Philadelphia Civil Court

Monsignor who led clergy office to stand trial for abuse conspiracy ...

Clearing the way for what will be a landmark sex-abuse case, a judge ruled Friday that Msgr. William J. Lynn, former head of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia's clergy office, must stand trial on a charge of conspiracy to endanger the welfare of children.

Lynn, 60, is the highest-ranking member of a Roman Catholic diocese in the United States ever to face criminal prosecution over allegedly enabling and protecting abusive clergy.

The Philadelphia District Attorney's Office contends that Lynn recommended the assignments of priests he knew were accused of inappropriate behavior with minors, and helped them keep their histories secret. Lynn served as clergy secretary, primarily for Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua, from 1992 to 2004.

Common Pleas Court Judge Lillian Ransom also ruled Friday that Lynn would stand trial alongside three current or former priests and an ex-teacher charged with sexually assaulting two boys, then 10 and 14, in the 1990s.

Her decisions dealt a major setback to Lynn, whose attorneys had argued that he had broken no laws. They asserted that prosecutors had charged him under a 2007 child-endangerment law that went into effect three years after he left the clergy office to become pastor of St. Joseph Parish in Downingtown.

Ransom said prosecutors had found sufficient evidence that Lynn broke applicable laws. He is not charged with sexual assault of any minor, nor with assigning priests to intentionally cause sexual abuse.

In February, a Philadelphia grand jury recommended charges against Lynn and the others after a lengthy investigation into abuse claims by the two alleged victims.

One plaintiff, now 23, says he was shown pornography and orally sodomized by the Rev. Charles Engelhardt in 1998 while a 10-year-old altar boy at St. Jerome Parish in Northeast Philadelphia.

He also says that the Rev. Edward Avery, who lived at St. Jerome, approached him several weeks later, told the boy he had heard about his "sessions" with Engelhardt, and forced him to perform oral sex.

He further alleges that the following year, when he was a sixth grader at St. Jerome's parish school, teacher Bernard Shero offered him a ride home one day but instead took him to a park, where he sodomized and raped him and left him to walk home.

The other plaintiff, now 29, says the Rev. James Brennan, then a parish priest on leave, raped him in 1996 during a sleepover at Brennan's apartment when he was 14.

The practice in civil actions and proceedings in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, in the District Court and Court of Common Pleas for the city and county of Philadelphia, and in the courts of the United States

Philadelphia freedom, memoir of a civil rights lawyer

The district reports, containing cases decided in the various judicial districts of the state of Pennsylvania. v. 1-30, 1892-1921

Citizenship in Philadelphia

Pennsylvania county court reports, containing cases decided in the courts of the several counties of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania