KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter
July 26, 2019
By Jenn Morson
An alumna of Franciscan University of Steubenville in Ohio has written an open letter saying she was sexually abused while a student there and that the school administration ignored her complaints.
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In a letter published July 8 on Patheos, an online site, Karen, who chooses to not share her last name, states that she was sexually abused by a friar while attending Franciscan University from 1987 until she graduated in 1991. Karen’s story was told in an NCR piece last October. She wrote the open letter, she told NCR, because “it was important for me to use my voice, and to share that my story is not over.”
In her letter, Karen wrote that she was abused by Franciscan Fr. Sam Tiesi, who died in 2001.
“Fr. Sam taught me to trust, then he abused that trust for his own sinfulness. He used God and my innocent faith to keep his secret safe. He said he loved me like a daughter. But he was not a father. He was a monster,” she wrote.
She said that Tiesi groped her breasts and assaulted her with unwanted kissing. She said that she confided in another university Franciscan, Fr. Ron Mohnickey, who, she wrote, blamed her for the sexual contact.
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