A sequence of investigations by The File and NorthJersey.com this 12 months uncovered new details about former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick’s rise to energy via the church hierarchy regardless of abuse allegations that surfaced as early because the Eighties.
The File and NorthJersey.com additionally reported this 12 months that church officers tried to curtail McCarrick’s use of a Jersey Shore seaside home, the place he allegedly abused seminarians, way back to the Eighties.
His time as archbishop of Newark included the acquisition of not less than two seaside houses, together with one tied to a mysterious debt, and a sample of ignoring abuse allegations towards monks beneath his management — in a single case when the declare was bolstered by a letter from the therapist of a deceased sufferer.
The investigations additionally discovered {that a} still-secret church inquiry uncovered new proof associated to allegations {that a} priest stole $1 million from two parishes in New York and used the cash to pay for lavish holidays together with intercourse and bondage classes at a Jersey shore dwelling he bought for money.
Timeline of occasions:A timeline of ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick’s rise and fall
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The investigations got here amid a tough 12 months for the church in New Jersey as greater than 240 intercourse abuse lawsuits have been filed since final December, when the state suspended the civil statute of limitations for such instances.
McCarrick, who had been accused of sexually abusing grownup seminary college students and minors, is called in not less than 4 lawsuits alleging that he additionally abused youngsters.
A Vatican report released in November revealed that Pope John Paul II promoted McCarrick, then the archbishop of Newark, to be the top of the Washington, D.C. archdiocese in 2001 regardless of widespread considerations about McCarrick’s conduct round seminary college students.
The report laid the blame on three New Jersey bishops, all deceased, who didn’t inform the Vatican all they knew when church officers requested them for details about McCarrick. Two of the bishops failed to say that they as soon as witnessed the prelate groping a younger man.
First makes an attempt to restrain McCarrick
Within the late Eighties, a seminary trainer at Seton Corridor College went to Bishop Frank Rodimer of the Paterson diocese with college students’ complaints that McCarrick sexually harassed them throughout in a single day stays at a house in Sea Girt. The bishop indicated he would contact the Vatican’s U.S. representatives.
“One thing needed to be completed,” stated the trainer who made the report, the Rev. Ed Studying. “It is emotional abuse and an influence drawback.”
Two weeks later church officers made an unannounced go to to the Newark archdiocese in an obvious effort to clamp down on McCarrick’s use of the seaside dwelling. It might have been the primary try to curtail McCarrick’s prelate’s actions, however the penalties seem to have been fleeting.
Second shore dwelling and mysterious debt
In 1997, beneath strain from church officers, McCarrick was pressured to promote the Sea Girt dwelling. But the Archdiocese of Newark purchased a replacement in a much better location, on a spit of land jutting out into Barnegat Bay in Brick Township.
That home had been owned by a priest who had been a detailed colleague of McCarrick when he was the bishop of the Metuchen diocese. The priest, Monsignor Francis Crine, was McCarrick’s director of personnel.
After the monsignor died in 1989, the Diocese of Metuchen demanded the home be turned over to the church to repay a mysterious debt owed to St. James parish in Woodbridge, the place Crine had been the pastor. Property information present the home was transferred to the parish to repay a debt owed by the priest.
It was later transferred from the parish to the Metuchen diocese for $1, after which bought to the Archdiocese of Newark in 1997, giving McCarrick a substitute for the home in Sea Girt. There are not any recognized allegations of abuse associated to the Brick dwelling.
The Vatican’s report on McCarrick briefly talked about the house, which was first revealed in a report by The File and NorthJersey.com. Officers of the Diocese of Metuchen and Archdiocese of Newark have stated they don’t have any details about the debt or the aim of property transfers that left the house in McCarrick’s palms in 1997.
McCarrick ignores allegations
McCarrick allowed a number of monks to proceed working as clerics after he was made conscious of abuse allegations towards them, victims have stated.
Mark Crawford, now a sufferer’s advocate, stated he went to Archdiocese of Newark officers in 1983 to report he’d been abused by Rev. Kenneth Martin, a Bayonne priest. Years later, Martin was promoted to be McCarrick’s private secretary within the Newark Archdiocese.
Story continues under the gallery
Crawford stated he met with McCarrick in 1997 and informed him that he and his brother had been abused and crushed by Martin. However he stated McCarrick did not take any actions. Martin continued working as a priest till he was faraway from ministry in 2002 amid a nationwide intercourse abuse scandal within the church.
The boy’s mom informed The File and NorthJersey.com via an lawyer that she reported the abuse to Newark archdiocese officers in 1996. The next 12 months, after her son died of a mind aneurysm, a psychological well being facility the place he’d been a affected person despatched a letter to the archdiocese saying the abuse allegations got here up throughout remedy classes. Church officers informed the boy’s dad and mom in a subsequent letter that McCarrick would think about what to do in regards to the case “in a loving and pastoral method.”
But Sudol continued working as a priest for many years. In 2002, he was suspended because the church grappled with a nationwide scandal, however he was restored to ministry after being acquitted in a church trial. In 2018, he was dwelling in a Jersey Metropolis parish with a college when three extra accusers from Ridgefield Park got here ahead. He was moved out of the church and has been positioned on an inventory of credibly accused monks.
Priest allegedly stole $1 million
The Archdiocese of New York not too long ago despatched a report back to the Vatican that included new proof a couple of priest, the Rev. Peter Miqueli, who allegedly stole $1 million from two parishes. The pinnacle of that investigation stated in an audio recording offered to The File and NorthJersey.com that he found the priest had been protected by clergy who worked in the archdiocesan headquarters, but who are no longer there.
“It is crystal clear precisely what went on on this case,” Father Richard Welch, till not too long ago the New York archdiocese judicial vicar, stated within the recording. He stated that church officers in Rome have been “going to see that he was protected” and that there “is little doubt about that. That makes it much more egregious, particularly within the local weather at this time. You can’t tolerate coverups or hiding these things.”
He promised parishioners the investigation could be made public and details about the alleged thefts offered to regulation enforcement. Nevertheless, church officers not too long ago stated the case is closed after Miqueli was discovered useless at his Brick dwelling over the summer time, and no details about the matter could be launched.
Abbott Koloff is an investigative reporter for NorthJersey.com. To get limitless entry to his watchdog work that safeguards our communities and democracy, please subscribe or activate your digital account at this time.
E mail: koloff@northjersey.com
Twitter: @abbottkoloff
