FLORIDA
News-Press
Fort Myers, Florida (News-Press) — A confidential Diocese of Venice document detailing sexual abuse by a former priest at a Fort Myers church will be released Tuesday at a press conference announcing a settlement in the case.
The defrocked priest, Jean Ronald Joseph, was accused in 2009 of sexually abusing a child while he was serving at St. Francis Xavier church.
Adam Horowitz, the victim’s lawyer, and an attorney for survivors of clergy sexual abuse, will hold the press conference at the church, 2157 Cleveland Ave.
“This is a case in which the priest held a press conference to call his victim a liar,” Horowitz said this morning.
The allegations were made against Joseph in 2009 by a 31-year-old man. The events happened about 15 years previous, the victim said. The diocese made the accusations public at that time. The priest was defrocked by the diocese in 2013.
“What I’m going to release today is a confidential church document when the diocese found the priest guilty,” Horowitz said. He claims a cover-up by the diocese.
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