Posted on 05/17/2002 5:43:08 AM PDT by Dr. Scarpetta
The Archdiocese of Boston turned former priest Paul J. Mahan loose on the public in the mid-1990s after he had been diagnosed as a ``sociopath'' and a ``threat to adolescent males,'' according to documents released yesterday.
In a sign of just how sick therpists deemed Mahan, doctors at St. Luke Institute in Suitland, Md., expelled him as hopeless in 1995 - kicking him out of a hospital that has specialized in treating clergy with severe sexual disorders.
At least one plaintiff alleges he was raped by Mahan at a home on the North Shore soon after the priest was discharged by the archdiocese without a warning to civil authorities or former parishioners.
``They released a sexual predator into the Marblehead community and did not warn a soul,'' said Joseph G. Abromovitz, a lawyer suing the church and Mahan on behalf of two of the ex-priest's nephews, both of whom claim he raped them from 1993 to 1995. ``My clients were told Mahan was on a routine sabbatical when he was in fact being treated for incurable pedophilia,'' Abromovitz said.
Mitchell Garabedian, the lawyer who won the release of Mahan's personnel file, and represents 11 of his accusers, made two of the documents available yesterday after Superior Court Judge Constance M. Sweeney ordered that the archdiocese hand over the records.
Garabedian said he would review the full file before commenting in detail, but added: ``These psychiatric characteristics obviously are of some concern.''
The latest documents unveiled in the Roman Catholic Church abuse scandal include a summer 1995 evaluation from the Southdown treatment center in Ontario, Canada, a facility where now-defrocked pedophile John J. Geoghan was also shipped by the church.
The Southdown report states that Mahan's ``behavior has been aggressive and intrusive and in some instances predatory.'' Therapist Michael John Sy wrote Mahan acknowledged his ``high risk for re-offending'' against children.
But more damning information is contained in a September 1995 letter, also released yesterday, in which the Rev. Brian M. Flatley, then a top archdiocesan official handling sexual abuse matters, argued that Mahan should be dismissed from the priesthood. There had been eight sexual misconduct allegations against Mahan, ``a number of them involving more than one child,'' Flatley wrote.
Flatley cites an incendiary series of evaluations from St. Luke covering Mahan's two separate visits there - one in 1994, a second that spanned late 1994 and early 1995 - that made clear he was a predator.
Upon being discharged after his first 1994 visit, Flatley wrote, Mahan ``immediately lapsed into his pattern of predatory behavior.''
A therapist there concluded ``there was a real question about Father Mahan's ability to tell the truth,'' Flatey's letter states.
After Mahan was sent back to St. Luke for a second time, Flatley wrote, Mahan's therapist telephoned to say he was recommending the priest leave the facility.
``It was his judgment that Father Mahan was not able to be helped at St. Luke Institute and perhaps not anywhere,'' Flatley wrote in a letter to Rev. Richard G. Lennon, one of Bernard Cardinal Law's top aides. The therapist ``is convinced that Father Mahan is exhibiting the symptoms of a sociopath,'' Flatley continued. ``He is a dangerous person. He is a threat to adolescent males.''
In addition to being a chronic liar in therapy - ``he has a lapse of memory whenever there is a victim involved'' - Mahan also misled therapists by saying he had stopped drinking when in fact he had not, Flatley wrote.
At the very time church officials were exchanging the damning assessments, they stood by as Mahan ended his priestly career and moved unfettered to Marblehead.
Mahan later relocated to Arlington, Va., where he worked at a Radio Shack near two elementary schools until earlier this year.
Repeated efforts by the Herald to reach Mahan, including visiting his Virginia apartment building in March, were unsuccessful.
His lawyer, Martin Cosgrove, had fought to keep the psychiatric data away from Garabedian and other plaintiffs' lawyers. Attorneys for the Boston Herald and other media argued in court that the Mahan papers, like the Geoghan files, should be publicly filed.
Flatley concluded his 1995 letter by writing that Mahan should be allowed to leave the priesthood, lest he ``be a source of scandal to the people.'' Garabedian's plaintiffs, including William and Paul Oberle of Boston, allege they were abused by Mahan between 1969 and 1982 at St. Ann's in Dorchester and St. Joseph's in Needham.
What about the role of bishops and cardinals?
I have to admit I had similar thoughts about the priest at a funeral recently. I know it's not fair to the decent clergy, which is why the church needs to release the records without subpoenas.
Many, many homosexual men are sexually attracted to teenage boys. Some can resist this temptation and some cannot. Given that, teenage boys should NOT be placed under the authority and supervision of homosexual men, either in the Catholic Church or in Boy Scouts. If the Catholic Church insists on having a huge homosexual representation among its priests, they should adopt the Boy Scout policy: no priest alone with a boy, ever, and all boys in the Catholic Church should be warned about potential homosexual molestation, just as in the Boy Scouts. That would be prevention - rather than just waiting for the damage to be done and then (if they get around to it) doing something.
You don't need a truth serum. Many of them demonstrate this every day.
Then you have knowledge of Bella Dodd's testimony before the House Unamerican Activities Committee in the late forties,early fifties,wherein she testifies that the Communist party had placed over 1000 young men in seminaries in Western Europe and the United States. This infiltration had taken place from the twenties to 1942 at which point I believe she left the Party. This certainly goes a long way in explaining much of the cause of this scandal.
In order to control man it is necessary to destroy his belief in a transcendent God and therefore it is imperative to destroy a channel to that God. Since the Catholic Church,established by Jesus Christ to carry that message over time and space to God's children on earth,was the largest institution carrying the message it was targeted for destruction. It is a just a series of baby steps from no faith to no truth to no life.I think that is why the Pope argues so eloquently for the Culture of Life which is what the Church offers,as opposed to the Culture of Death,which is what the world offers.
This is the sad thing. My wife and I and our kids will probably not live to see this.
Since they want to continue in sin its easier to change the words of the gospel,teach error rather than truth,focus on a community meal rather than the eternal sacrifice and in all ways seek to form a god to their liking.This of course leads to excactly what we now have,a big scandal because of man's disobedience driven by his appetites and abetted by the modern world which says "you can have it all".
I am with the many of these threads that say,no matter how much it hurts the boil has been lanced and it must be drained and disinfected. I believe this is going to bring forth a great reawakening in Christianity in the world and I am looking forward to it.The faster the better.
In addition to being a chronic liar in therapy - ``he has a lapse of memory whenever there is a victim involved'' - Mahan also misled therapists by saying he had stopped drinking when in fact he had not, Flatley wrote.
Mahan isn't the only one having a "lapse of memory whenever there is a victim involved."
Law has to go!
Not even remotely. The truth or falsity of the unchanging teachings of the Catholic Church is in no way called into question by the evil misbehaviour of men who have openly and flagrantly disregarded those teachings. Indeed, that such open and flagrant disregard has resulted in grave scandal simply reinforces the truth of the teachings. Does your Holy Orthodox Faith approve of buggery? I didn't think so.
AB
I don't know about that. Seems like a few "Vaticancides" have been taking place lately. Like that priest "apparently" hanging himself at St. Luke's Hospital for Reprobates.
Can't. Christ only established one Church.
Besides, corruption amongst the Apostles wasn't unknown during Jesus' time, if you know what I mean.
It is so silly for anyone to use the corruption often found in the Catholic Church through the centuries to slyly insinuate that perhaps it is the Church that is the problem. It's not,it's us.And those who believe in the Truth as taught through the centuries by the Church need to again work to cleanse it of the corruption that frail humans with prideful notions of their own omnipotence and omniscience create.
Absolutely. The truth the Church has always taught is unchanged. But respect for that truth has fallen into a squalid pit.
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