PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer
By John P. Martin
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER
The Archdiocese of Philadelphia file on the Rev. James J. Brennan had dozens of documents bluntly detailing what the archbishop, nuns, pastors and even Brennan himself thought of his strengths, flaws and potential.
Missing from those same records were words like sex abuse, molestation, and accusation, a detective acknowledged Wednesday.
“Those words are not used, no,” said James Dougherty, an investigator for the District Attorney’s Office, told jurors at the landmark trial for Brennan and Msgr. William J. Lynn.
Brennan’s lawyer, Richard J. Fuschino, used that omission to underscore a theme of his defense: that no one reported any evidence of misconduct before or after prosecutors say the priest tried to rape a 14-year-old boy in 1996. And that, despite widespread publicity about that allegation, no other accusers have come forward, bucking a pattern prosecutors have suggested is common among sexually abusive priests.
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