Vt. Diocese's Lawyer Caused Mistrial in Last Airing of Lawsuit
By Kevin O'Connor
Rutland Herald
November 25, 2007
http://www.rutlandherald.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071125/NEWS04/711250396/1024/NEWS04
Before last summer's mistrial, it was billed as the first recent priest misconduct case to reach a Vermont jury. Now, a retrial this week is about to bring a replay.
Literally.
Lawyers for a man accusing Vermont's Catholic Church of child sexual abuse say they'll show testimony recorded at the original trial rather than call several witnesses back to speak before a new judge and jury.
James Turner, a 47-year-old Northeast Kingdom native, alleges in a lawsuit that the former Rev. Alfred Willis — a priest in Burlington, Montpelier and Milton before being defrocked in 1985 — performed oral sex on him when he was 16 and staying at a Latham, N.Y., hotel in 1977.
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| James Turner gathers himself while testifying in his lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington on June 22. The trial ended in a mistrial after a church lawyer violated a pretrial ruling limiting questioning. The retrial is set to start Monday. |
To prove that, lawyer Jerome O'Neill questioned several people in Burlington's Chittenden Superior Court last June, including the Rev. Wendell Searles, former second-in-command of the statewide Roman Catholic Diocese. At one point, the 78-year-old priest found himself reciting personnel records so lurid that he asked to stop.
"I'm sorry," Searles said last summer. "I have to read this aloud? Do I have to?"
The judge apologized but said yes, only to have the lawyer voice the passage himself.
This time, Searles and several other witnesses from the first trial won't have to reappear in court. Instead, O'Neill is set to offer his opening statement in person on Monday and then present up to three days of recorded testimony before Turner takes the stand.
In the original trial, Turner, now living in Virginia Beach, Va., was testifying on the fourth day when a defense lawyer for the diocese asked him a question banned under a pretrial order. As a result, Judge Ben Joseph declared a mistrial and ordered the church to pay the plaintiff $112,450 in legal costs.
Fellow Superior Judge Matthew Katz is now presiding over the civil lawsuit, which a dozen new jurors will hear in a retrial expected to last five to seven days.
Turner says Willis not only performed oral sex on him at the Latham, N.Y., Holiday Inn in 1977 but also tried to molest him at the teenager's home in Derby later that year.
Turner charges that the diocese knew Willis was sexually active as early as seminary "but took no action to remove him from the priesthood or to investigate his proclivities" until after abuse had taken place, court papers say.
Turner is one of more than 30 recent accusers to take Vermont's Catholic Church to court. At least six previous accusers resolved similar civil lawsuits against the diocese by accepting a total of more than $1.5 million in settlement money before their cases went to trial.
Lawyers for Turner and the diocese have tried but failed to negotiate a settlement. (Last June, Turner's lawyers asked the jury for more than $1 million.) As a result, he's the first to tell his story on the witness stand.
Willis, now 63 and living in Leesburg, Va., has denied the accusations but has settled with Turner for an undisclosed "minimal amount," lawyers say.
Turner's lawsuit isn't the first against the diocese concerning Willis.
In 2004, the diocese settled another case involving the priest by paying $150,000 and admitting in a three-page statement that it knew Willis had a problematic history as early as seminary yet transferred him repeatedly without telling churchgoers of his past.
Two other men have filed court cases against Willis. In addition, Vermont's largest religious denomination faces two dozen other misconduct lawsuits against seven other retired or deceased priests.
Contact Kevin O'Connor at kevin.oconnor@rutlandherald.com.
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