THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, March 8, 1996 TAG: 9603080599
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A6 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BOSTON GLOBE
DATELINE: DEDHAM, MASS. LENGTH: Medium: 56 lines
John C. Salvi III has ``unique'' views about Freemasons targeting individual Catholics, but other aspects of his world view are shared by millions of Americans, including Republican presidential candidate Patrick J. Buchanan and religious broadcaster Pat Robertson, a theologian testified Thursday.
Thomas Wangler, a religious historian at Boston College, said in Superior Court that the Roman Catholic Church and the Freemasons have been at odds for centuries over theological and social differences. Catholics are still forbidden from joining the organization, but do not face excommunication as they had in the past.
Freemasons are a fraternal organization dedicated to secular government and liberal social policies, and the group is not operating an economic conspiracy to deprive individual Catholics of their homes as Salvi has written, Wangler testified.
``I have never seen a Catholic express the opinion that Masons were conspiring to get Catholics,'' Wangler said.
Wangler was called by Salvi's defense team to reinforce its claim that Salvi shot and killed two women in Brookline family-planning clinics in 1994 because he was experiencing paranoid schizophrenic delusions. Shannon Lowney, 25, and Lee Ann Nichols, 38, receptionists at the clinics, were killed.
Salvi has written that Catholics need to print their own money to break free of the financial control Freemasons assert through credit cards. He has also written that Freemasons are using money to run abortion clinics that lure Catholics in order to reduce the number of Catholics.
Under cross-examination by Norfolk County Assistant District Attorney Marianne C. Hinkle, Wangler acknowledged that some of the broad themes Salvi touched upon in his written statements - fear of credit cards being used to gain control of the individual, and fear of a one-world government - are echoed in the words of Buchanan and Robertson of Virginia Beach. Wangler also acknowledged that some of Salvi's themes about a Freemason conspiracy were printed in the Fatima Crusader, a Catholic publication, found in Salvi's truck.
Also Thursday, Dortch-Okara barred a defense psychiatrist, Dr. David Bear from describing most of what he said was a detailed history of mental illness in Salvi's maternal family. Scientists believe schizophrenia is an inherited disease.
The judge ruled that beause Bear had relied on anecdotal information, not medical records, most of the testimony about Salvi's family history was not admissible.
Salvi was arrested Dec. 31, 1994, in Norfolk, Va., after he allegedly fired a rifle into the Hillcrest Clinic. by CNB