ALASKA
Fairbanks News-Miner
By MARY BETH SMETZER
Staff Writer
Another Jesuit priest who served in the Fairbanks Catholic diocese 25 years ago has been named in a civil lawsuit, which claims he sexually abused a minor on the campus of St. Mary's Boarding School in Western Alaska.
The complaint alleges that the Rev. James Laudwein molested a 14-year-old Yupik Eskimo girl, listed as "Jana Doe," while she was visiting the boarding school campus in 1980.
According to the lawsuit, the teenager asked to go to confession, and Laudwein took her to a darkened room and told her "her sins would be forgiven" if she did what he asked.
At the time, Laudwein was administrator of the Catholic mission boarding school, which closed in 1987.
Today, Laudwein, 75, is semi-retired and working part-time with the poor doing social services in Portland, Ore., said the Rev. John Whitney, provincial of the Society of Jesus, Oregon Province.