On trial

As my Toledo-area contact said, "This will fit in well with Da Vinci mania"

Trial of priest accused of satanic-tinged murder of nun begins next week. Will be broadcast on CourtTV

One of the biggest criminal cases in Toledo history had been scheduled to be shoehorned into one of the smallest courtrooms in the city until a judge reconsidered yesterday.

Lucas County Common Pleas Court Judge Thomas Osowik asserted yesterday morning that the Rev. Gerald Robinson’s murder trial would begin Monday in his 30-seat courtroom.

“This is where we do business,” Judge Osowik told media representatives during a meeting to discuss the logistics of covering the trial, which will be broadcast gavel-to-gavel on Court TV.

By early afternoon, however, with local and national news representatives maneuvering for the 10 courtroom seats allotted for media, and attorneys complaining about a lack of space for charts, boards, projectors, and other courtroom props, Judge Osowik relented and moved the trial to a larger room around the corner.

Comments

[Lee Podles]

Because it is a murder trial rather than a sexual abuse trial, I don’t know how much the prosecution will explore the allegations that Robinson was involved with prominent Toledo citizens in a sexual abuse ring.

In the hundreds of abuse cases I have read, there are a few which contain indications of diabolism (such as that of Rudy Kos in Dallas) but reporters have left all mention of that out of their stories.

There were rings of abusive priests, such as the one in Davenport, Iowa, who engaged in sacrilegious abuse. Whether it extended as far as Satanism, I do not know, but once a priest goes bad and is determined to be transgressive as possible, his mind set and symbol system will eventually end in Satanism, as in Huysman’s La-Bas.

The DA is not seeking a conviction for first degree, premeditated murder, which in Ohio carries the possibility of the death penalty. Clearly if Robinson did the murder, it was premeditated, but I assume that the DA thinks he cannot get a conviction if the jury thinks a priest could be executed.

[CV]

Yes, this epidemic of Satanic-influenced-priests-murdering-nuns must be stopped.

When will Catholics put their collective foot down and say, no more!

Sarcasm off.

[Sonetka]

Reporters voluntarily left all mention of diabolism out of their stories? Forgive me, but in view of the lurid reporting of the "Satanist day care" stories of twenty years ago, I find that sudden self-restraint hard to believe.

[Ken]

"Priest Accused of Satanic-tinged Murder of Nun"?

Now THAT'S a tabloid title!
Weekly World News, listen up!

[Lee Podles]

Reporters were stung by almost-but-not-completely-false Satanic Abuse panic, a phenomenon which perfectly fit Philp Jenkin's description of a moral panic, and did not want to discredit the all-too-real abuse that victims suffered by printing the allegations and hints of diabolism - at at least that is what I think motivated their reticence. The allegations are there in the Kos court record, and appaer in a few other cases.

[Daniel C.]

"In the hundreds of abuse cases I have read..." As warranted as it may be, in rooting out people who seem to be intent on doing as much damage as possible, this strikes me as taking the Proctologist's view of the Church.