ILLINOIS
Belleville News-Democrat
BY GEORGE PAWLACZYK
News-Democrat
Seven former priests, including five who once had ties to the religious order that operates the National Shrine of Our Lady of the Snows near Belleville, have been publicly named in Minnesota as “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of minors, according to a written statement from the national Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate.
“Credibly accused” is the standard language used by the Catholic Church to describe a member of the clergy who, after an investigation by a diocese or religious order, is believed to have molested a minor and is unfit for further ministry.
Release of the names was part of a settlement in a Minnesota lawsuit in connection to a former priest — the late J. Vincent Fitzgerald — in which the defendants agreed to “public disclosure” of the names of all Oblate priests in the United States “against whom there has ever been a credible accusation of sexual abuse of a minor or possession of child pornography.” The lawsuit’s defendants were The Diocese of Duluth, the Diocese of New Ulm, Minn., and the Oblates. Other details of the settlement, such as monetary damages, were not released.
“The release of the names is as a result of the genesis of the Father Fitzgerald litigation,” said Patrick Wall, a paralegal with the Jeff Anderson & Associates law firm in St. Paul, which brought the legal action. Fitzgerald, who formerly was assigned to the Oblates in Belleville, had been accused in civil court of sexually molesting a number of young boys in several states, including on an Indian reservation.
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