Clergy Abuse Survivor, Attorney to Detail Allegations of a Coverup by Former Erie Bishop Trautman

ERIE (PA)
Erie News Now

Jan. 2, 2020

James Faluszczak, abuse survivor, former priest and whistleblower before the 40th Pennsylvania Grand Jury, and Paul Barr who has represented injured victims on the Niagara Frontier and is an abuse survivor himself, will address the two new court filings at 11:30 a.m. in front of St. Joseph Cathedral in Buffalo.

They will detail allegations of coverup by defendant Bishop Donald Trautman, former Auxiliary Bishop of Buffalo and now retired Erie Bishop, who they said maintained the coverup from the Erie Diocese. Faluszczak and Barr will also identify active Buffalo priest Fr. Richard Reina as an alleged abuser for the first time.

When the Diocese of Buffalo and Bishop Richard Malone published an incomplete list of abuser priests in March 2018, they left out the timing and nature of alleged abuse, preventing the community from knowing about Fr. Gerard Smyczynski’s propensity to abuse children, according to Faluszczak and Barr.

Bishop Donald Trautman is alleged for have concealed this information by two specific actions in his capacity as Vicar General of the Buffalo Diocese, causing harm to an innocent child. They say it established a pattern of coverup that Trautman carried across state lines when he later became Bishop of Erie.

Reina is alleged to have sexually abused a minor child while he was a priest at Holy Cross Church in Buffalo. Reina then spend multiple years forming future priests in seminary work and is presently serving Christ the King Church in Snyder, NY.

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