It's about all the innocent victims, children, young adults, teenagers,
who because Donald World kept his lousy mouth shut and did not do the right thing,
we can only imagine how many people are either suffering, and their families from
alcoholism, drug addiction, not being able to hold a job, marriages dissolved.
Cardinal Donald World spent decades carefully crafting an image of a reformer,
tough on sex abuse, an image the public bought wholesale.
That image was eventually shattered, but not until after years of damage to the
church and to victims.
Senior producer Christine Niles takes a look at the recent arrest of a priest once
in World's charge and the fallout from World's past cover-ups.
Abusing him by taking child porn images of him in the restroom of this Target store
in East Liberty.
On December 7th, 2021, Paul George Spisak was arrested after taking photos of a
13-year-old boy at a Target in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Spisak was allegedly using his phone at an angle under a bathroom stall to take nude
images of the boy.
When police arrived, Spisak tried to flee, but was caught and taken into custody at
the Allegheny County Jail.
He was charged with invasion of privacy and sexual abuse of children.
It's not Spisak's first run-in with the law.
An incident 15 years ago at another bathroom stall is nearly identical to this
one.
In fact, Spisak's fixation with underage males stretches back decades, to his time
as a priest in the Diocese of Pittsburgh, under his bishop at the time, Donald
Wuerl.
Once considered a kingmaker, Cardinal Wuerl was fawned over and fettered as
Archbishop of Washington, hobnobbing with powerful politicians, his power and
influence stretching all the way to Rome, where he had the Pope's ear.
Wuerl was among Pope Francis's elite inner circle, helping set the agenda at multiple
synods in Rome.
He was untouchable.
Then came June 2018.
Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, tonight suspended from his public priestly duties,
after an allegation he abused a teenager in New York 47 years ago.
Media exploded with news of Wuerl's predecessor in D.C., powerbroker Cardinal
Theodore McCarrick and his sexual assault of a male minor, coined the Summer of
Shame, revealing a ring of complicit clergy who for years protected the
homosexual predator, Wuerl the top U.S.
cleric to do so.
I have tried to do my very best to deal with this whole question of allegations
against a priest.
Wuerl endured months of withering press that summer after he appeared to be
minimizing sex abuse.
Remember, that, we're told, was decades ago.
Repeating his favorite refrain, that McCarrick's abuse occurred a very
long time ago, and misleading others about his own actions.
This claim goes back over decades and decades.
Did you ever move priests quietly to another?
That wasn't our process.
Things only worsened after he was caught lying about his knowledge of McCarrick's
crimes.
Were you aware of the rumors McCarrick was having relationships with other priests?
No, no.
Turns out there was a 2004 abuse claim against McCarrick involving Father Robert
Sialek, and that not only had Wuerl known about the sexual misconduct allegations,
he's the one who reported them to the Vatican.
As damage control, Wuerl claimed he had forgotten all about it.
Cardinal Donald Wuerl is now saying he forgot that he knew about sex abuse
reports while he was the Bishop of Pittsburgh.
He writes in a new letter, quote, it's important for me to accept personal
responsibility and apologize for this lapse in memory.
I don't believe for one moment that he has ever forgotten about it.
A high school named after Wuerl was vandalized, followed by the decision to
remove his name.
Once the grand jury report came out, nearly 8,000 people signed a petition for
Wuerl's name to be removed.
Other increasing signs of dissatisfaction.
Protesters were gathering regularly outside St. Matthew's Cathedral,
Wuerl's parish, and a petition began circulating demanding that Wuerl resign,
including a call from Washington deacon James Garcia, refusing to serve any more
masses with the Cardinal.
A critical part of genuine healing involves accountability.
And inside the cathedral.
Wuerl was jeered at by an angry parishioner, who then stormed out.
Then came Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò's bombshell testimony in August,
revealing a homosexual network in the church, led by McCarrick, noting that
Wuerl, quote, lies shamelessly in his attempts to cover up McCarrick's sexual
predation.
And all the while, church leadership carried on.
Wuerl kept records of the abuse and the cover-up.
But perhaps the most devastating blow to Wuerl that summer, precipitating his
abrupt resignation, was the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report, where his name was
cited 169 times.
He was named throughout this report as one of the bishops who helped cover up the
crimes.
Contrary to Wuerl's claims he'd always been tough on priest sex abuse,
the report exposed him as a protector of predators.
The public comments that he has made directly contradict the church's own
documents that we found in the secret archives.
Another fact hidden by Wuerl, he was named in at least two multi-million dollar
lawsuits as Bishop of Pittsburgh, accused of covering up priestly sex abuse,
leading to further abuse and even death.
Of course, the sexual abuse was horrific, but the abuse by working with the diocese
was almost as bad.
For years, Wuerl portrayed himself as leader of the pack in implementing a
zero-tolerance policy in Pittsburgh, where he served as bishop for nearly two
decades, from 1988 to 2006.
Catholic and secular media bought the story, praising Wuerl as an example in
handling clergy sex abuse.
Church Milton, however, was ahead of the curve in not only predicting his downfall,
but also exposing the lie about his handling of clergy abuse before the grand
jury report ever came out.
A report where Wuerl's name is associated in some way with approximately two dozen
accused clergy, including Father George Zerwas, Father Henry Kravchik,
Father John Wellinger, Father William Yockey, Father Leo Berchianti,
Father John Crowley, Father Richard Dorsch, Father John Hale, Father Lawrence
O 'Connell, Father Ernest Paone, and many others.
Father George Zerwas was found dead in his apartment in Havana, Cuba on the morning
of May 27, 2001, suffering heart paralysis after being shot in the neck with animal
tranquilizer.
He was a priest who was once part of a pedophile ring in Pittsburgh.
The Pennsylvania grand jury report reveals Wuerl had paid him hush money in exchange
for his silence on the crimes of fellow clergy.
In 1996, Zerwas informed the diocese that he had knowledge of other Pittsburgh
diocese priests' involvement in illegal sexual activity.
In exchange for this information, he demanded that his sustenance payments
be increased.
Wuerl agreed.
He asked for a statement in writing from Zerwas disavowing any knowledge of the
crimes.
As soon as he got it, Bishop Wuerl increased his monthly stipend.
What were those crimes?
Zerwas was part of a child sex ring involving fathers Richard Zula,
Robert Woke, and Francis Pucci, all eventually indicted for sex crimes.
They used whips and chains on teen altar boys, plying them with drugs and alcohol,
and passing them around for sex.
George, one of Zerwas' victims, testified before the grand jury that when
he was 15, Zerwas took him to a parish rectory where three other priests were
present.
They asked him to take off his clothes.
They then drew an analogy to the image of Christ on the cross and told George to
remove his pants so that his pose would be more consistent with the image of Christ
in a loincloth.
At that point, the priests began taking Polaroid pictures of George.
As the picture-taking continued, the priests directed George to take off
his underwear, exposing himself.
George noted his photos were added to a collection of similar photos of other teen
boys.
The teen boys chosen for grooming were given gifts of gold chains with a cross.
They were a signal to other predators that the children had been desensitized to
sexual abuse and were optimal targets for further victimization.
In 1988, Zula, Woke, and Pucci were charged for their crimes, but Zerwas
managed to escape prosecution.
Instead of removing Zerwas from ministry, Wuerl simply reassigned him to St.
Scholastica Parish in Aspinwall.
In fact, in spite of multiple abuse complaints against Zerwas dating as far
back as 1987, Wuerl would keep him in active ministry for nearly a decade,
moving him from parish to parish after each allegation.
In 1995, after Zerwas was placed on a leave of absence, he moved to Cuba with
his live-in boyfriend.
There, Zerwas, who called himself the Grand Duchess of Havana, facilitated sex
trafficking, putting foreigners in touch with Cuban prostitutes.
Zerwas himself died at age 47 at the hands of a young male prostitute.
It was Zerwas's live-in boyfriend who found his corpse.
The priest had been murdered by a Cuban rent boy he had picked up the night
before.
The rent boy, Abel Medina Valdez, would later confess to killing Zerwas by
shooting animal tranquilizer into his neck, causing cardiac paralysis.
Valdez also confessed to having murdered two other gay foreigners.
The U.S.
government worked with Communist Cuba to fly the priest's body back home,
where Wuerl gave him a grand send-off, holding a funeral at his boyhood parish of
St. Alphonsus in Wexford, with two bishops, 20 priests, and 100 mourners
present.
And Zerwas clothed in priestly vestments.
Wuerl eulogized the pederast in glowing terms, expressing confidence he was in
heaven.
It's very difficult, first of all, to bury a priest who is still so young and
with so much potential ahead of him.
Wuerl never reported his hush money deal with Zerwas to police, nor has he ever
denied the secret payoff, conceding in 2018, quote, Today, we would have handled
the Zerwas case much differently.
Father Henry Kravchik made national news in 2003, after a 19-year-old football
player fell to his death from the church rafters.
Wide receiver Billy Gaines was a rising star in the University of Pittsburgh's
football team, there on a scholarship after winning Player of the Year in his
senior season at Urbana High School.
A young life cut short, owing to the negligence of a bishop who looked the
other way.
Gaines had been living at a vacant convent next to Kravchik's parish, St. Anne's,
after the priest invited him and his roommate to live there when their
apartment was destroyed by fire.
Kravchik frequently invited Gaines to drink with him.
According to family, Gaines felt pressured to comply because the priest was doing him
a favor by allowing him to live at the convent.
The priest held an all-night cookout on June 17, 2003, inviting Kravchik and other
football players along, where he served cocktails to the under-21 crowd,
played drinking games, and watched Playboy.
Around 2.30 in the morning, after 8 to 10 drinks, Gaines climbed two flights of
stairs, went to the attic, and clambered into a crawlspace in the church ceiling,
looking for mysterious markings or symbols located there.
The ceiling gave way, leading to a 25-foot fall, Gaines crashing into a pew below.
He suffered a fractured skull and spinal injuries, dying 20 hours later.
An autopsy shows Gaines' blood alcohol level was at nearly twice the legal limit.
His death made national news.
World placed Kravchik on leave, but it was too little, too late.
Wuerl had been notified several times over the course of years of Kravchik's habit of
drinking with and homosexual advances on young men.
Those allegations were met with a reprimand, Wuerl sending the priest away
for psychiatric treatment before putting him back in ministry, until the fatal
accident in 2003.
The priest pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and reckless endangerment,
and was placed on seven years probation.
The Gaines family filed a $75 million federal lawsuit against Kravchik and the
diocese for covering up the cleric's past indiscretions, settling in 2006.
That same year, two brothers contacted the diocese to report that their other brother
used to smoke pot and drink alcohol with Father Kravchik, waking up one time to
find the priest giving him oral sex.
That brother ended up killing himself the same year Wuerl was being installed as
archbishop in Washington, D.C.
If Wuerl had taken seriously all the allegations against Kravchik years before,
at least two young men might still be alive today.
Mike Ferencz, former contributor to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in the early
2000s, reported on Gaines' death at the time, and wrote a public letter to his
parents.
And I stated that their son should be alive, because if they had warned the
public, especially the colleges and universities, about priests like John
Wellinger, who like to prey on college students, or any student for that matter,
that the college students would be aware of this and would know to stay away from
the parties thrown by the priests and bishops in the Oakland and Shadyside area.
Ferencz is referring to Father John Wellinger, another Pittsburgh priest
accused of abusing multiple boys.
One of them shot Ferencz's son in the head in 1989, before turning the gun on
himself.
While the victim died, Ferencz's son survived.
Well, I had started investigating John Wellinger in 1990 following the attempted
murder of my son.
The shooter may have been sexually abused or abused in some fashion by John
Wellinger.
It was the start of Ferencz's decades-long pursuit of truth in Pittsburgh.
Unlike other journalists at the time, Ferencz wasn't buying the story that Wuerl
was tough on sex abuse, penning a 2009 article in the Pittsburgh Examiner titled,
Donald Wuerl, Zero Tolerance or Zero Credibility.
He asked, does Donald Wuerl deserve the zero tolerance tagline that is associated
with his tenure as Bishop of Pittsburgh?
Going on to say, there's reason for doubt, plenty of doubt.
Not only did Ferencz learn that Wuerl knew far more about Wellinger than he let on,
this was the case with multiple abuser clergy.
Wellinger was in fact one among 17 clerics named in a multi-million dollar lawsuit
filed by 32 abuse victims in 2004, alleging a diocesan-wide cover-up of sex
abuse, with Wuerl directly involved.
It resulted in a $1.25 million settlement in 2007.
It was such chump change.
It was the most ridiculous settlement ever.
I think they spent more on Zubik's installation as bishop.
So it was a ridiculous sum.
And I feel sorry for those people who settled.
Another cleric named in that lawsuit, Father Robert Castellucci.
At the Savior's command and formed by divine teaching...
Wuerl knew of Castellucci's sex abuse of boys as early as 1994, but kept him in
ministry for nearly a decade, through 2002.
Ed Stamara Jr. met with the diocese in 1994, including then-father, now-bishop,
David Zubik, detailing sexual assault that took place when he was 13 through 17,
including masturbation, oral sex, and attempted anal sex, sometimes at the
rectory, sometimes in the priest's car.
An October 22, 1994 letter from the victim to Castellucci says, I was 13 or 14 when
you talked me into masturbation parties, only to offer me money later.
Wuerl determined the allegations were credible, but never reported them to
police.
The victim's eight-year-old brother was also allegedly abused by Castellucci.
The priest asked to retire, but Wuerl refused, instead ordering him to St.
Luke's Institute, a controversial clergy rehab center in Silver Spring,
Maryland.
St. Luke recommended inpatient treatment, but Castellucci instead asked Wuerl for a
leave of absence to go to Ohio to take care of his sick mother.
Wuerl agreed, never informing police of his movements, nor informing local
Catholics who now have a sexual predator as their neighbor.
It led to an incident in Ohio in 1999, where Castellucci was reported to police
for giving a 17-year-old boy a pornographic video and performing oral sex
on him.
It was only after this that Wuerl suspended Castellucci, but he waited three
more years before finally urging the priest to withdraw from ministry.
After even more allegations had surfaced, Castellucci denies any wrongdoing.
Stemera was among the 32 survivors who sued the diocese.
Wuerl should have never become a cardinal, Stemera told the Washington Post in 2018.
Those are the worst crimes, that there was no one there to help, no one there to tell
the truth.
I tried, it didn't work.
Then there's father William O'Malley, who had a habit of inviting kids into his
hot tub, and also lived with a 17-year-old male, who shared a joint bank account with
him.
In 1997, O'Malley admitted to fondling an 11-year-old boy.
Wuerl did not report him to police, but instead sent him off to St. Luke's.
From the grand jury report, on January 12, 1998, a confidential memorandum was sent
to Wuerl advising that O'Malley was given a diagnosis of ephebophilia, based on his
admitted sexual interest in adolescence, and that O'Malley was at a high risk for
seeking emotional gratification with adolescence.
In spite of this, just four days later, Wuerl wrote a memo in O'Malley's file
stating, I expressed to him our desire to help him in whatever way we can do to all
of the things that are necessary to present him for priestly ministry.
That same year, Wuerl appointed O'Malley to the diocesan tribunal.
It should be noted that a portion of this period of sexual abuse, from the end of
1998 through 1999, occurred after Wuerl placed O'Malley back into ministry as
canonical consultant.
Former Catholic priest Paul Spisak was in handcuffs in a jail jumpsuit for his
preliminary hearing.
All charges were held against him.
Father Paul Spisak is just the latest in a long line of clerics Wuerl protected.
Ordained in Pittsburgh in 1978, Spisak moved through eight different
parishes before being reported to the diocese in 1998, after prisoners found
pornographic magazines, tapes, and internet material in Spisak's room
that depicted homosexual and sadomasochistic activity.
This included pictures of underage boys he took on vacations, showing their buttocks,
and pictures of Spisak pulling down his swim trunks and pulling down the boys'
pants.
Bishop Wuerl sent him off to St. Luke's.
After months there, Wuerl returned Spisak to ministry in July 1999, assigning him to
St. Mary of Mercy Parish.
This in spite of an evaluation letter from St. Luke's just a month earlier,
warning him the priest was still a danger to children.
Spisak has also acknowledged a sexual attraction to minors as well as to adult
men.
Spisak is at risk to act out his problematic behavior again, that is,
use of pornography, compulsive masturbation, and possible sexual activity
either with minors or adults.
And a year before that, Wuerl received this diocesan evaluation.
Spisak has both sexual and interpersonal issues that are significant enough to
warrant residential treatment.
Spisak was diagnosed as having a sexual disorder that is compulsive in nature and
is currently manifested in his use of porn.
Some of the testing identified Spisak shows a significant interest in grade
school age males, and his interest in one of the boys pictured in a photo found in
the rectory began when the boy was in seventh or eighth grade.
Welcome him from the plane on to the... In spite of ample warning about Spisak's
tendencies, Wuerl left him in active ministry from 1999 until 2002 when Spisak
himself asked to withdraw from ministry.
Wuerl finally suspended him the next year.
Even so, he kept him on the diocesan payroll up till the present, Spisak living
at the St. John Vianney Manor, a retirement home for clergy, where
numerous other accused clergy also live.
On April 21st, 2006, Spisak was arrested after a man reported him recording him on
camera from the rear corner of the bathroom stall at South Hills Village Mall
in Bethel Park.
According to the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report, when initially approached by mall
security, Spisak denied having a camera.
Spisak then faked that he was ill and ran into the bathroom.
A security guard followed Spisak and saw him flush the memory card from the camera
down the toilet.
Spisak pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct.
More than a decade later, in a 2017 police interview, he admitted he had a sexual
fixation with a male buttocks.
The December 2021 incident in the Target bathroom with a 13-year-old boy shows the
fixation has never gone away.
Neither was it taken seriously all those years ago under Bishop Wuerl.
Those are just a handful of the many cases Wuerl mishandled and the terrible fallout
resulting in more abuse and even death.
The detail all his cases would take hours, but they all feature the same modus
operandi, failing to report clergy to police, sending them off for treatment,
shuffling them from parish to parish.
A number of these priests were abruptly retired by Wuerl in 2002.
That's no coincidence.
It's the same year the Boston Globe's Spotlight team exposed massive priest sex
abuse in Boston and in the wider church.
It was then that Wuerl began reshaping the narrative, selling the story he was tough
on predator clergy and had a zero-tolerance policy for abuse.
As the record shows, that was a lie.
Comments from William Camerata, former head of Pennsylvania's Office of
Children, Youth, and Families in Pittsburgh, are enlightening.
In 1988, Camerata called the newly installed bishop telling Wuerl he believed
the diocese was mandated to report child sex abuse to civil authorities.
Wuerl said he'd meet with him.
From the Washington Post, Camerata arrived to the chancery, quote, to instead find a
monsignor and a lawyer for the diocese in a conference room, unwilling to concede.
I said to them, my position is you should be reporting these.
The church as an entity are mandated reporters, Camerata said.
The lawyer said, we have a different opinion.
That was the sum total of the meeting.
That's how Wuerl's tenure began in Pittsburgh.
And that's how it continued.
But Chris Matthews, who was an outspoken victim of not only John Wellinger,
but of the Pittsburgh diocese, was quoted as saying that he considers
Wuerl the most evil person I have ever met.
Evil says it all about Donald Wuerl.
Evil says it all about Jeffrey Epstein.
Evil says it all about Harvey Weinstein.
It's one thing to say, gee, I don't like that person.
He has some bad habits.
But evil, there's nothing worse.
While Cardinal Wuerl's favorite refrain is that clerical abuse happened decades and
decades ago, as we see the fallout from such abuse, and Wuerl's failure to handle
it properly, continue to this very day.
One cleric whose name came up repeatedly in the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report,
Wuerl's right-hand man in handling Pittsburgh abuse cases, was the director
of priest personnel, who met with abuser clergy and their victims, and knew where
all the bodies were buried.
That was Father David Zubik, today the sitting bishop of Pittsburgh.
Christine Niles, Church Militant, Detroit.
you