ALBANY (NY)
Albany Times Union
By MICHELE MORGAN BOLTON, Staff writer
First published: Thursday, January 27, 2005
ALBANY -- A Boston judge has dropped the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany and its bishop from a $5 million clergy sex abuse lawsuit, noting in his Dec. 29 decision the client's lawyer missed a paperwork deadline.
On Wednesday, attorney John Aretakis disputed the ruling by Suffolk Superior Court Justice Christopher J. Muse and said he is confident the claim filed by Joe Woodward of Fort Ann will stand.
He said the Massachusetts judge's action isn't valid because a case can only be dismissed on its merits, not a technicality.
Woodward, 37, says he was sexually abused as a young teenager in the early 1980s by the former Rev. Dozia Wilson. The subject of a number of other complaints both here and in Boston, Wilson was removed from ministry in 1993.