Andrew Nicastro Testifies That Sexual Abuse by Former Priest Alfred Graves Made Him Angry, Emotionally Distant
By Buffy Spencer
SPRINGFIELD – Andrew Nicastro said it wasn't until 2008 that he realized continuing sexual assaults by former priest Alfred Graves more than two decades before in Williamstown had led him to become a person ruled by angry outbursts and unable to connect emotionally even with his own family. He said The Rev. Mark Burke, a priest who became a friend of his, in 2008 helped him to see the role the sexual abuse had played in making him who he was. "I felt like, 'I get it,'" Nicastro said. Nicastro was on the witness stand Wednesday in Hampden Superior Court in his civil suit against two former bishops. He contends they should be held accountable for his several years of childhood abuse by the Rev. Andrew Graves because they were in supervisory positions in the Roman Catholic Diocese and knew Graves had assaulted two other boys before Nicastro. Lawyers for the Most Rev. Joseph F. Maguire and the Most Rev. Thomas L. Dupre had unsuccessfully tried to have the case dismissed on the grounds the statute of limitations had expired by the time the suit was filed. But the defense lawyers said in opening statements they will argue at trial the statue of limitations had run out. John J. Stobierski, Nicastro's lawyer, contends Nicastro could file suit – the way the law is written – because he didn't understand the way the abuse had affected him until 2008. The defense will cross examine Nicastro Thursday. A man who now lives in New York took the stand Wednesday and said Graves had inappropriately touched him when he was a boy. He said he met with Maguire in 1976, along with a friend of his who was also abused by Graves. The other boy's father was at the meeting, he said. The man who testified Wednesday said Maguire said, "I'm sure it was just horseplay." John Egan, Maguire's lawyer, said in his opening Maguire will testify he confronted Graves and Graves admitted the behavior toward the other boy, and said he wouldn't do it again. Maguire will say the man who testified Wednesday was never at that meeting, Egan said. The statute of limitations question seemed paramount in court Wednesday. Because of witness schedules, some people were questioned out of order. The defense called the Rev. William Cyr, a priest at St. Elizabeth of Hungary Parish in North Adams. Cyr said Nicastro told him around 2005 that in the past "something untoward had happened" with Graves. When Nicastro was on the stand, he said he never met with Cyr nor told him anything about Graves. The defense also called to the stand Kevin Murphy, a retired State Police officer who was hired by the Diocese of Springfield in 2004 to help investigate allegations of abuse by priests. He testified Nicastro told him he told his mother about the abuse in 1995. Nicastro said he did not tell his mother he was abused by Graves. He said she was asking why he wouldn't go to church, she asked was he touched by a priest, and he pointed a finger at her and said, "You got it" and left, with no more discussion of the matter ever. Murphy said during the investigation he told Nicastro that Graves had admitted to him he abused Nicastro. Maguire, bishop emeritus of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield, and Dupre, who resigned suddenly as bishop in 2004 amidst allegations he had molested altar boys in the 1970s, were named in 2009 as defendants in Nicastro's suit.
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