MISSOURI
National Catholic Reporter
Dennis Coday | Oct. 24, 2013 NCR Today
Msgr. Thomas J. O’Brien, subject of more than two dozen lawsuits alleging sexual abuse of minors, one of which ended in a $10 million settlement against the Kansas City-St. Joseph diocese, died this week according to his lawyer, The Kansas City Star is reporting. He was 87.
Leaders of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, SNAP, are asking Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City-St. Joseph to keep funeral services for O’Brien discreet.
Six lawsuits against the diocese involving O’Brien are pending. In July the diocese settled a wrongful-death lawsuit for $2.25 million with the parents of a boy whose family claimed he took his own life 30 years ago because of repeated sexual abuse by O’Brien.
O’Brien, who was ordained a priest in 1950 and served in a number of Kansas City parish, was principal of a Catholic high school 1961-1968 and superintendent of Catholic schools for the diocese 1969-1971.
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