October 27, 2005

Ex-priest abused many, lawyer says

INDIANAPOLIS (IN)
The Courier-Journal

By Ken Kusmer
Associated Press

INDIANAPOLIS -- An attorney for four men who have sued the Catholic Archdiocese of Indianapolis alleged yesterday that it repeatedly transferred a sexually abusive priest to increasingly rural parishes as accounts of him molesting boys mounted.

Attorney Patrick Noaker said the Rev. Harry E. Monroe abused at least a dozen boys in Indianapolis, Terre Haute and Perry County before the late Archbishop Edward O'Meara removed him from ministry in 1984.

Noaker filed two new lawsuits Tuesday accusing Monroe of sexually abusing two altar boys while he was at the now-closed St. Catherine parish on the south side of Indianapolis in 1977 and 1978.

The complaints also named the archdiocese as a defendant and accused it of negligence, fraud and other charges for hiding Monroe's history from a previous posting at St. Andrew parish on the city's northeast side.

"What's tragic about this is they could have prevented this," Noaker said of church leaders, none of whom are named in the lawsuits.

Posted by kshaw at October 27, 2005 08:29 AM