Irish report finds abuse at Catholic schools

by Michael Paulson
May 20, 2009

A much awaited report on abuse at Catholic institutions in Ireland was released today by the government-sponsored Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse.

The conclusions are shocking, even given how much has been revealed in recent years about sexual abuse of minors:

"Physical and emotional abuse and neglect were features of the institutions. Sexual abuse occurred in many of them, particularly boys’ institutions. Schools were run in a severe, regimented manner that imposed unreasonable and oppressive discipline on children and even on staff."

The report, according to the Associated Press, concerns conditions at "Ireland's austere network of industrial schools, reformatories, orphanages and hostels from the 1930s until the last church-run facilities shut in the 1990s." The schools, according to the AP, housed "more than 30,000 children deemed to be petty thieves, truants or from dysfunctional families -- a category that often included unmarried mothers.'' the rest