MIDLAND (TX)
San Angelo Standard-Times
By PAUL A. ANTHONY, panthony@sastandardtimes.com or 659-8237
January 22, 2006
The woman's son was 11 when he told her he no longer wanted to go to confession.
The priest at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in Midland had tried to kiss him on the lips the week before, the boy told his mother. He is identified in the lawsuit as Domingo Estrada.
The woman talked to priests at two other churches, who said they would ''take care of it.'' When she didn't hear back from them, she said, she called back, and one priest told her the priest had said he wouldn't do it again.
''I still was not satisfied with that,'' the woman told prosecutors in 2002 during testimony before a Midland County grand jury. ''I talked to an attorney, and I asked him, I said, 'What do you think I should do?' And he said, 'Well, we can write a letter to the bishop.' ... And we did send a letter to the bishop.''
A transcript of the testimony, attached to documents filed in a Midland County state district court last month, is a key point in one of two lawsuits pending against the Catholic Diocese of San Angelo and its bishop, Michael D. Pfeifer, that allege sexual abuse at the hands of diocesan priests.