WOODBRIDGE (NJ)
NJ Advance Media
May 14, 2019
By Rebecca Everett
When Justin Hoffmann was 9 years old, his best friend was a priest in his late 60s. They spent time together almost every day.
But reflecting on that relationship Tuesday, a day after filing a lawsuit alleging the late Rev. Brendan Sullivan sexually abused him over the course of five years, Hoffmann said it wasn’t until 2017 that he realized, “it wasn’t a friendship.”
“When you’re with an authority figure when you’re young, you don’t know if something that they’re doing is right or wrong and I certainly shouldn’t have been expected to know,” Hoffmann, now 29, said at a press conference in Cherry Hill with his lawyers.
Hoffmann, who was an altar boy with Sullivan at the former St. James Parish in Ventnor, filed a lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Camden Monday and its former bishop accusing them of not preventing the alleged abuse. The abuse, which allegedly included inappropriate touching and indecent exposure, started in 1996 when Hoffmann was 7 and lasted until 2001, the suit claims.
Hoffmann calmly described Tuesday how he rationalized Sullivan’s actions.
“While they seemed playful and kind of like just messing around when I was a kid — it seemed O.K. When I look back on the things he was doing, it’s like gross negligence,” he said. “I’m like, O.K., how did I get myself into this position.”
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