ARLINGTON (VA)
USA Today
March 19, 2019
By Chris Woodyard
West Virginia’s attorney general filed a lawsuit Tuesday against a retired Catholic bishop and a diocese alleging that they knowingly employing pedophile priests and failed to conduct adequate background checks.
Attorney General Patrick Morrisey’s suit follows the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston’s disclosure last November of 18 priests who were credibly accused of having sexually abused children over a span from 1950 through last summer and another 13 who were accused in other states and then came to West Virginia, though no complaints were lodged against them there.
“The diocese and its bishops chose to cover up and conceal arguably criminal behavior of admitted child sex abusers,” the lawsuit states.
The diocese had no immediate comment. In September, it announced Bishop Michael Bransfield’s retirement and said he had been under investigation over allegations of sexual harassment of adults and financial improprieties. A team of investigators had interviewed 40 people over four months and delivered its findings to the Vatican, the diocese said.
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