Owego priest among 8 accused of child sex abuse in Rochester diocese

Flanked by two former priests, a Boston attorney stood on the steps of Sacred Heart Cathedral in Rochester and called Wednesday for the resignation of a Tioga County priest, naming him as one of eight clergy members accused of sexually abusing children in the Diocese of Rochester between 1950 and 1978.

The Rev. Thomas J. Valenti currently serves as the parochial administrator at Blessed Trinity — which includes St. James Church in Waverly, St. John in Newark Valley and St. Margaret Mary in Apalachin — as well as St. Patrick's parish in Owego.

His name appears on a list that attorney Mitchell Garabedian gathered from the testimony of 15 men and two women. He called on the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester to release records it may hold concerning allegations of sexual abuse of children by clergy.

It is time, he said, for "the church to stop these evil acts."

Now between the ages of 52 and 77, the victims approached Garabedian over the past six months and said they were abused by the priests when they were children.

"And as you can see from the assignment sheets from the official Catholic directory, these priests were transferred from parish to parish, which is typical of a diocese, or archdiocese or the Catholic Church," Garabedian said Wednesday.

In a statement Wednesday, the diocese said the allegation against Valenti was "investigated, reviewed and determined to be unsubstantiated."

"No further complaints of sexual abuse of a minor against Father Valenti have ever been received," the statement continued.

Garabedian is a Boston attorney who rose to prominence representing survivors of sexual abuse by priests there in the 1990s and 2000s. He was portrayed by actor Stanley Tucci in the Oscar-winning film "Spotlight," which chronicled the case. To date, his firm has represented more than 1,000 victims and survivors of clergy sexual abuse.

He recently has worked with people in Syracuse and Buffalo who made similar allegations there.

Three of the accused priests had already been publicly identified in the past by the Diocese, including David P. Simon, who served as pastor of St. Margaret Mary Church in Apalachin (now part of Blessed Trinity Parish) from June 1983 to June 1999. In 2002, the then-pastor of St. Paul Church in Webster resigned amid allegations he sexually abused a teenager in the mid-1970s.

Eugene Emo, an associate pastor at St. Margaret Mary and St. Patrick in the 1960s and 1970s and chaplain at St. James’ Mercy Hospital in Hornell, pleaded guilty in 1997 to molesting a 30-year-old disabled man not connected to the Tioga County churches.

Allegations of misconduct by Francis H. Vogt was also reported by the local press and the Diocese acknowledged the accusations. Emo and Simon were removed from their ministry and Vogt has since died.

But allegations against five of the priests accused Wednesday had not been previously reported. They include:

Thomas J. Valenti

G. Stuart Hogan

Gary P. Shaw

Richard J. Orlando

Charles J. McCarthy

Valenti is listed as a speaker for the upcoming Priests, Deacons, Seminarians Retreat on June 18-22 as part of Steubenville Conferences, an outreach of Franciscan University of Steubenville in Ohio.

Garabedian said Valenti is accused of abuse beginning when he was a deacon and continuing into his priesthood at St. Mary's of the Lake Church in Ontario, New York.

A native of Rochester, Valenti was ordained a priest in 1976, served as an associate pastor at Blessed Sacrament church in Rochester and worked for many years as the director of vocations for the Diocese of Rochester, as well as serving at Holy Apostles Church in Rochester, St. Louis in Pittsford, Church of Notre Dame in New York City and St. John the Baptist Church in Yonkers, according to assignment records.

He also served as Catholic chaplain of Ithaca College, football team chaplain and director of the team’s community outreach for Columbia University.

Diocese Director of Stewardship and Communications Douglas Mandelaro said when, as with Valenti, the diocese receives notification of a claim, it conducts its own investigation, reviewed by an independent review board of experts in law, child protection, law enforcement and psychology.

G. Stuart Hogan served at St. James in Waverly, New York, from 1951-61, after his time at Sacred Heart Cathedral from 1924-31. He retired from St. Gregory Church in Marion in 1965, the time Garabedian said the allegations concern, and died in 1985.

Diocese officials said it has never received complaints of clergy sexual abuse of a minor against Hogan, Charles McCarthy or Richard Orlando, now all deceased; or against Gary Shaw, who served at St. Margaret Mary in Irondequoit from 1974-77, at which time he resigned and was "dispensed from the clerical state in 1978," according to the diocese.

Orlando served at a series of churches in Rochester, including St. Francis Xavier, Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, St. Anthony of Padua and Holy Rosary as well as St. Helen church in Gates. He retired from St. Michael in Lyons, Wayne County, in 1993 and died in 2006.

McCarthy was an assistant at St Bridget’s and Holy Rosary parishes from 1947 to 1960. He was serving at St. Andrew on Portland Avenue when he died in 1971. Garabedian said it was while McCarthy was at St. Andrew that he allegedly abused a child.

"Secrecy is what allows the clergy sexual abuse to continue" Boston, Massachusetts, attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who has represented thousands of victims of clergy abuse, asks the Diocese of Rochester to come clean about sexual abuse by priests.

Garabedian called on Rochester Bishop Salvatore Matano to release any records he has about allegations of sexual abuse against priests, including so-called "secret files," so the public can know who the accused priests are and what their supervisors did to respond to allegations.

"The question always remains how far up the chain did sexual abuse go, and how many supervisors allowed this sexual abuse to go on time and time again," he said.

Garabedian said the pattern of coverup left no doubt in his mind that the sexual abuse of children by priests was still happening in Rochester.

"We're dealing with an entity that has covered up sexual abuse for decades upon decades," he said. "There's no reason for them to stop now."

Garabedian was joined at Wednesday's press conference by Robert M. Hoatson, founder and president of Road to Recovery, a nonprofit organization that assists victims of sexual abuse and their families.

Hoatson, a former Catholic priest, echoed Wednesday the call for Matano to release any information he holds about allegations against local priests.

"If not for the 17 very courageous and harmed people who came forward, we would not be here today," Hoatson said. "And yet we have an entity here in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester with all the resources to make information available so that people can heal."

Also standing with Garabedian was James Faluszczak, a former priest in Erie, Pennsylvania, who is helping childhood sexual abuse victims in the Buffalo area. He said he was also a survivor of clergy sexual abuse and called for other victims to come forward.

Five Rochester priests accused of sexual abuse Mitchell Garabedian, a Boston, Mass. attorney who has represented over 3,000 victims of clergy abuse, announced the names of five Rochester priests who allegedly sexually abused 17 people over a period of 28 years that started in 1950.

"What I say to other victims is that you are not alone," he said. "Even if it may feel as though your soul has been murdered, you are not alone and there are people waiting to help you."

Garabedian said he has spoken to diocese officials, who have requested to have their own investigators speak to the alleged victims and possibly try to resolve the cases through arbitration or mediation.

He called the diocese response "callous, typical of the Diocese of Rochester and not pastoral in any sense of the word."

But the diocese said in a statement Wednesday that it "treats all claims of abuse most seriously and has done so for decades, long before the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops issued the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People in 2002." Included was a breakdown of the protocol followed when a claim is made.

"The diocese has invited participation in a process of investigation and resolution," Mandelaro said. "We have had little or no response."

Should a claimant agree to participate, according to the news release, Hon. Robert J. Lunn, a retired New York State Supreme Court justice who is a partner at Trevett Cristo, P.C. in Rochester, has been retained by the diocese to serve independently and review "all required documentation relating to the claim, evaluate the merits on a case-by-case basis and make a final decision regarding appropriate compensation for the victim."

"The diocese has agreed to accept his determination without appeal," Mandelaro said.

In a statement, Matano said: "I again wish to re-state to the victims and all the faithful my deep sorrow, regret and empathy for those who have suffered so grievously the sin of sexual abuse. I continue to offer fervent prayers for those who have been hurt and betrayed, and I ask all the faithful to join with me in these prayers."

History of priest abuse in New York

In June of 2012, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester published a list of priests who had been the subject of "credible allegations" of sexual abuse within the previous ten years.

In a column that accompanied the list's publication, then-Bishop Matthew Clark apologized to abuse victims and praised the efforts of the diocese to stamp out sexual abuse.

"I take this step to further the cause of openness and transparency in this critical issue, to create a resource and a checkpoint for any victim who might come forward, to assist the process of restoring trust and to help victims in their healing," Clark wrote.

Clark also promised to update that list "if and when any new credible allegations of abuse are presented."

More:Diocese of Rochester says no new priest abuse allegations here since 2012

More: Priest abuse spotlight shone on Rochester, too

From the Archive: D&C coverage of allegations of priest abuse

But nearly six years later, no new names have been added. The list at the diocese website has remained largely unaltered since its original publication on June 6, 2012.

In response to an inquiry from the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle last summer, Doug Mandelaro, a spokesperson for the Diocese of Rochester, said: "Since 2012, there have been no allegations against any other priests."

In an email response, Mandelaro also said that one of the four priests whose case was pending in 2012 has since died.

"The rest remain barred from any public ministry or duties of a priest and may not present themselves as priests," he said.

That claim comes against a backdrop of new allegations made across the state following the 2015 release of the film "Spotlight." It depicted a year-long investigation by the Boston Globe of sexual abuse by priests and attempts by church officials in that city to cover up that activity.

Video: How the Syracuse diocese will distribute funds The Diocese of Syracuse is establishing a settlement program for victims of clergy sexual abuse spanning decades, Bishop Robert Joseph Cunningham announced Wednesday.

The film brought renewed attention to how local dioceses handled allegations of abuse by their priests.

Matano, who succeeded Clark in 2013, sent a letter to parishioners shortly after the film opened. He affirmed his commitment to assuring that those problems would not reoccur, and that steps were being taken to be more proactive moving forward.

“The issue of sexual abuse of children by clergy and others in our Church has caused much pain, alienation from the Church, hardship and understandable anger,”

Matano wrote. "As the Shepherd of this Diocese, I will continue to work unceasingly to ensure that our parishes, schools and every entity connected to our Diocese are safe and holy environments for all.”

Since then, there have been new cases reported in almost every diocese in New York state, including Albany, Buffalo, Long Island, New York City and the Hudson Valley.

More: Syracuse Bishop: New settlement program for sex abuse victims

More: Law firm releases list of 27 NY priests accused of sexually abusing minors

In February, Bishop Robert J. Cunningham and the Diocese of Syracuse —which includes Broome, Chenango, Cortland, Madison, Oneida, Onondaga and Oswego counties — announced a settlement program funded by the diocese’s liability insurance fund for more than 70 victims of clergy sexual abuse in cases against about 40 priests, spanning decades.

It’s a program administered by mediators Kenneth Feinberg and Camille Biros, who have overseen clergy abuse compensation programs in three downstate dioceses.

In March, Jeff Anderson & Associates law firm distributed a list of 27 New York clergy members accused of sexually abusing minors, including eight who served in Broome County:

Robert A. Ours, who in 2014 was convicted of sending child pornography through the mail. Ours worked at Seton Catholic Central High School from 1990 to 2011.

Thomas F. Keating, who in the early 2000s was accused of sexually abusing four girls in the 1980s. Keating was removed from the ministry in 2004, and his case was sent to the Vatican. He worked at Seton Catholic Central High School in 1973.

Daniel W. Casey Jr., who served in Johnson City. Anderson & Associates' list does not make clear whether Casey served at the Church of the Blessed Sacrament or Blessed Sacrament School. Two civil suits in 1992 alleged Casey sexually abused three children in the 1980s.

Charles H. Eckerman, who served at St. Mary of the Assumption Church in Binghamton in 1985, was defrocked and sentenced to a "life of prayer and penance" in 2014 for allegations of child sexual abuse.

John F. Harrold was arrested in 1983 for allegedly sending child pornography through the mail. Those charges were dropped after he entered a treatment center. Harrold served at St. Catherine in Binghamton from 1979-80 and was the executive director of the Catholic Charities in Broome County in 1980.

Bernard Garstka, who served from 1954-58 at the Church of St. Ann in Binghamton and from 1959-60 at the Church of the Blessed Sacrament in Johnson City, was accused of child sexual abuse in two civil suits filed in the early 2000s.

James C. Hayes, who served at the Church of St. Mary in Binghamton from 1966-67, was permanently removed from the ministry in 2003 because of allegations of child sexual abuse.

John M. Zeder served at St. Ambrose Church in Endicott from 1955-59 and Seton Catholic High School, where he was the principal, from 1960-67. Zeder was accused in a 2003 civil suit of raping a woman between 1979 and 1981. The diocese said he had been permanently removed in 2003 because of allegations of child sexual abuse.

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