Fairstein, Linda - Silent Mercy

“And abuse of alcohol?”

“Yes, certainly. Those came to me.”

“So sexual abuse was the only parish problem that was not under your jurisdiction.”

“Those weren’t my words, Ms. Cooper.”

“I guess we can have your testimony read back, Bishop. I believe you said that oversight of such allegations wasn’t part of your duties as vicar of the archdiocese.”

A less enthusiastic smile this time. “I suppose I should say there were no records of any such misconduct, so nothing came to my attention.”

“Well, sir, were there written records of any sexual abuse allegations in this diocese during your tenure?”

“Written, Ms. Cooper? Specifically, written?” He was speaking to me but looking to the judge as though for help.

“Exactly.”

“No need for that. No need for anything in writing.”

“Why not, sir?”

Bishop Deegan tapped the side of his head with his arthritic forefinger. “Because I kept all that sort of thing up here, Ms. Cooper.”

“In your head?” I said. “Let the record reflect that the bishop is pointing to his head while speaking.”

“Precisely.”

“And neither you nor anyone else in a position of authority in the Archdiocese of New York thought it necessary to make any formal record of such complaints?”

“Why should it be necessary, Ms. Cooper? They trusted me, of course.”

I glanced at Judge Keets to see whether he was as unimpressed with that answer as Barry and I seemed to be, but his expression was glacial.

“By the way, Bishop Deegan, how many parishioners are there in this archdiocese?”

“Two and a half million, young lady.”

“And you keep it all up here, is that correct? Every complaint and allegation?”

“Objection,” Enright said. “She’s just getting argumentative with the witness.”

“Sustained.”

“Then let’s move on from these files,” I said, tapping my own forehead.

The bishop reached for the paper cup of water. I didn’t know whether the tremor in his hand was related to his health or was a reflection of his discomfort. “I’d like to do that. Where to, Ms. Cooper?”

“I’d like to discuss the secret archives of the church.”

“The what?” Judge Keets asked, over the shouted objection of Sheila Enright. “Is there such a thing, Bishop Deegan?”

The bishop didn’t answer the judge.

“There are indeed secret archives, Your Honor,” I said. “I’d like to inquire about them.”

“I’VE given you some scope, Alexandra, because there’s no jury here,” Keets said, pushing his readers to the top of his head as Enright, Donner, and I stood at the bench. “Would you mind telling me what these secret archives are?”

“I’d also like to know,” Enright said.

“I’m sorry if you didn’t do your homework, Sheila, but this goes to the heart of the matter. They’re church records, and I believe I’m entitled to inquire about them.”

“Do they have anything to do with this defendant?”

“Certainly.”

“She’s just fishing, Your Honor,” Enright said. “You can’t let her do that.”

Keets turned to the bishop and asked him to step down, letting the court officer lead him away as our voices raised beyond a stage whisper.

“You think what this man has said is credible?” I asked, trying to keep some semblance of respectability in the tone of my voice. “Every diocese in this country has been rocked by these scandals. The settlement numbers are over four billion dollars now, and at least six dioceses have had to file for bankruptcy. They’re closing down churches and parochial schools all over the country. Parishioners in the poorest communities are suffering, and it’s primarily because of the failure of the Mother Church to confront this issue for more than fifty—fifty—years.”

“That’s not my client’s fault.”

“I’m well aware of that, Sheila. But Deegan has been part of the problem. Philadelphia, Your Honor, and Boston, for example, are places typical for the kinds of reports that are involved. Their diocesan personnel files show that more than seven percent of the priests in their cities had been accused of abusing children in the last half century. At least seven percent. And you know what the numbers are in New York?”

Keets lowered his glasses and made notes as I talked. “Go on.”

“One point three percent. The lowest in all 195 dioceses in the country.”

“How fortunate for the children of New York,” Enright said with obvious sarcasm.

I couldn’t think of the legal term of art for the word “bullshit.” “That’s absurd and you know it. It’s totally artificial.”

“Ladies, ladies. Let’s not have a catfight,” Keets said. “What reason would you offer for that, Alexandra?”

“Two things, Your Honor. First is that our numbers are ridiculously low because we have the most restrictive statute of limitations of any state. There are many, many more reports, but they aren’t legally viable because the complaints came in too late.”

“You mean that in most jurisdictions, the reporting can be done for a period of time after the youths have attained majority?”

“Yes, sir. That’s so very logical. Most minors don’t have the knowledge or wherewithal to take on the church at such a young age. So the statutes have been extended. And secondly, we’re the only city in which prosecutors have been denied access to the chancery’s records.”

“There are no chancery records here,” Enright said. “Didn’t you listen to the bishop?”

“Isn’t it lucky that Deegan hasn’t been hit by a bus, Sheila? Or lost his head?” I said, thinking of the body I had seen just hours earlier. “Fifty years of unholy acts right out the window, ’cause the only place they were tracked in the entire archdiocese is in the bishop’s eighty-year-old cranium. That’s what the secret archives are about.”

Barry and I had piqued Lyle Keets’s interest. “Step back, ladies. I’ll let you run with this a bit, Alexandra.”

Enright was practically frothing at the mouth as she continued to object. “But — but Ms. Cooper is going way beyond—”

“I’ve heard enough, Ms. Enright,” Keets said, pointing a finger at her. “Will you resume your seat, Your Grace?”

I waited until the bishop arranged himself in the wooden chair and looked at me. “Would you explain to the court, sir, what the secret archives are?”

Deegan frowned and paused for an objection, but none followed.

“Am I correct that this diocese has such archives?”

“Yes, Ms. Cooper. It’s a canonical requirement that every diocese has them,” Deegan said, now turning his body toward the judge. “The ‘secretive’ designation really means only that certain documents are set aside, Your Honor. Historical papers, if you will, that relate to the founding of the diocese and such things. It’s not as mystical as it sounds.”

“If one of your colleagues were to receive a complaint about a priest’s misbehavior?…”

“What kind of misbehavior, madam?”

“Any kind. Liturgical or theological,” I said. “Even sexual. Anything deleterious to a priest’s reputation or career. Would that complaint be written up for the secret archives, in addition to being stored in your memory bank?”

Whatever these archives held, it was obvious that Deegan thought I was prying open Pandora’s box. He didn’t want to answer any questions.

“Sorry?” he said, leaning forward to better hear me, I thought.

But he was drawn to the opening of the courtroom door behind me, so I turned to look as well. A man entered alone, his dark hair slicked back, disappearing behind his long neck into the scarf he wore. It looked as though he had on a clerical collar beneath his winter coat. He was wearing sunglasses, which made it difficult to discern his features, but his skin was such a ghostly shade of white that it seemed he hadn’t been exposed to daylight in ages.

I repeated my question, shifting position so that I could follow the spectator’s movement. He seated himself in the next to the last row behind Denys Koslawski — the groom’s side of the aisle, as Mike liked to call it. It seemed as though Bishop Deegan nodded at him, almost imperceptibly.

“No, Ms. Cooper. Nothing like that exists in the secret archives of this diocese.” Each word was delivered with emphatic confidence.

“Would it be possible, sir, for me to examine those—”

“Objection, Your Honor. Did I say this was a fishing expedition, or what?”

“Sustained, Ms. Enright.”

What I couldn’t get one way I would try to do another. I would be permitted to continue my cross if the candor of the witness himself were at issue, as I believed it to be. “Are you aware, Bishop Deegan, of how many claims of sexual abuse in this diocese were settled out of court?”

“I’m afraid I cannot say.”

“Because that information is not ‘up here’?” I asked, mimicking his motion of tapping the side of his head.

He snapped back a reply. “Because there are things called confidentiality agreements in such lawsuits, Ms. Cooper.”

“Yes, of course, Bishop Deegan. So then you are aware of the claims?”

“Objection!”

“Sustained. Ms. Cooper,” Lyle Keets said, clearly growing annoyed with my line of questioning.

“For what reason, Bishop, did Denys Koslawski leave the diocese?”

His trembling hand reached for another sip of water. The lone spectator stood up and moved a few rows closer to the front of the room. The dark glasses hid his expression from me and blocked his features, but his skin seemed rough with angry red blisters on one cheek.

“Do you recall?”

The bishop’s voice was softer now. “It was a medical dismissal.”

“Medical?” I asked, trying not to show my surprise. I liked to prep my cases with a nod to the axiom that advised not asking a question to which one didn’t know the answer. I wasn’t expecting this one.

“Entirely that,” the bishop said, picking up his head with renewed satisfaction and smiling at Koslawski — or the man who had come in to observe.

“And what condition might that be?” I asked as the Mike Chapman voice that often played in my brain despite my best efforts to keep it at arm’s length was laughing and repeating the word “priapism”—the persistent, painful erection of the penis.

“Objection. Mr. Koslawski’s health condition is privileged.”

“Hardly, Judge. The bishop was not his physician.”

“I’ll allow it. Go ahead and answer, Your Grace.”

“Hepatitis. Denys suffered from hepatitis, which required a lengthy period of hospitalization and recovery.”

“And did you ever hear, Bishop Deegan, that Father Koslawski — before suffering this medical setback — had invited a teenage boy to his room in the rectory and engaged him in oral sex?”

“No, I certainly did not.”

“And would you agree with me, sir, that such conduct would not only be ‘improvident,’ to borrow a phrase from you, but that it would also be illegal?”

He closed his eyes and answered, “Yes.”

“Are you aware of where Mr. Koslawski went when he left this diocese?”

“In hospital, as I recall. Out of state.”

“Isn’t it a fact that he was transferred first to another diocese in the Midwest?”

Deegan seemed to look for the answer in the light fixture high above his head. “I don’t remember that.”

“Do you recall that one of your colleagues asked him to sign a document requesting laicization?”

“No.”

“But if that were a fact — if such a document existed — it would be in the secret archives of the New York diocese, would it not?”

“Slow down, Ms. Cooper,” Judge Keets interjected, lifting his fountain pen from his notebook to refill it. “For the record, Your Grace, why don’t you tell us what laicization is?”

“Certainly. It is the act of reducing a priest to the lay state, Your Honor. Relieving him of his duties.”

“And that would be within your power to do?” Keets asked.

“Indeed it would. There are certain authorities in the Catholic faith that a priest has — to preach, to minister the sacraments, to say Mass, and so on. I’m able to suspend him from those acts.”

“And are you aware that one of your colleagues performed that suspension in regard to Denys Koslawski?” I asked.

“I… was. . not.” Deegan shifted in his chair as he spoke a firm answer.

“Did you ever correspond with Father Koslawski while he was in New Mexico?”

“I did not.”

“Did you know he stayed for a period of time at the Via Coeli in that state?”

“I don’t recall.”

I fingered a piece of paper — a copy of a letter Koslawski had written to the bishop many years ago.

“What is Via Coeli?” Keets asked. “Do you mind letting me in on this?”

“A church-run facility,” the bishop answered, responding more politely to the judge than to me.

“I see,” Keets went on. “For medical treatment, for his hepatitis?”

“No, Your Honor,” Deegan had lowered his head. “It’s a monastery.”

“A monastery of sorts, wouldn’t you say?” I asked. “Bishop Deegan, is it more accurate to describe Via Coeli as a facility to which priests accused of sexual abuse — priests whose deeds were recorded in secret archives, or in the deep recesses of your brain — were sent?”

“Yes.” The bishop gave me another quiet yes. “They were transferred there for a good reason, Ms. Cooper. For rehabilitation.”

“Are you aware, Bishop Deegan, that most professionals in the therapeutic community don’t believe that there is any kind of rehabilitation that is effective for sexual predators, most especially for child molesters?”

“Objection,” Sheila Enright said. “Your Honor, this is a hearing. It’s not a bully pulpit for Ms. Cooper’s views on sex offenders.”

“Sustained. That objection is sustained. Move on, Ms. Cooper. I’ve given you plenty of latitude.”

“Yes, sir. Well, if you didn’t correspond with Denys, Bishop Deegan, do you recall receiving any mail from him?” I said, raising my copy of the old letter.

The heavy doors creaked open again. I leaned against the railing at the jury box and looked back to see Pat McKinney, the chief of the trial division and my archnemesis in the bureaucratic structure of the office. Although he wasn’t one of my regular supporters, he made his way to the front of the room and seated himself behind me, on the bride’s side.

“No, I don’t.” Deegan’s eyes narrowed and he glanced from the first visitor, dragging his line of sight like the cursor on a computer across the aisle to McKinney.