MINNESOTA
Star Tribune
Article by: CHAO XIONG , Star Tribune Updated: November 20, 2014
Early in the former Rev. Gerald Funcheon’s career, a superior wrote of him: “Almost his sole interest is young boys.”
Five alleged victims are suing a former priest and a Catholic order for sexual abuse that occurred in the 1970s and ‘80s.
The two suits, filed Thursday against the former Rev. Gerald Funcheon and the Crosier Fathers and Brothers religious order, allege that Funcheon abused children while he worked at St. Odilia church in Shoreview and while he taught at Palma High School in Salinas, California.
The victims’ attorneys, Jeff Anderson and Mike Finnegan, released church documents about Funcheon that showed that leaders with the Crosiers and also the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis were aware of Funcheon’s interest in boys and the allegations of sexual abuse.
“In a conversation with the Bishop, Jerry [Funcheon] indicated that there may be around 50 victims with whom he engaged in mutual masturbation or improper touch which [sic] these young men were between the ages of 10 and 16,” wrote the Rev. Bob J. Rossi, a Crosier, in October 1992. “Bob Sell indicated that Jerry was having a hard time seeing improper touch as sexual abuse.”
Sell was chancellor of the Diocese of Lafayette, Indiana.
As a Crosier, Funcheon, now 76, worked in and outside the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, and was associate pastor at St. Stephen’s Parish in Anoka in 1985. He also worked in Indiana, Florida, Germany and Hawaii.
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