Some exiting letters of resignation from SNAP
Some of the leaders wish to post their personal resignation letters here. The will be accumulating over the days and months ahead.
March 27, 2026
Dear Snappers,
I recently resigned from Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests due to a catastrophic change in direction taken by the current leadership, the Executive Director, Angela Walker, and the Board of Directors. I believe they have taken actions that have destroyed our survivor organization, an organization that I have worked with and volunteered with for the last thirty-one years. This destruction of our peer network of survivors deeply saddens me. I joined two dozen SNAP leaders in resigning en masse on Monday.
Let me share with you my three major concerns about the current leadership prompting my resignation:
~ They erased the myriad resources previously found on the SNAP website to help survivors, including the contact information of all the SNAP leaders and their local support groups. No longer can a victim easily find a local SNAP leader to talk to or a local support group to join. This removal only harms vulnerable survivors who are just coming forward--filling out a form online is no substitute for connecting with a peer! For three decades, SNAP had been a lighthouse for survivors, welcoming victims, originally from the Catholic community but later expanding to include religious communities (Baptist, Orthodox, Lutheran, Jewish, Mormon, etc.) and other institutions. SNAP also supported survivors from the LGBTQ community, incest survivors, and those abused by women religious. All those links and contacts are now gone.
~They erased the history of SNAP and the founding of SNAP. This was a rich history that started with small peer-to-peer support groups that grew into an international organization, with survivors from around the world building a large network. They erased history by removing historic press statements and media advisories. The stories of leaders recorded by StoryCorps, including those of SNAP founder Barbara Blaine, David Clohessy, and Barbara Dorris, are gone. The survivor stories shared by dozens of survivors from around the world are also gone.
~They fired one longtime leader, Melanie Sakoda, who had worked as the Survivor Support Director for more than 6 years. She had been a local SNAP leader in CA and in the Orthodox Christian community since 2008, having joined SNAP several years earlier. Melanie served on the Board of Directors of SNAP from 2016-2019, where she served as Secretary. Other local volunteer SNAP leaders were also eliminated, for what I view as dubious grounds. Other leaders withdrew before Monday's mass resignation.
SNAP is now a ghost of its previous glory as a peer network of survivors supporting one another and challenging the powerful institutions that fail to protect the vulnerable and cover up for the abusers. The winter storms have done their damage. However, there are new blossoms of hope with the founding of the Abuse Survivors Coalition (ASC), a new home for survivors.
Much has changed. I celebrate the opportunity to build a new home for survivors. Join other former leaders and me in building ASC!
I welcome comments and questions.
Tim Lennon
Survivor
Joined SNAP Board in 1995
Local Leader, 2008 to 2026 (upon resignation)
Sponsor Local Support Group, AZ, NV, & NM
SNAP Board of Director 2009 to 2021
President of the Board of SNAP 2018 to 2021
Author of Book, Stand Up Speak Up – How Survivors Created a Movement to End Sexual Abuse
To the SNAP BOD
I have been with SNAP for over 20 years and have always had full confidence in the integrity of the BOD of SNAP. While I may not have agreed with everything that they were doing, I always believed they had the survivor’s best interest at heart. With the
current BOD, I do not believe that they mirror either of these attributes. In fact, they have shown themselves to be dishonest and lacking of moral authority.
There are numerous examples that I could cite over the last 2 years but let me use a recent even that should illustrate my concerns. Melanie Sakoda appealed the ruling for receiving unemployment benefits after being fired from SNAP. At her dismissal, neitherAngela nor Shaun would offer any specific reason for her being fired but warned her not to request unemployment. She did appeal and she won unemployment benefits. I attended the hearing in support of Melanie though I could not stay the entire time. During this hearing, I specifically heard Dan McNevin state that Melanie refused to work on the 2024 conference (this is probably wrong since I did see her work on it very hard) but then he added that the conference was the biggest fundraising event that SNAP has. Dan said this to a federal judge and I have a recording of it. For the past year and a half, Dan has been telling everyone that SNAP has NEVER made money on the conference. I have several emails from him to that effect. This truly calls Dan’s integrity into question and causes me to ponder why he is the treasurer of SNAP. He has either been lying for the last 2 years or lied to the federal judge.
I also read Angela's submission to the federal judge. It was submitted the very day of the hearing and this did not allow for much time to review and adequately rebut. However, I have read some of it since that time. Angela is accusing Melanie of
favoritism for allowing a friend, Sally Zakhari, to enter the conference for free. Let’s ignore the fact that I had paid for Sally’s admission and that neither Dan nor Angela even bothered to ask Melanie about this before firing her. They simply saw that Sally had not paid and then leapt to the inaccurate assumption that she must had been let in for free. In the submittal, Angela implies that Sally should not have been treated as a leader and should never have been allowed into the leaders meeting because she had not been properly ratified. This is a clear case of rewriting history. The whole idea of leader ratification only came about after the conference had closed. Sally had been recognized at the beginning of that very conference as a leader and was given a green lanyard. She had also been listed on the SNAP website as a leader along with her contact information. She was, in fact, invited to the leaders’ meeting. While Angela’s statement about Sally not being ratified was technically correct, it was written in such a way as to lead the reader to the conclusion that Sally’s status of being unratified (whatever that might mean as this concept defies definition) had occurred before the conference, which is simply not true.
For this reason, and dozens of others that are listed on rememberthesurvivors.org, I believe that SNAP leadership can no longer be trusted by me or by survivors in general. I regretfully but rightfully resign from SNAP. Please remove any reference to me from the SNAP website as I can no longer be associated with what I perceive as a corrupt organization. I request that my image, likeness, writings and spoken word no longer be used to promote SNAP or any of its activities.
Sadly, but defiantly,
David Lorenz
Former SNAP Maryland Director
March 23. 2026
Good afternoon,
It is with deep regret that I wish to inform you that the actions of the current Board of Directors & Executive Director have left me no choice but to disaffiliate my association with SNAP. Over the past nine years, I have had the privilege of being with many incredible individuals who have been part of SNAP. The organization has helped me & many survivors cope with the lasting consequences of abuse. Sadly, I no longer believe SNAP acts in the best interests of all survivors. The current SNAP leadership, in my opinion, has behaved in ways that are authoritarian, disrespectful, entirely self-referential, & lacking in moral authority.
Over the past two years, there have been many examples of the board attitudes listed above. The entire process that has led to my difficult disaffiliation with SNAP is well documented on http://rememberthesurvivors.org. I do not choose to repeat this documentation. I will say that as the former clinical director of a behavioral health company providing services to over a thousand individuals per week, I know the value of leadership. And I know that with leadership comes authority, but effective leadership links that authority with responsibility, accountability, transparency, & respect for those you lead & those to whom you provide assistance. It is evident to me that the current SNAP leadership does not share these values.
I will cite one specific instance. As a member of the so-called “group of 12” I have been part of the attempt to address valid concerns. The multiple requests simply to meet with the board to address those concerns were ignored, dismissed, & rebuffed, with no valid reasons provided. Then the board convened a “mediation” session with those requesting the meeting. All members of the concerned group attended - all board members did not. After making us wait for 3 1/2 hours, we were told the board (who convened the meeting) was now refusing to meet because they stated only a few of the group were “vetted” leaders. The board was well aware of who was going to be in that meeting well before it was convened. All our signatures were on the correspondence with the board. Not once was the issue of “vetting” raised. It was crystal clear that the artificial use of “vetting” was simple a way to avoid meeting with us & to avoid addressing the valid concerns. The actions of the board were arbitrary, disrespectful, & unworthy of anyone claiming to be a true leader.
The recent actions of the Board of Directors & the Executive Director have made clear the belief that simply having a title means your value to the organization is greater than anyone else who is part of the organization. The issuing of an authoritarian, disrespectful, & quite frankly ridiculous set of “rules” leads me to conclude that SNAP has turned itself into an incompetent version of the Catholic Church. Like the church, it has become a toxic organization & environment. I have had to leave such environments in the past, and now, despite my best efforts & those of many others, I regretfully must do so again. I do not authorize the use of my image, likeness, written or spoken words to be used by to promote, endorse, or be associated with SNAP or its activities.
I remain committed to the welfare of survivors as an advocate & fellow survivor & will continue this work free from SNAP.
Regretfully,
Frank Schindler
o the SNAP Board of Directors and the SNAP Executive Director:
You will see my name on the Joint Resignation Statement sent to you by the SNAP Reform Caucus. After more than eighteen months of attempting to communicate in a meaningful way with the top leadership of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, I have come to the conclusion that continued efforts are futile.
You have not listened.
You will not listen.
You are closed to even a conversation.
As a result, I am left with no option but to resign from SNAP and continue my volunteer work on behalf of survivors of abuse elsewhere. This decision is entirely due to the intransigence, gaslighting, and disrespect that we, as a group, have experienced from your leadership.
Following the August 2024 Annual SNAP Conference—where deeply troubling events occurred—we requested a conversation. You refused even a one‑hour Zoom meeting with twelve of us. Today, we depart with twice that number of signatures and a renewed determination to carry on this work in a new setting.
I could detail here the failures of the Board and the Executive Director, but none of these are secret. They are documented at RememberTheSurvivors.com and reflect a pattern of inept and abusive leadership. At what point did SNAP begin to mirror the very abusive and corrupt institutions we have spent decades exposing? When did SNAP’s top leadership adopt the same behaviors and values as the churches and institutions I have worked to hold accountable for the past twenty‑four years?
Your removal of all of the leaders in the US and around the world from SNAPnetwork.org is the final indignity. We cannot be reached by survivors. You have removed our support groups from the website also. You expect a generic form to replace all of us? I will not stay while you cut the heart out of a once vibrant and impactful organization.
I am wasting my breath attempting to speak with you. I will do so no longer.
I hereby tender my resignation, effective today. I look forward to a future with the Abuse Survivors Coalition, where we will reclaim the founding ideals of SNAP and build a new peer‑to‑peer network to fill the void SNAP has left behind.
Sincerely,
Susan Vance
Former Leader in Tennessee
As some of you will have already seen, I added my name to a group Resignation (to SNAP administration ) today. 37 years ago, 34 year old me would never have seen this day coming.
However I am leaving SNAP for two important reasons. The first is that my vision of who I could be, as a survivor advocate, activist, support person, Abuse Researcher and Archivist, has grown so much in the past 4 decades.
I am so grateful to the fellow leaders and allies who I have met along the way. You have been an inspiration to me and the reason that I could not quit before this, as we met each new challenge. Words cannot describe my deep respect and love for you. You helped to stay strong against Churches, Religious Orders, Church leaders, and those nasty Catholic Conferences who loved to thwart our work at every turn.
But you're also the very reason that I cannot passively stay a part of an organization which is no longer aligned, in my opinion, with with our mission, as I understand it.
I have learned too well, by listening to all of you for all these years. I cannot be a part of an organization which I no longer consider to be safe for survivors, leaders, or allies--whether that be the Church or any one survivor organization.
My second reason is that I now have a broader vision of how we can work to change things, by creating a coalition of many individuals and groups who focus on even more aspects of protecting the vulnerable, healing the wounded, preventing the abuse, and Fighting for Justice.
We have learned so much about all these things for 40 years, and I believe that this is the ABSOLUTE WRONG TIME to make massive changes in SNAP, emphasizing risk management, control of message, "professionalization" of SNAP, centralized communication, control, proprietary content, and branding. (This is my own personal opinion of trends that I am seeing.)
These things are also triggering, imo to survivors. If you read the above paragraph again, this method of organization also describes the way that every Catholic diocese is organized.
Even the new email contact system, is, in my opinion, not survivor friendly. And, full disclosure, it is set up in the exactly the same method and visual as many dioceses: survivors must give information about themselves, with all of those risks and triggers, before learning who they are speaking with.
I cannot support these things.
For most of the past 4 decades, SNAP has meant EACH OF us and ALL of us. With my new knowledge, which I believe that I understand correctly, WE are not members of SNAP anymore, unless we are members of the current administration/Board.
This, in no way reflects the NETWORK that 2 Ohio female survivors began to build in 1989 Chicagoland. It is the polar opposite , in my opinion, of what was ever intended.
So this is my personal resignation, and the reasons why I cannot, in good conscience, remain.
Many thanks to David Clohessy and Laura for all that you have taught me, especially all the talks on grassroots organizing. That you for your tireless support of survivors and always fighting the good fight and making good trouble. You are the best.
Thank you to Judy Block Jones and Steven Spaner for thousands of things, big and small, that you did for other survivors and me. I cannot say enough about the countless hours that you spent driving, speaking, writing, holding up pictures and signs, working on website and press releases, documenting survivor stories and standing up to truly corrupt and evil Church leaders (and communication directors) for the whole Midwest. Thank you for always gathering us together and for the laughter and support. You are the SNAP that I dreamed of, embodied in 2 leaders.
Thank you to Mary Dispenza for being Mary Dispenza and for your beautiful heart and love for so many.
And thank you to the SNAP REFORM CAUCUS for being the biggest and best surprise of my old age. Your courage, integrity, dedication and love has amazed me. You were amazing as SNAP leaders and equally amazing in taking on problems within our own organization. I love and respect you forever.
This was long but 37 years of SNAP was long, especially the last year, so if you read this far, thank you. I am giving my resignation to the SNAP leaders and I realize the many of you don't even know me. But I respect all of you.
You are all also welcome to join us at abusesurvivorscoalition.org
as we build a bigger tent to meet the challenges of the future.
Respectfully submitted,
Terry Steubenville aka Ohio Valley SNAP