Diocese facing 3 new lawsuits

TheRoman Catholic Diocese of Stockton has drawn three new lawsuitsaccusing a deceased priest and an already convicted child molesterdeported to Ireland of sexually abusing former students at a Lodiparochial school.

The civil lawsuits, filedin San Joaquin County Superior Court, come five years after charges ofsexual abuse by clergy surged across the country. An attorney and avictims' advocate said the suits show that clergy abuse continues toresonate today.

One suit alleges the StocktonDiocese failed to prevent the Rev. Murty Fahy from molesting a girl forthree years beginning in the second grade at St. Ann's ElementarySchool in Lodi. Fahy died five years ago.

Twoother suits claim defrocked priest Oliver O'Grady abused a boy and agirl who were students at the Lodi school, which is operated by theDiocese of Stockton.

All three plaintiffs,each identified in court papers as a "Doe" to protect their identitiesand prevent them from embarrassment, are now adults, and each seeksundisclosed amounts of money in the suits filed separately last month.

JohnManly, a Newport Beach attorney who has won million-dollar settlementsin clergy abuse cases since 1997 and represents the three plaintiffs,said the public's shock has waned since media reports in 2002 firstdetailed a systemic problem in the church.

Still, the church has failed to change its policy requiring priests' celibacy, Manly said.

"Thisis not going away," said Manly of the policy he blamed for creatingsexual predators. "That's a screwed-up view of the world."

SisterTerry Davis, a spokeswoman for the Stockton Diocese, would not talkspecifically about allegations because of the pending lawsuits.

"We'velearned about these lawsuits," she said. "I think it's important forpeople to know the diocese is in the process of conducting its owninvestigation into the allegations."

Therecently filed court papers detail allegations of abuse over periods ofyears. The physical and mental abuse has left deep scars that preventvictims from maintaining adult relationships, among other emotionalproblems, court papers read.

In one suit, a21-year-old woman accused Fahy, who remained a priest until 2002, ofmolesting her inside the church's confessional and other locations atthe school. The woman said she was abused from the ages of 5 to 11, thesuit said.

A 42-year-old man who filed one ofthe lawsuits involving O'Grady said in court papers that for years hehad repressed dark memories of the abuse suffered from the ages of 8 to11.

Mental images came back to life in June2005, when O'Grady sent a letter to him and other victims seeking aface-to-face meeting where he could apologize, the suit said.

Theman now is having "confusion with his sexual orientation, includingnightmares of being with men and having major problems with intimacy,"the suit said, adding that emotional problems have kept him from stableemployment.

A 32-year-old woman who recently filed the third lawsuit named O'Grady.

Beforethese most recent lawsuits, O'Grady garnered attention as a convictedchild molester, even becoming the subject of the award winningdocumentary film "Deliver Us from Evil." Convicted in 1993 of molestingtwo boys, he spent seven years in Ione's Mule Creek State Prison.

Hewas deported to his native Ireland in 2000 and made the news again inOctober with reports that he disappeared, possibly moving to Canada. Ashopkeeper in Dublin, Ireland, recently reported chasing away O'Grady,who was trying to buy construction paper.

Manlysaid he believes O'Grady will remain a threat to any community in whichhe lives until he either dies or is again locked up. More childrencould fall victim to the former priest, Manly said.

"O'Grady is like a shark eating fish," Manly said. "He continues to consume children."

Theselawsuits are three of some 2,000 cases pending against clergy in theUnited States, said David Clohessy, executive director for theSurvivors Network of those Abused by Priests. Most of the lawsuits arein California courts, he said.

Isolated casesof priest abuse have dated back several years, but Clohessy saidnational attention to it peaked five years ago this month, when mediareports started to identify it as a systemic problem among Catholicclergy.

Clohessy said the Survivors Networkof those Abused by Priests today hears from people almost on a dailybasis reporting for the first time that they were abused. More of themare in their late teens and 20s, he said.

"There always have been and always will be molesters in the ministry," he said. "I try not to be so pessimistic."

Contact reporter Scott Smith at (209) 546-8296 or ssmith@recordnet.com.