Subject: John Manly

• Mater Hey!

  Glad to see the Los Angeles Times follow up earlier this week on the Mater Dei High girl-diddling basketball coach scandal we wrote about in April. Yesterday, a judge ruled attorney John Manly can interrogate anyone he damn wants for the civil trial. Might one of those people be Orange County Treasurer candidate Patrick Desmond? According to Desmond's ballot statement (which we have on our desk but, since we don't know how to scan you'll have to see here), the man was CFO for Mater Dei for a sh

  May 26, 2006

• Suck on it, USC!

  My alma mater (at least for the MA) shocked USC, 13-9, a great joy for all of us who despise the lords of Orange County. Click over to OC Blog, where you can find a comprehensive list of these terrible Trojans (my boss and courageous Catholic lawyer John Manly excepted). Also remember that South Coast Plaza hosts a Trojans memorabilia store. Us UCLA grads? We get to revel in the upset of the millenium.

  December 2, 2006

• Another Sex-Abuse Accusation Against Diocese of Orange

  It's now been over a month since the Weekly revealed that Diocese of Orange Bishop Tod D. Brown had a molestation allegation lodged against him in the past. We knew Brown wouldn't comment on the matter (we thought about confronting him yesterday, when he presided over the Confirmation of my brother and others at St. Boniface in Anaheim, but thought better of it), but what has shocked us is that neither the bleeding Los Angeles Times or Orange County Register ever hopped on the story. We understa

  May 26, 2007

• Breaking: OC Diocese Lawyers Seek to Seal Bishop Brown Deposition

  Over the weekend, attorneys with the firm of Manly, McGuire & Stewart deposed former Catholic Diocese of Orange Bishop Norman McFarland and current bishop Tod D. Brown as part of the firm's ongoing lawsuit against the Orange Diocese, Mater Dei High School, and former boy's basketball coach Jeff Andrade (click here for the Weekly's coverage of the lawsuit). Now, sources tell the Weekly that lawyers for the Orange diocese successfully convinced a judge to stop Brown's deposition midway through his

  September 11, 2007

• Statutory Rapist Andrade And Pals Seek to Block Many Things

  A slew of in limine motions filed this past week by former Mater Dei High School boys' basketball coach/admitted statutory rapist Jeff Andrade and his former employers, the Catholic Diocese of Orange. Andrade's lawyers moved that any potential jury not hear "in any manner, either directly or indirectly, any reference to documentation, witness testimony and/or opinions that refer to any allegation that [Andrade] was criminally prosecuted or not criminally prosecuted as a result of his sexual rela

  September 25, 2007

• Subpoenas Sought for Urell, Urell’s Attorneys

  Links to come--am boarding a plane to El Paso... While OC Weekly cover boy Monsignor John Urell is in Canada to presumably get his rocks back in order, the Jeff Andrade matter trudges on. The latest twist: Urell’s lawyer is busy fighting a subpoena filed against the two of them filed by Newport Beach attorney John Manly. In a letter dated Sept. 25, Urell personal attorney Peter Hennessey tries to plead innocence and ignorance as to why he should be deposed. “I am not aware of any legitima

  September 28, 2007

• OC Blog Spins for Urell (And Spins and Spins...)

  Bear with us, gentle readers--this is a long post... Though the Weekly anointed Orange Juice as the county's best blog, even the Juicers would admit that the king of the county blogosphere is OC Blog, started and administrated by Jubal, the nom de plume of political consultant and longtime local Republican activist Matt Cunningham. Its politics are unapologetically center-right--it says so on the banner. But we had no idea that OC Blog would also evolve into a mouthpiece for the pedo-priest pro

  October 1, 2007

• Did John Urell Lie During his Deposition?

  October 3, 2007

• Diocesan Lawyers All of a Sudden Uppity

  For decades, the Catholic Diocese of Orange has dealt with survivors of its pedo-priests in secrecy--sealed settlements, claimed ignorance, and always, always, away from a jury. In none of the civil settlements that the Orange diocese signed off on were there any admission of guilt by the priest or diocesan lay employee charged with molestation. That's what makes the current strategy by longtime diocesan lawyer Peter Callahan so bizarre. Callahan has represented the Orange diocese on almost all

  October 3, 2007

• What the Hell is Bishop Brown Doing in St. Augustine?

  As the Catholic Diocese of Orange heads toward a potentially blockbuster civil trial, as diocesan PR flacks spin furiously, Bishop Tod D. Brown is in...St. Augustine, Florida?! Yep. His Excellency is there as part of the Joint Committee of Orthodox and Catholic Bishops. Now, we don't hold anything against our Orthodox brethren--Orange County Register columnist Steve Greenhut is Greek Orthodox--but surely there are more important things for Brown to take care of that a millennium-old schism, no?

  October 4, 2007

• A Critique of a Critique Criticizing My Bishop Brown Critique

  Google is great, really: a couple of random searches, and voila! You have a media critique. At least that's how Dave Pierre, author of The Media Report and a contributor to NewsBusters, operates with my recent LA Times opinion piece bashing Catholic Diocese of Orange Bishop Tod D. Brown. Under the headline, "Facts, Fairness Out the Window In LAT Op-Ed Attack On Calif. Bishop," Pierre proclaims that my article's premise that Bishop Brown's handling of the Orange diocese sex-abuse scandal is horri

  October 5, 2007

• Breaking: Orange Diocese Settles Andrade Case

  Scroll down for updates as they come... Just received word that the Catholic Diocese of Orange just settled a civil suit filed against it and former Mater Dei High School boys' basketball coach Jeff Andrade. Strange, considering diocesan lawyers were publicly proclaiming they were raring to start the trial. And isn't it convenient that they announce it on a Friday afternoon, just as the weekend starts and reporters are busy planning how to lose the weekend in a glass of Jack Daniels? Details as

  October 5, 2007

• Statement by John Manly on Settlement Against Orange Diocese

  Here's John Manly, the Newport Beach lawyer who represented four sex-abuse victims of employees with the Orange diocese, on the $6.885 million settlement announced this afternoon: Today, Bishop Tod Brown and the Diocese of Orange agreed, at the point of a legal gun and on the eve of trial, to settle four civil cases brought by women who were sexually abused as young girls between 1991 and 1999 by employees of the Diocese of Orange. Most of the abuse took place in the mid to late 1990s by sta

  October 5, 2007

• Peepee Match Between John Manly, Jubal On!

  Today, Judge Gail Andler refused to dismiss a contempt-of-court motion filed against Diocese of Orange Bishop Tod D. Brown by his longtime nemesis, John Manly for the recently settled Jeff Andrade case. Read more about the hearing in this Thursday's issue of the paper--for this post, I'll discuss a quien-es-más-macho incident that happened before Judge Andler's court went into session. Manly associate Vince Finaldi set his suitcase in Judge Andler's courtroom a bit before 9 a.m. He went outsid

  October 9, 2007

• Urell Supporters Take Out Full-Page Ad in OC Register

  We rarely read past Page Four of the Orange County Register's front page, since anything beyond that is usually Macy's ads and rehashed Associated Press or Reuters blurbs. Indeed, we didn't read past page four this morning until an eagle-eyed reader (gracias, amigo) alerted us to a full-page ad taken out by a group calling themselves "Friends of Msgr. John." The ad in question was an "Open Letter in Support of Msgr. John Urell," the priest who for years handled sex-abuse complaints in the Cathol

  October 10, 2007

• "Friends of Monsignor John" Already Deletin'

  Scroll for updates after the jump... A support group for embattled Orange diocese Monsignor John Urell isn't even a day old, and already site administrators are deleting messages critical of Urell and his peers' handling of the diocese's sex-abuse scandal. You won't know this from reading their website, of course: they deleted the messages, silly! But this trusty reporter has three of them for you, after the jump:

  October 10, 2007

• "Friends of Monsignor John" Not Friends to Sex-Abuse Victims

  The "Friends of Monsignor John," a support group for embattled Diocese of Orange Monsignor John Urell that counts as members OC Blog founder Matt "Jubal" Cunningham and Rancho Santiago Community College District board president John Hanna, claim they care about sex-abuse victims. Indeed, a page on their website asks readers to "Please pray for these young women [who recently settled civil suits against the Orange diocese], for their healing, their serenity and that their hearts will always remai

  October 12, 2007

• The Continuing Story of the Bunglin' Friends of Monsignor John

  Go visit the website of the Friends of Monsignor John, the brave individuals who sought to publicly support the Catholic Diocese of Orange's longtime point man in its horrendous sex-abuse scandal. Notice anything different? Notice there are no more comments, deleted or otherwise? Notice there are no more depositions, redacted or otherwise? Notice there isn't even the text of the group's full-page ad in the Orange County Register from last week? Granted, websites constantly evolve, but the Friend

  October 16, 2007

• Friends of Monsignor John Fully Repentant, Involve More Politicos

  The bumblin' Friends of Monsignor John got walloped yesterday on the radio by the John and Ken Show, and today in print by Orange County Register columnist Frank Mickadeit for their, well, bumblin' (read our archives for background on the matter, por favor). Mickadeit elicited the first public response on the controversy from the Friends' website administrator and OC Blog god Matt "Jubal" Cunningham, who told Frank the posting of unredacted depositions which revealed the names of Orange diocese

  October 17, 2007

• More on the Defenders of the Bumblin' Friends

  A commentator on my previous post about the latest pee-pee battle between OC Blog god Matt "Jubal" Cunningham and Newport Beach lawyer John Manly pointed out something that deserves further examination. The lawyer helping Cunningham and the Friends of Monsignor John, Darren Aitken, not only is Cunningham's former classmate at Servite High School (the all-boys Catholic prep in Anaheim) but is also the son of Wylie Aitken, one of the county's more prominent lawyers and a longtime Democratic Party

  October 17, 2007

• Jubal Speaks

  Nearly a week after posting an unredacted deposition revealing the names of six Orange diocese sex abuse victims, Friends of Monsignor John Urell webmaster Matt "Jubal" Cunningham posted a lengthy apology on his powerful, widely read OC Blog. Cunningham's mea culpa is rather extraordinary in that his previous commentaries about the Orange diocese sex-abuse scandal antagonized sex-abuse survivors and their supporters with his spin for Urell, the Orange diocese's former person in charge of investi

  October 19, 2007

• OC Diocese Not Paying Sex-Abuse Victims?

  On Oct. 5, Catholic Diocese of Orange Bishop Tod D. Brown announced that the Orange diocese had settled four molestation claims against former lay employees for $6.685 million. Today, the Orange diocese is supposed to pay up--but plaintiff's attorney John Manly says Bishop Brown and his cronies have delayed too long. This morning, Manly sent out a letter to longtime diocesan lawyer (and Orange County's 14th scariest person this year) Peter Callahan expressing outrage over the fact he's not retur

  November 20, 2007

• Thursday's Headlines. No Surprises: Bishop Brown citation dropped

  Bishop Brown citation dropped: The Los Angeles Times reports that a contempt-of-court citation against Orange Bishop Tod Brown has been dropped as part of an almost-$7 million sex abuse settlement. Plaintiff's attorney John Manly said the diocese forced them to drop their bid for the citation: "The diocese insisted that it be done this way or they would have refused to pay our clients." But Diocese of Orange attorney Peter Callahan, in typical Callahan form, said the contempt case was dismissed

  November 29, 2007

• Pedophile Protector Apologist of the Day...

  ...Is Patrick Redmond of Newport Beach! Today, the Orange County Register prints his letter blasting star columnist Frank Mickadeit for his supposed "umbilical fascination" with famed Catholic Church sex-abuse victim's attorney John Manly. The trigger for such a clever twist of words? A March 7 column Mickadeit wrote about the return of Monsignor John Urell, the longtime Catholic Diocese of Orange priest who lost it in a deposition regarding his pedophile-protecting past, in which he quoted a Ma

  March 12, 2008

• The Devolution of a Mater Dei Apologist

  Until we upgrade our blog, many of ustedes might not know about the many fights raging on blog posts of the past--the old posts that seem to get the most attention include those on local Armenian genocide denier Ergun Kirlikovali, Laotian Secret Army general Vang Pao, and my review of Lola Gaspar. But the funniest such fight by far has to do with Mater Dei High grad Nick Manning.Two weeks ago, I wrote a post urging Servite High students to drop the racist chants during boys' basketball games aga

  February 9, 2009

• Pope Benedict XVI to Give Papal Recognition to a Bunch of Orange Diocese Pedo-Apologists

  Who says Diocese of Orange Bishop Tod D. Brown doesn't take care of his lackeys? Actually, no one: anyone with half a brain (me, me!) knows this. Anyways, Brown sent out a letter to his priests two days ago announcing that "our Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI has honored papal recognition, to those listed below for their outstanding service to the Church." The list is long, so we're only going to post the worst of the worst. The ceremony for their official installation, according to the letter, is

  February 12, 2009

• Former O.C. Bishop Lies Like a Devil in Fresno Pedophile Case

  Yesterday, a Fresno jury acquitted the Catholic Diocese of Fresno of culpability in the priestly rapes of innocents, and does this news really surprise you given Fresno is Fresno? We really can't expect much intellectually and morally of this town, given its head padre is Bishop John Steinbock, former auxiliary bishop of the Orange diocese. On the witness stand, news accounts quote Steinbock as saying, "I never have returned anyone to ministry that I believe was guilty of sex abuse."HAHAHAHAHA!

  April 4, 2009

• Cirilo Flores Rarely Pursued Discipline of Molesting Priests While Serving on Important Church Board

  January 15, 2009

• Joelle Casteix Fights for Catholic Church Sex-Abuse Victims While Pursuing Her Own Abuser

  July 10, 2008

• Fiddlin' in St. Augustine

  October 11, 2007

• Bad Moves

  September 27, 2007

• McKnight Shifts

  August 9, 2007

• McKnight Out

  February 22, 2007

• McKnight Moves

  February 1, 2007

• McKnight Fall

  January 25, 2007

• Mcknight Errant

  December 21, 2006

• The Wretched of the Wretches

  November 9, 2006

• Hardwood Babylon

  April 27, 2006

• King of the County Pedophiles

  December 15, 2005

• Shreddin'!

  March 24, 2005

• Northern Exposure

  March 3, 2005

• Boy-Buggering Bingo!

  10 unlikely winners and losers in the Orange Diocese sodomy sweepstakes

  December 23, 2004

• A Millstone Around Their Necks

  December 2, 2004

• The Army of God

  August 12, 2004

• Local Boy Makes GoodFor Child Molesters

  July 15, 2004

• John Manly Writes to John Moorlach Regarding Pedo-Apologist Baird

  Perhaps no one* has more moral weight in the Diocese of Orange sex-abuse scandal than Newport Beach lawyer John Manly, of Manly & Stewart. It's because of Manly's law offices that so many victims have found justice through civil courts, that the public knows about the pedo-protecting ways of Orange bishops and so many others through his release of once-confidential documents and depositions. Because of this, many county Catholics and GOP loudmouths despise him, even though Manly was enough o

  January 12, 2009

• King of the County Pedophiles

  December 15, 2005

• OC Diocese Lawyer Trashes OC Weekly But Still Loses

  Last month, famed Newport Beach attorney John Manly sent two associates to Monterey so they could argue before a judge why Manly should depose Catholic Diocese of Orange Bishop Tod D. Brown. Why Monterey? Brown was the Diocese of Monterey Chancellor until 1989, and Manly represents an alleged clerical sex-abuse victim from the region. Brown, needless to say, doesn't want to go through a Manly deposition, mainly because His Excellency is terrible before an interrogator and has sicced his lawyers

  July 9, 2007

• OC Diocese Convicted Perv Albert Lee Schildknecht Violated Probation, Served Jail Time

  Schildknecht​Finally! The Diocese of Orange has its third pervert to ever serve jail time for sexually abusing a minor: Albert Lee Schildknecht, a former choir directory at St. Timothy in Laguna Niguel (home to pedo-apologist supreme John Urell), who plead guilty earlier this year to two felony counts of oral copulation of a minor and one felony of sexual penetration with a foreign object of a minor but amazingly received a sentence of five years probation. The terms of the probation exp

  September 9, 2009

• Tod Brown Allowed Funeral of Pervert Bishop G. Patrick Ziemann at Holy Family Cathedral

  Ziemann: Inflicted Hell, now receiving it...​Sorry we're late to the party, but G. Patrick Ziemann--a teacher at Mater Dei during the early 1970s who went on to become an auxiliary bishop in Los Angeles and head bishop at the Diocese of Santa Rosa before resigning in disgrace for screwing up its finances and screwing a fellow priest--died late last month. Ziemann deserves a special spot in Hell, above Eleuterio Ramos but below founding Diocese of Orange Bishop William Johnson. The Archdiocese

  November 11, 2009