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  Woman Says Limits Don't Apply to Priest Convicted of Killing Nun

The Associated Press, carried in Beacon Journal
July 19, 2006

http://www.ohio.com/mld/beaconjournal/news/state/15074332.htm

Toledo, Ohio - A woman who filed a lawsuit accusing a Roman Catholic priest - already convicted of killing a nun - of taking part in ritual abuse ceremonies said the suit should not be dismissed because the alleged abuse began nearly 40 years ago.

A motion filed in Lucas County Common Pleas Court said the time period for when she could file the lawsuit did not begin until she knew her abuser's identity.

The woman, who was not identified, said she did not know the Rev. Gerald Robinson's name until she saw him on television in 2004 after he was charged in the 1980 killing of Sister Margaret Ann Pahl.

Robinson, 68, was found guilty on May 11 of choking and stabbing Sister Pahl and sentenced to a mandatory term of 15 years to life in prison.

A year ago, a woman filed a lawsuit accusing Robinson and other clergy members of torturing and raping her as a young girl in a church basement. Police said they had not been able to link any ritual abuse to Robinson.

Attorneys for Robinson have denied the woman's claims.

Other defendants in the lawsuit include the Toledo Diocese and St. Adalbert Parish.

The diocese in June asked that the lawsuits be dismissed because she missed deadline for filing the lawsuit.

At the time the suit was filed, the statute of limitations was two years after an alleged victim turned 18. The Legislature has since extended the statute to 12 years after the victim turns 18.

The woman, in her filing, included pages of handwritten rhymes and drawings from journals that she said she began keeping in 1993 when she began to recall the alleged abuse.

The journals included drawings of men in robes and an upside-down cross. She also wrote "I promise I won't tell no one."

 
 

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