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	Priest Sued in Abuse Case Denies Charges By Tim Gerber Chicago Sun-Times April 6, 1992 A Northbrook Roman Catholic priest sued last week by parents who accused him of sexually abusing their son told his parishioners Sunday that he never has abused or hurt any child. In a two-page statement released after a morning mass at St. Norbert Church in the north suburb, the Rev. Robert Lutz denied the allegations made against him in a civil lawsuit Thursday. The suit says Lutz sexually abused a first-grader who attended St. Norbert School in 1986. The boy, now in his early teens, alleges that he and Lutz engaged in "indecent sexual acts on at least three separate occasions" in the spring of 1986, said the boy's attorney, Jeffery R. Anderson. "These allegations are completely and utterly false," Lutz said. "I never abused that child, and I never abused or hurt any child in any way." Lutz also said the allegations had been investigated by state authorities and no evidence was found to substantiate them. "Each and every one of these investigations determined that the charges are absolutely unfounded and lacking in any factual support whatsoever," the statement said. The suit filed Thursday was the third to be brought against Lutz in the last 10 years. A 1989 suit accused him of sexually abusing a second-grade boy from September, 1987, to June, 1988. That case is pending in Circuit Court. Before that, a sexual harassment suit was filed against Lutz by a woman while he was at St. Mary Star of the Sea Parish on the Southwest Side. Those allegations were investigated by state authorities and found to be unsubstantiated, according to Mary Dempsey, Lutz's attorney. The statement said the family who filed the most recent lawsuit may have been in close contact with the group that filed a lawsuit against Lutz in 1989. "I do not know what motivated these troubled people, although I am told that they have been in close contact over the past several years with the other family which had filed a similar and totally unfounded lawsuit against me and the archdiocese," Lutz said.
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