Father Bernard Preynat was on Thursday "dismissed of the clerical state" – the heaviest sentence that can be pronounced by the church's ecclesiastical court.
Preynat was indicted in February 2016 for the sexual assault of minors dating back to the 1970s. More than 80 other people came forward with allegations of abuse by Preynat over a 20-year period.
In a related article dated 1 July 2019, RFI published French Cardinal’s trial highlights Church response to child abuse stated that "Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, 68, is one of six Church officials accused of failing to report Bernard Preynat, a priest accused of abusing children around the French city of Lyon between 1986 and 1991." [2] [Hyperlinke omitted.]
The article continued to report as follows [3]:
Two other French Catholic officials have been convicted of failing to report child abuse in the past, but Barbarin is the highest-profile official implicated in a cover-up.
“It’s very rare that cardinals or bishops are prosecuted for covering up child abuse, and that’s the most effective action that civil authorities can take to change the system,” says Miguel Hurtado of the international victims’ rights group The Ending Clergy Abuse Global Justice Project.
“The biggest precedent [French judges] can set is to say that nobody is above the law, no matter how powerful you are; that you may be a cardinal, but if you cover up abuse, you go to jail.”
When will American judges set this precedent?
[3] Ibid.
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