Diocese Settles Sex Assault Complaint

By Jay Tokasz
Buffalo News
August 16, 2012

http://www.buffalonews.com/city/article1007697.ece

The Catholic Diocese of Buffalo has reached a financial settlement with a 37-year-old woman who accused a priest of sexually assaulting her inside the rectory of a downtown Buffalo church in 2009, according to the woman’s lawyer.

The incident led to the removal in January of the Rev. Secondo Casarotto, longtime pastor of St. Anthony Church.

The settlement means the woman will not file a lawsuit in federal court, said her lawyer, Adam Horowitz.

Horowitz would not disclose the monetary terms of the settlement, although he said those terms were not confidential.

“The dollar amount was never the most important thing to her,” Horowitz said Thursday.

In a statement, the diocese confirmed the settlement agreement and also declined to disclose the amount.

The woman, who lives in Canada, was most interested in holding accountable the priest, the diocese and the priest’s religious order, the Scalabrinian Fathers, Horowitz added.

“She feels like she was able to expose him for what he did,” he said.

The cost of the settlement was to be split between the diocese and the missionaries of St. Charles Borromeo, otherwise known as the Scalabrinian Fathers, a worldwide order of clerics who have a provincial office on Staten Island.

In a prepared statement provided by her attorney, the woman said she hoped she helped give victims of sexual abuse who had not reported the abuse “some strength to report it and seek therapy.”

“As a Catholic, I struggled very deeply, and the silence was killing me,” the woman said. “The secret I had to hide from the people I loved most hurt so much. Because of my Catholic upbringing, I thought I could just forgive him and move on.”

Casarotto, who had been at St. Anthony Church for about 25 years, was placed on administrative leave in January with little explanation.

A few days after Casarotto’s removal, diocesan officials confirmed that then-Bishop Edward U. Kmiec had recently received a letter from Horowitz regarding the allegation against the priest.

The woman also called Buffalo police about her allegations in March 2011, although she did not make a formal statement until three months later – and nearly two years after the alleged groping.

Authorities didn’t charge Casarotto because they had no corroborating evidence, Erie County District Attorney Frank A. Sedita III said back in January.

When confronted by police, the priest acknowledged sexual contact with the woman and said that it was consensual, according to the district attorney.

But Horowitz maintained that a detective who worked on the case told him that Casarotto admitted to sexually attacking the woman, then backtracked and contended that it was consensual contact.

The woman claimed that Casarotto was giving her a tour of the parish, and when they arrived at his living quarters, he threw her on the bed, pulled down her shorts and fondled her before exposing himself and masturbating.

The allegations shocked the small, traditionally Italian parish where Casarotto, now 70, was a well-liked pastor.

They also prompted a second woman to step forward with a complaint about the Italian-born priest.

The second woman accused Casarotto of making unwanted sexual advances in August 2008, while she was alone with the priest in her home in a Buffalo suburb.

The second accuser told Horowitz she had contacted the diocese previously. However, a spokesman for the diocese said the woman’s complaint never reached the appropriate diocesan officials.

Casarotto can no longer function as a priest in the Buffalo Diocese and has returned to the Scalabrinian order.

“We trust that the Scalabrinian Fathers will do the right thing and keep him out of any public ministry around women,” said Horowitz.

Contact: jtokasz@buffnews.com