Federal judge rules SNAP statements accusing St. Louis, Missouri, priest were false

A federal judge in the United States ruled that a group of sexual abuse victims made statements against a priest of the Archdiocese of St. Louis “in a negligent and reckless disregard for the truth,” according to the report. The ruling concerns the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP), which the court described as influential, and the priest, Fr. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang.

District Judge Carol E. Jackson wrote that SNAP failed to comply with a court order to provide details about the individuals who had accused Fr. Jiang of sexual abuse, which made it impossible to litigate the lawsuits against him. According to the court, SNAP’s statements “were false and that they did not carry out any investigation into the truth or falsehood of these public statements.” The court also stated that the defendants conspired to seek a conviction of Fr. Jiang on sexual abuse charges because of “a discriminatory spirit against the plaintiff based on his religion, religious vocation, race and national origin,” as reported by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Under the ruling, SNAP will have to pay the “reasonable expenses, including attorney fees” of Fr. Jiang.

In 2014, Fr. Jiang was charged with sexually abusing a child in a bathroom at a Catholic school in 2011 and 2012. Prosecutors dropped those charges the following year. Shortly afterward, Fr. Jiang filed a lawsuit for conspiracy and defamation against the child’s parents and SNAP leaders David Clohessy and Barbara Dorris. In the suit, he also alleged that police misled him on the basis of his religious and racial background.

On June 27, the judge ordered SNAP to provide detailed information about those who made the accusations, including emails, text messages and contact information. SNAP argued that the information was protected by a privilege for rape crisis centers. The judge held that no such privilege exists and said SNAP had made “repeated affirmations of a non-existent privilege,” even though alternatives had been proposed, such as protected drafting of the victims’ names or handing over information only to attorneys. SNAP said it had given the priest’s lawyers “hundreds of pages” of written documents.

SNAP also refused the judge’s order to produce all donation records it had received from the law firm Chackes, Carlson & Gorovosky, which handles cases of this kind. Clohessy said the firm had given donations to SNAP between 2005 and 2012, but that the organization did not know why the priest’s lawyers wanted that information. He said SNAP was concerned about “the ability of victims and alleged victims to report to abusers and be protected,” and told the Post-Dispatch that the lawsuit was intended to “make sure that an alleged victim, witness or complainant remains silent.”

Separately, Fr. Jiang had been accused of improper touching of a girl connected with St. Louis’ Basilica, where he had served for a time. Charges of endangering children and manipulating witnesses in that matter were dropped in 2013.

Source: Read the original report (translated from Spanish)