PROVIDENCE (RI)
Providence Journal
October 2, 2019
By Brian Amaral
The attorney for a former altar boy suing the Diocese of Providence urged people to come forward with information that could shed light on what church leaders and others knew about the sexual abuse of children.
Timothy J. Conlon, attorney for now 53-year-old Philip Edwardo, said at a news conference Wednesday that the church and its leaders should be considered “perpetrators” of the abuse Edwardo suffered as a child, just as much as the abusive priest himself.
“The problem is the institution,” Conlon said at his office. “You don’t sue the cockroaches for being in a restaurant. You sue the restaurant for letting them breed.”
Edwardo, who now lives in Florida, said he was inappropriately touched, molested or otherwise abused from 100 to 300 times by the Rev. Philip Magaldi, then a parish priest at St. Anthony Church in North Providence. Magaldi died in 2008. In July, the diocese placed him on its list of “credibly accused” clergy.
Edwardo’s suit, filed Monday in state court, takes aim at the diocese’s role in the abuse crisis as part of an effort to overcome possible barriers to the litigation.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.