DALLAS (TX)
Dallas Morning News
May 15, 2019
By Jennifer Emily and Cassandra Jaramillo
An affidavit Dallas police used to obtain a search warrant Wednesday to raid Dallas Catholic Diocese offices laid out allegations against five priests and suggested the church subverted police efforts to obtain more information.
The affidavit, signed by Detective David Clark, who is working full-time on sex abuse allegations within the Diocese, sought to seize Diocese records because the church hadn’t handed over all the records it had about allegations against the priests.
All five priests are on the Diocese’s list of 31 “credibly accused” priests, which the church released in January. That list included only accusations against priests that the Diocese concluded were credible after a review by former law enforcement officials and the Diocean Review Board.
But the records handed over to police were not complete, Clark wrote.
The accused priests could not be reached for comment and none have been arrested. One priest previously said he should not be included in the credibly accused list.
Here is a look at the allegations, according to the affidavit:
Edmundo Paredes
Dallas police began investigating a sexual abuse allegation into Edmundo Paredes, 70, after the Diocese told police a victim came forward in August. A warrant was issued for Paredes’ arrest in January. But the details of the allegations by a former altar server were not public until Wednesday in the affidavit.
Three others had previously accused Paredes of sexual abuse and he was included in the list of 31. But police had said the accusers did not want to pursue criminal charges.
Paredes is believed to have fled, possibly to his native Philippines.
The fourth accuser told the Diocese that Paredes sexually assaulted him in the 1990s, when the alleged victim was an altar server at St. Cecilia’s Church, the affidavit says. The boy also attended the church’s school.
The affidavit says Paredes “groomed him by taking him and other altar servers out to eat between Masses and bought them things” after they met in 1991.
In 1994, when the victim was a juvenile, the sexual assaults began: The victim told police “Paredes touched him on his genitals and Paredes placed his mouth on [his] genitals.”
Police interviewed several parishioners, office staff members and priests, all of whom corroborated that Paredes brought “several juveniles” into the rectory during evenings and weekends.
The affidavit also states that “some office staff members met with now-retired Chancellor Mary Edlund, in 2006, regarding their concerns over Paredes having juveniles inside the church offices and inside his residence.”
According to the affidavit, Edlund told Clark that Paredes’ file should contain information about the 2006 meetings.
“That file did not contain any information regarding the 2006 meeting between parishioners and Chancellor Edlund,” Clark wrote in the affidavit.
Instead, Clark wrote that he found only notes that appear to have been written by Edlund, which said, “Outcry from adult, send to CPS. … won’t hear back … letter better than online entry.”
In the affidavit, Clark says Child Protective Services officials “had no knowledge of ever seeing the letters” the Diocese says it sent concerning abuse allegations.
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