Vatican Court Hears Unprecedented Sexual Abuse Criminal Trial : NPR

Two priests are going on trial in the Vatican court — one accused of sexually abusing an altar boy and the other charged with aiding and abetting the alleged abuse, which allegedly took place at the St. Pius X youth seminary. The seminary’s residents are known as the “pope’s altar boys” and serve Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica.

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Two priests are going on trial in the Vatican court — one accused of sexually abusing an altar boy and the other charged with aiding and abetting the alleged abuse, which allegedly took place at the St. Pius X youth seminary. The seminary’s residents are known as the “pope’s altar boys” and serve Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica.

Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Editor’s note: This story includes details some readers may find disturbing.

An unprecedented trial is underway this month at the Vatican, the result of a whistleblower going public.

A young priest is charged with sexually abusing an altar boy over a five-year period inside Vatican City walls. An older priest is charged with covering up the abuse.

It’s the first criminal trial for sexual abuse to take place in the Vatican court.

The first hearing of the trial, held earlier this month, lasted just eight minutes — enough for the Vatican court to hear graphic descriptions of the charges. The alleged victim, identified by his initials, LG, was forced “to undergo carnal acts, acts of sodomy and masturbation at different times and in different places inside Vatican City,” according to charges read out by the court clerk.

The alleged abuse took place from 2007, when the victim was 13, until 2012.

Whistleblower Kamil Jarzembowski meets journalists outside St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican on Oct. 14. He reported the abuse to Roman Catholic Church authorities in 2012. In 2017, he went public. “I saw my roommate being abused by another seminarian,” he told an Italian investigative TV program. “I was scared. I didn’t understand. It was the first time I saw two people having sex.”

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Whistleblower Kamil Jarzembowski meets journalists outside St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican on Oct. 14. He reported the abuse to Roman Catholic Church authorities in 2012. In 2017, he went public. “I saw my roommate being abused by another seminarian,” he told an Italian investigative TV program. “I was scared. I didn’t understand. It was the…