LA PAZ, Bolivia – Two senior Jesuits in Bolivia were found guilty of covering up for a priest who admitted to sexually abusing dozens of minors decades ago, a victims association said Tuesday.
Marcos Recolons and Ramon Alaix, Spanish priests now in their 80s, went on trial in 2023 under a complaint brought by former students of Juan XXIII School in the central city of Cochabamba.
It was there that Alfonso Pedrajas, a Spaniard who died in 2009, taught and worked as a spiritual counselor.
Pedrajas kept a diary in which he wrote of abusing more than 80 children and adolescents in the 1970s and 80s. He said the two defendants knew of his behavior. The diary was made public in 2023.
A victims association welcomed the guilty verdict, which includes a one-year sentence.
“A door has opened to move toward the justice we had hoped for,” said Wilder Flores, a representative of the group.
Because of their advanced age and the shortness of the prison term, the defendants will not be jailed. AFP
“Today is a historic day for the Juan XXIII School and the country,” said Pedro Lima, a former Jesuit who was among the people that brought the complaint against Recolons and Alaix.
The defendants led the Jesuit order in Cochabamba. The court ruled that even though they knew of Pedrajas’s predatory behavior, they failed to alert the authorities.
Pedrajas first came to Bolivia in 1970. He died of cancer at the age of 66 without having gone on trial. AFP
