MINNESOTA
Duluth News Tribune
By: Tom Olsen , Duluth News Tribune
Attorneys representing the Diocese of Duluth and plaintiffs seeking the release of thousands of documents detailing priest sexual abuse cases made their arguments Wednesday before a Duluth judge, who will determine whether the request will be allowed.
The case before 6th Judicial District Judge David Johnson at the St. Louis County Courthouse was over a motion filed last month by the diocese seeking dismissal of the suits’ most substantial claims.
Susan Gaertner, a Minneapolis attorney representing the diocese, told Johnson that the suits’ private and public nuisance claims are not valid and said the statute of limitations has passed anyway. She said the plaintiffs cannot bring public nuisance claims because they are not prosecutors and cannot bring private nuisance claims because they have not suffered harm that is different than that suffered by the general public.
“The action for a private nuisance goes against any precedent or logic,” she said. “A public nuisance is the purview of a prosecuting attorney to bring on behalf of the public.”
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.