Diocese shamed sex victims' families
Oliver Cromwell
Diocese shamed sex victims' families
By Pat Schneider
May 25, 2002
Madison Catholic Diocese officials shamed parishioners who protested their
sons' sexual abuse by a priest or sued the church for compensation, an
investigation by The Capital Times has found.
One family's effort to settle a lawsuit in 1995 drew a letter insinuating
that they were "evil" for suing the diocese and comparing them to abortion
protesters who commit murder for revenge.
"They made you feel shameful for even bringing up the abuse," said a Sun
Prairie woman whose brother was one of about a dozen boys who eventually
filed suit against the diocese and former priest Michael Trainor, who had
been removed from his duties.
A Dane County woman and her husband received a letter from church lawyer
Donald Heaney on a settlement offer that warned that "evil begets evil." She
said that diocese officials seemed to think they were above the law.
"I knew we weren't evil. Were we evil because we would dare question the
authority of the church? That was pretty much how we were brought up," she
said this week.
The woman said the utter thoughtlessness of the church became apparent when
a form letter sent to her son thanking him for his testimony carried the
name of another victim in the salutation.
Madison Diocese spokesman William Brophy said that until a copy was provided
Wednesday by The Capital Times, Bishop William Bullock and other diocesan
officials had never seen the March 2, 1995, letter that compares the Dane
County couple to those who murder doctors who perform abortions.
Brophy said the letter was written by Heaney in his role as attorney for an
insurance company involved in the case.
Heaney, of Lathrop and Clark, has represented the diocese in numerous
lawsuits alleging sexual misconduct by priests.
In a letter in which he evokes "fundamental Christian principles," Heaney
states that he is representing both the diocese and its insurers, and
attempting to balance the bishop's pastoral concern with an insurer's
reluctance to offer large settlements in cases of "nominal value."
Heaney said in an interview this week he was trying to make the point that
"lawsuits are not very well designed to resolve most human problems."
"Why not try to resolve these matters with the resources that churches
have - which is essentially spiritual resources?" Heaney said.
Trainor's career in the Madison Diocese ended in 1984 when parents of two
boys confronted Bishop Cletus O'Donnell with evidence that Trainor had
sexually abused their sons.
Trainor entered a New Mexico facility that treated priest sex abusers, but
within months was working in Montana, ministering to families at St. Rose of
Lima in the tiny town of Dillon.
The chancellor of the Helena, Mont., diocese confirmed that Trainor worked
there as a priest from 1985 to 1991, but church officials there would
provide no information on what they knew of Trainor when he arrived there,
or why he left.
Trainor resigned from the priesthood in 1991.
O'Donnell died in August 1992 and Bullock was named bishop in April 1993.
Monsignor Paul Swain, a lawyer and vicar who responded in Bullock's stead to
The Capital Times' questions on the priest sex abuse issues, said that
letters between O'Donnell and the Helena bishop in Trainor's personnel file
indicate that the Montana cleric knew of the charges against Trainor.
Nearly a decade passed between a confrontation with O'Donnell - where
parents said they were cautioned to keep Trainor's activities secret and
were asked to pray for him - and the filing of the first lawsuit in February
1993.
What followed was a three-year legal battle waged by the local blue-chip
firm of Lathrop and Clark.
Court records of the proceedings in three cases brought against Trainor and
the diocese fill boxes in the clerk's office of the Dane County Circuit
Court.
In a series of sworn depositions, the boys who accused Trainor of abuse -
men by then, some with families - testified to what emerged as a decade-long
pattern of abuse involving boys as young as 9.
One man recalled his shock, fright and embarrassment at the attack when he
was 14. "I had always been taught to respect and put the priest up on a
pedestal. He was God's right-hand man," he said.
Trainor repeatedly molested youths during his three assignments in the
Madison Diocese - at St. Maria Goretti, St. Henry's and St. Thomas Aquinas
churches - in settings including a church sacristy, Trainor's living
quarters and office, and an area sports club, according to testimony
recorded in court documents.
Several boys reported that Trainor abused them on outings. Trainor was
taking boys out from the Holy Name Seminary high school so often that
priests on the staff complained to the Rev. Michael Burke, rector of the
school, that it was disrupting after-school athletic programs and study
hall, Burke testified in a June 15, 1995, deposition.
Burke testified that he phoned Trainor and "respectfully asked him not to
take the kids out of school." Trainor said "fine," Burke testified.
Burke, who is now pastor at St. Maria Goretti, said at the time he had no
concern that anything else was going on, but by the time of his testimony
did not doubt that Trainor had been sexually abusing boys. "I just don't
have any positive proof," he said.
Holy Name Seminary was closed in June 1995 by Bullock, in the face of vocal
opposition by students and their families. Bullock said the seminary was too
expensive to continue operating, especially since so few boys continued on
to the priesthood.
Swain said this week that the school's closing was not linked to abuse of
students there as far as he knew.
Plaintiffs contended in their lawsuits that diocesan officials knew or
should have known that Trainor had a proclivity to abuse minors.
When Heaney invited several plaintiffs to point to any evidence that church
officials knew of the abuse before May 1984, they could not.
But the Sun Prairie woman tried to. She and her mother recounted a 1982
meeting with the late Rev. Henry Lauters, pastor of St. Henry's church in
Watertown, in affadavits filed with the courts.
When the mother told Lauters she wanted to file a complaint against Trainor
for abusing her son, Lauters accused her of lying, then opened a door. There
stood Trainor.
Trainor came in and accused her son of defaming his character, she
testified.
Lauters then patted her on the shoulder, she testified, and told her she was
"taking it out on men" because of problems in her marriage.
Her daughter said the family didn't even think of bringing criminal charges
then because of the "hush-hush" aura surrounding sexual abuse by priests at
that time.
"It was like we were the ones sinning," she recalled, "not Father Mike. I
think they are a bunch of hypocrites. If you are here to do God's work, how
do you protect something he frowns on?"
Members of several families testified that in 1984 O'Donnell rebuffed their
efforts to identify for him other boys they feared might also have been
abused.
"He didn't want to turn over that rock," one father remarked.
A decade later the names of three more priests accused of sexual abuse of
minors over the years were revealed by their fellow clerics in testimony in
the Trainor case.
Swain said this week that no priest accused in Madison of sexual abuse of a
minor is active as a priest - anywhere.
Shortly after his arrival in Madison in 1993, Bullock developed a policy on
responding to sex abuse claims, as had been recommended in a national
meeting of U.S. bishops the year before.
The policy was the basis of the diocese's response to a '70s-era allegation
of abuse revealed in late 1993. The priest was suspended, Swain said. Police
were not called in, he said, because so much time had elapsed since the
abuse. The diocese is considering establishing a community board to review
allegations of sex assault, which Swain said would be in addition to
referring complaints to civil authorities.
A clearer idea of the makeup of the board might emerge after the meeting of
the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in June, which will focus on the
national sex abuse scandal.
Swain acknowledged that settlements were paid by the Madison Diocese in some
sexual abuse cases.
The diocese declined this week to check its records to tally the amount paid
out, but correspondence in the court records of the Trainor cases refers to
a rejected offer of $110,000 in one lawsuit.
Swain made a point of saying that any such settlement would not have come
from the Sunday collection basket or appeals for special missions. "There is
kind of a moral understanding that if people give money to support the
Hispanic ministry, that's where the money is going to go," he said,
suggesting an example.
The bishops also likely will address confidentiality agreements at their
meeting, Swain said.
Heaney said such agreements could be dissolved only if all parties -
typically a victim, the diocese, an insurer and a perpetrator - agree. "It
can be very hard to accomplish that," he said. Insurance companies, for
example, may not want to invite lawsuits by revealing the amount of a
settlement.
"The secrecy the church has maintained regarding pedophile priests prohibits
survivors of clergy sexual abuse and their families from healing," said
Patty Gallagher Marchant, a member of SNAP, Survivors Network of Those
Abused by Priests. Marchant, now living in Milwaukee, is a survivor of child
sexual abuse in the Madison Diocese and under a confidentiality agreement is
forbidden to name the abuser.
Marchant says confidentiality agreements are intended to silence victims.
"On top of that, secrecy agreements support harboring criminal behavior,"
she said.
Swain said that in the past the church has been accused of relying too much
on lawyers and insurance agencies and psychiatrists in tailoring its
response to priest sex abuse. "I'm hopeful going through all this will
cleanse us in a way that allows us to be strong as a church, and restore a
pastoral response to the balance."
The Dane County couple who sued after their son's abuse and received the
letter shaming them sometimes wondered if they were doing the right thing,
the wife admitted.
"It caused a great deal of emotional stress," she recalled. "But then this
letter came, and as bizarre and horrendous as it was, it told us we did the
right thing."
--
"The highest achievements of the human mind are the concepts of
"loyalty", "duty" and "honor". Whenever these concepts fall into direpute --
get
out of there fast! You may possibly save yourself, but it is too late to
save that society. It is doomed."
Miranda Writes, B.Sci, JD, EAC!
-snip_
Child molestation and rape at a church named " St. Maria Goretti's"?
That just broke my vatican-strength irony meter.
Miranda
Legatus
<OoooOOohBaby-2...@user-2ivf8fj.dialup.mindspring.com>,
Miranda Writes, B.Sci, JD, EAC! <OoooOO...@outofyourmindspring.com>
wrote:
> , "Oliver Cromwell" <rose...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> >http://www.captimes.com/news/local/26181.php
-snip-
> >Trainor repeatedly molested youths during his three assignments in the
> >Madison Diocese - at St. Maria Goretti,
>
> Child molestation and rape at a church named " St. Maria Goretti's"?
> That just broke my vatican-strength irony meter.
>
> Miranda
It's more ironic than naming the national airport after the man who
fired all the air traffic controllers. It's more ironic than when the
SS sent an administrative judge to Auschwitz to investigate corruption.
It's so ironic that it may shift the polar orientation of the globe.
Steve
--
Blanche's battle cry: "attack-attack-attack-attack the goose Pee."
Miranda Writes, B.Sci, JD, EAC!
>Miranda Writes, B.Sci, JD, EAC! <OoooOO...@outofyourmindspring.com>
>wrote:
>
>> , "Oliver Cromwell" <rose...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> >http://www.captimes.com/news/local/26181.php
>
>-snip-
>
>> >Trainor repeatedly molested youths during his three assignments in the
>> >Madison Diocese - at St. Maria Goretti,
>>
>> Child molestation and rape at a church named " St. Maria Goretti's"?
>> That just broke my vatican-strength irony meter.
>>
>> Miranda
>
>It's more ironic than naming the national airport after the man who
>fired all the air traffic controllers.
I'd say it's right up there.
> It's more ironic than when the
>SS sent an administrative judge to Auschwitz to investigate corruption.
Corruption? What? Did somebody buy factory-second canisters of Zyklon-B
and keep two sets of books? " Corruption" at a Nazi death-camp?
Uh, maybe not _that_ ironic, but still... of all potential church names,
that child-rape should oocur in one named after _ her_ , well...
>
>It's so ironic that it may shift the polar orientation of the globe.
NooOOOoo!
Should that happen, how would Blanche then find his way from the coop to
a latin mass? Would the Red Sanda of Pee® not be scattered to the four
winds?
Miranda
>
>Steve
Legatus
<OoooOOohBaby-2...@user-2ivf8fj.dialup.mindspring.com>,
> In article <260520021143384702%leg...@notcharter.not>, Legatus
> <leg...@notcharter.not> wrote:
> > It's more ironic than when the
> >SS sent an administrative judge to Auschwitz to investigate corruption.
>
> Corruption? What? Did somebody buy factory-second canisters of Zyklon-B
> and keep two sets of books? " Corruption" at a Nazi death-camp?
As I recall (and you aren't gonna believe this)... prisoners were being
shot rather than gassed. The ammo "shrinkage" was showing up on the
books so the issue had to be investigated. I don't remember the
resolution, but I believe the officers in charge were, um... shot.
Beyond THAT even, it was illegal to SHOOT the prisoners... even those
who were being herded to the gas house.
I think I need a drink now...
biff
> One family's effort to settle a lawsuit in 1995 drew a letter insinuating
> that they were "evil" for suing the diocese and comparing them to abortion
> protesters who commit murder for revenge.
If true, this is pathetic. Allow abuse, protect the abuser, then vilify the abused.
Jamie
http://www.captimes.com/news/local/26181.php
Madison Catholic Diocese officials shamed parishioners who protested
their sons' sexual abuse by a priest or sued the church for
compensation, an investigation by The Capital Times has found.
One family's effort to settle a lawsuit in 1995 drew a letter
insinuating that they were "evil" for suing the diocese and comparing
them to abortion protesters who commit murder for revenge.
"They made you feel shameful for even bringing up the abuse," said a
Sun Prairie woman whose brother was one of about a dozen boys who
eventually filed suit against the diocese and former priest Michael
Trainor, who had been removed from his duties.
A Dane County woman and her husband received a letter from church
lawyer Donald Heaney on a settlement offer that warned that "evil
begets evil." She said that diocese officials seemed to think they
were above the law.
"I knew we weren't evil. Were we evil because we would dare question
the authority of the church? That was pretty much how we were brought
up," she said this week.
The woman said the utter thoughtlessness of the church became apparent
when a form letter sent to her son thanking him for his testimony
carried the name of another victim in the salutation.
Madison Diocese spokesman William Brophy said that until a copy was
provided Wednesday by The Capital Times, Bishop William Bullock and
other diocesan officials had never seen the March 2, 1995, letter that
compares the Dane County couple to those who murder doctors who
perform abortions.
Brophy said the letter was written by Heaney in his role as attorney
for an insurance company involved in the case.
Heaney, of Lathrop and Clark, has represented the diocese in numerous
lawsuits alleging sexual misconduct by priests.
In a letter in which he evokes "fundamental Christian principles,"
Heaney states that he is representing both the diocese and its
insurers, and attempting to balance the bishop's pastoral concern with
an insurer's reluctance to offer large settlements in cases of
"nominal value."
Heaney said in an interview this week he was trying to make the point
that "lawsuits are not very well designed to resolve most human
problems."
"Why not try to resolve these matters with the resources that churches
have - which is essentially spiritual resources?" Heaney said.
Trainor's career in the Madison Diocese ended in 1984 when parents of
Trainor repeatedly molested youths during his three assignments in the
brian
"biff" <bi...@dogomania.com> wrote in message
news:c08fdef9.02052...@posting.google.com...
"coming from the 'evangelical nutcase fringe' groups this is not only true
it is the norm. They would trash whole families, through them out of houses
change the keys on the church doors to get rid of pastors. Amazing what
people will do when you tell them something critical, and when you attack
them they say you are attacking God. The most used phrase is whiner, liar,
apostate, heretic, serial soul killer(my personal favorite) and many more.
Obscene phone calls, try to get people fired, stalk them, physical threat
and intimidation, and so on. It is truly amazing."
>