The auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, Andrew Cozzens, was there, along with Tim O'Malley, who is the Director of Ministerial Standards and Safe Environment. O'Malley is a former FBI man and judge. They covered, in general, the charges against Fr. Fitzpatrick and answered, to the extent they could, a variety of questions from the parishioners.
The challenge that Archdiocesan officials face is twofold -- how to ensure that the process is fair, and how to deal with the reality that the Archdiocese is going through bankruptcy. A few particulars:
- Since Fr. Fitzpatrick is pastor at two churches, St. Rose and nearby Corpus Christi, it was important to get another priest into position, serving as a canonical administrator. The new priest's name is Fr. Jim Devorak, who comes to the position after serving as a priest in the New Ulm Diocese, mostly in parishes in the southwestern part of Minnesota.
- The investigation of Fr. Fitzpatrick has two tracks -- first, the criminal investigation, which falls to Ramsey County, and then the internal investigation that the archdiocese will conduct. The process could take a long time. If the county investigators believe a crime has been committed, then the question comes down to whether the statute of limitations has run. It is possible that the law enforcement officials will determine that the allegation is without merit as well. Given the high profile that abuse cases have, it's likely the criminal investigation will take place sooner than later. Since the allegations go back potentially 30 years or more, it's difficult to say how much time it will take.
- The archdiocesan process will follow the criminal investigation and involves a 12-person review board that includes two diocesan priests and 10 lay people.
- Some of the questions that the parishioners have can't be answered, at least not directly. The identity of the accuser and the potential of a civil lawsuit are things that the archdiocese can't discuss. And because the archdiocese is bankrupt, they have severe limitations in what they can do because all expenses end up getting scrutiny from the judges and trustees administering the bankruptcy, to say nothing of Jeff Anderson and the other attorneys who have been chasing the archdiocese for years.
- As I mentioned in my earlier post, we are relatively new to St. Rose, but it is evident that Fr. Fitzpatrick is much beloved. The sense you get from the parishioners is incredulity that their beloved pastor could have done such a thing. Based on my limited dealings with Fr. Fitzpatrick, it does seem implausible, but I would imagine similar accusations against other priests must have seemed implausible as well. We don't know what happened, or didn't happen, all those years ago.
- What's difficult about the process is that, for the moment, Fr. Fitzpatrick has to stand alone and apart from the archdiocese. Given the history, it has to be this way. There can be no possibility that the archdiocese is seen as harboring a potential fugitive priest. In some respects, Fr. Fitzpatrick is paying for the sins of others. It may not be fair, but that's how it is.
- Parishioners asked if they could take up a legal defense fund for Fr. Fitzpatrick. The bishop indicated that this could be done, but was hesitant to say more. He also discouraged the notion that the parish could take up a second collection at Mass for such a fund.
There's more to the story, but it will have to wait until tomorrow.
10 comments:
30 years ago, and nothing since? this is what disturbs me.
It does seem odd. Priests (and others) who engage in such behaviors don't usually stop doing it. I'm coming back to this tomorrow morning. There are some other factors in play that may explain the timing of this allegation.
How old is the preist in question?
Looks fifties-ish to early sixties, which would likely indicate that the events in question would have occurred (if they did) when he was not that far out of seminary. Between bankruptcy and a vow of poverty, I'm thinking "public defender" here unless the parish is very generous. And then--"bankruptcy"--can they help without those assets being attached in court?
Guilty or innocent, I don't envy the man.
Regarding the 30 year wait for the crime to be revealed, I'm torn. On one side, I hear many saying that they don't reform until they're jailed--that it's really an orientation that can't be changed--and on the flip side, I see that only 5% of sex offenders are rearrested for sex crimes. So either they're good at not being caught, or the criminal justice system scares some of them straight. And if they're scared straight by criminal justice, why not other factors? Something like the sailor whose ensign scares him away from port hookers by listing the sailors he's known who've gotten gifts that keep on giving from them.
If people want to help, my suggestion is talk to a lawyer who knows bankruptcy first.....could save a LOT of headaches. Worth a few hundred or a couple thousand bucks.
Gino, Fr. Fitzpatrick is in his late 60s -- I want to say 67-68, something like that.
Bubba, the archdiocese is bankrupt, not Fr. Fitzpatrick personally. An important distinction. Although I'm not certain of it, I would assume he has taken a vow of poverty, although I don't know that for sure.
I'd also say that it's up in the air that there's a crime. I'll write about this more tomorrow, but there was a deadline for cases to be brought in the bankruptcy of the Archdiocese. The deadline was in early August, so if someone was trying to get in on it, they would have done that now. We don't know anything about the accuser or if he has retained Jeff Anderson or another attorney. There have been false accusations in the past, too. The bar is that the accusation is "credible," which means it could have happened, but we don't even know what parish the allegation comes from. Fr. Fitzpatrick served at more than one parish in the 1980s. In other words, we don't know much other than that he denies the allegation.
Was it involving a 5 yr old boy, or a 17 yr old girl? This matters, as well.
They won't tell us that, Gino, because of privacy concerns, and because they don't want to cause problems for the criminal investigation. We'll find out eventually, but at this point I have no idea about any of that.
I was friends/neighbors with a therapist (this was about 10 years ago now) who specialized in pedophiles. (This was, perhaps not surprisingly, something he didn't disclose until we'd known each other for a while.) His experience, FWIW, was that the vast majority of them really, really didn't want to act on their impulses, and that among those who had, recidivism was actually really low. (The general impression of serial offenders over many years is probably due in no small part because those end up being the most egregious and high profile cases.)
So...it isn't difficult to imagine that he slipped up when he was young, deeply regretted it, and either got some help or powered through on his own, and has been clean ever since. That doesn't supersede the (alleged) victim's right to some justice, but it's entirely possible that he's both the guy that did a bad thing and the stand-up priest you've known all along.
Difficult stuff, any way you cut it. I hope a just resolution is reached.
I do, too, Brian.
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