ILLINOIS
Chicago Tribune
Manya Brachear Pashman
Chicago Tribune
A popular Back of the Yards priest who admitted to sexual misconduct as a teenager has left his Roman Catholic religious order and asked the pope to remove him from the priesthood, according to a letter from the lawyer for the Claretian Missionaries provided as part of a legal settlement.
Bruce Wellems, a former priest at Holy Cross Immaculate Heart of Mary Church, who acknowledged that decades ago, when he was 15, he abused a 7-year-old boy, resigned from the Claretians in the past year, after the victim sued the order.
The victim, Eric Johnson, now 52, said Wellems abused him multiple times when Johnson was 7 years old.
“I could have chosen to remain anonymous, but I did not, which was not easy for my family nor myself. Yet I continue to push for justice,” he said. “He is a danger to the kids and the community.”
Wellems, 60, was barred from active ministry in the Chicago Archdiocese last year after an independent review board uncovered “additional facts that weren’t previously available.” It is unclear whether the review disclosed an additional victim.
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