ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests
For immediate release: Wednesday, Jan. 1, 2014
Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests ( 314 566 9790, SNAPclohessy@aol.com )
In a rare move, yesterday a judge sanctioned St. Louis’ archbishop and ordered to turn over possibly dozens and dozens of names of victims and child molesting clerics – over two decades – to a 20 year old woman and her attorney. Both parts of the ruling are unusual and significant.
Sadly, it’s not that unusual for Catholic officials to repeatedly break a judge’s orders and claim special status that allegedly exempts them from honoring the rules and responsibilities that govern other people’s behavior. But it IS unusual when Catholic officials so severely and repeatedly try a judge’s patience and violate a judge’s orders that a judge formally sanctions them for their egregious and arrogant wrongdoing.
That’s what’s happened here. St. Louis City Judge Robert Dierker harshly criticized that Archbishop Robert Carlson’s conduct in the case of “Jane Doe v. Fr. Joseph D. Ross and the St. Louis Archdiocese,” writing that “the archdiocese’s dogged refusal to comply with court orders has inflicted unnecessary trouble and expense on the plaintiff, manifestly interfered with trial preparations, and borders on if not actually (amounts) to contempt.”
He also criticized the archdiocese for “insisting that an archbishop does not have the control of records of the various parishes as an excuse” for not producing the required information.
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