[1] One employee of the institution, which at the time comprised 10 orphanages and schools caring for 4,600 children, ran a male child prostitution network involving 100 boys.
[1] The scandal involved several prominent men, including TV presenter Carlos Cruz, former Casa Pia governor Manuel Abrantes, and former UNESCO ambassador Jorge Ritto.
The weekly magazine Visão reported that a Portuguese diplomat, Jorge Ritto, was removed from his post as consul in Stuttgart (1969–1971) after German authorities complained to Lisbon about his involvement with an under-age boy in a public park.
[1] Secretary of State for Labor and Training from 1999 to 2001, Paulo Pedroso, who was responsible for the Casa Pia homes, which care for some 4,600 children at 10 centers around Portugal, was suspected of 15 cases of sexual violence against minors, which allegedly took place between 1999 and 2000.
[1] In September 2008, a Portuguese court ordered the state to pay 100,000 euros ($140,000) to the ex-minister Paulo Pedroso, on the grounds that he was wrongly detained on paedophilia charges.
[7] The Socialist Party leader at the time, Eduardo Ferro Rodrigues, who was a close personal friend of Paulo Pedroso, offered to undergo police questioning after "he had learned of plans to implicate him in the [Casa Pia] scandal".
The Prime Minister at the time, José Manuel Durão Barroso, whose Social Democratic Party ousted the Socialists in March 2002, promised to bring life and honor back into the Casa Pia children's homes and allow new director Catalina Pestana to reform the institution.
The accusations against the German-born Portuguese businessman living in Cascais near the Boca do Inferno and owner of a valuable art collection, allegedly involved child sexual abuse crimes perpetrated across the last 20 years for which he was held in pre-trial detention.
António Olmos, a well-known figure in Cascais among the local high society, where he lived in a mansion in an exclusive area, was often seen having lunch with television presenter Carlos Cruz and diplomat Jorge Ritto who in 2010 were both convicted in the Casa Pia child sexual abuse case in Lisbon.