OH – Accused predator priest is back on the job

OHIO
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on November 16, 2012

Cleveland’s Catholic bishop is restoring to ministry a priest who “groomed” a teenager and tried to abuse him.

In a nine minute televised investigative report, based largely on “hundreds of pages of documents from the Lake County prosecutor,” Fox 8 investigative reporter Bill Sheil reports that Bishop Richard Lennon is putting Fr. Jeffrey M. Weaver back on the job for the first time in a decade.

Read the story.

Leaders of a support group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, are blasting the move as “reckless, callous and deceitful.”

According to the records released by prosecutors, in 1996, Fr. Weaver

–“bought the teenager a large number of alcoholic drinks,”
–“then tried to French kiss him” while victim pushed him away in the Immaculate Conception rectory,
–“rubbed his legs above the knee, approaching his penis one time,”
–“locked his legs together over the victim’s legs, saying ‘isn’t this nice,’” and
–“put the victim’s hands on his (the priest’s) legs.”

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