The story just keeps getting worse:
Five new complaints of alleged abuse committed by Father Marko Rupnik have been presented to the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome, where an investigation into the case is being carried out after Pope Francis decided to lift the statute of limitations.
The new cases mark the latest development in the case of Rupnik, a Jesuit accused of having committed serious sexual, spiritual, and psychological abuse against at least 20 women over a period of decades.
As reported by the Italian news agency Ansa, the testimonies of five alleged victims were presented at the Vatican dicastery by Italian lawyer Laura Sgrò on April 3.
The complainants include two women who shared their testimony at a press conference in February, while the other three are heretofore unknown cases.
On Feb. 21, Mirjam Kovac (who said she suffered spiritual and psychological abuse but not sexual) and Gloria Branciani recounted during a press conference in Rome what they experienced in the Loyola Community, an institution co-founded by Rupnik in Slovenia in the early 1990s.
During the unusual press conference, the former women religious shared their testimony and were accompanied by Sgró, known for also being the lawyer of Pietro Orlandi, brother of Emanuela, the young woman who disappeared from the Vatican in the 1980s, as well as by her participation in the Vatileaks case.
