NEW YORK: The key witness in the case of a Chilean bishop accused of covering sexual abuse said on Saturday he gave “eye opening” testimony to a papally mandated investigator and hoped it would lead to the truth. Juan Carlos Cruz met in a church on Manhattan’s Upper West Side for about four hours with Archbishop Charles Scicluna, one of the most experienced and respected Vatican investigators of clergy sexual abuse. “It’s been a good experience and I leave here very hopeful today,” he told reporters afterwards. “I feel that I was heard … it was very intense and very detailed and very, sometimes, eye-opening for them.” “Hopefully it will lead to good things,” he said. The Vatican announced on Jan. 30 that Pope Francis had appointed Scicluna to look into accusations that Bishop Juan Barros of the diocese of Osorno in Chile had covered up crimes against minors. It was a dramatic U-turn for the pope, who eight days earlier told reporters aboard his plane returning from Latin America he was sure Barros was innocent and that the Vatican had received no concrete evidence against him. Published in Daily Times, February 19th 2018.