Maryland
Judge OKs release of Baltimore church sex abuse report
BALTIMORE (AP) — A judge on Tuesday granted the Maryland Attorney General’s Office permission to publicly release a redacted version of an investigative report detailing sex abuse allegations against more than 150 Roman Catholic priests and examining the Archdiocese of Baltimore’s response.
Officials declined to provide a timeline for when the release would take place.
Completed last year by the Maryland Attorney General’s Office, the report has remained under seal because it contains information obtained from church officials via grand jury subpoenas, proceedings that are confidential in Maryland. But lawyers for the state asked the court for permission to release their findings, and Baltimore Circuit Court Judge Robert Taylor ruled last month that a redacted version should be made public.
The next step was for Taylor to review a list of proposed redactions, which he approved Tuesday. Once the attorney general has made those redactions, his office can release the report.
According to earlier court filings, the nearly 500-page document identifies 158 priests accused of abusing more than 600 victims over the past 80 years. The attorney general’s investigation was launched in 2019.
In his previous ruling, Taylor said releasing the report is in the interest of justice, partly because the “only form of justice that may now be available is a public reckoning.” He gave the attorney general a March 13 deadline to submit a list of proposed redactions.
“The need for disclosure outweighs the need for secrecy,” Taylor wrote.
He also said Maryland legislators should be able to consider the report’s contents during the ongoing state legislative session, which ends April 10.
Lawmakers are currently considering whether to end the state’s statute of limitations for when civil lawsuits can be filed against institutions related to child sexual abuse. Currently, victims of child sex abuse in Maryland can’t sue after they turn 38. Other proposals to do away with the age limit have failed to become law in recent years, but the issue has received renewed attention this session.
The judge told prosecutors to entirely redact the names and titles of 37 people from the report before releasing it. The court will then contact those individuals, allow them to review certain sections of the report and finally, consider whether to remove the redactions and release a more complete version in the future. Taylor also told the attorney general to rephrase some pieces of the report to avoid identifying 60 other people.
Another 91 individuals have since died, so their names need not be redacted, Taylor ruled, as well as those identified through a means other than grand jury proceedings. Many accused priests named in the report have been previously publicly identified by the Baltimore Archdiocese.
In a statement Tuesday, Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown said his office was pleased with the judge’s ruling.
“We will work to complete the court-ordered redactions and release the report as expeditiously as possible,” he said.
Louisiana
14-year sentence for ex-cop who molested teen rape victim
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A former New Orleans police officer was sentenced Tuesday to 14 years in federal prison for sexually assaulting a 15-year-old girl who was already a rape victim.
Federal prosecutors said Rodney Vicknair was a police officer in 2020 when he escorted a then-14-year-old victim to a hospital for a rape examination after she was assaulted by another man. Prosecutors said Vicknair offered to become the girl’s friend and mentor and often showed up at her house unannounced.
But in time, according to court documents, he began making comments to her that were sexual in nature, eventually persuading her to send him sexually explicit pictures of herself that he kept on his phone. And on Sept. 23, 2020, when the girl was 15, he showed up at her house and told her to get into his truck. When she was in the passenger seat, Vicknair locked the door, leaned over her and “intentionally touched her genitals under her clothing,” according to a Justice Department news release and court records.
Initially arrested on state charges that included sexual battery, Vicknair pleaded guilty in federal court to deprivation of rights under color of law.
U.S. District Judge Lance Africk rejected an initial plea agreement carrying a 7-year sentence. On Tuesday, he sentenced Vicknair to 14 years, according to court records.
“We are grateful to this young survivor for coming forward, even though she thought no one would believe her,” Assistant U.S. Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division said in a news release.
California
Care home charged in connection with COVID deaths
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A Southern California residential care home company and three of its managers have been charged in connection with 14 COVID-related deaths at one of its facilities three years ago, prosecutors said Monday.
The criminal complaint alleges Silverado Senior Living Management failed to follow appropriate safety procedures when admitting a new resident to its Beverly Place facility in Los Angeles in March 2020.
The resident arrived from New York City, “which was a COVID-19 epicenter at the time,” and was not properly screened upon arrival or placed in isolation after later testing positive for the virus, Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón said in a statement.
“These careless decisions created conditions that needlessly exposed Silverado staff and its residents to serious injury and – tragically – death,” Gascón said.
An outbreak at the Beverly Place facility led to the deaths of 14 people ranging in age from 32 to 94, prosecutors said. In addition, 45 employees and 60 residents were sickened, according to the court filing.
Silverado Senior Living Management and three of its managers each face 13 felony counts of elder endangerment and five felony counts of violations causing death, according the DA’s statement.
“Silverado’s top priority is and always has been providing world-class care, respect, and dignity to people living with dementia and a caring environment for our associates,” spokesman Jeff Frum said in a statement. “We deny all charges filed against us - they are baseless and egregiously contradict the facts. We look forward to presenting our case during the legal process.”
“We will always grieve the loss of the residents to the pandemic and the frontline hero who cared for them,” the statement said. “We have taken the pandemic extremely seriously since the start. We recognized COVID-19’s unprecedented threat to society, particularly for people living with dementia and their caregivers.”
The Irvine-based firm manages care facilities across Southern California.
Wisconsin
Judge: Netflix’s ‘Making a Murderer’ didn’t defame detective
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A retired Wisconsin detective has lost a defamation lawsuit against streaming giant Netflix over his portrayal in the 2015 documentary series “Making a Murderer.”
On Friday U.S. District Judge Brett Ludwig ruled in favor of Netflix and “Making a Murderer” filmmakers Laura Ricciardi and Moira Demos, concluding that none of them acted with any malice toward now-retired Manitowoc County Sheriff’s Detective Andrew Colborn.
Netflix aired “Making a Murderer” series in 2015. The 10-part series follows the story of Steven Avery, who spent nearly 22 years in prison for sexual assault before DNA tests exonerated him. He was released in 2003 but was convicted four years later along with his nephew, Brendan Dassey, in the 2005 murder and rape of photographer Teresa Halbach. Avery and Dassey were ultimately both sentenced to life in prison.
The documentary raised questions about whether Manitowoc County officials framed them. Colborn, who participated in the Avery investigation, filed a lawsuit in April 2019 alleging that the documentary defamed him by misquoting his testimony — and editing snippets of his testimony, and reactions of others in court to make him appear nervous and uncertain.
Ludwig found that the edits retain the gist of his testimony, and that Colborn failed to show that the streaming service or the filmmakers acted with malice toward him, a key element to defamation. It’s defined as when someone makes a defamatory statement even though he or she knows it’s false, or shows reckless disregard for its veracity.
Colburn’s attorney, listed in online court records as George Burnett, didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment on the ruling.
Michigan
Case dropped against couple after gun pulled on Black family
Criminal charges have been dropped against a white couple charged in 2020 after one of them was captured on video pulling a handgun on a Black woman and her daughters outside a Michigan restaurant.
The trial had been set to start Monday for Eric Wuestenberg and Jillian Wuestenberg, but Oakland County Circuit Court Judge Mary Ellen Brennan dismissed the case after the alleged victims did not show up to provide witness testimony, The Oakland Press reported.
The Wuestenbergs were each charged with one count of felonious assault for the July 1, 2020, incident in the parking lot of a Chipotle restaurant in Orion Township, about 40 miles (64 kilometers) northwest of Detroit.
David Williams, Oakland County’s chief assistant prosecutor, noted that the charges were dismissed Monday without prejudice, “meaning that our office can reissue charges in this matter if and when those witnesses become available.” He declined further comment.
Takelia Hill, who is Black, told The Detroit News in 2020 that the incident happened after a white woman later identified as Jillian Wuestenberg bumped into Hill’s teenage daughter as they were entering the restaurant and Wuestenberg was leaving with a carry-out order.
The Oakland Press reported that the Pontiac woman was visiting the restaurant with two daughters when the incident began. A three-minute cellphone video posted online documents part of the ensuing confrontation in the restaurant’s parking lot.
Jillian Wuestenberg can be seen outside her vehicle shouting, “Get the (expletive) away! Get away!” while pointing a handgun at the person who’s recording. She eventually gets back into her vehicle, which her husband drives away.
The Oakland County Sheriff’s Office said both parties called police on each other and that the Wuestenbergs drove away and waited for deputies to arrive. The couple was arrested shortly afterward.
Following his arrest, Eric Wuestenberg lost his job at Oakland University where he was coordinator of veterans support services. His attorney, Dean Greenblatt, said the Wuestenbergs have lived “with clouds over their head for three years.”
“Nothing can bring their jobs back, their lives back, their reputations back,” Greenblatt said.
Jillian Wuestenberg’s attorney, Terry Johnson, said the dismissal of the charges was long overdue.
“On behalf of my client, we’re excited it only took 32 months for the Oakland County Prosecutor to finally drop the charges. My client’s life, unfortunately, will never be the same,” Johnson said.
