St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York. Photo Credit: (AP Photo/Richard Drew) Suspected church arsonist ‘unfit’ for trial
A man accused of attempting to enter St Patrick’s Cathedral in New York last month carrying containers of gasoline and a lighter has been deemed unfit to stand trial due to his mental health.
Police arrested Marc Lamparello in April after he attempted to enter the cathedral. The 37-year-old is a New Jersey resident and PhD student at City University of New York.
A court-appointed psychiatrist has now found him mentally unfit to stand trial, according to his lawyer Chris DiLorenzo, who also said that Mr Lamparello suffers from schizophrenia and was off his medication on the day of the alleged arson attempt.
Assistant District Attorney David Stuart said his office would review the results and determine how to proceed with the case, the New York Post reports.
Former Vatican official won’t be tried under canonical changes
A Vatican court has decided not to initiate canonical charges against a former Vatican official, after an investigation into allegations he made sexual advances toward a woman in the confessional several years ago.
Fr Hermann Geissler (53) is a member of Familia Spiritualis Opus (FSO), informally known as ‘Das Werk’.
Fr Geissler’s community announced that five judges of the Vatican’s supreme tribunal decided on May 15 that he would not be tried for “a delict of solicitation to a sin against the sixth commandment in the context of Confession”.
Fr Geissler, who maintained his innocence throughout the process, stepped down from his position within the CDF earlier this year, where he had been an official since 1993. From 2009 he had been the head of the congregation’s teaching office.
Mexico grants abortion if mother’s ‘health at risk’
Mexico’s Supreme Court has ruled in favour of a woman who complained she was denied access to an abortion despite suffering ill health during pregnancy.
The May 15 decision declared that denying a woman access to an abortion if her health is at risk violated the patient’s right to health, even though Mexico’s criminal code does not mention the health of the mother as a motive for allowing the termination of a pregnancy.
None of Mexico’s 31 states has decriminalised abortion, though Mexico City allows it during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.
Verdict of Christian couple killing announced
A Pakistani court has upheld death sentences for three Muslims but acquitted two others in the 2014 mob killing of a Christian couple accused of blasphemy in the eastern city of Lahore. The ruling comes five years after Shahzad Masih and his wife Shama Bibi were beaten to death and thrown into a brick kiln in the eastern town of Kod Radha Krishan in Punjab province.
Shortly after the incident, police arrested scores of people and five of them were charged and sentenced to death in 2016.
Under Pakistan’s harsh blasphemy laws, anyone accused of insulting God or Islam can be sentenced to death.
Sale of consecrated hosts prohibited
An Etsy representative has clarified that the sale of consecrated hosts for the purpose of desecration is a violation of the e-commerce website’s terms.
A petition asking Etsy to confirm that it does not allow the sale of consecrated hosts gained thousands of signatures overnight, following a listing claiming to offer hosts to abuse.
The Etsy account ‘Pentagora’ claimed to be selling “Real Catholic Hosts, consecrated by a priest”. The hosts were advertised “to abuse for classic black fairs or black magic purposes”. The listing claimed to be selling a package of nine hosts that had been consecrated in Germany.
A few days later, the listing for the consecrated hosts was marked as ‘Sold Out.’
It was subsequently deleted.