Former Archdiocesan Deputy Reveals Reluctance to Talk to Investigators
By Richard Chin
A former top official in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis -- described by lawyers suing the church as the person who knows the most about child sex abuse allegations in the archdiocese -- has avoided talking to police and his church's own child abuse investigation panel, according to sworn testimony released Thursday. In a deposition of the Rev. Kevin McDonough, former vicar general, McDonough said he regretted deeply that the church previously had "an outdated and now clearly dangerous assumption" that child-abusing priests could be rehabilitated, and he regretted how some older cases of alleged abuse were handled. "But I think this diocese was a real leader and worked very hard to -- to protect children," said McDonough, in a transcript of the April 16 deposition. "I feel good about the work that we were doing already by the early 1990s," McDonough said. But lawyers for an alleged abuse victim suing the church said McDonough's 6 1/2 hours of testimony showed a pattern similar to one employed by accused abusers themselves -- denying and minimizing accusations and blaming others. Plaintiff's attorney Mike Finnegan called McDonough a "master of half-truths" who helped cover up allegations of priest child abuse, putting "countless" children at risk. Finnegan said McDonough had a flawed understanding of the law requiring officials to report allegations of abuse to police, and he said McDonough chose to put the reputation of the archdiocese ahead of the safety of children. In his deposition, McDonough said St. Paul police sent him a letter before Christmas, but he turned the letter over to his lawyer. He said he didn't recall reading the letter and did not talk to police, according to his testimony. "Why didn't you speak to them?" plaintiff's attorney Jeff Anderson asked at the deposition. "Don't answer that," Andrew Birrell, McDonough's lawyer, advised his client. McDonough, however, said there hasn't been further contact from St. Paul police, and he didn't think it was appropriate to reach out to police to provide them information. "One doesn't simply call the police and say, 'I'd like to come in for a chat, ladies and gentlemen,' " he said. McDonough also refused to be interviewed by a lay task force formed by the archdiocese last fall in response to reports that the church had failed to deal adequately with alleged priest misconduct. When asked why he refused to talk to the panel, McDonough cited the "media frenzy" stirred up by "inaccurate statements" from Anderson. "And so I decided very early on that it would be better that folks who were doing whatever studies they were doing would proceed and at some point I'd have an opportunity to offer my input," McDonough said. "Since most of my activity was heavily documented publicly for many, many years, (I) didn't see any particular pressing need to defend my record." Although the task force was created by Archbishop John Nienstedt, McDonough said Nienstedt did not order him to talk to the panel. "Archbishop never approached me and ordered me to appear before anyone," he said. When asked, "What were you afraid of?" McDonough replied, "I'm not afraid of much. "I -- I do not characterize my stance as fear, but my prudent choice was in the current -- in the then-current environment, that my participation would add nothing not already available in the records possessed by the archdiocese," he said. McDonough served for 17 years, until 2008, as vicar general, or top deputy to the archbishop. He was the chief point person on priest sexual abuse and continued in that role from 2008 to the fall of 2013 as "delegate for safe environment." Nienstedt's deposition was released Tuesday. In it, he said that when he began in his post in 2007, he was told by McDonough that there were no offending priests still active in the archdiocese. In several cases, Nienstedt said, he was unaware of decisions that McDonough had made but trusted him to make sure children in the archdiocese were safe. In McDonough's deposition, Anderson asked about his dealings with several priests accused of misconduct, including A former priest at Our Lady of Grace, the Rev. Jerome Kern, who was sued in 1993 by a man in his 50s who said Kern abused him when he was 12 to 16 years old, although Kern never was charged with a crime. Asked if allegations that McDonough learned in 1987 of Kern grabbing a child by the crotch was abuse, McDonough said, "I certainly would report that to the police today." "You didn't report it then, did you?" Anderson said. McDonough said he didn't. He said that law enforcement officials told him at that time that they wanted to hear of reports of potential danger to a child or criminal activity that occurred only in the prior three years. "I had the understanding that they did not want to know about older matter," McDonough said, "I'm certainly aware, I've heard now, that they'd like to hear about older matters. "Now it's years later, and we all have greater clarity about those things. "I indicated, for example, and I regret this now, of course, looking back, but during the 1990s, we didn't consider Jerome Kern to have actually abused children," he said. McDonough said he could only recall two or three instances when he directly contacted police to report priest abuse allegations. In another case involving former St. Paul priest Curtis Wehmeyer, convicted last year of abusing two boys in 2010, McDonough testified he met with Wehmeyer before he was arrested to serve a "decree of removal as pastor." McDonough said he had permission from a police officer to do that, and he testified that he took away Wehmeyer's computer and gun. McDonough said he was afraid Wehmeyer might hurt someone else, but he told Wehmeyer it was for his own safety. "He said, 'I'm not gonna hurt myself.' 'Why don't you give me the gun anyway, Curtis,' I told him," the deposition transcript said. Anderson questioned why McDonough and the church didn't act sooner with Wehmeyer because they had heard earlier reports of Wehmeyer approaching young men and "cruising for sex." McDonough said he thought Wehmeyer had homosexual adult attractions, but did not question him about sexual involvement with children. "I never believed that -- that Curtis Wehmeyer constituted a danger to kids," McDonough said. "I'm sorry I didn't believe that, I wish I'd believed it, I wished I could have acted on that." "Okay. But it's your job to keep the kids safe, wasn't it?" Anderson asked. "You bet," McDonough said. "And you agree that you blew it?" "Any time a kid is hurt, my heart's broken" McDonough said. "Could I have acted differently based on the information I had? I don't think I had a right to do so. I don't -- I don't believe I blew it, no." Asked whether policies and practices of the archdiocese since 1980 regarding protection of children were "dangerous and dreadful," McDonough said, "I would say that during the period -- and I know it personally really only from '87, I believed that we got better and better at it all the time." But McDonough expressed regrets that priests in the past were allowed to return to ministry even after accusations of abuse. "So this goes in the context we talked about this morning about our announced practice in the 1990s where we said in some cases we are going to at least consider restoring to ministry these priests," McDonough said. "That -- that was foolish and I wish we had not done so." "It was a gamble, wasn't it?" Anderson asked. "Well, I wouldn't characterize it as such, but I think it was a bad practice," McDonough said. In another case involving Hugo priest Jonathan Shelley suspected of having child-porn images on his computer, Anderson said reports of an investigation commissioned by the archdiocese indicated that search terms like "free naked boy pictures" were found on the computer. McDonough said he looked at about 450 images on the computer after then-Chancellor for Canonical Affairs Jennifer Haselberger said she thought the images were child pornography. "And you saw some that were borderline enough to be possible child porn, didn't you?" Anderson asked. "I did not. As a matter of fact, I was disgusted after looking at about a third, a little over a third of the files and went back to Jennifer and said, 'I don't see anything here that is remotely child pornography.' "So, then, she took the files and downloaded from the files the images that she considered child pornography. Curious practice, I thought, but nonetheless, when I, then, looked at them, and I think there were about a dozen ... it was quite apparent to me that they -- these were not sexual images of children," McDonough said. "But they were in the pornography and you didn't look at all of them, so you saw some that were kids, right, but they weren't sexually explicit, is what you're saying?" Anderson asked. "That's correct," McDonough said. Prosecutors concluded this year that the pornographic images on the computer did not involve children, and declined to charge Shelley. Asked if he ever made a choice to not keep records concerning abuse cases because of the possibility that Anderson's office would eventually see them, McDonough said, "Actually, my stance usually -- you probably didn't ever hear this because I didn't call you, but when I produced records, my tendency was to mentally invite Jeff Anderson into the office, presuming that I would be held accountable in the years ahead for my activity." McDonough also said he has avoided "reading the great majority of newspaper reports related to any of these matters in recent months. "I had other work I thought was more important -- important and required my full attention," he said. McDonough said he didn't review any documents to prepare for the deposition. Asked how he prepared for the session, he replied, "I spent time in prayer." McDonough may have to undergo more questioning by Anderson. At the deposition, lawyers for McDonough and the archdiocese disagreed with Anderson over how long McDonough had to testify. Anderson said Ramsey County District Judge John Van de North gave him eight hours to question McDonough. The archdiocese's lawyers argued that limit should include time spent for lunch and other breaks. According to Finnegan, they cut off the testimony after McDonough had talked for about 6-1/2 hours. Finnegan said he would seek an order from Van de North compelling more testimony from McDonough and Nienstedt. Contact: rchin@pioneerpress.com
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