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Portugal's High Society Pedophile Ring... Just The Surface Scratched In 6 Year Trial
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Worldwide this goes on with our 'Leaders' using boys and girls for their own sexual gratification.
Perhaps the reason these Portugese were brought to some justice (none rec'd a life sentence, none rec'd a death sentence) is because they did not share their windfall (the young, including Deaf and Dumb children segregated for special abuse by a top physician) with the High Society living in other nations.
Link to full article: [link to www.independent.co.uk]
Excerpt from article:
"Two of those found guilty included Carlos Cruz, a popular television chat-show host with 30 years in show business, and Jorge Ritto, a former ambassador once sent home in disgrace from a posting in Germany over allegations that he had been having an improper relationship with a young boy in a park.
Their co-defendants included Carlos Silvino, an orphanage driver who would ferry children to paedophile houses; Joao Ferreira Diniz, a prominent doctor who often deliberately picked out deaf and dumb children; Manuel Abrantes, a former deputy principal at an orphanage; solicitor Hugo Marcal and Gertrude Nunes, the only female defendant who allowed her house to be used by the paedophile ring. The successful convictions, eight years after the paedophile scandal was exposed, is a major victory for Portuguese police, under intense criticism over their handling of the investigation into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann. One of the lead detectives in the Casa Pia case, Paulo Rebelo, also investigated the Madeleine McCann disappearance after the original lead investigator was sacked. Rebelo and his team of forensic investigators – called "the cleaners" because they leave no stones unturned – are said to have played a pivotal role in securing the convictions.
But the trial was dogged by accusations that witnesses had been intimidated, and allegations that senior politicians turned a blind eye to the abuse to protect friends. Reports that paedophiles were using Casa Pia orphanages to source victims surfaced in the early 1980s but they were swept under the carpet. Teresa Costa Macedo, a senior government official, said she informed the country's then president, General Ramalho Eanes, and provided photographic evidence. But the photographs were "lost" by police and Mrs Macedo said she was also intimidated by phone calls from anonymous callers. "They said they would kill me, flay me and a lot of other things," she recalled."
And:
The scandal that went right to the top
João Ferreira Diniz
A wealthy doctor, Diniz was arrested in January 2003 near his office in Belem, Lisbon. He insisted on his innocence throughout the trial. He has been sentenced to seven years in jail after being found guilty of abusing two children. His accusers claimed they had been abused by him at a house in Elvas, owned by co-defendant Gertrude Nunes.
Jorge Ritto
One of the most high-profile figures to be caught up in Portugal's largest paedophile ring, Ritto was once a career diplomat with a glittering career. He retired in 2002 after serving as Portugal's ambassador to Unesco. During the trial it emerged that he was sent home from a posting in Stuttgart in the early 1980s after allegations surfaced that he had been caught in an "improper relationship" with a boy in a park. He denied all charges in the Casa Pia trial. He was jailed for six years.
Carlos Cruz
Once voted "Portugal's most popular man", Carlos Cruz has spent three decades as one of the country's most recognisable television personalities. The 68-year-old fronted a number of successful shows during his career in the media and famously married a wife who is three decades his junior. He was arrested in 2003. He has repeatedly alleged that his arrest was the result of "a vendetta". Cruz is now facing a seven-year jail sentence.
The trial in numbers
800 witnesses and experts gave evidence in the case.
4,500 people were cared for at Casa Pia homes for children in need.
639 crimes were confessed to by ex-Casa Pia driver Carlos Silvino.
2,000 pages: the length of the sentencing document.
32 victims were identified during the near six-year trial.
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