CALIFORNIA
Sacramento Bee
BY SAM STANTON
sstanton@sacbee.com
Dorothy Small met the new priest at Woodland’s Holy Rosary Catholic Church in April 2014, and almost immediately the Rev. Renerio Sabuga Jr. began inviting her out for bicycle rides or dinner, Small says.
Within weeks, she said, the priest – known to parishioners as “Father Jong” – would confide in her with intensely private thoughts.
“I’m a man like any other man,” she recalled him telling her. “I can do everything like any other man, just from the waist up.
“I can’t have sex.”
In a matter of months, that stance changed as Small and Sabuga became close and the priest pursued her romantically until Feb. 17, 2015, when the priest “cornered (Small) in her bedroom and sexually assaulted” her, a lawsuit filed Monday in Sacramento Superior Court alleges.
The allegations in Small’s lawsuit are explosive, charging that church officials routinely ignored Small’s requests for help. Her suit was filed by Sacramento attorney Joseph George against the Sacramento Catholic Diocese, Sabuga and Holy Rosary priest Jonathan Molina.
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