OHIO/PENNSYLVANIA
WKBN
A Pennsylvania attorney has filed a notice of intent to sue the Catholic diocese in Youngstown and Johnstown, Pa. and a school where a Franciscan friar allegedly abused teenage boys he was supposed to be treating for sports-related injuries.
About 60 people have now alleged abuse against Franciscan friar Brother Stephen P. Baker during his tenures at Warren’s John F. Kennedy High School and Johnstown, Pa.’s Bishop McCort High School, according to several attorneys now involved in the case.
Baker, according to attorneys and seven alleged victims from JFK and Bishop McCort, used his position as athletic trainer at the schools from 1986-2000 to give teenage boys massages where he would fondle their genitals and digitally penetrate them. Baker was also a religion teacher and baseball coach at both schools.
Baker was removed from ministry at Bishop McCort in 2000 when allegations surfaced that Baker molested a student during the 1980s. A confidential lawsuit was resolved in 2002, the Altoona Mirror reported. Bishop McCort, which is no longer a diocese school, launched an internal investigation Thursday, according to diocese spokesman Matthew Beynon. The diocese was in charge of the school when the alleged abuse occurred. They hired former Allegheny County District Attorney Kathleen A. Gallagher and Eckert Seamans to investigate the claims.
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