MINNESOTA
Fox 9
by Mike Durkin
HASTINGS, Minn. (KMSP) –
Former Rev. Francis Hoefgen was charged Wednesday in Dakota County with two counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct in connection with allegations he sexually abused a former altar boy.
The alleged abuse occurred at St. Elizabeth Ann Seaton Catholic Church in Hastings, Minn., from the spring of 1989 to the fall of 1991 when the boy was 9 to 12 years old.
Hoefgen, 63, currently lives in Columbia Heights, Minn.
DETAILS AT 2 PM
Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom and Hastings Police Chief Bryan Schafer are holding a 2 p.m. news conference to discuss the charges.
LAWSUIT: ‘THEY TURNED HIM LOOSE’
Last November, a Minnesota man filed a lawsuit against St. John’s Abbey, the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and the St. Luke Institute, alleging they should have known Hoefgen was a sexual predator
The lawsuit alleges the defendants should have known Hoefgen was a danger to children because he sexually abused another boy at the St. Boniface Church in Cold Spring, Minn. in 1983.
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