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	One-Time Foxboro Priest Center of Suit Two People Claiming He Was Their Father By Jim Hand Sun Chronicle May 30, 2009 http://www.thesunchronicle.com/articles/2009/05/30/news/5037991.txt FOXBORO - A religious order in Baltimore is being sued for $10 million by two people who charge the order bears responsibility for a Catholic priest originally from Foxboro who they contend is their biological father. Carla Latty of New Jersey and Adrian Senna of British Columbia, Canada, contend that DNA tests from a relative proves the late Rev. Francis Ryan got their mother pregnant and never took responsibility for them. Ryan is originally from Foxboro, according to Carmen Durso, an attorney for the plaintiffs. Durso said the order, St. Joseph's Society of the Sacred Heart, also bears responsibility because it did nothing to stop Ryan's behavior. "We believe the order knew what was going on or didn't want to know," Durso said. He said churches at that time typically transfered priests engaged in inappropriate conduct rather than discipling them. "There was no effort by the Church to reign him in," Durso said. A priest having sex with a lay person should not be considered the actions of two consenting adults because the priest is in a position of authority, he said. There is also a racial element, in that the mother was an African-American woman living in Alabama and Ryan was white, he said. African-Americans living in Alabama in 1950 were reluctant to take complaints to authorities, he said. The suit has been filed in Baltimore, where the order has its headquarters. The attorney said Ryan never helped the children he fathered and they should be compensated by the order. Durso said Latty, who was adopted as a child, searched for years to find out who her parents were. When she found out about Ryan, she tracked down two relatives in Massachusetts. One would not cooperate. The other gave a DNA sample, which Durso said proves Ryan was the father. The attorney said Latty was lucky in that she was adopted and raised by a good family. She is now a labor attorney in New York. Senna, however, was put in a tough orphanage and had a very difficult childhood, Durso said. Senna "pulled himself up by the bootstraps" and is now a successful educator and actor in Canada, he said.
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