ROME (NY)
Rome Sentinel
February 20, 2019
The Rev. Paul F. Angelicchio, of Rome, has been named in a lawsuit accusing him of sexually abusing a teenage altar boy when the priest worked at a church in Onondaga County in the late 1980s.
Angelicchio is pastor of the Catholic Church of St. John the Baptist & Transfiguration on East Dominick Street. Angelicchio was placed on a leave of absence by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Syracuse in late 2016 to investigate the claims. Church officials deemed the accusations not credible at the time and Angelicchio soon returned to service.
The lawsuit, filed on Feb. 14, also accuses two Syracuse-area priests who were named by the Diocese in December as having “credible” accusations of sexual abuse made against them. Those priests, Charles Eckermann and James F. Quinn, are both deceased.
Angelicchio was not among the priests listed by the Diocese in December.
Kevin Braney, age 46, currently of Colorado, filed the lawsuit only hours after the Child Victims Act was signed into law. The Act extends the statute of limitations for sexual abuse victims to seek criminal charges or file lawsuits. Braney is represented by the Saeed & Little LLP law firm in Indiana.
The lawsuit has been filed as a class action case, meaning other possible plaintiffs can join. The lawsuit lists up to 1,000 possible “John Doe” victims of sexual abuse by Syracuse Diocese priests. The lawsuit also accuses four to 200 unnamed “John Doe” priests as defendants, alongside Angelicchio, Eckermann and Quinn.
Braney’s lawsuit also accuses impropriety from the Diocese itself, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and Bishop Robert J. Cunningham.
“We want to expose and discover the truth of what happened,” said attorney Lauren Berri, of California. She is one of several attorneys attached to the class action lawsuit.
“Who knew what and when? Who allowed these priests to abuse so many children, and why didn’t they do anything to stop it?”
Berri said that the attorneys attached to the lawsuit are working to find and involve more plaintiffs with accusations against the three priests and the Syracuse Diocese.
“It’s expected to be a very large number,” she stated. The plaintiffs will be allowed to remain anonymous, with Braney acting as the focal point.
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