LOS ANGELES
Los Angeles Times via City News Service
October 30, 2017
A decade after the Archdiocese of Los Angeles paid about $600 million to settle allegations of clergy abuse, memories of the scandal loomed over a downtown courtroom today as prospective jurors were interviewed for a trial pitting the religious body and singer Katy Perry against a businesswoman concerning the purchase of a former convent.
Though the lawsuit filed against Dana Hollister deals with a real estate transaction and not with inappropriate behavior by priests with young parishioners, many jurors who spoke individually with Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Stephanie Bowick and the attorneys said their memories of the molestations have not faded.
Archdiocese attorney Kirk Dillman and the other attorneys took turns questioning the prospective jurors, who were given a questionnaire last week to fill out regarding their ability to serve. A lawyer who said he was of the Jewish faith said he has no particular bias toward nuns or the Catholic Church in general, but was swayed by past media coverage of pedophile priests and believes that bishops and popes were heavily to blame for what happened to the victims.
“For me, the higher-ups probably had some knowledge and turned a blind eye, I suppose,” he said.
The juror also said that given the large amount of the 2007 settlement, it probably meant that the church agreed to the resolution based on the merits of the case rather than just to have it go away.
The juror, who says he manages seven attorneys in a law firm and that one of the cases they are currently handling is related to the Harvey Weinstein sex scandal, said he bears no ill will toward the church.
“I don’t hate the Catholic Church, but I wouldn’t go into it with a completely blank slate,” he said. The juror was one of several individuals dismissed by Bowick based on their interviews.
Another prospective juror, who called himself an agnostic, wrote on his jury questionnaire that he was “not particularly fond of the Catholic Church” and that the clergy abuse was a major reason.
“It was a pretty big scandal,” he said. “I have children of my own. I know there were a lot of false accusations, but it left a bad taste in my mouth.”
A woman who said she belonged to an Armenian church said she, too, was affected by the media coverage at the time of the abuse revelations.
“I don’t mean to offend anyone in here,” she said.
She praised nuns in the church, saying they appeared to be “charitable and community-oriented.”
Yet another non-Catholic said she was disturbed by the way many abusive priests were simply moved to other parishes and said she believes high-ranking church individuals such as former Archbishop Roger Mahony were aware of the coverups.
“I don’t have the greatest opinion of organized religion,” she said, adding that many of her friends are “lapsed Catholics.”
The lawsuit alleges Hollister knew she did not have the written authority of the archbishop to buy the property on Waverly Drive, but recorded the deed anyway. The archdiocese and Perry maintain Hollister’s actions forced them to come to court and fight for two years to get the Hollister transaction undone.
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