Speaker 1: Warning. This episode contains references to sexual violence. Listener discretion
Speaker 1: is advised. There are thousands of bodies buried in the
Speaker 1: fertile soils of El Salvador, deep beneath the volcanic ash
Speaker 1: feeding the coffee plantations in the mountains. The practice of
Speaker 1: burying multiple bodies in a common grave goes back centuries
Speaker 1: when the conquistador is killed with swords and plagues when
Speaker 1: the government massacred our indigenous people in the nineteen thirties.
Speaker 1: Often common graves are marked with nothing more than two
Speaker 1: sticks in the shape of a cross, a simple memorial
Speaker 1: to lives lost.
Speaker 2: After pushing the bodies into the grave, the villagers covered
Speaker 2: it and placed a simple cross us made out of
Speaker 2: tree branches on the grave. I always thought it was
Speaker 2: just some little twig cross, and it was big three
Speaker 2: feet tall, this cross. And I think it was very
Speaker 2: obvious that the compasinos wanted this grave to be found,
Speaker 2: otherwise they wouldn't have marked it that way.
Speaker 3: That's my opinion on that.
Speaker 1: That's sister Cynthia glavic an Ursulae nun from Cleveland, Ohio,
Speaker 1: and she's talking about a common grave that was discovered
Speaker 1: in the afternoon of December fourth, nineteen eighty four women's
Speaker 1: bodies had been found sprawled along the roadside in the
Speaker 1: village of Santiago Nonualco. Local campasinos had found the women
Speaker 1: and buried them together in a shallow grave. This is
Speaker 1: nine months after Oscar Romero's assassination. By this time, the
Speaker 1: country was teetering on the brink of all out war
Speaker 1: and finding bodies along the road side was becoming more
Speaker 1: and more common. But one detail about these women stood
Speaker 1: out so much so that one of the villagers who
Speaker 1: was there went back and told his priest about it.
Speaker 2: The sandals was an interesting detail because the Salvadoran women
Speaker 2: didn't wear any shoes, so the fact that these women
Speaker 2: had sandals, it was like an identifying item that they
Speaker 2: were who they were, that these were the missionaries.
Speaker 1: Four American missionaries had gone missing. They'd been coming back
Speaker 1: from the airport in a big white van when they
Speaker 1: just disappeared. So when the priest heard about the women
Speaker 1: in sandals, he immediately raised the alarm. He called the
Speaker 1: American embassy and the US ambassador Robert White. We heard
Speaker 1: about in the last episode. White went to the grave
Speaker 1: site and asked the local authorities to dig up the bodies.
Speaker 2: The bodies were unearthed and pulled out of the shallow
Speaker 2: grave one by one with ropes, first, then more than Dorothy,
Speaker 2: and finally Ita.
Speaker 1: This graphic moment was caught on film by reporters and
Speaker 1: broadcast all over the US. Sister Cynthia was one of
Speaker 1: the people watching on TV.
Speaker 2: Those bodies being pulled out of the grave over and
Speaker 2: over again on TV. I think that just reinforced the
Speaker 2: brutality of this the whole thing.
Speaker 1: For Sister Cynthia, this footage hit especially hard because she
Speaker 1: recognized some of these women from back home.
Speaker 2: We were especially shocked in Cleveland because Dorothy and Jean
Speaker 2: had lived among us, so when they were found in
Speaker 2: a shallow grave in this deserted cow pasture, this news
Speaker 2: made headlines in every local and national news program and
Speaker 2: in every newspaper. Their deaths brought the tiny country of
Speaker 2: El Salvador and its problems to the intention of the
Speaker 2: entire world.
Speaker 1: The news that four American churchwomen had been killed execution
Speaker 1: style in El Salvador broke in the United States like
Speaker 1: a bomb. It was the first time that the general
Speaker 1: public in the US had heard any detail about what
Speaker 1: was happening in El Salvador. Oscar Romero had been murdered
Speaker 1: earlier that same year, but the murder of these four
Speaker 1: churchwomen would bring a whole new level of international scrutiny.
Speaker 1: This moment became a litmus test for the United States
Speaker 1: what they do about this heinous crime. Were they willing
Speaker 1: to keep funding a war that had killed its own citizens?
Speaker 1: The answer would reveal a murky cover up and would
Speaker 1: threaten the relationship between these two countries. I'm Jasmine Romero,
Speaker 1: and this is sacred Scandal. Nation of Saints, Episode four.
Speaker 1: The nuns. I don't know about you, but when I
Speaker 1: think about nuns, I generally picture them walking around in
Speaker 1: clusters around a cathedral, heads bowed and counting their rosary beads.
Speaker 1: What I don't picture is nuns canoeing.
Speaker 2: I just have this memory of us laughing, kind of
Speaker 2: screaming on the river wherever we were. We were in
Speaker 2: some park and trying to maneuver the canoes.
Speaker 1: But that's how Sister Cynthia remembers her time with Dorothy Kasel,
Speaker 1: one of the four churchwomen who were sent to El Salvador,
Speaker 1: not as a nun, but as the vibrant and dynamic
Speaker 1: woman she was.
Speaker 3: She was very outgoing. She had a huge smile, a.
Speaker 2: Lot of energy, the ability to make you feel special.
Speaker 1: Cynthia first met Dorothy when she joined the Ursuline Sisters
Speaker 1: of Cleveland in nineteen seventy three, but it turns out
Speaker 1: that Dorothy and Cynthia had actually grown up in the
Speaker 1: same place.
Speaker 2: Her family lived on the same street as I did,
Speaker 2: Shoreview Avenue, in Ublite, Ohio. They lived six doors away,
Speaker 2: so I knew her parents pretty well. So when I
Speaker 2: told her that I was from Shoreview Avenue, she called
Speaker 2: us the Blondes from Shoreview because she always had nicknames
Speaker 2: for people.
Speaker 1: Sister Cynthia is now the director of Archives for the
Speaker 1: Ursuline Sisters of Cleveland, and she wrote a book about
Speaker 1: Dorothy after her death. It's called In the Fullness of Life,
Speaker 1: and in the process of writing her book, she researched
Speaker 1: deeply how her fellow sister came to be in El
Speaker 1: Salvador and what her time there was like. In the
Speaker 1: nineteen sixties, the Pope had asked religious congregations to send
Speaker 1: missionaries to Latin America to support the new vision for
Speaker 1: the Catholic Church. Dorothy immediately knew that she wanted to
Speaker 1: be involved.
Speaker 2: Sister Dorothy wrote a letter volunteering and she mentioned that
Speaker 2: she had always had this desire since she was a
Speaker 2: child to serve the Spanish and Indian people, that she
Speaker 2: wanted to stay there and get to know them and
Speaker 2: help them.
Speaker 1: In the summer of nineteen seventy four, Dorothy landed in
Speaker 1: El Salvador. This was well before Oscar Romero was named archbishop,
Speaker 1: before Rorito, that we saw and had death squads, before
Speaker 1: the pressures of the country would boil over into all
Speaker 1: out war.
Speaker 4: Wednesday around enjoying thirty first, I think, and we arrived
Speaker 4: here on Monday afternoon. A plane came in early, it
Speaker 4: was about four o'clock. We had a beautiful flight. The
Speaker 4: flight down was really nice.
Speaker 1: Throughout her time there, Dorothy Kasel recorded audio cassette letters
Speaker 1: that she sent back to Cleveland.
Speaker 5: The country is really exquisite. It's mountainous and green, very
Speaker 5: green right now, and you really have to see it
Speaker 5: to appreciate it. It really is beautiful.
Speaker 1: Tapes that describe her new life in El Salvador. Listening
Speaker 1: to her, it kind of reminds me of my own
Speaker 1: reactions when I arrived, taking in the beauty but also
Speaker 1: the poverty of this place.
Speaker 4: When you pull into Cherry Library, you just pull onside
Speaker 4: too a dirt road which.
Speaker 5: Is really rocky and pitted. So we went around a village.
Speaker 4: And if they say it's great powerty stricken, it's just
Speaker 4: something you.
Speaker 5: Get used to living with and used to looking at it.
Speaker 4: Really, it is amusing to see these pigs tranding around
Speaker 4: those too, big pigs, little pigs, big counse, little counts,
Speaker 4: big bulls all over the place.
Speaker 3: It's different.
Speaker 1: Dorothy worked with priests administering to the community. She worked
Speaker 1: in three different parishes and was eventually sent to the
Speaker 1: Immaculate Conception parish in La Libertad.
Speaker 2: They planned an organized celebrate rations of the Eucharist and
Speaker 2: other liturgies. They played music and conducted choirs for the liturgies.
Speaker 2: They prepared adults and children for the reception of the sacraments.
Speaker 3: They also visited the sick.
Speaker 1: She also trained Salvadorans to be religious teachers. She distributed
Speaker 1: food to mothers and young children as part of Catholic
Speaker 1: relief programs. She and the other nuns they became a
Speaker 1: real presence in the area.
Speaker 2: Now whereas a priest could only visit his entire area
Speaker 2: once a month, the sisters and laywomen visited their areas
Speaker 2: all ten or more villages weekly alone and usually on
Speaker 2: horseback or by motorbike because of the rough terrain. So
Speaker 2: since the women served as such a vital link of
Speaker 2: communication between the parishes and its prisoners, the sisters really
Speaker 2: guided the work of the parish.
Speaker 1: Dorothy committed to stay six year years in El Salvador
Speaker 1: from nineteen seventy four to nineteen eighty. In those six years,
Speaker 1: she became part of the community. She slowly learned Spanish,
Speaker 1: learning the names of the towns that she was working in,
Speaker 1: and she grew to love the people that she was helping,
Speaker 1: and they too loved her. She became known as Madre
Speaker 1: de Rothera. In nineteen eighty, her term was ending and
Speaker 1: she was due to go back to Cleveland, but then
Speaker 1: Oscar Romero was killed.
Speaker 6: Everybody's just in a stage of shot, because you know,
Speaker 6: it's just he had just given us beautiful, beautiful homily
Speaker 6: and Sunday very strong. It was very his message was
Speaker 6: very strong, you know, he says, and to the soldiers,
Speaker 6: I have a specialness. And she says, I beg of you.
Speaker 7: I pleaded with you in the name of God, stop
Speaker 7: the repression.
Speaker 6: Don't kill Oh it was you know and in your years.
Speaker 1: Dorothy was at Romero's funeral. You can see her in
Speaker 1: the photos that were published from that day, standing by
Speaker 1: his casket. She was inside the cathedral while the bombing
Speaker 1: and the shooting was happening outside. In letters back home,
Speaker 1: she describes the horror of that day, watching the bodies
Speaker 1: of those killed be carried into the cathedral. Soon, Dorothy
Speaker 1: would be faced with a choice, one that directly tied
Speaker 1: to Oscar Romero's assassination. That's after the break, it was
Speaker 1: clear that the situation in El Salvador was rapidly deteriorating.
Speaker 1: The Bishop of Cleveland worried about Dorothy and her safety,
Speaker 1: but he also knew how much good the missionaries were doing.
Speaker 1: After Romero was assassinated, the bishop asked Dorothy if she
Speaker 1: wanted to come home or stay for another year.
Speaker 3: She so, well, of course I will stay, you.
Speaker 1: Know, But this wasn't the same El Salvador that she
Speaker 1: had arrived to in her six year stay. The political
Speaker 1: landscape had completely changed that Wisun's TV programs and death
Speaker 1: squads were fully operational in two months. The leftis Gerrias
Speaker 1: the FMLN will declare war on the Salvadoran government. Suddenly,
Speaker 1: Dorothy and the missionaries are not just spreading the word
Speaker 1: of Jesus. They're tending to wounded civilians and assisting people
Speaker 1: who had become refugees within their own country.
Speaker 2: A call would come for one of the gringas to
Speaker 2: transport refugees from a bombed out village to a refugee center.
Speaker 1: The women helped refugees find whatever they needed, medicine, shelter.
Speaker 1: All four of the churchwomen who were murdered in El
Speaker 1: Salvador were involved in this kind of humanitarian work, including
Speaker 1: Mary Noll's sisters Mara Clark and Eda Ford, and lay
Speaker 1: missionary Jane Donovan.
Speaker 2: So anyway, with their white Toyota van, Dorothy and Jean,
Speaker 2: who had been called the rescue squad by more and Ida,
Speaker 2: traveled through the hills, moving food supplies and refugees to
Speaker 2: refugee centers. They distributed medicine to the sick and wounded people,
Speaker 2: took them to medical clinics.
Speaker 3: They couldn't take the people to.
Speaker 2: Government hospitals for fear the people would be killed there.
Speaker 1: It was clear to the sisters how bad things were getting,
Speaker 1: especially as they were working in and around towns with
Speaker 1: heavy Geria presences. They saw a lot of death.
Speaker 7: On Friday, the next day and the twenty third, they
Speaker 7: found their bodies and I thought they were hacked. One
Speaker 7: of them was decapitated. I mean, it was just gruesome,
Speaker 7: just gruesome. So you know, it's just why why.
Speaker 6: I couldn't believe, you know, how these people can endure
Speaker 6: all of this.
Speaker 7: It's just been, you know, something's been happening like every week,
Speaker 7: you know, every day in the paper, ten bodies found
Speaker 7: in Santa on a five, and Ali Chapon with E M.
Speaker 7: The Squadron written on another twelve, and Son Miguel. It
Speaker 7: just gets to be too much. Sometimes it's so sad
Speaker 7: and it's just like so out of control.
Speaker 1: But Dorothy was determined in her decision to stay.
Speaker 2: She wrote, I could not leave Salvador, especially now, because
Speaker 2: I am committed to the persecuted church here.
Speaker 1: Now. I don't doubt for a moment Sister Dorothy's resolve
Speaker 1: and her desire to help. But there's also something else
Speaker 1: that influenced her decision to stay.
Speaker 2: They were well aware of the danger of doing that
Speaker 2: type of work, and they were fearful. But because they
Speaker 2: look so American with their blonde hair and blue eyes,
Speaker 2: Dorothy and Jean believed that they were safe.
Speaker 1: Whiteness americanness. It was a kind of unspoken protection that
Speaker 1: they carried. Dorothy wrote in her letters that even the
Speaker 1: local priests liked to have the American women with them
Speaker 1: when they walked around because they knew it was a
Speaker 1: kind of armor.
Speaker 2: Gane used to say, they the military don't shoot blonde,
Speaker 2: blue eyed North Americans, and Dorothy said, being a gringa
Speaker 2: is an asset. They wouldn't do anything to hurt you.
Speaker 1: But that protection only went so Fardnesday, November twenty sixth
Speaker 1: of nineteen eighty, Dorothy and Jean were invited to visit
Speaker 1: the US Ambassador Robert White at his home.
Speaker 2: They had met at a Thanksgiving ecumenical service the week
Speaker 2: before Thursday before, and they were talking about the political situation,
Speaker 2: and White said, well, why don't you come, We'll continue
Speaker 2: this conversation. Why don't you come to the American embassy. However,
Speaker 2: because of the curfew, please bring an overnight back, you know,
Speaker 2: so you could stay overnight.
Speaker 1: They spent the night, and the next day sister Dorothy
Speaker 1: and Jean went to the airport to pick up sisters
Speaker 1: Mara Clark and Eta Ford, who had been at a
Speaker 1: conference in Nicaragua.
Speaker 2: So the plane landed at seven o'clock. Dorothy and Jean
Speaker 2: greeted more and Ida, and they proceeded to the baggage
Speaker 2: claim to pick up their baggage there. And while they
Speaker 2: were waiting for their baggage, which they chatted with a
Speaker 2: group of Canadians who were arriving and.
Speaker 3: Kind of milling around there.
Speaker 2: The Canadians then got their luggage and said goodbye.
Speaker 1: That's really the last time that anyone saw the four
Speaker 1: women alive. The next day, the pastor at Dorothy's parish
Speaker 1: went to Dorothy and Jean's apartment. He was confused when
Speaker 1: they weren't there. He and others in the surrounding parishes
Speaker 1: started to make phone calls searching for the women. The
Speaker 1: American Ambassador, Robert White and the Minister of Defense were alerted,
Speaker 1: and several of the sisters themselves started to search. Two
Speaker 1: of them drove to the airport. On their way, they
Speaker 1: spotted a burnt out vehicle, a wreck surrounded by police
Speaker 1: a large white van that looked familiar. When they got
Speaker 1: to the airport, they asked around about the nuns, showing
Speaker 1: their photographs. Witnesses confirmed that they had been there. When
Speaker 1: the sisters got home, they looked up that white van's
Speaker 1: serial numbers, and.
Speaker 2: The numbers listed on the van's registration papers matched the
Speaker 2: numbers stamped on the motor block of the abandoned, burned
Speaker 2: out van, so they knew that that was their van.
Speaker 1: The women's bodies would be found the day after they
Speaker 1: went missing, but now the question was who had taken
Speaker 1: them and why. That's after the break the bodies were
Speaker 1: buried in the red clay earth of Santiago Nonualco in
Speaker 1: the Salvadorn Hills. Local Gumpasinos were ordered to reopen the
Speaker 1: grave and pull up the bodies of the four churchwomen.
Speaker 1: When they were exhumed. US Ambassador Robert White was there.
Speaker 1: Just three days before he had dined with the women.
Speaker 1: Now he watched their bodies being pulled from their shallow grave.
Speaker 2: It was apparent they had been executed military style. When
Speaker 2: the back, they were probably forced to lie on the ground,
Speaker 2: face down, and they were shot by the way Dorothy
Speaker 2: was shot twice. She was shot in the shoulder, they
Speaker 2: missed her head. I know that sounds horrible, and she moved.
Speaker 1: The investigations that followed showed that the women were not
Speaker 1: only murdered, they were also raped. Almost immediately. Robert White
Speaker 1: suspected that the Salvadoran government and the National Guard were involved.
Speaker 1: Sister Cynthia interviewed Robert White for her book in nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety three, and he told her that he began to
Speaker 1: think that something was fishy when he talked to the
Speaker 1: Minister of Defense hened al josegi More Garcia on the phone.
Speaker 2: He told Garcia that the women were missing. The first
Speaker 2: thing Garcia asked was were they wearing habits. Ambassador White
Speaker 2: then said that he had a very very bad feeling.
Speaker 2: This is in his own words, because that's the kind
Speaker 2: of standard defense that they make.
Speaker 1: As if not wearing habits, not being recognizable could have
Speaker 1: led to their deaths. This question, it got to the
Speaker 1: very core of the religious persecution in El Salvador. What
Speaker 1: he was really asking was were these traditional nuns who
Speaker 1: wore habits and stood with the elites, or were these
Speaker 1: part of the new and radical church that, in their
Speaker 1: eyes stood with the communists.
Speaker 2: But I do think that because they were working with
Speaker 2: the poor, this seemed to be the pattern with the military,
Speaker 2: that they were considered subversives and they were maybe even
Speaker 2: being watched. I think that, you know, maybe that was it.
Speaker 1: Whatever the reason, the killing of four Americans in Alsalvador
Speaker 1: was an undeniable shock to the United States.
Speaker 2: Up until that time, American citizens had not been killed.
Speaker 1: When the women were killed, Jimmy Carter was president. Like
Speaker 1: we mentioned in the last episode, Carter was concerned about
Speaker 1: human rights abuses, but he was also hesitant to clamp
Speaker 1: down on the Salvadoran government. Up until this point, he
Speaker 1: had resisted any calls to suspend AID, including a letter
Speaker 1: from Archbishop Romero himself, sent a few weeks before his death.
Speaker 1: In the letter, he pleaded with Carter to stop supporting
Speaker 1: the Salvadoran government. But the murder of the churchwomen would
Speaker 1: finally wake up the American public and force President Jimmy
Speaker 1: Carter to take action.
Speaker 2: After the bodies of the women were found, the United States,
Speaker 2: and this was under President Jimmy Carter announced that it
Speaker 2: was suspending military and economic assistance pending clarification of the
Speaker 2: circumstances of the killings of the women.
Speaker 1: Following the announcement of the churchwomen's murders, the US government
Speaker 1: sent two State Department officials to conduct a preliminary investigation.
Speaker 1: They would look into the killings of the churchwomen and
Speaker 1: whether the Salvadoran government had been involved. They sent FBI
Speaker 1: specialists to look at the evidence, fingerprints and bullet fragments.
Speaker 1: All the evidence pointed towards it being Salvadoran National guardsmen
Speaker 1: who were responsible for these murders. To this stay, there
Speaker 1: are still holes in the timeline, but here's sister Cynthia
Speaker 1: paraphrasing the FBI's report.
Speaker 2: The women got into their white Toyota van and proceeded
Speaker 2: to leave the airport and at the first toll station
Speaker 2: outside the.
Speaker 3: Airport, National guardsmen.
Speaker 2: Sergeant Louise Antonio Kalndra Aloman and four other guardsmen ordered
Speaker 2: the women to vacate the van, and then after they
Speaker 2: interrogated the women, the guardsmen ordered them back in the van,
Speaker 2: got into the van with them and proceeded to drive
Speaker 2: the van in the direction of the town of Santiago
Speaker 2: Nannualco to a deserted area a dirt lane by an
Speaker 2: empty field and Klendre Aloman then ordered the women out
Speaker 2: of the van. The guardsmen then proceeded to rape the women. Afterwards,
Speaker 2: they killed the women execution style and left the bodies
Speaker 2: along the roadside.
Speaker 1: Afterwards, the women's van was driven outside of La Libertad.
Speaker 1: Their personal items were removed, and so were the license
Speaker 1: plates on the van. The killers then.
Speaker 2: Took a can of gasoline and poured gasoline on the
Speaker 2: inside and outside of the van and set the van
Speaker 2: on fire.
Speaker 1: This information was all based on US led investigations. The
Speaker 1: US State Department wanted the Salvadoran authorities to conduct their
Speaker 1: own independent investigation and find out if these National guardsmen
Speaker 1: had acted on their own or on higher orders. The
Speaker 1: Salvadoran government assured the US that it was doing everything
Speaker 1: it could to figure out what had happened, but really
Speaker 1: there was already a rushed cover up happening. The guardsmen
Speaker 1: had been transferred away from their airport post right after
Speaker 1: the murders, and they'd had their rifles exchanged so that
Speaker 1: the ballistics couldn't be traced for months. Salvadorn authorities reassured
Speaker 1: the US and continued to hide the truth, but the
Speaker 1: families of the women, and US Ambassador White would continue
Speaker 1: to speak out and insist that there was a bigger
Speaker 1: cover up at play. You know.
Speaker 2: The argument was always that these lower National guardsmen would
Speaker 2: never have done this, They never would have singled out
Speaker 2: for American women to kill. From the beginning too, the
Speaker 2: Salvadoran government wanted to make clear that those guardsmen acted
Speaker 2: on their own see, because they wanted military aid.
Speaker 1: Military aid. Jimmy Carter, a president committed to human rights,
Speaker 1: had suspended the aid immediately after their deaths, but that
Speaker 1: pause didn't last long. And how quickly does the aid resume?
Speaker 2: It was resumed On December seventeenth.
Speaker 1: Two weeks after the women were found dead. Twenty million
Speaker 1: dollars in economic aid resumed.
Speaker 2: So and there was outrage in the United States.
Speaker 1: Cynthia went to Washington, d C. To protest with an
Speaker 1: organization called the Religious Task Force.
Speaker 2: We went on a bus, the big bus went from Cleveland,
Speaker 2: you know, filled with people, to go to this protest.
Speaker 2: And I remember it so well because it was just
Speaker 2: so moving with seeing so many people, you know, the crowds,
Speaker 2: and we carried coffins, cardboard coffins of the four women
Speaker 2: and had their names on the side, and we had
Speaker 2: a huge assembly at the Washington Monument.
Speaker 3: Now by then, you know, Carter was out.
Speaker 2: This was before Reagan was inaugurated.
Speaker 1: The women had been murdered in December while Carter was
Speaker 1: on his way out. Reagan inaugurated the next month in
Speaker 1: January of nineteen eighty one, and despite those protests, he
Speaker 1: would continue to send aid to El Salvador.
Speaker 8: Good evening, the Reagan administration today won preliminary approval in
Speaker 8: the Senate for its plans to increase military aid to
Speaker 8: El Salvador.
Speaker 1: The Reagan administration approved a huge increase in military funding.
Speaker 1: Ambassador White began to speak out very publicly and criticized
Speaker 1: this continued aid, and he quickly became an enemy of
Speaker 1: Reagan's administration. Here he is testifying before Congress.
Speaker 9: The security forces at Al Salvador have been responsible for
Speaker 9: the deaths of thousands and thousands of young people. Are
Speaker 9: we really going to send military advisors in there to
Speaker 9: be part of that type of machinery.
Speaker 1: Ambassador White openly criticized the Gold government's investigation into the
Speaker 1: women's deaths.
Speaker 2: And he told me that the Department wanted White to
Speaker 2: certify that there was progress in these investigations, and he
Speaker 2: refused because he said that simply was not true. And
Speaker 2: White said he wouldn't have any part in a cover up,
Speaker 2: and that decision not to participate in the cover up
Speaker 2: costom his job.
Speaker 1: Two weeks after Reagan was inaugurated, Robert White was fired.
Speaker 1: White felt that the Reagan administration was downplaying the Salvadoran
Speaker 1: government's involvement in the killings because they wanted to support
Speaker 1: their ally in the proxy Cold War.
Speaker 8: I think that the Reagan administration is so completely transfixed
Speaker 8: by their interpretation of Central America that it's an East
Speaker 8: where conflict, that they are ready to embrace anyone, no
Speaker 8: matter how reprehensible, as long as he or she will
Speaker 8: say that they are anti communists.
Speaker 1: He also pointed to statements made by government officials about
Speaker 1: the nuns, statements that implied that the nuns weren't just
Speaker 1: innocent victims but part of the Gerria, or that they
Speaker 1: had been killed by accident. This is Jeane Kirkpatrick, Ambassador
Speaker 1: to the UN. I'll warn you the tape is a
Speaker 1: little hard to hear.
Speaker 3: Not just now.
Speaker 5: This, We're going to get a little more great cut.
Speaker 5: A participantly usually on.
Speaker 1: It's hard to hear in the tape, so I'll say
Speaker 1: it again because it's worth repeating for just how tone
Speaker 1: deaf it is. The nuns were not just nuns. The
Speaker 1: nuns were also political activists. She made this comment on
Speaker 1: December twenty fifth of nineteen eighty, just weeks after the
Speaker 1: rape and murder of the four churchwomen. And then there
Speaker 1: was Alexander Haigh, Secretary of State, who had just a
Speaker 1: few months later, told Congress perhaps the vehicle in which
Speaker 1: the nuns were writing may have tried to run a
Speaker 1: roadblock or may have accidentally been perceived to do so,
Speaker 1: and that there had been exchange of fire, implying that
Speaker 1: the nuns had guns of their own and had been
Speaker 1: in a shootout. Cynthia and her fellow sisters remember hearing
Speaker 1: these public comments.
Speaker 2: And we were just outrage and we have a whole
Speaker 2: file of letters that some of our sisters wrote. Mother
Speaker 2: Bartholomew wrote a searing letter to Jan Kirkpatrick. She was
Speaker 2: a very wonderful, quiet, soft spoken, gentle person, and yet
Speaker 2: she wrote this letter really accusing Jan Kirkpatrick. It was
Speaker 2: just outrageous that the nuns would have guns and would
Speaker 2: have exchange fire and also that they were left as
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 3: Our mission team.
Speaker 2: They stayed out of politics, and they were there to
Speaker 2: be pastoral ministers and later to help the refugees, to
Speaker 2: give them food, to give them, you know, they were
Speaker 2: not to be involved in politics.
Speaker 1: For years on end, this charade went on. The US
Speaker 1: would dangle its aid package in front of the Salvadorans
Speaker 1: and say, you need to show us that you're making
Speaker 1: progress on this investigation, threatening to stop aid, and the
Speaker 1: Salvadorans would call their bluff. They'd say sure, sure, we're
Speaker 1: looking into it and make no progress. Inevitably, another one
Speaker 1: hundred million dollar check would get sent. The Reagan administration
Speaker 1: would end up sending over four billion dollars to all
Speaker 1: Salvador basically the entire Civil War.
Speaker 2: Robert White also told me quote that when the Reagan
Speaker 2: administration reached the conscious decision not to pursue this issue,
Speaker 2: meaning the churchwomen's murders, with the salvador military, they were
Speaker 2: giving a very clear signal to the military that we
Speaker 2: would not try to hold them accountable for civilian deaths,
Speaker 2: whether they were foreigners or whether they were Salvadorans.
Speaker 3: End of quote.
Speaker 1: I mean if the US government wasn't willing to protect
Speaker 1: their own citizens and was willing to defame nuns who
Speaker 1: are raped and murdered. What hope did the Salvadoran people have.
Speaker 1: I mean, honestly, there's no other way to interpret that.
Speaker 1: Eventually there would be some sort of justice once the
Speaker 1: Cold War connection and the allyship was no longer necessary
Speaker 1: to the US. Five National guardsmen, including Colindre A. Leimann,
Speaker 1: would be charged with the women's killings in the spring
Speaker 1: of nineteen eighty one. It would take many years, but
Speaker 1: they would eventually go on trial.
Speaker 2: Nineteen eighty four, the five men named responsible for the
Speaker 2: murders of the churchwomen went on trial and were found
Speaker 2: guilty of murder and sentenced to thirty years imprisonment.
Speaker 1: The head of the Salvadoran National Guard, Vivez Casanova, spent
Speaker 1: years freely living in the US. So did the Salvadoran
Speaker 1: Minister of Defense, Jose Yermo Garcia, the one who White
Speaker 1: claims asked him if the nuns were habits.
Speaker 2: Videes Casanova was in charge of the National Guard. They
Speaker 2: were in command when the women were killed and when
Speaker 2: a lot of other atrocities were taking place.
Speaker 1: After ten years of lawsuits. In twenty fifteen, human rights
Speaker 1: groups finally succeeded in getting the US government to deport
Speaker 1: Videes Casanova for the killing and torture that happened under
Speaker 1: his command, including the killing of the four churchwomen. The
Speaker 1: next year, josegi Or moo Garcia was deported too, for
Speaker 1: his role in extra judicial killings, including the killing of
Speaker 1: Oscar Romero. These were some of the few government officials
Speaker 1: who saw consequences for the human rights abuses that happened
Speaker 1: during the war, which got it something that's bothered me
Speaker 1: since I started this reporting. What happened to these four
Speaker 1: women is unspeakably horrible, that's without question. But at the
Speaker 1: very least there was an investigation done to hold their
Speaker 1: killers to account. But what about the thousands of Salvadorans
Speaker 1: whose lives were also lost, the ones whose names never
Speaker 1: appeared in a newspaper. Didn't their lives matter? Without the
Speaker 1: US involvement, the Salvadoran Civil War does not happen, at
Speaker 1: least not to the scale that it did. El Salvador
Speaker 1: was just a pawn in a much larger game, and
Speaker 1: the lives lost were just nameless casualties to the politicians
Speaker 1: in DC. Dorothy's family member Joseph Kasel would later tell
Speaker 1: The Washington Post, at least this is some justice being done.
Speaker 1: I don't know if there'll be enough justice done for them.
Speaker 1: They killed the four missionary girls, but how many other
Speaker 1: people killed that's another question. After their deaths, a service
Speaker 1: was held for the churchwomen in El Salvador. We've spent
Speaker 1: this entire episode talking about Dorothy's story, the fullness of
Speaker 1: her life, but she was only one of the four killed.
Speaker 1: Mara Clark, Eda Ford and Jane Donovan's lives were just
Speaker 1: as full, just as meaningful. They left their mark on
Speaker 1: the people around them. A salvador In priest that I
Speaker 1: interviewed told me that there are still little girls named
Speaker 1: Eda in his parish. The reason why Cynthia has so
Speaker 1: much detail about Dorothy's life is because Dorothy left these
Speaker 1: tapes behind, tapes of the things that she witnessed, the
Speaker 1: things she felt and saw during her time in El Salvador.
Speaker 7: Lots of things have been happening that I want to
Speaker 7: tell you about, and again, I wish you would hold
Speaker 7: on to this tape for me.
Speaker 1: She sent them to a friend of hers, trusting her
Speaker 1: to keep her words. And her record of her life
Speaker 1: in El Salvador. She wanted to remember everything she'd seen,
Speaker 1: but not scare her parents.
Speaker 7: Please don't yeah tape over it.
Speaker 1: Just save it for me, Remember the way that each
Speaker 1: day she and her sisters did what they could. Each
Speaker 1: day they lived with Salvadorans who never knew, moment to
Speaker 1: moment if they were safe.
Speaker 7: So to this day, we don't know who knows. That
Speaker 7: we'll never know, but oh, the poor poor families. That
Speaker 7: was really a grueling thing for us. But it's over
Speaker 7: with and you know, we're still living with the sin
Speaker 7: of it.
Speaker 1: On the next episode, my family finally tells me the
Speaker 1: story of what pushed them to leave El Salvador. Ra gea, Hey, yeah, aviao,
Speaker 1: ya ya lato, that's next time. A Nation of Saints
Speaker 1: Sacred Scandal. Nation of Saints is a production of a
Speaker 1: HA podcast in partnership with Iheartsmichael Dura podcast Network, and
Speaker 1: is hosted and written by me Jasmine Romero, produced by
Speaker 1: Jazmine Romero, Sofia Palita car Renald Gutierrez with help from
Speaker 1: Jorge Just and a research and reporting by Jasmine Romero,
Speaker 1: edited by Cyda Kevelo, Jorge Just and rose Red. Nation
Speaker 1: of Saints was recorded in New York City at the
Speaker 1: Relic Room, with engineering by Sam Bear. Mixing and sound
Speaker 1: designed by Bacchiquinones. Original music by Golden Mines, Darko and
Speaker 1: Diame based on Patrick Hart's original composition, fact checking by
Speaker 1: Erendidra Aquino Ayala. Executive producers are Gorman gerterol Isaac Lee
Speaker 1: rose Red, and Nando Villa. Our executive producers at iHeart
Speaker 1: are Giselle Bansis and Arlene Santana. Sacred Scandal was created
Speaker 1: by Melanie Bartley and Baula Varro's Special thanks to Cynthia Glavick,
Speaker 1: Joanne Gross, and the Ursuline Sisters of Cleveland. The recordings
Speaker 1: of Dorothy Kasel in this episode were provided courtesy of
Speaker 1: the Ursuline Sisters of Cleveland Archives. For more podcasts, go
Speaker 1: to the iHeartRadio app or wherever you listen to your
Speaker 1: favorite podcasts