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	Indiana Clergy Pleaded with Diocese to Hire Accused Priest By Sam Hemingway Burlington Free Press May 7, 2008 http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080507/NEWS/80507022 A bishop for the Indiana Roman Catholic diocese where the Rev. Edward Paquette was in trouble for molesting boys in 1972 pleaded with the bishop of Vermont's diocese to give Paquette a job, according to an internal church document. "I begged Bishop (John) Marshall to give Father Paquette a chance," said a portion of the April 27, 1972, note written by Bishop Leo Pursley of the Fort Wayne, Ind., diocese. Marshall was then bishop of the Vermont diocese. Pursley's remark was contained in a previously confidential Indiana church document that lawyers for the Vermont diocese Wednesday displayed to a Chittenden County Superior Court jury hearing evidence in a case of a former Burlington altar boy who alleges Paquette molested him in 1978. The former altar boy contends Paquette groped him between 40 and 100 times in the sacristy at Christ the King Church in Burlington in the late 1970s. The sacristy was a room located next to the altar at the church. The alleged victim, now 40 and a resident of Lakewood, Colo., has sued the diocese contending it failed to properly supervise Paquette, resulting in his abuse. The Burlington Free Press does not disclose the identities of alleged victims of sexual crimes without their consent. Diocesan lawyers have argued that the church made personnel decisions based on the best information it had at the time and should not be held liable now for incidents that occurred 30 or more years ago. Paquette is not a defendant in the case. During testimony at the trial Tuesday, a lawyer for the Colorado man showed the jury newly obtained Indiana diocese documents that provided details about misconduct by Paquette going back to 1963. One document described how Paquette was once picked up by police in Massachusetts after being found in a parked car with a teenage boy. The lawyer, Jerome O'Neill, said the discovery of the documents showed that the Vermont diocese failed to do an adequate background check on Paquette before hiring him. The diocese's lawyer has claimed the Indiana diocese didn't provide Vermont everything it could have about Paquette.
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