Archdiocese told not to destroy file

Records that a judge ordered preserved could contain abuse allegations against priests

By Gregory A. Hall

A Jefferson circuit judge yesterday ordered officials of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Louisville not to destroy any records in a secret file, which could contain allegations of abuse against priests.

Judge Denise Clayton also gave permission for an attorney handling 14 lawsuits -- all alleging sexual abuse of children by the Rev. Louis E. Miller in the 1960s and 1970s -- to take depositions from a retired bishop and a nun.

The attorney, William McMurry, said that he believes that both Bishop Charles G. Maloney and Sister Mary Fulgence knew of allegations against Miller decades ago.

All the lawsuits filed against the archdiocese since mid-April, including some naming priests other than Miller and one teacher, claim that church officials knew or should have known of allegations of abuse.

The lawsuits say the archdiocese had a duty to report allegations of child abuse to authorities, but failed to. Such reporting was first required by Kentucky law in 1964.

The failure to report the allegations constitutes concealment and allows the lawsuits to be filed now -- decades after the statute of limitations would normally expire, the lawsuits claim.

McMurry said the judge's ruling is a victory. ''For the first time we have an order in place that will make it a crime to destroy these records.''

Brian Reynolds, the archdiocese's chief administrative officer, said the archdiocese will comply with Clayton's order.

''We don't believe it was necessary because we weren't going to destroy records,'' he said.

McMurry initially asked that the church produce the records, saying that he feared they might be destroyed. When an attorney for the church objected, McMurry then suggested the judge could keep the records.

Clayton's ruling forbidding destruction of the records allows the church to keep the file.

In her rulings yesterday, which came after an emergency hearing on Monday, Clayton denied a request by McMurry to combine all the cases he was handling that involved Miller, citing procedural grounds. The judge also rejected McMurry's amended complaint that added a plaintiff to one of the pending suits.

Church laws -- called canons -- require a bishop in charge of a diocese to keep sensitive records in a secret archive that only he can access. Records of criminal matters concerning morals are to be destroyed, on an annual basis, when the criminal has died or 10 years after sentencing, according to church law. A summary of the case along with the text of the sentence is to be retained, however.

The archdiocese has acknowledged having such a file.

But Reynolds said that the archdiocese does not regularly eliminate files. Canon law ''also recognizes the reality of civil law and that the church exists within that context,'' he said.

Yesterday's ruling by Clayton also allows McMurry to depose Maloney and Sister Mary Fulgence, who was principal at St. Aloysius, where Miller was serving in the early 1970s.

McMurry said in court Monday that both are elderly and that he wants to take their depositions within two weeks. Reynolds said the archdiocese will not object to the depositions.

In a telephone interview with The Courier-Journal last week, Maloney said allegations of Miller's conduct in one case had been reported to him. He didn't recall the specifics but said he would have referred them to thenArchbishop John A. Floersh, who died in 1968.

McMurry filed three more lawsuits yesterday against the archdiocese involving allegations of sexual abuse of minors by priests. One of those was the 14th lawsuit involving Miller. None of the lawsuits names the priests as defendants.

The other two complaints filed yesterday involve allegations concerning the Rev. Daniel C. Clark and the late Rev. Arthur L. Wood.

Details of the three suits:

• Timothy L. Baker accused Miller of sexually abusing him during the early 1960s when he was an altar boy at Holy Spirit parish. Baker is now 53.
  
• Patrick Gatti (formerly Mudd) alleges that Clark sexually abused him in 1981 and 1982 when he attended St. Rita School. Gatti is 31 now.

  Gatti's suit is the second naming Clark, who pleaded guilty to sexual abuse in 1988 and spent time in jail after the conviction.

• Timothy M. Scott claims that in 1972, Wood sexually abused him when Scott was about 11 and a sixthgrader at St. Ignatius School.

  That is the second lawsuit filed recently involving Wood.

  Regarding the three lawsuits filed yesterday, church officials do not comment on litigation, said Cecelia Price, an archdiocesan spokeswoman. Attempts to reach Clark and Miller yesterday were unsuccessful.