MINNESOTA
Minnesota Public Radio
Madeleine Baran St. Paul, Minn. Jul 1, 2014
A Minneapolis law firm has been secretly investigating the private life of Archbishop John Nienstedt for the past six months. Nienstedt acknowledged Tuesday that he had authorized an investigation into allegations made against him.
In a statement posted to the archdiocese’s website, Nienstedt said the allegations involve events “alleged to have occurred at least a decade ago,” before his arrival in the Twin Cities. They do not involve minors, he said, nor lay members of the church, and “they do not implicate any kind of illegal or criminal behavior.”
“These allegations,” he said, “are absolutely and entirely false.”
Jennifer Haselberger, a former chancery official, said she met with attorneys from the Greene Espel law firm several times at their Minneapolis office. Some of the meetings lasted hours. The lawyers — Matthew Forsgren and David Wallace-Jackson — told her at the time that they had interviewed more than a dozen priests and laypeople in several states and that 11 people provided sworn statements. The attorneys told her that Nienstedt had authorized the broad investigation into his own life in late January.
Forsgren and Wallace-Jackson specialize in internal investigations, white-collar criminal defense and business litigation, according to the firm’s website.
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