Karadima, priest defrocked for sexual abuses, dies in Chile

Fernando Karadima, a Chilean priest who was at the center of a sexual abuse scandal that shook the Catholic Church in Chile and who was eventually defrocked by the pope, has died

SANTIAGO, Chile -- Fernando Karadima, a Chilean priest who was at the center of a sexual abuse scandal that has recently shaken the Catholic Church in Chile and who was eventually defrocked by the pope, has died. He was 90. Karadima died on Sunday of bronchopneumonia and kidney failure in the nursing home where he was living, according to his death certificate. After being defrocked in 2018, Karadima was sanctioned to a lifetime of penance and prayer for having sexually abused minors in a parish in Chile’s capital. Three of his victims said on a press release that they knew Karadima had died and that he was only “another link on this culture of perversion and cover-up in the church,” and they hoped this never happens again.