SPRINGFIELD (MA)
Republican
Tuesday, May 24, 2005
By BILL ZAJAC
wzajac@repub
SPRINGFIELD - One of Bishop Thomas L. Dupre's two alleged sexual abuse victims is supporting a call for the Vatican to defrock Dupre, to announce the results of its investigation of Dupre and to reveal the bishop's whereabouts.
Tuan Tran, a Vietnamese refugee who said Dupre began abusing him as a pre-teen, expressed support for the plan by the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests to hold a press conference today in Springfield calling for the Vatican to act on 15-month- old allegations against Dupre, who served in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield until his resignation in February 2004.
The 11 a.m. press conference in front of the Springfield Diocese's Chancellery is being held on the eve of CBS's 60 Minutes Wednesday's planned broadcast of a story about the 33-year-old unsolved murder of Springfield altar boy Daniel Croteau, defrocked priest Richard R. Lavigne - the only publicly identified suspect - and Dupre.
David Clohessy, executive director of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, said his organization's main concern is that children be protected from someone accused of sexual molestation.
Dupre's lawyer, Michael O. Jennings, and the diocese refused comment.
Posted by kshaw at May 24, 2005 07:34 AM