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	Diocese's Deal Precluded Appeal in Sex Case By Ann Givens The Newsday [Long Island] June 1, 2007 http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/ny-lichur0602,0,2173218.story?coll=ny-top-headlines There's a reason the Diocese of Rockville Centre decided not to appeal the first verdict ever against it in a sex abuse case: It couldn't. On the day last month when the $11.45 million verdict was announced, a diocese spokesman said the church would consider an appeal. Then, the following day, he said the church had decided to let the verdict stand, as a gesture toward healing and moving forward. But that decision had been made long before the jury foreman ever announced the verdict. Sometime during the trial, the plaintiffs had made a deal with the diocese limiting the amount the church would pay to $5 million on the condition that the diocese would not challenge it, sources close to the case said. The "high-low" agreement — not an uncommon kind of deal in civil cases — also provided an insurance policy of sorts for the plaintiffs. Even if the jury decided not to award them any money, they still would get $1.5 million, a source close to the case said. The deal was confidential, and plaintiffs' lawyer Michael Dowd and Sean Dolan, the diocese spokesman, would not confirm or deny that it happened. But Lawrence Carra of Mineola, the lawyer for the youth minister convicted of raping the two plaintiffs during several years at St. Raphael's Church in East Meadow when they were teenagers, confirmed there was a deal that held the diocese responsible for only $5 million. Carra said his client, Matthew Maiello, will be liable for the remaining $6.45 million, and could pay 10 percent of his future earnings to the plaintiffs. In an open letter posted on the diocese's Web site shortly after the verdict, Bishop William Murphy acknowledged that the diocese would not pay more than $5 million in the judgement — a fact that Dolan would not explain. The case was filed by two of the four people who Maiello admitted raping. Maiello, 33, served more than 2 years in prison for his crimes. Newsday is not naming the plaintiffs in the case because they are victims of sex crimes. The jury found that Maiello was 70 percent liable for what happened and the church, priest and diocese together were 30 percent liable. But because the jury found that church officials acted with reckless disregard for the safety of others, the plaintiffs could have collected the entire $11.45 million from the church without the high-low agreement. As much of a surprise as the agreement is to many following the case — including the jurors who believed they were deciding its outcome — high-low agreements are hardly a rare thing in civil courts, experts said. As jury awards have become more and more unpredictable in recent years, lawyers have increasingly been hedging their bets by entering into pre-verdict deals that limit how much the plaintiffs will get if they win, but guarantee them something if they lose. In some cases, plaintiffs give up shockingly high awards in exchange for the certainty a high-low agreement can offer. For example, in 2004 a $111.7 million medical malpractice verdict in Suffolk was reduced to $6 million, the amount that had been stipulated in the high-low agreement, according to news reports. The way that each deal is done varies, experts said. Sometimes even the judge doesn't know about them, although other times they are discussed openly in court, though never in front of the jury, said Jim Cohen, a professor at Fordham Law School in Manhattan. It is not clear whether Justice R. Bruce Cozzens knew about the agreement in the diocese case. The deals are legally binding as contracts between the two parties and have been upheld by the New York State Court of Appeals, said Rodger Citron, a civil procedures professor at Touro Law Center in Central Islip. In general, judges like the agreements, which cut down on post-trial motions and appeals, since usually the parties have agreed to live within the parameters of the agreement, Cohen said. The people most likely to object to the deals are the ones least likely to know about them — the jurors. Juror Doreen Aragona of Williston Park said she was stunned to hear that the complicated formula that the jury labored over for eight days — outlining how much money each plaintiff would get during what period of time, is moot. A source close to the case said the two plaintiffs will get $2.5 million each from the diocese. "They should have just settled this in the first place," Aragona said. But she added that she was not entirely disappointed to hear that the plaintiffs will get less from the diocese, since she said she now regrets awarding so much money. Citron said the jury's role still is important, whether there's a high-low deal or not. "The jury hasn't been necessarily invalidated," he said. "They have issued a verdict and that verdict has been publicized. It's just that the amount has been reduced." Contact: ann.givens@newsday.com
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