Lee Higgins

The (Westchester County, N.Y.) Journal News

Caruso says any injuries girl suffered were result of %27culpable conduct%27 by her%2C her family

Girl%27s lawyer says Caruso is %27beyond depraved%27

Caruso molested girl when she was 8

CARMEL, N.Y. -- A child molester being sued for moving back next door to one of his victims after getting out of jail is blaming the victim for any injuries she suffered as a result of the 2003 attack at her Carmel home.

Mario Caruso, who sexually assaulted the girl when she was 8 along with her 9-year-old friend, claims in a court filing this week that the girl's injuries, if any, were the result of "culpable conduct" by her and her family members.

Neither Caruso, 63, nor his lawyer, William Spain, could be reached for comment Thursday. The filing asks that the lawsuit be dismissed and does not elaborate on why Caruso is blaming the victim and her family.

On Sunday, The Journal News reported that the girl, now 19, was suing Caruso in state Supreme Court in Putnam County for the assault and moving back next door in 2011, alleging he disregarded the "substantial probability" it could cause her "severe emotional distress." Her lawyer, Niall MacGiollabhui, was shocked at Caruso's response.

"For a convicted pedophile to blame an 8-year-old girl and her family for the suffering his sexual abuse of that girl has (caused) is beyond depraved," he said. "For that girl to know that such a sick monster is her next door neighbor is horrifying."

Caruso, a married pharmacist and longtime family friend when he assaulted the girl, was trusted to be alone with her and other neighborhood children, her father has said. He played games with the neighborhood children, did arts and crafts with them and invited them to do chores and gardening at his home, paying them small amounts of money, the father said.

Caruso was arrested in September 2009 by Putnam County sheriff's deputies after a Mahopac school official reported the assault. The girl's father was aware of it, convincing Caruso more than a year earlier to sign a confession and forgive him from paying back loans. Prosecutors estimated the loan amount between $20,000 and $50,000. The father said the loans had nothing to do with him not reporting the assault. Rather, he said, he didn't want his daughter subject to media scrutiny and public humiliation.

Caruso, a Level 3 sex offender, the category considered most likely to re-offend, fought in court to move back home after being released in May 2011 from the Putnam County jail, where he served 16 months for three counts of first-degree sexual abuse. Listed as a violent sex offender, he claimed he struggled to find a place to live, as he was being kicked out of motels, even sleeping in a van in a law office parking lot.

Caruso convinced Judge Albert Lorenzo to permit the move, removing a requirement in an order of protection that he stay 1,500 feet from the girl. The girl didn't want Caruso returning, writing in a letter to the court that he showed no remorse and it "will induce panic when I hear any car in his driveway or hear his garage door open or hear him talking to his wife or mother."

Putnam County District Attorney Adam Levy's office didn't object to the move, suggesting it was easier to supervise Caruso at a fixed address.

The girl is seeking an unspecified amount of money in the lawsuit filed last month, alleging she suffered physical, emotional and psychological injuries. More specifically, she claims she has been depressed, lacked trust in others and had "intrusive memories of the abuse."

Her father has told The Journal News that she wishes she could make Caruso disappear.