User talk:Mjwegs

Come to the Stable/The Stephen Spalding Foundation (CTS/SSF) is registered as a 501(c)(3) non-profit charitable corporation with the United States Internal Revenue Service; organized under the laws of the State of Minnesota. The foundation is based in Minneapolis, MN.

Stephen Spalding (1953-1986) is the first-known victim of Anthony J. O’Connell, the former bishop of Palm Beach, FL, and Knoxville, TN. O'Connell was the dean of students and spiritual director at St. Thomas Aquinas High School Seminary in Hannibal, MO, when Stephen's mother reported in 1968 that O'Connell had molested her son.

The name Come to the Stable is based on the religious concept of the Christchild in that victims of childhood sexual molestation often have nowhere to turn in their time of need, i.e. no room at the inn. Consequently, the Stephen Spalding Foundation asks them to Come to the Stable, an initiative that is developing a respite care facility for victims of sex crimes and their families. O’Connell survivor/victims are members of the CTS/SSF Board of Advisors.

Data compiled by the Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire between 1984 and 2000 can be translated as follows:


 * 1 out of every 6 boys is a victim of sexual abuse before the age of 16;
 * 1 in 7 victims of sexual assault is a child under the age of 6;
 * the median age of a victim of childhood sexual molestation is 9 years old in the United States, boys aged 11-17 comprise the most sexually victimized group;
 * 1 in 7 boys sexually abused by the age of 18;
 * 1 in 4 girls is sexually abused by the age of 18; and
 * 50% of all rape victims are girls under the age of 18.

According to the Juvenile Offenders and Victims: 1999 National Report, 32% of all reported sex crimes involve children aged 12 or younger and only 1 in 18 instances of violent crime where the victim is under the age of 12 is ever reported to the police. Nearly 1,100 deaths related to child abuse occur each year; 38% of those children die before their first birthday, according to the JOV report.

Child victims frequently require long-term health and mental health care – even into adulthood. American taxpayers are assessed a $13 million surcharge each day to help those damaged by violence of this type, according to the Child Welfare League of America. Nationally, the total annual cost of coping with child maltreatment is calculated conservatively at $94 billion.

Survivor/victims of clergy sexual abuse at St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary in Hannibal, Missouri, and their families, and their friends have established Come to the Stable/The Stephen Spalding Foundation in an effort to help sexc crime victims recover from the tragedy that they've experienced. This initiative's original funding source is a portion of a settlement agreement between Michael Wegs of Minneapolis, MN; Anthony J. O’Connell, the former bishop of Palm Beach, FL, and Knoxville, TN; and Bishop John R. Gaydos and Bishop Michael F. McAuliffe (retired) of the Diocese of Jefferson City, MO.

The settlement is modest: $5,000 from O’Connell; $20,000 from the Diocese of Jefferson City.

Doe v. Jefferson City is noteworthy in that it sets precedent by disagreeing with the 1997 Missouri Supreme Court case, Gibson v. Brewer, which ruled that members of the clergy are contract workers and not employees, thereby limiting the liability of church-affiliated organizations.

Marion County Circuit Court Judge C. David Darnold ruled in the Wegs case – known in Missouri as Doe v. Roman Catholic Diocese of Jefferson City, et al., CV302-142CC – that “churches can be held to the same standard as any other entity that is in the position of caring for children.”  Consequently, the Missouri court ruled that members of the clergy, in fact, are employees of religious denominations and cannot be considered as contract workers, consultants, or temporary employees in order to limit liability.

Wegs is the first student to file a civil suit against O’Connell in the wake of Christopher Dixon’s 2002 disclosure about his secret settlement with O’Connell and the Diocese of Jefferson City. Matthew A. Cosby filed the second suit in 2002. A third civil suit was filed by a student identified as John T. Doe, who is a former classmate of Wegs.

Evidence compiled by criminal investigators estimate that O’Connell molested at least 50 boys during his 25-year-tenure as rector of St. Thomas Seminary. Three St. Thomas survivors/victims, for example, are members of the Class of 1971; three more are members of the Class of 1970; one is from the Class of 1980; another graduated in 1986.

The Diocese of Jefferson City, Missouri, a co-defendant in numerous clergy abuse cases, promoted O’Connell frequently to more influential positions. He was vocation director and the rector of its high school seminary for more than 25 years before becoming a bishop.

O’Connell also is a protégé of Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston. Law sent his high school seminarians to St. Thomas when he was the bishop of Springfield-Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Law was instrumental in promoting O’Connell as the first bishop of Knoxville, Tennessee (1988–1998), and later to Palm Beach, Florida (1999–2002).

--Mjwegs 12:40, 21 January 2006 (UTC)Michael Wegs