Lawsuit Alleging Sexual Abuse by Former Falmouth Pastor Settled

By Wheeler Cowperthwaite
Cape Cod Times
January 25, 2019

https://www.capecodtimes.com/news/20190123/lawsuit-alleging-sexual-abuse-by-former-falmouth-pastor-settled

Two men who filed a lawsuit alleging they were sexually abused for years by a priest in St. Anthony’s Parish have each received $200,000 settlements.

Their attorney, Mitchell Garabedian, announced the October settlements Tuesday as the Archdiocese of Hartford released the names of 48 priests found to have been credibly accused of sexual abuse. Garabedian said the list was a “small step in the direction of healing for clergy sexual abuse survivors,” but said the archdiocese should also release “the names of those who participated in the cover-up.”

The link between the Falmouth case and the Hartford archdiocese is the Most Rev. Daniel Cronin, who served as bishop of the Fall River Diocese, which includes the Cape and Islands, from 1970 until 1991 and then became archbishop in Hartford, Connecticut, until his retirement in 2003. Cronin was named as defendant in the lawsuit because he supervised Monsignor Maurice Souza, who was assigned to St. Anthony’s from 1977 to 1986, and the suit said he “knew or should have known” about the abuse.

“Agents” who worked for Cronin and were supervised by him knew the boys spent the night at the rectory with Souza and went on overnight, out-of-state trips with him, the suit said.

Souza died in 1996 at age 83.