Summit staff took the girls to the Legionary priest, saw them cry and shut up, Biani accuses

Mexico City. - The administrative staff of the Cumbres Institute in Cancun knew that Fernando Martínez, a member of the Legionaries of Christ, abused girls, but kept silent, Biana López-Antúnez, one of the victims of the pedophile priest.

“All the administrators saw that girls were entering the address, they saw that they were crying, and they were silent,” he said in “Los Periodistas”, a program conducted by Alejandro Páez Varela and Álvaro Delgado Gómez.

“There were already reports of sexual abuse and they moved him. They put it with girls. He was the director of the school and the priest. He abused us in the direction and in the chapel, ”he said.

On May 2, Ana Lucía Salazar joined the #MeToo after issuing a public complaint in which she stated that she was a victim of sexual abuse by Father Fernando Martínez. The abuses occurred when the victim was 8 years old, while enrolled in the Cumbres Institute. In addition, in his complaint, Salazar said the school authorities decided to "shut up," as did the parents of other minor victims.

“When Ana Lucia makes her complaint, another victim speaks to me. I realized they were more. Fernando Martínez forced me to see how he abused other girls. It was a shock. We ended up making a conference call several victims. We started talking about it. We had it repressed. It is something that has affected us so much that we all start talking instantly, ”he said.

López-Antúnez wrote a clear incriminating document against the priest Fernando Martínez that had not been disclosed until now, when the order is once again at the center of a scandal about abuse and cover-up.

“I didn't remember writing that letter. That happens when you suffer abuse. They were continuous abuses, ”he said in“ Los Periodistas ”.

“It's a very confusing thing. It is out of all the references you have at age eight. You do not know what is happening. He is the priest, he is the one who gives us the masses, he is the director. You can't ... It took me time to click and assemble the puzzle. I don't remember when I wrote the letter, but I remember a particular abuse, ”he said.

“Fernando Martínez had complaints since 69. They knew it and put us in our school. It is a series of abuses of power, ”he denounced.

In December 2019, the Legionaries of Christ recognized that 175 minors have been victims of sexual abuse, including at least 60 by Father Marcial Maciel, in the congregation since its founding in 1941.

The report designates 33 priests as responsible for the cases of pedophilia against these children, mostly between 11 and 16 years of age.

It also highlights that the number of victims “includes at least 60 minors who were abused by Maciel” (1920-2008), founder of the Legionaries and who was appointed in 2010 by the Vatican for their “very serious and objectively immoral” behaviors .

Previously, in 2006, the Holy See ordered the Maciel withdrawal from the priestly ministry.

If Maciel is excluded from the list, two priests committed virtual abuse, 4 abused his victim only once, 9 repeatedly made him a single victim, 11 abused between 2 and 5 victims; 5 of them between 6 and 10 victims and one that has already been removed, has 13 known victims.