Allegations of Police Corruption at Benedictine University

Edit: there's more going on at Collegeville lately.   A University employee has admitted to a criminal act, but the local law enforcement officials refuse to investigate any further.  Meanwhile, the target of a threat lives in fear for their safety.

This event gives some further credence to claims that County officials were deliberately incompetent in their investigation of the disappearance of Josh Guimond in 2002.

What's happening can only be described as Kafkaesque.

Gagliadi Only Sees Evil Abroad

[Eponymous Flower]  Collegeville is a small town which includes the decadent Old Liberal Monastery of St. John's Abbey and has a population of approximately 3,000.

Some may recall that football's most winning football coach, John Gagliardi, had hypocritically commented on the Sandusky scandal, ignoring the substantially more significant problem in his own back yard.

 Despite admitting that he himself has had knowledge about predatory Monks at the Modernist Abbey of St. John's Abbey in Collegeville Minnesota, he did not know “if there was enough punishment in the world for a guy like that" when it came to a softball interview for the national news at the St. Cloud Times.

It's easy to be brave at times like that. Yet this was his statement in view of Penn State's Jerry Sandusky, who was accused of 50 allegations of sexual misconduct.

Gagliardi has been in close proximity to over 16 credibly accused homosexual perpetrators who preyed on students for as long as he's been coaching at St. John's. As the Pine Curtain notes, they taught at the schools where Gagliardi's children were schooled, and one of them even drove the bus for Gagliardi's football team. Impossible not to know, and what if they'd molested one of his children? There is no comment.

Perhaps some level (a very feeble level), of professional loyalty is in play here, as we pointed out before. Surely, Gagliaridi has a certain responsibility to his employer St. John's University, but at what point does the institution to which you belong become so morally compromised, dishonest and corrupt that it tarnishes your reputation as well?

SJU Employee Terrorizes Alum

It's easy to make brave statements about how "shocked" you are at sexual abuse when someone else is at fault, it's almost as easy as making criminal and terroristic threats on Facebook, and almost as easy as getting away with it because your grand father is the football coach.

Normally, such transgressions would result in termination from a job, some jail time and possibly community service, but this is St. John's Abbey of Modernism we're talking about here.

Corruption in Local Law Enforcement?

In any cease, such observations were likely to arouse profound anger and hatred on the part of Gagliardi's family members. Recently, John Gagliardi's grandson, Johnny Gagliardi, admitted to making a threat on the Facebook page of a person who had made a point of posting about John Gagliardi's possible complicity in the sexual abuse at St. John's Abbey and University. Despite the fact that the target was concerned for their safety during a visit to the campus where the perpetrator worked in "Life Services", local law enforcement and the prosecutor have decided not to investigate the case. Pine Curtain writes:

On February 3, 2012, however, Stearns County Sheriff’s Department Captain Pam Jensen called the target to report that her office had decided to close the matter. Remarkably, she told the target that the suspect was still “angry.” [Incredibly, implying that the target is actually at fault]

On February 3, 2012, the target of the threat sent an email to Stearns County Sheriff’s Department Captain Pam Jensen, cc’ing Stearns County Sheriff’s Department Lieutenant Jon Lentz, Stearns County Sheriff’s Department Sergeant Danial Winkels, and Stearns County Attorney Janelle Kendall.

The target explained that he felt the threat was real and that the suspect’s “reference to ‘what is coming’ is worrisome, given his and his family’s influence and connections.” He wrote, “it is important that my (and my family’s safety never be in question, whether in my own home and community or on future visits to my alma-mater. That is not currently the case.”
[Note: Less than a month earlier, a member of the suspect's family was made aware that the target was planning to visit the area in early February.]

If the local authorities have dismissed any further investigation into the case, it is very likely the result of a conflict of interest. The Pine Curtain Writes:

The February 3, 2012 request for an independent prosecutor was denied. This request was made because:

1) Stearns County Attorney Janelle Kendall’s children attend Saint John’s Preparatory School.


2) Stearns County Attorney Janelle Kendall’s husband, John Kendall, is currently listed as a faculty member at Saint John’s University.

3) Janelle and John Kendall give money to the Saint John’s University Annual Fund.

4) Stearns County Sheriff John Sanner and at least one of his sons reportedly attended Saint John’s University.

5) Sheriff John Sanner has been a fixture on the sidelines at Saint John’s University football games.

Read further at Pine Curtain...