A priest was arrested in southern Bolivia on Thursday (22) for alleged sexual abuse as authorities investigate the country’s most significant clerical pedophilia scandal.
Government Minister Eduardo Del Castillo shared a photo of the priest, Jorge Luis Machicado, being transported in a patrol car from his rural parish in Tarija, located 650 kilometers south of La Paz, to the police headquarters.
Machicado is the third priest arrested since the scandal emerged in late April when a diary left behind by deceased Spanish Jesuit Alfonso Pedrajas revealed his confession of abusing minors in the 1970s and 1980s.
Two weeks earlier, another priest was sentenced to 10 years in prison for the abuse of a minor in Santa Cruz, while a priest under investigation for alleged sexual abuse of seminarians a decade ago was also detained.
The recent arrest follows the Vatican’s delivery of Pedrajas’ diary to Bolivian prosecutors.
The Society of Jesus in Bolivia received the diary from the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith and handed it over to prosecutors in Cochabamba, where the alleged events occurred.
The society intends to request a full copy of the diary from the prosecutor’s office, as only partial excerpts were published.
Concerns have been raised about the timing and possession of the diary, with demands for accountability from the Society of Jesus.
The diary contains Pedrajas’ confession of abusing 85 minors, primarily in Catholic boarding schools in Cochabamba.
It arrived in Bolivia shortly after Pope Francis expressed his distress over the abuse allegations and pledged the Church’s cooperation with the Bolivian judicial investigation.
Before this, Bolivian President Luis Arce had written to the Pope, condemning the complicit silence of the local ecclesiastical structure and requesting access to relevant files.
Spanish priest Jordi Bertomeu, who led investigations into abuse cases in Chile and Paraguay, visited Bolivia after the Pedrajas case came to light.
The Bolivian Church clarified that the visit was unrelated to the scandal.
The Jesuits have established a commission to address Pedrajas’ victims, some of whom have already filed complaints.
Ongoing confidential investigations into alleged sexual abuse by priests are being conducted by the judiciary, with at least 12 cases currently under scrutiny according to the Bolivian Episcopal Conference.