NEW ORLEANS (LA)
The Guardian [London, England]
August 8, 2023
By Ramon Antonio Vargas in New Orleans
Exclusive: memo reveals Gregory Aymond disregarded recommendations from board advisers to publicly label certain accused clerics as credibly suspected molesters
hen he took over leadership of New Orleans’s Roman Catholic archdiocese in 2009, one of the administrative tools that archbishop Gregory Aymond inherited was a board of advisers which was set up to help determine the credibility of sexual abuse allegations made against clerics under his command.
But, multiple times, Aymond has demonstrated his comfort with disregarding recommendations from those advisers to publicly label certain accused clerics as credibly suspected molesters.
The archbishop on six different occasions disregarded findings of credibility that would have led to accused priests being outed as abusers to a region with about 500,000 Catholics, essentially going against the advice of his board.
Puzzling to some, Aymond’s handling of the half-dozen cases in question as the head of the US’s second-oldest Catholic archdiocese are outlined in a memorandum which attorneys for victims of clerical sexual abuse prepared and handed to law enforcement in the latter part of last year. They wrote the document as a report, or brief, summarizing evidence of crimes they believed could still be prosecuted.
Though it has not led to any substantial action from authorities, the memorandum constitutes the latest revelation in a decades-old scandal at the 230-year-old organization whose reputation has been marred by evidence of going to extreme lengths to conceal at least one self-confessed child abuser.
The 48-page memo references documents handed over after the New Orleans church sought federal bankruptcy protection in 2020 in response to other abuse-related lawsuits. Broad confidentiality rules govern the proceeding, so both church officials – and, to some extent, advocates for victims – have tried to shield the memo from becoming public.
The Guardian obtained a copy and learned that the administrative actions outlined in it do not emulate the promises of full transparency that the worldwide church has made, particularly as it relates to claims of clerical abuse.
Aymond himself made some of those pledges in November 2018 – when, under pressure, he released the first version of a list of dozens of clerics considered by his archdiocese to be credibly accused abusers.
“We have published the names of all those … whom we saw substantiated sexual abuse,” Aymond said during a radio interview on the day of the release of that list. “My promise is transparency – is to be transparent now and in the future.”
Aymond’s handling of the cases stands apart from his counterparts’ work. Allegation review boards have been criticized as being overly secretive, undermining victims’ claims, protecting clergymen’s reputations and helping the church avoid having to pay damages, as an Associated Press investigation reported in 2019. But as Aymond showed in New Orleans, even when the board sided with an accuser, it was meaningless if the archbishop refused to endorse the body’s recommendation.
Meanwhile, Catholic priest, critic, canon lawyer and clerical abuse victim advocate Tom Doyle said he believes the facts – as outlined in the memo and quoted documents – suggest Aymond potentially violated the spirit of Pope Francis’s “Vos estis lux mundi”, his landmark 2019 legislation aimed at combating sexual abuse in the worldwide Catholic church.
Earlier this year, Francis permanently decreed the legislation whose name means “you are the light of the world” and which affirms an obligation to report molestation involving both children and adults who are considered vulnerable. Among other measures, it generally eliminates secrecy requirements for witnesses to misconduct, calls for the protection of people who report alleged church abuse and provides possible discipline for institutional leaders found to have engaged in cover-ups.
“Unfortunately … the bishops say one thing and do another,” Doyle told the Guardian upon learning of the memo’s contents. “And one of the things that I’ve noticed in many years of involvement in this … is the culture of audacity. They lie all the time, and they lie to protect themselves … And if that’s what’s really going on, it needs to be exposed.”
In one case highlighted by the memo, Aymond authorized separate financial settlements of $125,000 and $100,000 for out-of-court resolutions with two people. Both accused the cleric in these cases of molestation.
Aymond’s archdiocese also greenlit a relatively substantial $87,500 payment to settle a claim against a seventh priest, who is named Jerry Dabria. They did so before barring the advisory review board from even considering the allegation for potential credibility.
The Guardian has not independently viewed all of the source documents and clerical personnel files which the memo references.
But it has examined hundreds of documents pertaining to two clerical abuse case cited in the memo – including one of the five which Aymond ignored his board after the advisers found what they considered to be credible allegations of child abuse. And the memo accurately summarized them.
Two of the cases involve priests whose names have never before been publicly linked to the New Orleans church’s scandal: William O’Donnell and Joseph Benson. Another involves a name that hasn’t been mentioned in connection with the scandal for years: Luis Henao, who quietly retired before Aymond’s 2018 list release.
The others – Brian Highfill, Paul Hart and Luis Fernandez – have fallen under media scrutiny more recently.
Only the late Highfill has ever appeared on Aymond’s credibly accused list – which has grown from fewer than 55 named clerics to more than 70 since it was first published – or faced a law enforcement investigation. Even then, Aymond waited more than two years to add him to the roster.
Also notably, the list published by Aymond has neglected to include three priests whom his predecessor reported to a suburban New Orleans district attorney’s office for possible criminal prosecution of abuse claims.
Highfill, Hart and Dabria are now dead.
Henao’s brother and Fernandez himself confirmed to the Guardian that the archdiocese cut off their retirement benefits after the judge overseeing the organization’s bankruptcy ordered the church to stop such payments for credibly accused clergymen. Fernandez believes the archdiocese’s lead lawyer told him that his retirement benefits – with the exception of a stipend for medication – were being cut off because the allegations against him were credible.
But Fernandez correctly noted that he has never been put on Aymond’s credibly accused list.
Attempts to contact O’Donnell and Benson were not immediately successful.
Aymond declined to respond to a detailed list of questions provided by the Guardian, saying that doing so “would neither be helpful nor in the spirit of the court’s” confidentiality rules.
But he did prepare a statement in which he asserted, “I do not act alone”, and, “In each instance, I can assure you that decisions were made and actions were taken based upon the information and in consultation with lay professionals and experts as well as church leadership.”
“As each situation developed, additional information became available that led to further actions or alternate decisions,” Aymond’s statement continued. “Looking at specific statements or actions out of the overall context of a case does not always represent an accurate account of what happened. Each situation is complex, and decisions were not made with a careless disregard for survivors nor a desire to protect the church and the priests.”
Aymond’s statement said he pledged to “continue to learn from the past”. But he added that he was “more focused on the present and the future”, especially strengthening protocols for responding to allegations of clerical abuse as well as programs which the archdiocese has said are meant to protect both children and “vulnerable” adults.
His statement concluded: “My focus is bringing the bankruptcy proceedings to their conclusion so that the survivors can be fairly compensated.
“I know that there is no amount of money that can bring healing to those who have been hurt,” Aymond also said. “I only hope that my prayers and the pastoral support the survivors are able to receive will help them and bring them peace.”
‘Victim’s accusations were credible’
O’Donnell had been retired for three years when, in 2016, allegations against him were reviewed by Aymond’s board. That board had 10 members, including psychologists, a medical doctor, a social worker, attorneys and the mother of the city’s mayor at the time.
One complaint accused O’Donnell of having raped a boy weekly for a period of two years beginning when the child was 12, doing so occasionally while other priests watched and took photos. A second complaint accused him of orally raping and molesting another boy for a period of two years beginning when the child was about 10.
According to the memo, after scrutinizing the allegations and rebuttals from O’Donnell as well as reviewing “the testimonies of friends and family members”, the entire board unanimously voted that the allegations “were not manifestly false or frivolous”.
The board also took a series of other votes aimed at weighing the claims’ credibility. Eight from the group found the allegations believable and plausible while six found that the allegations were reasonable and probable. Seven voted that the allegations were credible based on the preponderance of the evidence, a burden of proof which is less than the criminal court standard of “beyond a reasonable doubt” but is often used at universities for disciplinary investigations.
In 2017, Aymond authorized settlements of $120,000 and $100,000 to each of O’Donnell’s accusers. They were just two of an astounding 130 or so abuse-related settlement agreements that Aymond’s administration struck in a 10-year period beginning in 2010, according to the memo.
The memo noted how a high-ranking archdiocesan official told one of the settlement recipients that the church would only make such a payment if “the victim’s accusations were credible”.
In early May of 2018, Aymond issued a decree which asserted that the allegations against O’Donnell had “no semblance of truth”. The decree didn’t mention the review board’s findings or the settlements. He ordered all documents surrounding the investigation to be stored in an archive that only he and select appointees of his could access.
A third allegation against O’Donnell surfaced that year, which the priest addressed in a letter to Aymond. He admitted to inflicting corporal punishment on students – including spanking teenagers – but denied sexual contact.
There were obvious inconsistencies – at one point, O’Donnell claimed he didn’t even remember that accuser but then also confidently stated that the claimant never would “cry uncontrollably” when spanked. The memo said it was implausible for him to not remember the accuser but also assert that the claimant was lying about sobbing when spanked.
Aymond dismissed the third complaint as lacking any semblance of truth.
By then, the archbishop had extensive experience encountering clerical abuse claims. Not only had he previously been the bishop of Austin, Texas, for several years earlier in his career, but he had also been one of the highest-ranking assistant archbishops in New Orleans, whose duties included dealing with allegations of clerical molestation.
He had also worked with or around several clergymen who would land either on the credibly accused list which he published – or similar ones put out by other Catholic institutions.
‘A vulnerable adult’
In 2011, more than two years after Aymond became New Orleans’s archbishop, his advisory board heard three abuse complaints against priest Joseph Benson.
A report from the board cited in the memo documents how Benson admitted to inappropriately touching the genitals of two men older than the age of 18. He argued that he was applying oil on their privates as part of a blessing. The board considered those two claims as true on that basis alone.
The board ruled that it couldn’t issue a finding on the other allegation because the claimant had died by suicide at that point. That accuser, before his death, had described being sexually assaulted by Benson in a rectory.
Without specifying which, board members determined at least one of the victims was “a vulnerable adult by reason of his psychotic condition, documented close to the time the incident occurred, by psychological testing and the history he gave of paranoid delusions and hallucinations”. Benson confirmed having been told by that accuser that the claimant “had been hearing voices for the previous two years and that he was taking medication for schizophrenia,” documents cited by the memo show.
The board “unanimously recommended to [Aymond] that … Joseph Benson be removed from all active ministry”.
Benson retired in 2012, according to an archdiocesan spokesperson.
‘Little hope’
By the time Aymond was in his second full year as New Orleans’s archbishop, priest Luis Henao was facing at least 15 accusations of grooming or inappropriate behavior. At the time, he underwent evaluation by the archbishop’s credibility review board.
The Colombian native, whose duties included ministries for the New Orleans area’s Latino Catholics, first encountered at least one of those allegations in 2002. That year, as a clerical molestation and cover-up scandal engulfed Boston’s Catholic archdiocese and made international headlines, New Orleans church officials placed Henao on leave in light of allegations that he had abused a child of a family with whom he was friends.
The New Orleans’s archdiocese later reinstated Henao, citing in part a purported dearth of evidence against him and his adamant denials of wrongdoing. But more allegations piled up against him by the time his case went in front of the review board convened by Aymond.
According to the memo, the allegations were compelling enough to prompt two board findings about Henao: that his ministry “should not involve any contact with children and adolescents whatsoever” and that he “should be directed to absolutely avoid such interactions and contact”.
The board sees little hope in … Henao changing his behavior through counseling or mentoring
“The board sees little hope in … Henao changing his behavior through counseling or mentoring,” the group said. “Despite the serious consequences of the complaint of sexual abuse that led to his publicly being placed on administrative leave in 2002 … his behavior has continued to be questionable and generate anxiety.
“One would have expected a prudent person to err on the side of being overly cautious to avoid any perception of such behavior. Instead he has continued in this behavior.”
The archdiocese told Henao to interact only with adults and avoid ministering directly to children. But, in addition to duties at what the archdiocese called its Hispanic apostolate office, he also celebrated masses at a church in New Orleans’s Lower Garden District whose congregation included children.
His work garnered coverage in the archdiocese’s in-house newspaper as recently as 2016. Without any public explanation from either the church or him, Henao’s name suddenly stopped appearing in a 2017 directory of Catholic priests in the US.
The priest’s brother, Gustavo Henao, told the Guardian recently that Luis – who is now in his 80s and living in Colombia as he grapples with dementia – simply retired because of his age and health. But Gustavo confirmed that his brother’s retirement payments were cut off when the judge overseeing the archdiocese’s bankruptcy case ordered church administrators to stop paying out the benefits of all living priests and deacons who had also been found to be credibly accused abusers.
Unsuccessfully, Gustavo Henao objected to the termination of those benefits. Any explanation for the objection has been sealed from public view because of the bankruptcy’s confidentiality rules. But Henao told the Guardian that he believed it was unfair for his brother’s benefits to be cut off in light of his reinstatement following his suspension in 2002.
The same year Henao was suspended, the archdiocese – then led by Aymond’s predecessor, Alfred Hughes – privately reported him to New Orleans police along with six other priests and deacons confronted with abuse allegations, according to a letter from the institution to the law enforcement agency which was reviewed by the Guardian. Though no law enforcement action directly resulted from that missive, the other six clerics mentioned in that letter all were included on the credibly accused list which Aymond released in 2018.
Luis Henao was the only one of those six who did not appear on that roster. His brother insisted that there has never been any reason for him to be included.
A legal opinion
The memo reviewed by the Guardian sheds new light on Aymond’s handling of priests facing abuse allegations which were previously but incompletely reported on in the media.
One of the more notable revelations centers on Paul Hart, who earlier in his clerical career had admitted to fondling, kissing and engaging in simulated sexual intercourse while clothed with a 17-year-old girl. Aymond ultimately judged that Hart behaved immorally but did not abuse a child because church law which was applicable at the time set the age of adulthood at 16.
The memo indicates that one of the main canon lawyers whom Aymond consulted to reach that conclusion was Robie Robichaux. Robichaux was later removed from a high-ranking post in the Catholic diocese of Lafayette, Louisiana, after a woman came forward with allegations that Robichaux sexually abused her when, decades earlier, she was a teenager seeking his counsel.
A second woman later came forward and reported similar allegations against Robichaux, who – according to the memo – after consulting Aymond on the Hart case allegedly admitted to sexually abusing at least one minor.
“Had the incident taken place today, we could well be faced with a full fledged case” before the department at the Catholic church’s worldwide headquarters at the Vatican which deals with clerical molestation claims, Robichaux wrote to Aymond in a June 2013 letter reviewed by the Guardian. But because it had occurred before key reforms to the age of adulthood under canon law, Robichaux wrote to Aymond: “Take it slow and easy. … You know [father] Hart – strength and weaknesses. You have the responsibility of discerning his suitability for future ministry in the archdiocese.”
The archbishop assigned Hart to work at a local high school in 2017 before his admission’s appearance in bankruptcy-related documents prompted a tip to his employer about his past. Hart was forced to retire and later died without ever landing on the archdiocese’s credibly accused list, having apparently been at least partially insulated by Robichaux’s confidence in the legality of the late priest’s admitted actions.
‘They said my name was on a list’
Other notable new findings in the memo concern a retired priest named J Luis Fernandez. Fernandez once worked at a New Orleans high school where Aymond worked as a young clergyman. The school primarily catered to boys interested in becoming clerics.
In 2007, under the command of Aymond’s predecessor Hughes, the archdiocese reviewed a complaint which accused Fernandez of three instances of sexual abuse.
Two allegations involved Fernandez ejaculating on a boy. Members of the allegation review board at the time deemed the claims credible, the memo reveals, but the archdiocese never publicly disclosed that.
Instead, the church secretly entered into an agreement with the accuser that provided him unlimited psychological therapy.
Aymond’s administration left Fernandez off the 2018 credibly accused roster but was forced to address some aspects of the abuse allegations against him in late 2020.
That’s when his accuser spoke out for the first time ever about his unusual unlimited therapy settlement as well as his abuse at the hands of both Fernandez and another priest, the late Robert Cooper.
The archbishop announced after the accuser’s public statements that he had suspended Fernandez from being able to publicly conduct mass in his retirement. Aymond also said he was adding Cooper to his credibly accused list – which initially omitted him. But the archbishop said the archdiocese would not do the same with Fernandez while both a vaguely described “penal process” as well as a review of a separate, second accuser’s claims against him continued unfolding.
The archdiocese has not released any updates to that penal process or investigation.
Fernandez remains off the archdiocese’s roster of suspected clergy abusers despite at least some of the claims against him already being deemed credible nearly two decades ago. But some of what he has experienced – as he told it to the Guardian – seems to match the criteria for inclusion on the credibly accused roster.
Fernandez said Aymond at one point sent him a letter ordering him to stop saying mass publicly and wearing his clerical garb. “I wasn’t doing any of that anyway,” Fernandez said. “It’s like the doctor who retires and doesn’t operate anymore.”
Furthermore, like in Henao’s case, Fernandez said that the archdiocese more recently told him it would stop remitting his retirement benefits to him after the bankruptcy judge ordered the organization to halt payments to credibly accused priests. He said he was only allowed to keep receiving $150 monthly for medication.
Fernandez asserted that he pushed the archdiocese for an explanation because he denies ever abusing anyone. But he said the archdiocese wouldn’t even provide him details about any of the second accuser’s claims against him – including who made them, to when they dated back, and where they purportedly took place.
As Fernandez recalled, during a phone call with an archdiocesan attorney, “They said my name was on a list – on an addendum with these priests who were accused and it was confirmed”.
“It’s like they decided I was guilty, and that was that,” Fernandez said. “I’ve been treated like crap, to say the least.”
‘Rest in peace’
The memo additionally elaborates on a late priest who was ultimately labeled a credibly accused clerical abuser, but only after years of waffling. Before his death last year, Brian Highfill faced abuse claims from numerous people he met through his work as a priest.
Among the claimants were two US air force members who served during his days as a military chaplain. They said Highfill fed them alcohol and then forced sexual acts on them while they were unconscious. Another was a New Orleans-area woman who described how Highfill molested her at a local church in 1975 when she was 16 during a different phase of his career.
In 2018, Highfill was suspended from public ministry when a New Orleans-area man – Mike Brandner – went to the archdiocese and turned over stacks of love letters that the priest sent his little brother, Scot Brandner. Scot, who had since died by suicide, was 10 when he met Highfill.
Aymond’s review board examined Highfill’s case in October 2018 – shortly before the release of the credibly accused list – and ruled that the clergyman was “grooming” Scot Brandner for an overtly sexual relationship. The board acknowledged the possibility that one had already started by the time at least some of the letters had been sent. It recommended that Aymond prohibit Highfill from saying mass publicly.
Nonetheless, Aymond initially declined to put Highfill on the credibly accused list which was soon released. That omission came even after the Catholic diocese of Las Vegas hired an investigator to look into at least some of the allegations against Highfill and who found the clergyman to be credibly accused. The investigator had even referred Highfill to the Las Vegas police department.
Ultimately, Highfill drew intense media scrutiny after Brandner and some of his abuse victims went public. Then, after the New Orleans archdiocese filed for bankruptcy protection, more abuse claims came in against Highfill ahead of a key deadline, the memo reveals. Aymond, who retained final authority over Highfill’s career, finally decided to add him to the credibly accused list in the summer of 2020, and the Las Vegas diocese subsequently took a similar step.
Highfill died on 23 January 2022 at age 79 without ever facing prosecution, though he was the subject of a criminal investigation opened by the air force.
The New Orleans archdiocese announced the death in a weekly bulletin which expressed a wish for him to “rest in peace”. There was no mention of the air force investigation or that local church officials had in fact labeled him a credibly accused predator.
‘Be assured of my prayerful support’
The memo also recounts how Aymond has repeatedly failed to send sexual abuse allegations against clerics to the review board. These mostly are additional allegations against clerics already listed as credibly accused, coming through outside channels – such as lawsuits – rather than internal reporting mechanisms.
But there is one notable exception: the late Jerry Dabria. The memo recounts how Dabria was at the center of a sexual assault claim which resulted in the church paying out an $87,500 settlement.
Dabria – named as a defendant in a sealed lawsuit in a state courthouse in New Orleans – has never publicly been connected to the archdiocese’s broader abuse scandal, much less appeared on the credibly accused list.
The settled claim against Dabria, which was voluntarily dismissed from court in Aymond’s third full year as archbishop, was never even brought to the review board for an assessment of credibility. According to the memo’s authors, that breaks assurances Aymond made after the 2018 roster’s release.
“The more recent cases were and continue to be presented to the archdiocese review board, … made up of lay experts who review the cases and make recommendations,” Aymond wrote to parishioners at the time.
The memo’s authors contend that Aymond’s handling of claims against O’Donnell, Benson, Henao, Hart, Fernandez, Highfill and Dabria – who died in 2019 – shows the disparate treatment he directed to suspected clergy predators and their accusers.
In addition to the administrative actions in their favor, the memo highlights supportive words that he wrote to vividly accused clerics.
“Please be assured of my prayerful support and fraternal concern for you,” Aymond told O’Donnell at one point. “Please contact me if I can be of assistance.”
At the height of the scandal which ensnared Hart, Aymond wrote to him: “Be assured of my prayers for your health. I know this is a very challenging time, and I lift you to the Lord.”
The memo also confirms a long held rumor that in the summer of 2019, Aymond attended a mass and shared brunch with at least three clerics on his own credibly accused child abuser list. Among them was Benson and Lawrence Hecker, who has never been prosecuted and was allowed to retire on essentially his own terms despite admitting in writing in 1999 to either sexually molesting or harassing multiple teenagers whom he met through his work.
The memo shows how that contrasts with the tone attributed to the archbishop in some writings about abuse victims and those who advocate for them.
At one point, a message from Aymond that became part of the bankruptcy case dealt with compensation to abuse victims.
“We must be careful that there is not a dependency created,” Aymond said about making abuse victims financially whole.
Similarly, as he offered a $40,000 settlement in 2015 to a molestation claimant accusing a cleric who ended up on the credibly accused list just three years later, Aymond said the amount resulted from the archdiocese’s need to “be a good steward of the funds given to us for us to use in the church’s mission”, according to the memo.
“Pray for our enemies,” Aymond separately wrote in a text message which was cited in the memo and referred to the author of a 2020 newspaper article about how the archdiocese had continued to pay the retirement benefits of credibly accused predator priests.
In a letter sent to the Vatican after the judicial order for his archdiocese to discontinue those benefits given the organization’s bankruptcy, the archbishop described the court’s ruling as “unjust and painful”.
He invoked the devil when writing a text message referring to the journalist who had reported on the discontinued retirement benefits as well as an attorney who represents numerous clerical molestation victims.
As the memo put it, that text said: “Satan lives.”
- In the US, call or text the Childhelp abuse hotline at 800-422-4453. In the UK, the NSPCC offers support to children on 0800 1111, and adults concerned about a child on 0808 800 5000. The National Association for People Abused in Childhood (Napac) offers support for adult survivors on 0808 801 0331. In Australia, children, young adults, parents and teachers can contact the Kids Helpline on 1800 55 1800, or Bravehearts on 1800 272 831, and adult survivors can contact Blue Knot Foundation on 1300 657 380. Other sources of help can be found at Child Helplines International