PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia City Paper
By Ralph Cipriano
Published: 01/02/2014
The overturning of a criminal conviction is a rare event, with the odds of it occurring at less than 5 percent. Reversals in the criminal courts are “like diamonds,” as one local defense lawyer put it.
So it was a shocker on Dec. 26 when a panel of three state Superior Court judges unanimously ruled that the landmark conviction of Monsignor William J. Lynn should be reversed and he should be “discharged forthwith” from prison.
There may be more surprises when the alleged victim in the Lynn case takes the stand next June, when his civil case against the Archdiocese of Philadelphia is scheduled to go to trial.
Lynn, former secretary for clergy for the archdiocese from 1992 to 2004, was the first Catholic administrator in the country to go to jail for the sexual sins of the clergy — not for touching a child, but for failing to rein in the predator priests he supervised.
Though it reversed his 2012 conviction, the Superior Court judges noted there was evidence that he “prioritized the archdiocese’s reputation over the safety of potential victims.”
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