CONNECTICUT
The Hartford Courant
By DAVE ALTIMARI, daltimar@courant.com
The Hartford Courant
6:58 p.m. EDT, August 4, 2012
The Vatican’s refusal to let the Norwich diocese remove an accused pedophile from the priesthood is expected to play a role in the upcoming trial involving a New London woman who says the priest molested her when she was 12.
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger received the Norwich request days before being elected pope in 2005. It’s unclear, though, if Ratzinger himself decided against laicizing Father Thomas Shea, who was accused of molesting as many as 15 girls at 11 different parishes throughout the Diocese of Norwich in a career that started in 1953.
One of accusers, using the pseudonym Jane Doe, sued the diocese in 2008 alleging that Shea made her perform oral sex on him while he was pastor of St. Joseph’s Church in New London.
As a priest in good standing, Shea was being paid by the diocese a pension of about $15,000 annually and all of his health insurance costs, including his nursing home bills.
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