OHIO
BishopAccountability.org
Summary of Case: Ellis N. Harsham was ordained in 1968 for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati. He taught in Catholic high schools in Dayton, Cincinnati and Hamilton while assisting in local parishes. He was also a St. Gregory Minor Seminary faculty member, and director of campus ministry at Wright State University.
In a lawsuit settled in 1994, a man alleged that Harsham sexually abused him as during 1975-1977, when the man was a high school student who met Harsham while attending a pre-seminary program on weekends at St. Gregory’s Minor Seminary. The man said Harsham plied him with alcohol, marijuana and pornography. In a suit filed in December 1993, another man claimed Harsham sexually assaulted him when the man was a Badin High School student; Harsham taught at Badin 1977-1981. Further, former students of Carroll High School in Dayton, where Harsham taught 1968-1973, stated in the 1990s that the priest showed them pornography and seduced or attempted to seduce them.
Harsham was placed on administrative leave by the archdiocese in June 1994, and he resigned from active ministry later that year. His status remained “administrative leave” until sometime in 2006, when he was laicized.
Ordained: 1968
Laicized: 2006
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