By Rick Coca
LA Daily News
December 5, 2007
http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_7646043
Cardinal Roger Mahony told police Wednesday he was shoved to the ground and kicked by an angry man in a July attack but said he would not file a police report.
Mahony told Los Angeles Police Department Lt. Paul Vernon by phone that he was dressed casually in a sports shirt as he walked toward a mailbox near Our Lady of the Angels Cathedral at dusk last summer.
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| Cardinal Roger Mahony waves to those in the Guadalupe Procession as they enter East Los Angeles College Stadium for Mass Sunday, December 2, 2007. Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz |
"A man approached him and said: 'You're the cardinal, aren't you?"' Vernon said Mahony told him. "The man shouted at him. It happened very quickly and the man just went off on him - shoved him, knocked him to the ground and kicked him a couple of times."
Mahony said that since he takes blood thinners, he bruises easily, but he didn't feel the need to visit a hospital.
"In these types of confrontations that he's had over the years across the state ..., he prefers to not involve the police," Vernon said. He added Mahony said he would call police if a Mass were disrupted.
"'Lieutenant, to be honest with you, I don't even remember what the man looked like,"' Vernon said Mahony told him.
The Daily News reported Tuesday that Mahony revealed details of the attack to hundreds of priests at an October meeting while speaking about the church's sexual abuse scandal, which resulted in a record $660 million settlement with hundreds of victims.
Vernon said the LAPD would not investigate further.
"I counseled him that if he ever thought he was the victim of an ongoing campaign against him ... that he call the police," Vernon said. "That would be a much different circumstance."
Contact: rick.coca@dailynews.com 818-713-3329.
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