Religious order Carmelites added as defendant in Guam clergy sex abuse lawsuits

By Haidee V Eugenio
Pacific Daily News
December 3, 2018

https://bit.ly/2KP17Qj

The Guam flag waves in the tropical breeze with the Dulce Nombre de Maria Cathedral Basilica steeple set in the background on May 23, 2017. Photo by Rick Cruz

A Catholic religious order, Discalced Carmelite Nuns, is now named as a defendant in dozens of clergy sex abuse cases involving the recently deceased Father Louis Brouillard.

Brouillard was assigned in the late '60s to early '70s to the San Isidro Parish in Malojloj where the Carmelites had a monastery or convent at the time.

Lawsuits filed by former altar boys, former members of the Boy Scouts of America, and former parishioners, state Brouillard sexually abused and molested them at the convent, where the priest was residing.

The original lawsuits were filed in 2017, and were amended this year to include the Carmelites. A summons recently was served at the Carmelite Monastery in Carmel, California.

The Carmelites, also known as the Order of Discalced Carmelites and Carmel of the Immaculate Conception, arrived on Guam in 1966 and built a monastery and convent in Malojloj in 1968, the amended complaints said. The Carmelites later relocated to Tamuning.

In 2016, the Carmelites left Guam after 50 years, citing a "toxic environment" created by Archbishop Anthony Apuron, exacerbated by the child sexual abuse allegations against Apuron.

Attorney David Lujan represents the 25 plaintiffs who have named the Carmelites as a defendant. The other defendants include the Archdiocese of Agana, the Boy Scouts of America, other religious orders, priests and other clergy.

In early November, another Lujan client, identified in court documents only as “D.D.,” filed a lawsuit alleging that former Father Duenas Memorial School principal Gregory Seubert sexually abused him in the 1970s.

That lawsuit named another religious entity as defendant, the Marist Brothers of the School, which the lawsuit says operated and supervised Father Duenas Memorial School at the time Seubert was the school principal from 1974 to 1989.

Lujan started filing new clients' clergy sex abuse cases in local court in November this year, after filing more than a hundred similar cases in federal court since early 2017.

About 200 lawsuits have been filed, accusing many priests and others associated with the church, after Guam lawmakers eliminated the statute of limitation on such cases.

 Lujan's latest client to file a lawsuit is a plaintiff identified in court document only as "Andy" to protect his privacy.

In his $5 million lawsuit filed in the Superior Court of Guam on Nov. 2, "Andy" said Father Raymond Cepeda, now deceased, forcefully took off his underwear, groped him, and then tried to rape him when he was about 12 or 13 years old in or about 1975 or 1976.

"Andy" was an altar boy assigned to the Yigo Parish at the time, but was asked to assist a priest at the Dededo Parish one Sunday and that priest was Cepeda.

"Andy," the lawsuit states, stopped being an altar boy after the incident but continued to be a practicing Catholic. The complaint says the priest tried to sweet talk the child so he won't tell anybody what happened.