It’s time to lawyer up, St. Mary’s! And the Catholic Archdiocese of Tokyo. (Parents, if you see tuition go up next year–you’ll know why now).
If you haven’t seen the 2016 Best Motion Picture Academy Award Winner Spotlight, you should. (Now on Netflix!)
It is a story of how the Boston Globe uncovered the massive, systemic cover-up, by the local Catholic Archdiocese, of children being molested by priests. This initial case was how the world woke up to the inhuman system of an ‘untouchable institution’ that cannibalized children’s souls because people were too afraid to challenge it. It was the work of Boston lawyer Mitchell Garabedian that subpoaened the Archdiocese’s records showing that it knew one priest was harming over 130 children, and kept re-assigning him to new parishes to cover up the stories. (Sound familiar, St. Mary’s? Sending confessed rapist Brother Lawrence Lambert to a Japanese school in Shizuoka—all under the watch of the Archdiocese of Tokyo!). The case was a watershed moment that exposed the same rampant system of cover-up in dioceses across the US and the world. Thousands of victims have filed civil lawsuits based on the precedent of Mr. Garabedian’s initial class-action suit of 86 plaintiffs. He has been doing these cases for over 20 years in many countries around the world.
Mr. Garabedian is the legal counsel the alumni of St. Mary’s will be engaging. The jig may be up for the evil still doing business in Tokyo.
In mid-2015, the Tokyo community of international school families witnessed the intrepid journey of the 13 women survivors of sexual abuse at ASIJ holding their international school accountable, through petitioning with 1800 signatures, hiring their own lawyers and forcing an acknowledgment and apology from the notoriously absconding ASIJ Board.
In the June 15th, 2015 Final Report issued by the legal team of Crew Janci LLP (Portland, Oregon) representing the 13 survivors, an acknowledgment by ASIJ’s Board of Directors of crucial points that had been denied for 40 years was published. It also summed up the final result of the case:
…on June 5, 2015, the school’s newly appointed Board of Directors released a public apology, stating that “Jack Moyer’s abuse of students was extensive, and there were Heads of School, high-level administrators as well as teachers who were aware of information concerning abuse by Moyer.” The Board’s apology was issued as part of a unique resolution and reconciliation achieved by the victims and the American School in Japan, which included reimbursement for counseling costs, compensation for the survivors’ injuries, new and improved child safety policies, and full acceptance of responsibility for the actions of “teachers and administrators…[who] failed to protect students in their charge.”
A summary of the report can be read here.
St. Mary’s admin, in comparison, have lied about ever reporting the criminal and crime to the police, or seriously investigating anything. (For those of you new to the stories–the ASIJ scandal and the St. Mary’s scandal broke to the wider community at about the same time–early 2014). So, now, what about the boys of St. Mary’s?
Fathers, friends, leaders of society, and broken men living today were once students at St. Mary’s who were raped and molested by the Brothers and Staff. Months, and now years, have passed since the story broke and it is evident that the school and the archdiocese have taken ZERO measures to account for children harmed in their care and jurisdiction. The admin hope that in silence, it will be business as usual.
In St. Mary’s case(s), one of the worst perpetrators is still alive (a confessed rapist of children), and was even living on campus when the story broke—30 years after his first(?) early(?) raping days. Can the school corporation honestly say that they knew NOTHING all these years? Is that even possible when two brothers were present at the rape? When dozens of more boys’ lives were scarred in a system of depraved ‘summer camps’ and ‘office visits’, again, with multiple staff in attendance?
The only way to determine the extent of systemic abuse is to stitch together the massive array of narratives from the survivors of abuse at St. Mary’s International School. Many of the survivors are still alive.
The men will sue.
Here are some details about joining the class action lawsuit as we at the blog know it:
- it will be at NO legal cost to the individuals (i.e. $0); Mr. Garabedian only takes a percentage at the end IF there is a financial settlement
- anonymity throughout the whole case is the individual’s choice and will be honoured
- survivors can live anywhere in the world
- Teja Arboleda, a St. Mary’s Alumnus and survivor, has volunteered to be the lead and public plaintiff
Survivors looking for closure, with a band of brothers can contact Mr. Garabedian: http://www.garabedianlaw.com/contact-us
and / or
contact Teja Arboleda (Class of 1989): tejaarboleda@gmail.com
That’s right: to all those who wish to sweep this under the rug and carry on as usual: this cottage industry of boys in Tokyo being sexually abused by a cloaked institution is going to go out of business.
May you not sleep until it is over.
FYI: Pope Francis has set up a tribunal to clean house of all the Bishops into covering up evil against children.
St. Mary's International School Labor Dispute 