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  'P.I.' Priest Resigns

By Dan Mangan
New York Post
May 24, 2006

http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/69070.htm

May 24, 2006 -- A Connecticut church yesterday lost a pastor for the second time in a week after the newly appointed top priest confessed to hiring a private eye who uncovered financial wrongdoing by the former pastor.

"I made a huge mistake which has further complicated matters," said the Rev. Michael Madden in a letter to parishioners at St. John Catholic Church in Darien.

Madden apologized and resigned as acting administrator after meeting with a reportedly furious Bridgeport Diocese Bishop William Lori. By hiring a private eye on his own, without consulting his bishop, Madden breached the Catholic chain of command.

"I am deeply saddened that the situation in the parish has been worsened by today's events," Lori said.

Sources said Lori learned only Monday that Madden and a parish bookkeeper were the ones who hired a private investigator to look into the Rev. Michael Jude Fay.

The detective's investigation revealed Fay spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in parish funds on meals, furniture and a cruise with his boyfriend. Fay resigned last week.

 
 

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