BishopAccountability.org

Here’s what Dallas police seized from Catholic Diocese offices

By Cassandra Jaramillo
Morning News
May 29, 2019

https://bit.ly/2VUZqVi

Dallas Bishop Edward J. Burns spoke to members of the media after a police raid on several diocese offices on May 15.
Photo by Ryan Michalesko

During their raid on the Dallas Catholic Diocese offices this month, police said they seized settlement agreements, files on former bishops and records from the diocesan review board, which looked into allegations of sexual abuse by priests.

Court records, first reported by WFAA-TV (Channel 8) and obtained Wednesday by The Dallas Morning News, detailed the numerous records police now have as they continue their investigation. Police are required to return an inventory of seized items to the judge who signed the search warrant affidavit.

Dallas police officials declined to comment Wednesday but have previously called the raid “wholly appropriate." A detective wrote in a search warrant affidavit that during his investigation, he uncovered new allegations against five priests and that the diocese had stonewalled or handed over incomplete records for months.

The diocese, which has been shaken by allegations of sexual abuse for more than two decades, was critical of the raid. Bishop Edward J. Burns called the police action “unnecessary” and said church officials were cooperative despite the search warrant affidavit that said otherwise.

Annette Gonzales Taylor, a spokeswoman for the diocese, said Wednesday that church officials stand by their previous statements. She said Burns had given police “all of the files” regarding the five priests with allegations.

“We were aware of that they came in and took all of our records. We were not surprised by the inventory,” Gonzales Taylor said.

According to the search warrant return, police obtained insurance claims, terminated employee records, meeting notes, personnel movement letters and review board documents. Police also seized documents related to former bishops Charles Grahmann and Thomas Tschoepe, who previously led the Dallas diocese amid several sexual abuse scandals. Both are now dead.

Tschoepe was bishop of the diocese from 1969 to 1990. Grahmann served as bishop from 1990 to 2007, an era during which abuse allegations began to pile up. He was the diocese’s leader in 1997, when a civil jury found that the church was negligent in its handling of allegations against a former priest, Rudy Kos. The next year, Kos received a life sentence in a criminal trial.

Allegations continued to surface in the diocese and in the Catholic Church worldwide in subsequent years. Last year, Dallas diocese officials announced they had received credible allegations against Edmundo Paredes, a longtime pastor at St. Cecilia Catholic Church in Oak Cliff. The diocese reached financial settlements with Paredes' three accusers, who didn’t speak to police.

Dallas Detective David Clark worked on the Paredes case and obtained a warrant for Paredes' arrest after a new accuser came forward. But Paredes, who also was accused of stealing from the church, is believed to have fled to his native Philippines. 

In the aftermath of the Paredes allegations, Burns announced a statewide transparency effort to name all clergy whom church officials had deemed credibly accused dating to 1950. The diocese released its list of 31 names of clergy in January after a team of investigators culled through clergy members' files. Seventeen of those on the list had already died.

Clark, in his search warrant affidavit, continued to work on priests' cases. In the affidavit, he detailed new allegations regarding five of the priests on the list. 

Clark also questioned the diocese’s vetting process of allegations with the diocese’s review board. The affidavit states that diocese attorneys shared allegations against clergy with the review board. If the board determined the allegation to be credible, it would turn that name over to Burns. Clark wrote in the affidavit that diocesan attorneys didn’t reveal the number of priests who had accusations against them that were not deemed credible by the board.

In the affidavit, Clark suggested that the members of the Diocesan Review Board — a team of laypeople — lacked the credentials to assess allegations of sexual abuse of minors. According to the affidavit, some board members reached out independently to police to suggest that they should request a living priest’s file.

“I believe individuals involved in the diocese's vetting process have lost confidence in that process. I believe these individuals are aware of information in the priests’ files indicative of criminal behavior and want the police to investigate, but for some undisclosed reason those concerns are not being made in an ‘official’ manner,” Clark wrote.

In a statement this month after the raid, Burns said the board consisted of two local police chiefs, a clinical child psychologist who specializes in child-abuse victims, a doctor and an attorney. Burns, in his rebuttal, said the members reached out because he wanted them to do so.

Burns said that while the board “had insufficient information to arrive at a finding of a credible allegation in certain cases, members (and I) felt that the Police should nevertheless do an investigation with its resources of these other individuals because there was a possibility that something could be there worth investigating.”

When asked why the diocese hadn't publicly identified members of the review board that helped in investigating allegations, Gonzales Taylor said the church wanted to respect the board members' privacy.

“You can imagine if their names are out there, people would be calling them from all sides and possibly disrupting their home lives,” she said.

Zach Hiner, executive director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said other dioceses have made their review boards public to improve transparency and trust in the church. The Archdiocese of Chicago has an office of child abuse investigations that is made up of an independent review board team with publicly identified members who have experience in psychology, social work and legal work.

“If anything, being public with [their identities] would be a boon to their work, because it would show that they are taking efforts in their personal time to help keep children and vulnerable adults safe from sexual violence,” Hiner said.

City columnist Robert Wilonsky contributed to this report

Seized items | Catholic Diocese raid

Here's a list of the items contained in the search warrant return.

Diocese offices at 3725 Blackburn St.
  • PowerPoint printout, email and flyer

  • Notebook with handwritten notes

  • Financial documents re: claims

  • Yellow folder with notes on staff meetings

  • Folder with clergy documents

  • Employee files, notebooks and reimbursement documents

  • Canonical archive records A-C

  • Canonical archive records D-H

  • Canonical archive records I-L

  • Canonical archive records M-N

  • Canonical archive records O-S

  • Canonical archive records U-Y

  • Personal statements and news statements

  • Notebooks, complaint files, org. chart and envelope

  • Emails and apostolic letter

  • Receipts for boxes

  • Emails, employee appraisals and documents relating to training

  • Documents related to document retention policy

  • Notebooks with handwritten notes and printouts

  • Zip drives, floppy disks and assorted documents in gray tote

  • Settlement agreements and documents related to settlements

  • Notebook with handwritten notes

  • DVD of archives files

  • Emails, memos, news article and notes

  • Personnel board folders and letters

  • Meeting minutes, insurance documents and personnel movement letters

  • Letter with attached email

  • Resignation letter

  • Personal statements

  • Safesite documents

  • Documents related to document transfer

  • Notes, emails, schedules, various communications

  • Deacon file request

  • Receipts for evaluations

  • Clergy movement file, business card

  • Assorted documents

  • Files from Safesite

  • Email chain regarding clergy and letter

  • Letter to clergy and other documents

  • Emails, incident reports, letters

  • Assorted documents and files

  • Various folders and documents

  • Memo and email

  • Documents regarding clergy

  • 2019 complaints

  • Various files

  • Psychological evaluations, complaint files

  • Deacon and personnel files

  • Associated documents

  • Safesite box

  • Assorted documents

  • Review board document

  • Assorted documents

  • Emails, financial binders and budget papers

  • Complaints and ... document

  • Legal settlement papers

  • CD prior settlement documents

  • Lawyer invoices

  • Sexual misconduct document

  • Communications

  • Sexual misconduct coverage paperwork

  • Sexual misconduct litigation

  • Miscellaneous documents

Safesite storage facility at 4601 W. Ledbetter Drive
  • Hard drives from vault storage

  • DVDs with background checks

  • Legal documents July 2011

  • Bishop Tschoepe correspondence

  • Insurance claims

  • Insurance claim files

  • Lawsuit/legal documents

  • Bishop Grahmann documents

  • Case files

  • Sexual misconduct documents

  • Terminated employees

  • Diocese policies

  • Sexual conduct newspaper

  • Bishop Thomas Tschoepe files

  • Diocese Vs. Zomlik

St. Cecilia Catholic Church at 2809 W. Davis St.
  • Red binder with miscellaneous paperwork

  • 16 file folders with miscellaneous paperwork and photos




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