Various KPR news

[NICK HAINES]: The group Wounded Sheep was formed six month ago by Sonny and Verline Scroggins from Topeka. Scroggins claims his wife was sexually manipulated by their Baptist pastor over a period of eight years. Scroggins says the pastor told his wife that if she performed certain personal acts for him, it would assist his religious ministry. [Scroggins] We done everything in secrecy, got her to send him cards and letters and expressions of love, because it was helping him win souls. [Reporter] Scroggins says since he formed Wounded Sheep in June, that he's met and talked with people from across Kansas who have similar stories. They've set up a hotline that offers advice and support to victims. According to national studies, 38 percent of ordained ministers in the US claim to have had sexual intercourse with one of their parishioners. Scroggins doesn't believe the situation is worse now than it has been in previous decades, but he says it's only in the last few years that people are beginning to speak out about these issues. [Scroggins] In the past, it's been no one wanted to deal with a situation like this. They would rather pretend or ignore or just not

be involved with that because no one wants to confront a pastor and I feel that we must confront them. [Reporter] Mark Morris Macklemore agrees. Macklemore is pastor of the First Christian Church in Chicago Heights, Illinois and is an outspoken critic of pastoral abuse in the US. Macklemore says while the church believes that ministers should have an intimate relationship with their parishioners, that should never cross over into a sexual relationship. [Macklemore] It is not unlike the adult's responsibility a relationship with a child not to abuse the child. The adult and the clergyperson are in a special situation of trust and power. [Reporter] But while acknowledging that priests and ministers should be held to a higher standard, Macklemore says the public and the hierarchy of the church's leadership must now show a greater recognition of the pressures on individual clergymen who are often put in difficult and compromising situations with their parishioners. [Macklemore] Being a pastor means being with people at significant moments of joy or darkness like death or divorce,

and it means gaining people's trust, knowing them intimately, and sometimes involves hearing personal details of their lives, often sexual details, and it is hard not to have sexual feelings in those situations. [Reporter] Macklemore says it's only now that churches are examining the many complex factors involved in this issue. But Macklemore believes the current motivation for action is not based out of a deep rooted concern for the victims of abuse, but rather the fear of a lawsuit. In the last ten years more than 400 Catholic priests in the US have been accused of molesting children, and the cost of out of court settlements is now running into the tens of millions. Macklemore says the main way churches have dealt with sexual abuse cases is to transfer the minister or priest to another parish. But Macklemore says that solves nothing. [Macklemore] It merely takes the new predator and gives them a new hunting ground. [NICK HAINES]: Earlier this month the National Conference of Catholic Bishops announced measures that would make it easier for priests to be dismissed from the Catholic church for sexual misconduct.

Those measures have to be agreed upon by the Vatican, but Macklemore said that's a step in the right direction, a step the Protestant churches should follow. Meanwhile, Scroggins says his group is not interested in hounding ministers and forcing them out of jobs. He says his members are concerned more with mending wounds, healing, and trying to find forgiveness. [Scroggins] [audio breakup] --to forgive is to remember without the pain. [Reporter] [audio breakup] -- and Wounded Sheep will hold a public candlelight vigil for the victims --state house this Saturday evening. At the state house, this is Nick Haines reporting. ***** [AUDIO DISTORTION THROUGHOUT] [NICK HAINES]: In Kansas, like elsewhere in the United States, if a defendant cannot afford to pay for a lawyer to defend themselves against criminal charges, --constitutional rights-- attorney free of charge. It's up to each state to organize and pay for that legal representation. In Kansas, that's-- Indigent Defense Services. The board's executive director is Ron Miles-- increase in violent crime in Kansas has stretched the staff and the $8 million budget to--

...that means they have to farm out as much as 50% of all cases...$50 an hour for their services.. Miles says. He thinks...Miles...state of affairs...funding....Miles....private lawyers...to wait until... their services ....there won't be any...available to defend the indigent in Kansas. ....talk about...[NICK HAINES]: Jay Greeno agrees. Greeno is the public defender in Sedgwick County.

[JAY GREENO]: If you're tried within 90 days of the statute, they'd have to be-- [NICK HAINES]: Greeno says it's...additional money...public defenders...Kansas Governor Joan Finney says they can't have. Finney has asked Kansas budget might...next year...Rochelle Chronister is chair of... ...legislative committee.major ..public defenders...she says much of...depends on ...lawmakers...cases...can't afford lawyers...[ROCHELLE CHRONISTER]: to deal with that..happen to be .[NICK HAINES]: In an effort to save money...considered...defense ....senior services...legal representation...

...another option being...public defenders...Currently there are four public defenders that are in Johnson County if a person lives outside of those areas, the Indigent Defense Board..As an alternative, the board is looking at splitting up...geographical it. The board will hold a public hearing on the issue in Kansas City, Kansas, next week. At the statehouse, this is Nick Haines reporting. ***** [AUDIO DISTORTION THROUGHOUT] [JOHN TIBBETTS]: The Joy Luck Club takes its name from the weekly mahjong group comprised of four women,

or "aunties," as they are called by their daughters. One of the women, Suyuan, has just died and her daughter June is invited to join the group. It is June who, after discovering that her mother had had twins while still living in China, decides to return and seek them out. The Joy Luck Club is a dense interweaving of eight stories -- of the four mothers, and of the four daughters. The action ranges across Old China, Shanghai, and San Francisco's Chinatown. Each of the mothers has had a harrowing life before coming to America, and now they have daughters with their own different kinds of problems. There are unabashed sentiments here. There are moments of real horror. There are moments, even, of comedy. That's the kind of range this picture has. Essentially an anthology, it links its episodes along the chain of mother-daughter relations and Chinese-American relations...the movie is a real tour de force of voices, each seamlessly joined to the other, each taking on fragments of stories, sometimes dissolving in flashbacks within flashbacks. Now here it

might be a problem for some of us. I'll have to admit to some occasional fatigue throughout this almost 2 1/2 hour movie. You are following a lot of...a lot of characters, and sometimes it tests your memory just a bit. But believe me, it's worthwhile. Before I give the film a rating, let's talk to director Wayne Wang, a Chinese-American. He was born in Hong Kong, and named for John Wayne by his father, who was an engineer and businessman. Wayne Wang has made movies like Dim Sum, Chan is Missing, which first gave him a national reputation. The Joy Luck Club was written in 1989 by novelist Amy Tan, who worked with Wayne Wang on the scenario of this movie. I talked to Wayne Wang a little bit about one of the central themes of the Joy Luck Club, which he agrees is that of one generation learning from the other, youngsters learning from their elders. Here's Wayne Wang. [WAYNE WANG]: In my soul I feel that there's a lot that we can learn from the drama, and the tragedies, and the sufferings that our parents have gone through, and then what they've gone through

to get us to this country, and bring us up, and all of that. You know, on one hand, it's a baby, you know, their expectations <UNK> lot of kids to learn the past, because <UNK> way they live through their eyes. [JOHN TIBBETTS]: The voice of Wayne Wang, the director of The Joy Luck Club. And what a fascinating contrast this makes to movies like the Home Alone Series, where all parents are idiots, and all of the youngsters are the smart alecks. Clearly we have something to learn from the elders, and I think it's a message worth remembering. The Joy Luck Club is certainly making a splash for itself. ?? It is a mainstream box office hit. I hope you get the change to see The Joy Luck Club. Out of four stars, I'm giving it three and 1/2. Watch for this young filmmaker Wayne Wang in the future. He is in the vanguard of a number of Asian-Americans currently working in today's cinema. I'm John Tibbetts, and I'll talk to you-- [audio cuts out]