STEUBENVILLE (OH)
WTOV - Fox 9 [Steubenville OH]
May 5, 2021
By Paul Giannamore
[Includes video of Attorney Mitchell Garabedian’s remarks.]
A priest ordained in the mid-1960s in Steubenville, who was a teacher at Catholic Central High School for a time, is the subject of a sexual abuse case settlement in the Archdiocese of Hartford, Conn.
According to the victim’s attorney, the Rev. Kenneth Bonadies was sent for treatment in the mid-1970s from Steubenville before he became a teacher in Connecticut.
“If he was in a treatment center for four years, why didn’t the leaders, the Archbishop of Hartford, inquire as to what those treatment records said?” he said. Or at least ask the Bishop of Steubenville, why are you sending him here? Why is he coming here, what’s going on with this guy?”
The Diocese of Steubenville does not list Bonadies among priests credibly accused of abuse. Officials are looking into his service in the diocese, but noted the local church was not informed by Hartford of proceedings.
Garabedian said anyone abused by priest has steps to take.
“If they were sexually abused by a priest, Father Bonadies or anyone else, they should get into therapy, they should try to heal, they should love themselves and be kind to themselves, contact the criminal authorities. Contact the civil authorities.”
Garabedian is the attorney who led the sexual abuse cases against the Boston Archdiocese that were the subject of the movie ‘Spotlight’. The Hartford settlement is in the “low six figures,” according to Garabedian.