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	Critic of Sex Abuse Panel Dies By Marc Parry Albany Times Union July 8, 2008 http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=701866 The Rev. Mark Jaufmann had sued Albany Catholic Diocese agency set up to help victims of clergy A California clergyman who sued the Albany Catholic Diocese's sex abuse mediation panel is dead, according to a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Police Department. The Rev. Mark Jaufmann's body was discovered March 21 in the city's Griffith Park. Other hikers evidently found the 51-year-old on a hiking trail. The cause of death was heart disease, said Ed Winter, assistant chief for operations/investigations with the Los Angeles County Department of Coroner. There was no sign of foul play or trauma, Winter said. Because the death appeared natural, there was "no need for a lengthy investigation," said LAPD spokeswoman Ana Aguirre. In November, Jaufmann celebrated a legal victory when a federal judge ruled that his lawsuit against the mediation panel could move forward. The lawsuit charged that the agency set up to help sex abuse victims is an agent for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany even though it claims to be independent. The Independent Mediation Assistance Program, or IMAP, was launched in 2004 with $5 million to help victims of clergy sex abuse. Two years later, Jaufmann went public at a news conference with claims that a parish priest in Hudson molested him several times starting when he was 9. An investigator working for the diocese later cleared the priest, although an advocate for abuse victims questioned the independence of the probe. Jaufmann was pastor at the Ecumenical Catholic Community of St. Paul and St. Andrew in South Glendale and chaplain at Glendale Memorial Hospital, according to a report in California's Glendale News Press. He lived in suburban Los Angeles.
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