Documents show hierarchy, pope covered for abusive priest, lawyer alleges

A lawyer representing a victim of priest abuse in a lawsuit against the Roman Catholic church said on Monday Vatican documents show the church hierarchy and the pope were ultimately responsible.

A lawyer for the church disagreed, saying the newly released documents show the Holy See was not involved in the offending priest’s transfer from Ireland to Chicago and then to Portland, Oregon, where the victim was a minor in the 1960s.

In April, U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman in Oregon ordered the Vatican to produce documents in the case that alleged a cover-up of priest sex abuse.

At the time, the judge’s order was termed a “historic step” by attorney Jeffrey Anderson, who sued the Holy See in Rome and U.S. archdioceses and church officials on behalf of an unnamed man in Oregon.

Anderson said on Monday an analysis of the 1,856 documents written in Latin, Italian and English showed the Vatican had direct control over the placement and laicization of Rev. Andrew Ronan, who left the priesthood in 1966 and died in 1992.

“At all times, Father Andrew Ronan’s life from profession to dismissal was under the control of the Holy See,” a report released by Anderson said.

One document from early 1966 showed that Ronan had asked the Holy See to remove him as a priest. The request was granted that year.

Also among the documents was a letter from a Provincial Minister to the Prior General in Italy in 1966 that said “we believe it will be possible, if the Holy Father will grant Father Ronan’s request, for him to leave quietly and without any open scandal.”

When confronted, Ronan admitted the abuse to his superiors at Our Lady of Benburb, Ireland, according to the documents, but was transferred to a Chicago high school anyway. He abused children there, the documents show, then was transferred to St. Albert’s Church in Portland.

On Monday, Anderson said the documents showed authority stems from “the top of the hierarchy, and that is to the papacy.” He said he would ask for additional documents.

“This is a selective, deceptive, incomplete production at best and in my view typical of the Vatican’s view that they are above the law,” Anderson said.

Jeffrey Lena, a lawyer for the Roman Catholic church in the United States, said the accusations of Vatican involvement in Ronan’s transfers were groundless. The Vatican has long held that its priests are under the local control of bishops.

“Like the documents previously released — and contrary to the plaintiff’s lawyers’ long-standing accusations — the written responses confirm that the Holy See was not involved in Ronan’s transfers and had no prior knowledge that Ronan posed a danger to minors.

“The responses also show that there is no support for the plaintiff’s lawyers’ spurious theory that Ronan was ever the Holy See’s employee,” Lena said.

©Thomson Reuters 2011

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Attorney: Vatican Didn't Turn Over All Documents

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) – An attorney for a man who claims he was sexually abused by an Oregon priest in the 1960s said Monday that the Vatican failed to produce all court-ordered documents in the case but that papers it did turn over show how the Vatican exercises firm control over the placement and removal of offending priests.

Both claims were quickly disputed by a church lawyer who said the Vatican gave Minnesota-based attorney Jeffrey Anderson all its documents pertaining to the late Rev. Andrew Ronan. Anderson has filed a lawsuit on behalf of a man who alleges Ronan abused him in the mid-1960s when he was assigned to Portland.

The Vatican gave Anderson more than 1,800 pages of documents last Friday, but Anderson claims relevant documents written by Vatican officials were left out because local dioceses have produced their own copies of such paperwork in this and other cases.

Anderson, who has filed numerous lawsuits nationwide on behalf of alleged victims of priest abuse, is trying to hold the Vatican responsible under U.S. and Oregon law for the abuse alleged by a Washington state man identified only as John V. Doe. He argues that the Vatican was effectively Ronan’s employer when the alleged abuse occurred. Ronan died in 1992.

An employment relationship could trigger an exception to a federal law that usually bars lawsuits against foreign sovereign entities such as the Vatican.

“This is a monarch known as the Holy See, or the Holy Father, who runs the Vatican. And all policies, all protocols, all the laws pertaining to the control of priests and sexual abuse come from the top,” Anderson said during a news conference at his St. Paul offices.

Anderson acknowledged that much of what was in the released documents was already in the public domain, but said the documents show that the Vatican makes the decisions, and establishes and enforces policies that concern each priest worldwide, “and this priest in particular.”

An attorney for the Vatican, Jeffrey Lena, of Berkeley, Calif., insisted Monday the Vatican gave Anderson all the documents it has pertaining to Ronan and challenged him to prove that anything is missing. Lena called Anderson’s news conference “yet another unfortunate attempt to mislead the public.”

The Vatican posted about 70 pages of documents related to Ronan on the Internet last Wednesday, followed by a larger turnover of more than 1,800 pages to Anderson on Friday. It marked the first time the Vatican has provided documents in response to a sex abuse lawsuit.

Lena said the documents released last Wednesday showed that the Vatican was unaware of the allegations against Ronan until church officials in the U.S. asked for permission to remove him from his priestly duties. He suggested Anderson is displaying “ignorance” or “willful blindness” when he says the Vatican exercises a monarch’s control over U.S. dioceses or religious orders.

Lena also said it was premature for Anderson to draw firm conclusions about what was in the over 1,800 pages of documents turned over to him late last week, given that many of them are in Latin. He said it took defense attorneys months to go through the material.

“After two days I can guarantee he has no idea what’s in there,” Lena said.

Ronan left the priesthood in 1966 shortly after the Portland archdiocese began a proceeding against him known as “laicization,” a process the church does not consider equivalent to firing. The Vatican approved his return to lay status. The documents released last Wednesday showed officials of Ronan’s order, the Friar Servants of Mary, knew about abuse allegations against him as early as 1959 and worried about the possibility of a scandal as they transferred him twice.

Lena said the documents prove that nobody in the church outside the Servite order knew about the abuse until Ronan and the order petitioned for his laicization and forwarded their internal documents to the Vatican in 1966.

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