Priests arrested after alleged victim wrote to Pope

Three priests and a teacher have been arrested in connection with a sex-abuse scandal in Granada.

The arrested priests are part of a group of 10 priests suspended last week accused of sexually abusing at least one boy.

Police are conducting a closed investigation into the alleged abuse, revealed when a 24-year-old man wrote to Pope Francis last summer describing the alleged events. The man claims that the abuse he suffered as a teenager also extended to other boys in the parish.

The Pope reportedly called the man twice to discuss the matter and apologise on behalf of the Church.

Those arrested on Monday were the “principal suspects” according to Santiago Pérez, a local government official quoted by El País newspaper. The priests are part of a group known locally as Los Romanescos, a reference to their leader, who was named by El País as Román Martínez, one of the detained.

Announcing the arrests, Spain’s interior minister Jorge Fernández Díaz emphasised the tough approach adopted by the Church. “I don’t think anyone can doubt that John Paul II, Benedict XVI and now Pope Francis have been extremely aggressive in their efforts to eradicate this type of behaviour from the heart of the Church,” he said. “It was the Pope himself who brought this case to light.”

On Sunday, Archbishop Francisco Martínez Fernández of Granada prostrated himself in the city cathedral, with other clerics, seeking pardon for the alleged abuse committed in their diocese.

“The evils of the Church are the evils of all of us,” said the archbishop.