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	Lawyer Advises Victims to Confront Priests By Rob Olmstead Daily Herald [Chicago IL] May 30, 2007 http://www.dailyherald.com/news/cookstory.asp?id=317818&cc=c&tc=&t= Lawyers go where the money is. That's why lawsuits against pedophile priests often end once the church settles. The only remaining defendant is the priest himself. Since many pedophile priests took a vow of poverty to begin with, or were defrocked and are just scraping by as it is, there's no more money to be gained for a client or attorney. But while announcing a new round of settlements Tuesday, attorney Jeff Anderson, who has pressed such suits for years against the Catholic Church, said he's changing his tack. Many abuse victims, Anderson said, find it helpful to have a priest admit the abuse or to at least confront the abuser and have a jury acknowledge their claims of abuse. "It can help the survivor be validated in their experience," said Anderson. But there's also an additional benefit, Anderson said. "It means we can also warn the community (on the whereabouts of abusers)," he said. As part of that goal, Anderson vowed to help all past, present and future Chicago clients to track down the priests who abused them, using private investigators and public records, and to publicize their whereabouts on a pro bono basis as well as help those clients sue the priest individually if they so desire. He also released the current addresses of five former priests accused of sexual abuse and said he will post them on his Web site, andersonadvocates.com. Joe Iacono was 11 when a priest abused him in Northbrook. The priest is dead now, and Iacono said he didn't confront the issue until 30 years after it happened. Had his abuser still been alive once he started trying to fix his life, Iacono said, he would have jumped at the chance to question to him. "I would have definitely pursued it," said Iacono, 56, of Springfield. "The greatest frustration I had was not being able to sit in front of him and ask him why he did what he did." Iacono doubts it would have done much to change his abuser. "But it's an ability to get your power back," he said. Peggy Hough, 53, of Evanston said she, too, wanted to talk to her abuser, but he died before she could do that. Hough said she wouldn't have pursued a confrontation in court, but wishes she at least could have talked to her abuser. "I would have liked an opportunity to talk to him to try to understand, to try and figure out what was going on in his world … kind of how he was able to make this OK in his mind," she said. Anderson said he doesn't fear that an abuse victim will take things into his own hands once he knows where his abuser lives. A more likely scenario, said Anderson, is that a victim who feels he has no way to process his experience may act self-destructively. "There are victims out there ready to implode," Anderson said.
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