A monk from Montserrat will have to go to trial for an alleged case of abuse of a minor under 16 years of age in 2019. The prosecutor requests a five-year sentence for brother Gabriel after the alleged episode of pedophilia that happened in the abbey a few years ago four years. The private prosecution, for its part, requests six years of deprivation of liberty. Both parties coincide in demanding that an oral trial be held and consider that the suspect should financially compensate the victim.
The monk Gabriel was 39 years old and was one of the coordinators of Montserrat Jove, an initiative that organizes meetings with minors for reflection. On one of the days, the monk met the victim and an increasingly close bond was generated between the two, according to El Periódico. The two accusations consider that the monk had a great influence on the victim and that he saw him as “a spiritual and personal guide”. The defendant invited the minor to the abbey one weekend and that’s when he allegedly abused him. According to the complaint to the Mossos d’Esquadra, Father Gabriel got the minor drunk during the two nights. It was in 2021 when the victim reported these events to the police.
The defendant had not only earned the trust of the minor, but also that of the family. In fact, he used the bottle of cava that the parents of the 16-year-old boy gave him as a gift for helping his son to endure some problems and doubts that affected the victim.
This is not the first case of pedophilia that has taken place in the Montserrat abbey. The first case was that of the monk Andreu Soler. The independent commission created by the abbot of Montserrat to investigate the abuses concluded in 2019 that it was “a sexual predator and a pedophile”. It was learned that for decades he abused various minors even though his case had expired and he did not have to go to trial.
Along with Soler’s case, it was discovered that there was a second monk who abused at least two minors, although they specified that he was no longer in the monastery and that the case had also prescribed. The monk Gabriel, therefore, will be the first of the monks of Montserrat who will have to stand trial. According to information from the abbey, the defendant continues to be part of the community, although they stress that he does not maintain contact with minors.
