BECKLEY (WV)
Register-Herald
Mar 19, 2019
By Erin Beck
West Virginia’s attorney general filed a consumer protection lawsuit Tuesday morning against the state’s Catholic diocese – the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston – and its former Bishop Michael Bransfield, alleging that Catholic leaders employed predatory priests while falsely advertising a safe environment at Catholic schools and camps.
The Diocese, meanwhile, issued a statement Tuesday afternoon accusing Morrisey of making errors in his lawsuit, and defending itself as “wholly committed to the protection of children.”
West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey’s office isn’t responsible for criminal prosecutions. That task would fall to county prosecutors.
Instead, Morrisey is arguing the Diocese violated the state’s Consumer Credit and Protection Act, although he said he has been in touch with some prosecutors.
West Virginia’s Consumer Credit and Protection Act states, “Unfair methods of competition and unfair or deceptive acts or practices in the conduct of any trade or commerce are hereby declared unlawful.”
Morrisey’s lawsuit, filed in Wood County circuit court, argues that the Diocese “sells and supplies educational services” and that it “advertised services not delivered” and accuses it of “failure to warn of dangerous services.”
“Now some may ask why are we pursuing a consumer protection action in this matter, but the answer is very straightforward,” Morrisey said, during a press conference at the State Capitol Tuesday. “Every parent who pays a tuition for a service falling under our consumer protection laws deserves to know that their schools that their children are attending are safe.
“Now this is obviously not a common action for our office to file but it is a critical one, as the public relies upon the state attorney general to enforce a variety of laws, especially as they may impact the well-being of children, our most precious resource.”
In August of 2018, a Pennsylvania grand jury issued a report identifying hundreds of predatory priests, including one or more who worked in West Virginia, according to the lawsuit.
Morrisey said his office began their investigation in September of 2018 into whether Catholic priests accused of sexually abusing children had worked in West Virginia.
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