On Monday, documents pertaining to the sexual abuse-related charges lodged against several senior church members and employees in the Archdiocese of St Paul and Minneapolis revealed that the a former auxiliary bishop is aware that sex abuse on children is a crime, Buzzfeed reported.
In a 1984 letter to then archbishop John Roach of St Paul and Minneapolis archdiocese, 69-year-old Robert Carlson, who is now archbishop, discussed the case of one sex abuse victim and the statute of limitations regarding the lawsuit. The document, which was released by law firm Jeff Anderson & Associates, revealed that Carlson mentioned that the statute of limitations for filing a claim will not expire for over two years. The letter also indicated that Carlson had wrote to the parents of the victim, who were considering to file a report to the police regarding the sexual abuse incident.
St. Louis Pst-Dispatch said that the law firm had taken Carlson's deposition as part of the sexual abuse lawsuit filed in Minnesota against Reverend Thomas Adamson.
In the deposition, Anderson asked Carlson about an alleged sexual abuse incident by another priest in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. Referring to a 1987 church memo, he asked, "But you knew a priest touching the genitals of a kid to be a crime, did you not?"
Carlson said yes.
Last month, Buzzfeed said Carlson testified in a case involving a lawsuit about the Minnesota Archdiocese and the Diocese of Winona not disclosing information on priests who have sexually abused minor patrons. Carlson himself is facing a clergy abuse lawsuit along with over a hundred priests and church employees of the Archdiocese of St. Louis for the fact that he served as an archbishop there since 2009.
Spokesman Gabe Jones for the Archdiocese of St Louis said in a statement about insinuations on Carlson's contradictory claims, "While not being able to recall his knowledge of the law exactly as it was many decades ago, the archbishop did make clear that he knows child sex abuse is a crime today. The question does not address the archbishop's moral stance on the sin of pedophilia, which has been that it is a most egregious offense."
