A California man is suing the Vatican, claiming that a Catholic priest sexually abused him for years when he was a teenager, and demanding that all clerical predators in the Church be outed by name.
The accuser is asking that the names of sexual abusers in more than 3,400 credible cases be released, and that the names of clerics found guilty of abuse be revealed to law enforcement.
“The problem is at the top, and until the problem is addressed at the top, it will continue,” the man’s attorney, Jeff Anderson, said.
The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in California federal court, alleges that Father Fidencio Silva-Flores sexually abused the man between 1979 and 1984, when he was a teenager. The accuser, now 52, settled with the Archdiocese of Los Angeles in 2007, but his lawyers still want the Vatican held accountable.
The suit further alleges that the Vatican allowed Silva-Flores to be in a position of authority at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in Oxnard, near Los Angeles, knowing that he was a threat to minors. In 2003, 25 charges of sexual abuse against Silva-Flores were dropped due to a Supreme Court ruling that the statute of limitations had expired.
“Defendant Holy See’s practices of retaining, hiding and concealing evidence of crimes of its agents and former agents has endangered numerous children and continues to put children in peril,” the suit reads.
The new suit comes as the Church deals with a mounting sexual-abuse crisis stemming from allegations that go back more than 50 years. Even the Pope himself has been accused of covering up the abuse of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, who was demoted and sentenced to a life of secluded prayer and penance in June.
The Vatican has repeatedly refused to release files containing the names of priests who have been accused of abuse.