By Tom Heinen
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
June 6, 2008
http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=759462
Milwaukee Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan's recent announcement that all 211 parishes in the 10-county Catholic archdiocese must undergo professional financial audits to ensure sound stewardship was based not just on national trends but also on local history.
The Catholic Mutual Group, which insures the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, paid $1,017,000 in parish embezzlement claims from 1997 through early 2008, according to the archdiocesan Parish and School Financial Services Office.
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| Milwaukee Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan |
"Since 1997, Catholic Mutual or the archdiocesan parish finance office or both have been involved in the review of 19 parishes with suspected financial theft or mismanagement by employees," said Katie Hoeller, director of the office. "Although authorities were called in on many of them, most were either not pursued by the parish; restitution was made and the case was dropped; or the police determined that there was insufficient information to proceed."
Hoeller said she could not release the names of the affected parishes without their knowledge and without a full understanding of what agreements may have been made with all parties involved in a settlement.
She said parishes are strongly encouraged to report all theft to civil authorities, but it is at the pastor's discretion. Catholic Mutual will handle a claim only if a police report is on file, she said.
"The church has the same right as any victim to decide whether to report the incident to law enforcement," said Assistant District Attorney David Feiss, director of the Public Integrity Unit in the Milwaukee County district attorney's office. "Many large embezzlements occur in the corporate world that are not reported. No prosecution can take place without the cooperation of the victim."
When large sums of money are embezzled, it often turns out that the suspect had some sort of addiction, such as drugs, gambling or sex, said Chuck Zech, director of the Center for the Study of Church Management at Villanova University.
It's human nature to be too trusting of clergy and lay employees or volunteers in church settings, Zech added. That's especially worrisome in small parishes with small staffs, where the same person might count donations, make deposits, write checks and balance the checkbook.
Not just a Catholic problem
Zech also said such thefts happen across all denominations and are not just a Catholic problem. Earlier this year, a Saukville man was sentenced for embezzling money from a Lutheran church in Jackson, where he served as business manager.
The issue of church embezzlement arose last month when the replacement pastor at St. John Vianney Church in Brookfield, one of the area's largest parishes, alerted parishioners in a letter that a preliminary review by parish leaders had raised "grave concerns" about the possibility that cash donated during weekly services over an extended period could be missing.
That internal inquiry was begun shortly after then-pastor Father Leonard Van Vlaenderen was arrested and charged with possession of cocaine, a misdemeanor. The parish has hired outside professional auditors, while cautioning members not to jump to conclusions regarding who might have taken funds if any are found to be missing.
Most recent incidents have involved actual or suspected thefts of less than $10,000, Hoeller said, but there have been large ones in the past.
The largest and best-known local case involved a bookkeeper who stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from Gesu Church in downtown Milwaukee from about 1999 to 2003 and gambled the money away at the nearby Potawatomi Bingo Casino. The woman, Rebecca Piekarski, now 42, was sentenced to four years in prison in June 2004 and was ordered to pay $518,000 in restitution to Gesu, which calculated the total loss at more than $800,000.
The most recent example surfaced last month when Jill Fink, 54, an employee of St. Matthias Parish, 9306 W. Beloit Road, was charged in Milwaukee County with theft on accusations of taking $2,500 to $5,000 in Mass collections from a locked chute in a locked counting room in 2007 and 2008.
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