Priest Who Admitted Groping Boy Appointed to High-Profile Position in Newark Archdiocese
By Mark Mueller
A Roman Catholic priest who confessed to groping a teenage boy 12 years ago has been named to a prestigious post in the Archdiocese of Newark, drawing furious criticism from advocates for victims of clergy sex abuse. The Rev. Michael Fugee, who is barred from unsupervised contact with children under a binding agreement with law enforcement officials, has been appointed co-director of the Office of Continuing Education and Ongoing Formation of Priests, the archdiocese recently announced in its newspaper, the Catholic Advocate. For several years, Fugee also has been director of the Office of the Propagation of the Faith, a fundraising position to support missionary work. The new appointment, effective late last year, shows “breathtaking arrogance” and “an alarming disdain for common sense” by Archbishop John J. Myers, said Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of BishopAccountability.org, a watchdog group that tracks abuse allegations against priests across the nation. “On the scale of actions by Catholic officials in the last 10 years, it’s somewhere between alarming and outrageous,” Barrett Doyle said. “No reasonable person would give a prestigious assignment to a priest deemed by law enforcement to be a danger to children. I hope Newark Catholics call him to account.” Jim Goodness, a spokesman for the archdiocese, called Fugee's new role an administrative position based in the chancery office in Newark. Under no circumstances, Goodness said, will Fugee be alone with children. "We have every confidence in him," the spokesman said. Fugee, 52, was serving as assistant pastor at the Church of St. Elizabeth in Wyckoff when authorities charged him in 2001 with aggravated criminal sexual contact and endangering the welfare of a child. He allegedly grabbed the crotch of a 14-year-old boy while wrestling with him at the teen’s home and on a vacation in Williamsburg, Va. Under questioning by detectives from the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office and Wyckoff police, Fugee admitted touching the teen, saying he did it intentionally, that it sexually excited him and that he knew it was a “violation,” according to a transcript of his statement. He later recanted, claiming he lied so he could go home earlier. In 2003, a jury in Bergen County convicted him of the sexual contact count but acquitted him of the endangering charge. Sentenced to five years’ probation, Fugee appealed. Three years later, an appellate panel overturned the verdict on the grounds that the trial judge gave improper instructions to jurors. The decision was based, in part, on the judge’s decision to let the jury hear the portion of Fugee’s statement in which he described himself as bisexual or homosexual. The appellate court said the admission could have led jurors to find Fugee guilty because of the “unfounded association between homosexuality and pedophilia.” The rest of the confession was not called into question. Rather than retry Fugee, the prosecutor’s office allowed him to enter pre-trial intervention, a rehabilitation program for first offenders. At the same time, the prosecutor’s office secured an agreement that Fugee undergo counseling for sex offenders and have no unsupervised contact with children as long as he is a priest. Fugee and Myers declined to comment for this story. Goodness, the spokesman, characterized Fugee as a victim in the case, saying the priest had been through a “terrible ordeal.” “The whole situation that caused this ordeal was not pleasant for anybody,” Goodness said. “However, at the end of it and the whole legal process he went through, he was determined by the courts to be unfairly judged in the trial. As a result, that should not penalize a priest from returning to a ministry.” Fugee's new role is an influential one, with a responsibility for shaping the education and so-called formation of priests in the archdiocese. That includes researching programs and workshops in New Jersey and elsewhere and alerting priests to them, Goodness said. Fugee is not likely to engage in one-on-one counseling with priests, the spokesman said. “That doesn’t appear to be part of what his responsibilities are,” Goodness said. Fugee continues to celebrate Mass daily at parishes across the archdiocese — which includes Bergen, Hudson, Essex and Union counties — but Goodness declined to identify specific churches. While children are certainly present in such situations, Fugee will not be alone with them, Goodness said. “He’s on the altar, and families go home after Mass,” the spokesman said. In a brief interview with The Star-Ledger, Fugee’s alleged victim, now 26, called the priest’s elevation to a second high-profile post “outrageous.” “Does it come as any surprise to me? No, not really, just seeing how everything has been swept under the rug in the past or at least ignored enough to get these promotions,” said the man, whose name has been withheld by the newspaper because he is an alleged victim of sexual abuse. “It doesn't surprise me remotely.” The man, who still resides in Bergen County, added that while the alleged incident took place more than a decade ago, “this will be part of my life for the rest of my life.” Other critics of the move contend it demonstrates a pattern of questionable decisions by Myers involving Fugee and other priests. In 2009, for example, Myers installed Fugee as a chaplain at St. Michael’s Medical Center in Newark without informing the hospital of his involvement in the criminal trial. A card Fugee carried identified him as a priest “in good standing.” After The Star-Ledger alerted hospital officials to Fugee’s background, they requested his immediate removal, and Fugee was recalled from the post, which gave him unrestricted access to patients and visitors of all ages. Mark Crawford, New Jersey director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, a national advocacy and support group, said Myers’ insistence on allowing Fugee to remain in ministry runs counter to the “one strike and you’re out” rule the nation’s bishops pledged to uphold at the height of the clergy sex abuse crisis in 2002. “It is unconscionable that a priest who admitted to touching a young boy — but who later got off on a technicality — is deemed to be fit for ministry,” Crawford said. “He still gets to wear his collar. He will at some point have access to children regardless of where he is assigned.”
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