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	Mexican, L.A. Cardinals Sued in Priest Abuse Case ABC News September 19, 2006 http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=2465520 Sep 19, 2006 — Los Angeles (Reuters) - The cardinals of two of the most important Roman Catholic dioceses in North America were accused in a lawsuit filed on Tuesday of allowing a priest wanted for multiple sex abuse to flee California for Mexico. Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles and Cardinal Norberto Rivera Carrera of Mexico City were named in a civil lawsuit claiming obstruction of justice, negligence and conspiracy to facilitate the flight of the priest and sexual battery. Mexico City is the world's largest Catholic diocese and Los Angeles is the largest archdiocese in the United States. Lawyers for the plaintiff said the lawsuit was unprecedented among the hundreds of sexual abuse charges brought since 2002 in the United States against Catholic priests and bishops accused of covering up their activities. "I don't know of any another lawsuit that has sued two cardinals in different countries. This is the first time. These are probably two of the most powerful cardinals in North America," said attorney Mike Finnegan. Mahony's spokesman, Tod Tamberg, said the conspiracy charge was "preposterous and without foundation." Representatives for Cardinal Rivera could not immediately be reached for comment. The suit was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court by Joaquin Aguilar Mendez, 25, of Mexico City, who says he was raped by Catholic priest Nicolas Aguilar Rivera in Mexico in 1994 when he was a 13-year-old altar boy. It claims that Mahony facilitated Father Aguilar's flight to Mexico in 1988, when a U.S. warrant was issued for his arrest, without notifying law enforcement in Los Angeles. Prosecutors were investigating allegations that he had abused more than 20 boys during his nine months in the Los Angeles archdiocese. Attorneys representing the Los Angeles area victims have previously charged that Mahony assigned Father Aguilar to work in Los Angeles in 1987 despite a letter from then Bishop Norberto Rivera that he had "homosexual problems." Tamberg said Father Aguilar fled without warning in 1988 after he had been removed from working as a priest and reported to child services. Mahony then wrote to Mexico urging his return to justice, Tamberg said. After his return to Mexico, Father Aguilar worked for several parishes in Mexico and was later convicted in Mexico 2003 on one charge of sex abuse but was not jailed. Finnegan said his current whereabouts are unknown but he is thought to be in Mexico. Joaquin Aguilar contacted the Los Angeles lawyers after reading of other priestly sex abuse cases they are handling in the United States. Finnegan said the court papers were delivered to Mahony's office on Tuesday and that lawyers planned to travel to Mexico City to deliver them to Cardinal Rivera on Wednesday. No lawsuits are being filed in the Mexican courts. Hundreds of lawsuits have been filed across the United States since the priest abuse scandal broke in 2002. Church documents published since then have shown that some bishops shuffled priests with histories of abuse between parishes or sent them for counseling rather than reporting them to police.
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