, AVIPIN) and the C&CS office", maintain the associations, which ratify "their total rejection and mistrust of the proposal by the Cremades & Calvo-Sotelo office, understanding that it is flawed root".
"While the Pope encourages putting the victims at the center of the table, the office of Cremades omits them and dedicates itself to carrying out an overwhelming display of power with so much national and international legal contact, yes, with charge to the coffers of the Church", states the statement, which regrets that among the members there are no "experts in victims of sexual abuse in the Church", nor victims, as Manuela Carmena lamented, in conversation with elDiario.es, who will prepare a dossier for the firm, without being part of the commission.
"Until now they have not had the slightest empathy with the victims, and with each step that the aforementioned office takes, it re-victimizes the victims even more," the associations point out, giving as an example the initial questionnaire in which the complainants were referred to as "affected".
"You cannot whitewash the essence of that office alluding to a more than questioned equidistance between victims and that outdated part of the Church and its sudden ideological 'plurality'," they argue. "Less fight the victims and more the pederasts, gentlemen!" They say.
For its part, from the Tolerance 0 platform, made up of Manuel Barbero, the first complainant of the Marist case and president of Mans Petites; Esther Pujol, first complainant in the Bellcaire case; Miguel Hurtado, first complainant in the Abadía Montserrat case; Jordi de la Mata, first complainant of the Jesuit case; and Alejandro Palomas, in addition to Vicki Bernadet, have called for "a Truth Commission" that exceeds the functions of the Ombudsman and those of the audit commissioned by the Episcopal Conference to Cremades. 'Tolerance 0' will not participate in any of them.
"Ethically and honestly, we cannot cooperate. We got off the Ombudsman train and we got off the Cremades office train [en referencia a la auditoría encargada por la Conferencia Episcopal al despacho Cremades & Calvo Sotelo, presidido por un miembro del Opus]", he stated during the presentation of the Miguel Hurtado platform.
“The undersigned Catalan victims are not going to participate in any other model of investigation, be it of a state nature (Investigation by the Ombudsman) or autonomous (Catalan Parliamentary Investigation Commission) due to the significant emotional wear and secondary retraumatization that collaborating with an investigation that does not have the necessary coercive powers to clarify the facts under investigation, overcoming opposition and secular obstructionism on the part of the Catholic hierarchy”, highlight the Catalan victims.
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