MINNESOTA
KARE
A law dating back to World War II has been successfully use to sue the Catholic church for clergy abuse.
"It was the Soldiers and Sailors Relief Act, enacted during World War II," said attorney Jeff Anderson.
Anderson, a Saint Paul attorney who handles charges of sexual abuse at the hands of Catholic Priests, was announcing how he had helped a man sue the Catholic Church Religious Order, The Dominicans, for sexual abuse suffered by his client nearly 30 years ago.
"That case survived and was able to be brought to resolution largely," said attorney Anderson, "because that survivor has been in the military long enough where the statute of limitations did not prevent him from gaining a measure of justice."
The case, scheduled to go to trial March 20, was settled late the prior week when the Dominicans, who operate Saint Albert's The Great Catholic Church at in south Minneapolis, agreed to pay Jeff Anderson's client $450,000 plus past therapy costs.
The settlement came, according to attorney Anderson, because he had records that then priest Edmund Frost, minister at Saint Albert's in 1978, had given the then 13-year old alcohol and marijuana and forced him into oral sex and abused him several times.