Fr. William Patrick Farrell

Order: OP
Ordained: 1965
Status: Accused

Died: 02/8/1989
Diocese: Archdiocese of Chicago IL

Taught high school in Chicago and in Dallas TX, assigned in 1971 to a parish in Edina MN. Accusations surfaced in 2017 that Farrell sexually abused a 16-year-old Chicago boy in 1970, when Farrell was a Fenwick High faculty member and the boy was a student. Farrell’s accuser wrote the Dominicans in 11/17 and received an apology. He said he knew of at least one other student who had been molested by Farrell. In 2016 a man alleged that Farrell molested him when he was a vulnerable 21 year-old. The man said he met Farrell via a Catholic charismatic organization in MN in the 1970s. When Farrell was assigned to a chaplaincy at Southwestern U. in LA in 1973, he asked the young man to help him move. His accuser said that during stops at hotels on two nights, Farrell awakened him, naked, wanting sex. Farrell died 2/8/89.


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