SPRINGFIELD (MA)
The Republican
Greenfield lawyer John Stobierski, citing Jerry Sandusky case, says other priest should have reported Richard Lavigne’s child sexual abuse
By Buffy Spencer, The Republican
SPRINGFIELD –When details of Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky’s child sexual abuse hit the news, local lawyer John J. Stobierski said he saw a parallel with a case he is prosecuting.
Stobierski was in front of Hampden Superior Court Judge Constance M. Sweeney Wednesday seeking to add the Rev. Robert Thrasher to a case pending against two former bishops of the Springfield Roman Catholic Diocese..
Sweeney promised a decision on the matter soon.
The suit by Peter J. Caffrey – filed in 2010 – accuses the Most Rev. Bishop Emeritus Joseph M. Maguire and the Most Rev. Thomas L. Dupre of negligence. It says they allowed Caffrey to be molested by now-defrocked priest Richard R. Lavigne in North Adams in 1976 and 1977.
Stobierski told Sweeney Thrasher had walked in on Lavigne abusing two other children in different instances about five years prior to Caffrey’s abuse, and had a legal duty to report the abuse to superiors.
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