The Guam Clergy Sex Scandal started with John Toves, who is now deceased after struggling with cancer. Je accused then Archbishop Anthony Apuron of sexually molesting his relative, whom he has never spoken to. After John admitted that he never spoke to his relative. His relative never even came out to support John's allegations. So, no one believed John Toves.
Then four other people came out in public to accuse then Archbishop Anthony Apuron again. According to Tim Rohr:
Had Apuron admitted his crimes or even met privately to apologize to his initial accusers, the archdiocese might have been spared the loss of millions and millions of dollars in legal fees and properties, most of which had been given to the Church by common, hard-working Catholics who sacrificed their own comfort and family security to help the Church they loved.
This is my response:
SERIOUSLY!!! They came out in PUBLIC, accusing Apuron of sexual abuse, and you want him to meet them in PRIVATE! SERIOUSLY!!! You also want him to admit to the crimes.Then Rohr said this (the bold is mine):
In fact, Apuron, if he really did not do what he was accused of, would not have even had to apologize. He could have just met with those initial accusers and heard them out. I was involved with those initial accusers and I can state for a fact that all they wanted to do was confront the man they believed who had hurt them in their childhood. They did not want to sue - there was no way for them to do that in the beginning anyway, they did not want to hurt the Church, they did not want to do anything other than to assuage their childhood pain.
Apuron DID say that he did not do what they accused him of. He claimed to be innocent to this day. And what did the four accusers do? They proceeded to sue him and the Archdiocese for 2 million dollars. According to news report:
Four people who publicly accused Archbishop Anthony S. Apuron of sexually abusing altar boys in Agat in the 1970s filed a libel and slander lawsuit against the Archdiocese of Agana, Apuron and up to 50 other unnamed defendants for calling them liars and for accusing them of “instilling hatred, ignorance and violence in the people.”
The plaintiffs in the suit are Doris Y. Concepcion, Roy T. Quintanilla, Walter G. Denton and Roland Paul L. Sondia. Through their attorney, David Lujan, they filed the lawsuit in the Superior Court Friday morning. The plaintiffs are seeking no less than $500,000 each for all general damages, for a total of at least $2 million
Well, so much for not being interested in money. Even before the sexual allegations came out against Apuron, Rohr wanted Apuron to step down as Archbishop of Guam. According to KUAM news
In Tumon, local blogger Tim Rohr spoke before island Rotarians. Rohr writes Jungle Watch, a blog that covers issues involving the island's Catholic community. Even prior to the removal of Monsignor James Benavente Rohr has been highly critical of Archbishop Anthony Apuron for his controversial removal of Father Paul Gofigan last year from the Santa Barbara Church.
Rohr said, "My only hope is that the archbishop for his own health resigns ASAP."One Rotarian questioned, "There seems to be a lot of conviction on your part on the archbishop's part - do you see any amicable meeting or meeting or meeting of the minds or compromise?", to which Rohr replied, "Absolutely not." He then reaffirmed his belief that the archbishop needs to resign.
Rohr announced this in 2014, two years BEFORE Roy Quintanilla publicly came out to accuse Apuron of child sexual abuse.
At any rate, although they claimed that they were not doing it for the money, they went ahead and pushed forward a bill that would give the four accusers to bring a lawsuit against the Archdiocese for 5 million dollars. Again, so much for not being interested in the money.
Then others came out of the woodworks also seeking 5 million dollars from the Archdiocese. Many of these accusers couldn't be identified because they only used their initials, and many of them accused dead priests. No investigation was done to verify their stories. Some of these accusers came from:
1. A Protestant who claimed to be an altar server in a Catholic Church.
2. A person who claimed to be a "back-up" altar server.
3. A female who claimed to be raped by Father Brouillard during a "Boy Scouts" event.
4. A person who claimed to be raped during a fiesta where hundreds of people were present
5. A person who claimed to be sexually abused by Fr. George Maddock just a few days after his death and while other youth praised the priest.
Are there any real victims out there? I'm sure there were, but their numbers have been overshadowed by the numerous false claims.