Ramsey County Asks St. Paul to Re-open Nienstedt and Wehrmeyer Cases

By Brian Lambert
MinnPost
March 27, 2014

http://www.minnpost.com/glean/2014/03/ramsey-county-asks-st-paul-re-open-nienstedt-and-wehrmeyer-cases

I hope someone is keeping a running diagram of which of these cases has been (a) Opened, (B) Closed, (C) Re-opened, or (D) Returned to limbo. Sasha Aslanian of MPR reports: “The Ramsey County Attorney's Office has asked the St. Paul Police Department to reopen two cases related to its investigation into the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. A St. Paul police spokesman confirmed the cases pertain to Archbishop John Nienstedt, and Curtis Wehmeyer, a St. Paul priest serving time in prison for child sexual abuse.”

And now the New Ulm Diocese is suing … a diocese in Ireland. Says Trisha Volpe of MPR: “The Diocese of New Ulm is suing another diocese and a religious order, accusing both of sending a priest to New Ulm in the early 1980s without telling the diocese that the priest had a long history of being accused of child sexual abuse. In a rare legal move, the diocese filed suit in February against the Diocese of Clogher in Ireland and a religious order known as the Servants of the Paraclete for sending the Rev. Francis Xavier Markey to Minnesota.”

Meanwhile, in the Strib, Jean Hopfensperger reports: “The Twin Cities archdiocese was granted more time to produce roughly 60,000 pages of documents related to its priests accused of child sexual abuse, under a ruling in Ramsey District Court Thursday. The archdiocese, facing a March 31 deadline for producing the files, argued that the scope of the work for the court required considerably more time.”

If the NIMBY strategy was to drive the price of the Southwest LRT up so high it’d die of sticker shock, it may be succeeding. Laura Yuen of MPR says: “The Southwest light rail line won't open until 2019 — or possibly 2021 — and costs will run significantly higher than initial estimates. … If the Met Council decides to build an LRT tunnel under a popular water channel in Minneapolis, it would push the project's start date to 2020.” MinnPost's Karen Boros has more here.

Corn prices are pretty much the whole story. In Tom Webb’s PiPress story, he writes: “Minnesota's farm income plunged in 2013 after breaking records the year before, due partly to much lower corn prices, a report out Thursday said. Net income last year was $41,899 for the median Minnesota farm studied, according to a report jointly issued by the University of Minnesota Extension and the Minnesota State College and Universities system. That's a 78 percent drop from the previous year, when Minnesota farm incomes shattered all records, with a median of nearly $190,000 among the 2,063 crop and livestock operations studied. … Minnesota officials said the net return for an acre of corn fell from $377 in 2012 to a negative $24 in 2013.”

Unemployment … up. Says Jennifer Bjorhus of the Strib: “Minnesota employers shed a net 100 jobs in February, pushing the jobless rate up a notch to 4.8 percent, according to state numbers out Thursday. Most of weakness was in the government sector which shed 1,000 jobs last month. Private employers added a net 900 jobs.”

Kathy Vos of the Mankato Free Press gets a column out of historical booze: “Central Minnesota may have a history immersed in illegal alcohol production, but residents statewide know the Sunday liquor sales issue is laughable if arguments against it are ever based on concerns of too much liquor accessibility. Adults can drink at bars and restaurants all day long on Sundays if they want. Most arguments against Sunday liquor are coming from the liquor store operators who don't want to open on Sundays and don't want their competitors to either.”

So what’s up in Mower and Freeborn counties? Brett Boese of the Rochester Post-Bulletin reports that the southeast corner of the state is otherwise a pretty healthy place to live: “Not surprisingly, Olmsted County — home of the Mayo Clinic — is rated tops among Minnesota's 87 counties in ‘health factors,’ one of two lists in the [County Health Report released Wednesday by the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute]. Eight of 10 local counties fall within the state's top 30 on the health factors list. Wabasha and Houston counties were listed at No. 6 and No. 9, respectively. Mower and Freeborn counties are outliers, ranking No. 70 and No. 76.”

Uh, copy desk to Sid … Aaron Rupar of City Pages writes: “Today's Sid Hartman column contains a big scoop about a new, $70 million practice facility for Jerry Kill's football team. The only problem is it's totally inaccurate, at least according to one high ranking University of Minnesota official. Citing unnamed sources, Hartman, 94, reports that ground will be broken on the football facility this December. But Chris Werle, senior associate athletic director, says, ‘That story is wrong. There's no groundbreaking date yet’. Not only that, but Werle has no idea where Sid got his $70 million figure.” 1500ESPN Sportswire quotes Lou Nanne, chairman of the fundraising project, denying the report, too. But other than that …