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Monday, December 26, 2011

The Seattle Times 2011 Photos of the Year

At a news conference March 25, Clarita Vargas of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation speaks about being abused by a priest at a mission school when she was a girl. The Jesuit order in the Northwest agreed to pay $166.1 million to about 500 victims. "Vargas was just 6 when the abuse started. 'My spirit was wounded,' she said at the news conference describing the abuse by the Rev. John Morse. Vargas, now 51, had her 'day of reckoning and justice' when the Jesuits agreed to settle with the hundreds of Native Americans and Alaskan Natives who were abused at its schools around the Pacific Northwest. It was daunting to hear Vargas' story with her abuser's photo looming behind her. Combining his photo and her emotions together created a very telling image." -- Courtney Blethen Rifkin