‘Mafia’ US bishops slammed

A FORMER US governor yesterday refused to withdraw his remarks likening Roman Catholic bishops to the Mafia.

Even as he resigned as head of a panel keeping tabs on the US Roman Catholic hierarchy's sex abuse reforms, Frank Keating had defiant parting shots for some bishops.

"To resist grand jury subpoenas, to suppress the names of offending clerics, to deny, to obfuscate, to explain away; that is the model of a criminal organisation, not my church," Keating, also a former FBI agent and federal prosecutor, said.