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	St. Paul Lawyer Takes on Vatican A Federal Court Raises the Possibility of the Vatican Being Sued for Priests' Sexual Abuses. the Pope Is Not Named As a Defendant By Jeff Strickler Star Tribune March 4, 2009 http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/faith/40757237.html?elr=KArks7PYDiaK7DUvckD_V_jEyhD:UiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU A federal Appeals Court says the Vatican can be sued for sexual abuse if it knowingly reassigns priests who have been accused of such acts in their previous parishes. "This decision kicks the door open for the survivors of these sexual predators to seek some measure of justice and to hold the Vatican responsible for its role in allowing these priests to continue their pattern of abuse," said Jeff Anderson, the St. Paul attorney who filed the suit. The decision, announced Wednesday morning, was issued late Tuesday by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Oregon. It upholds a ruling made by a Portland trial court. Anderson, an expert in priest abuse cases, filed the suit in Oregon because that's where the alleged abuse took place. The Roman Catholic Church has 90 days to appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court. "The next move is up to the Vatican," said Marci Hamilton, a professor at the Cardoza School of Law in New York City and a constitutional scholar whom Anderson brought on to help with the appeal. "We're either going to the Supreme Court or back to the trial court. Either way, we're ready." Whatever happens, Anderson expects it to happen quickly. "The Holy See filed an appeal [of the trial court decision] within 24 hours," he said. The suit was filed in 2002 for an unnamed 49-year-old man who alleges he was sexually abused as a teenager by the Rev. Andrew Ronan. Ronan died in 1969. After uncovering evidence that Ronan had been reassigned after being accused of similar abuses in parishes in Chicago and Ireland, Anderson argued that the topmost level of the church should be held liable for damages because it is a hierarchy in which decisions flow down from the Vatican. "The Vatican should be held responsible for the misdeeds of its employees," he said. "The church knew that he was an offender and had a proclivity to harm again, but his superiors chose not to stop him."
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