The Prisoner-Priest Behind These Stone Walls

By Ryan A. MacDonald

A wrongly convicted priest fights back from his prison cell, and teaches a lesson in fidelity and Catholic witness in the toughest of public squares.

On October 13, 2005, Catholic League President Bill Donohue appeared on NBC’s “Today” show to square off against a panel of contingency lawyers promoting lawsuits alleging sexual abuse by priests.  In the heated debate, the lawyers and litigants painted the Catholic Church and priests with a broad brush as evil, lecherous offenders.  But Bill Donohue had the last word, and it was the most memorable sound bite of the day:

          “There is no segment of the American population with less civil

            liberties protection than the average American Catholic priest.”

              

Bill Donohue was referring specifically to the case of Rev. Gordon MacRae, a priest of the Diocese of Manchester, New Hampshire, who by that point had spent eleven years in prison for crimes that a growing number of people believe never occurred at all. What caught Bill Donohue’s attention was “A Priest’s Story,” (April 27/28, 2005) a two-part series on the MacRae case by Dorothy Rabinowitz, a Pulitzer Prize winning investigative journalist on The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board.

Father Gordon MacRae is 58 years old.  Last September he marked 17 years of a life sentence in prison, but if he had accepted any of the “plea deals” offered to him before his 1994 trial, he could have left prison after only one or two years.  This is what makes this case such  “a Kafkaesque tale,”as the Rev. Richard John Neuhaus described it.  If guilty and willing to say so, Fr. MacRae could have left prison fifteeen years ago.  For insisting he is innocent, this priest may spend 67 years in prison for claims – prosecuted with no evidence or corroboration at all – alleged to have occurred almost 30 years ago.

  

At a time when many Catholics reeled over the scandal in the Catholic Church, Dorothy Rabinowitz took a hard look at the facts of the case of Fr. Gordon MacRae – facts that the rest of the news media distorted or conveniently omitted. The result was a disturbing account of greed, false witness, and, as Father Neuhaus described it in First Things magazine (July, 2009) “a Church and a justice system that seem indifferent to justice.”

The Wall Street Journal series caught the attention of some civil liberties experts and lawyers troubled by the case, and an investigation is near completion.   It has revealed some remarkable evidence of fraud and larceny – and Church officials all to eager to accommodate both – but no evidence whatsoever that the claims against this priest might be true. It is hoped that resources will be raised to bring a new appeal in the case of Fr. Gordon MacRae in the not-too-distant future. 

In the meantime, this priest has been writing from the confines of his prison cell, and what he writes truly warrants the Church’s notice.  Sitting in his cell on an empty plastic bucket in front of an old Smith Corona typewriter, Father MacRae has produced some remarkable writing about the scandal of the last decade, about the Church in Western Culture, about fidelity, false witness, and prison itself.  His typed articles are mailed to a supporter in Indiana who scans and e-mails them to Australia from where they are posted on-line. 

It’s the most arduous cyber-process even, but the amazing result is These Stone Walls an eye-catching, conscience-grabbing blog that is both riveting and spiritually uplifting.  This blog’s fidelity to the Church, and to the truth, has been deemed by many to be the finest example of priestly witness the last decade of scandal has produced.

In November 2005, The Catholic League journal, Catalyst, published the first of two major articles by Fr. Gordon MacRae about the scandal in the Catholic Church.  “Sex Abuse and Signs of Fraud” was a well-researched account of how some have taken advantage of the Church’s scandal to score windfall settlements based on fraudulent claims.  The article made its way to the late Cardinal Avery Dulles who wrote to the imprisoned priest:   

           
 "Your article is an important one, and hopefully will be followed by many others. 
Unfortunate though your situation is, you are in a position to carry on an
 effective  apostolate on behalf of unjustly accused priests.
The time is bound to come when the tide will shift and even the bishops will be
ready to hear the priests' side of the story. The change will come, but not before
the public is prepared for it by articles such as yours. Your writing, which is clear, 
eloquent, and spiritually sound, will be a monument to your trials." 

It seems that tide is indeed shifting.  These Stone Walls was recently honored by Our Sunday Visitor’s “2010 Readers’ Choice for the Best of the Catholic Web.”  In recent months, These Stone Walls has been noticed in The Catholic World Report, Catalyst, The Catholic Response, Homiletic & Pastoral Review, and has become a growing presence in the important arena of evangelism and Catholic commentary on the World Wide Web.  The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights has highly recommended These Stone Walls to its members.  

These Stone Walls and Fr. Gordon MacRae’s defense are endorsed and sponsored by the National Center for Reason and Justice , a Boston-based organization whose board of lawyers, journalists, and wrongful conviction specialists examined and unanimously approved the case of Father MacRae for sponsorship.  These Stone Walls is also endorsed by numerous civil liberties and wrongful conviction organizations and websites.

Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of These Stone Walls is what is not found there. The Lord has accomplished within this priest exactly what Cardinal Avery Dulles predicted.  These Stone Walls portrays articulately a spirituality for the wrongly imprisoned, and it does so with grace, dignity, and a challenge to all of us to seek justice upon the high road.  An example is this closing paragraph from Fr. MacRae’s recent, superbly written three-part series, “When Priests Are Falsely Accused.” His blog post challenged one accused priest who responded to his own plight with anger and vindictiveness:

        
“It’s ironic that this priest is often angry with me because he doesn’t think I am angry enough.  
I assure you, he is wrong on that score.  But being angry and feeling let down does not excuse
me from doing the right thing.  It does not excuse me from fidelity to the Gospel, fidelity to the Church, and fidelity to my own sense of right and wrong.  At the end of the day, I am still 
wrongly imprisoned, but I have the freedom to choose the person I am going to be while
wrongly imprisoned.”

No priest should be required to sacrifice his life to satisfy the demands of lawyers, insurance companies, and a rabid news media feeding on scandal.  The case of Rev. Gordon MacRae opens a new chapter in the story of scandal in the Catholic Church.  Have a long, hard look at These Stone Walls for a story of faithful priestly witness in the toughest of public squares.

A Compelling New Book : Catholic Priests Falsely Accused

“In 2002, the Diocese of Manchester, New Hampshire, faced accusations of abuse from 62 individuals. Rather than spending the time and resources looking into the merits of the accusations, Diocesan officials did not even ask for specifics such as the dates and allegations for the claims. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it,’ a pleased and much richer plaintiff attorney admitted.” (Catholic Priests Falsely Accused, p.80).

Thus is told the chilling tale of how decades-old claims of abuse by Catholic priests become “credible” to torte lawyers who score windfall profits from every claim, and Church officials cowered by a scandal-hungry media and the tactics of vigilante “victim” groups. Catholics disheartened by the sordid scandal of sex abuse in their Church would do well to read this well-researched account of how the Church’s tragedy was hijacked by contingency lawyers and others with nefarious agendas of their own. David F. Pierre tells the sordid story the mainstream media won’t touch.  It rings of both truth and justice.

Being very familiar with the trial of one falsely accused priest whose case is explored in David Pierre’s book, I marvel at the depth of his research and skill in telling this disturbing story. In succinct and lucid style, the personal accounts in Catholic Priests Falsely Accused leave the reader with some nagging questions:  How did the mainstream media fail to notice and report the extent of obvious fraud that took place in more recent years in the Catholic scandal?  Why did entire groups of self-described victim advocates, like SNAP, turn a blind eye to this fraud and blatantly deny its existence?

David Pierre goes on to answer these questions, and the answers are part of the horror of this story.  Mr. Pierre here exposes the sordid agendas of news media personnel looking to disparage the Catholic Church and “advocates” who have been transformed from the advocacy of victims to that of contingency lawyers, their ultimate masters.  As I have pointed out in other venues, “Greed ranks right up there with lust among the Seven Deadly Sins.” I highly recommend Catholic Priests Falsely Accused:  The Facts, The Fraud, The Stories.

Related link: A Book Every Priest Should Read:  Catholic Priests Falsely Accused. 

(Ryan A. MacDonald is a Spero News columnist, and an occasional contributor to These Stone Walls) 

Rev. David L. Deibel, J.D., J.C.L., An Advocate for Truth and Justice

By Ryan A. MacDonald


Canonist, Fr. David Deibel has endured unjust criticism as an advocate for Fr. Gordon MacRae at These Stone Walls and Fr. Frank Pavone at Priests for Life.

The Rev. David L. Deibel, J.D., J.C.L. is a respected and deeply committed Catholic priest with training and expertise in both civil and canon law. As such, he has proven to be a great asset to the U.S. Catholic Church throughout the last two decades of scandal and cultural upheaval.

Many Catholic priests who are accused of wrongdoing have found themselves without the benefit of solid canonical advice and advocacy to their own detriment and the detriment of the entire Church. Some canon lawyers with whom I have spoken are reticent to advocate for priests accused in decades-old sexual abuse claims because they say some U.S. bishops have themselves discarded observance of many of the tenets of canon law that provide for due process for priests accused. This has been especially so since the enactment of the Dallas Charter adopted by the United States Conference of Bishops in 2002.

The Charter and its much nuanced "zero tolerance" policy came as a result of the bishops' invitation to SNAP members to address the conference. It was, in effect, the sole voice the bishops heard as they embraced what many now believe to be a panic-driven policy that summarily discards the rights of priests and inflicts great harm on the relationship of trust between priests and their bishops.

For the moment, however, the American Catholic church has to live with this policy. Let me be clear here that the concerns I raise for both its efficacy and its fairness are mine and not Father David Deibel's. But he is left with some of its wreckage, and a part of that has been his unqualified and courageous canonical defense of a Catholic priest who I and many others have determined was falsely accused. For 18 years, Father Deibel has helped to preserve this man's rights under Church law when far too many in our Church were prepared to discard those rights.

A number of prominent writers have drawn that same conclusion, not least among them Dorothy Rabinowitz, the Pulitzer-Prize winning investigative journalist for The Wall Street Journal who authored "A Priest's Story" in 2005. This gripping two-part series blew open the doors of judicial and prosecutorial tyranny that resulted in the 1994 witch hunt trial and conviction of Father Gordon MacRae. In that series, Dorothy Rabinowitz commended Father David Deibel, the sole Catholic official to tell the truth when the rest of the Church and court system was willing to settle for "a negotiated lie" in their condemnation of a priest, but with no evidence or corroboration whatsoever.

This is why the late Father Richard John Neuhaus referred to the MacRae case as reflecting "a Church and a justice system that seem indifferent to justice." The problem for nearly everyone involved in that debacle of a trial is that Father MacRae did not just go quietly into the night. He has been writing, and what he writes has captured the attention of fair-minded Catholics everywhere, and others willing to hear another side of the sordid story of sex abuse and unquestioned monetary settlements that have been its driving force in more recent decades. In "A Voice in the Wilderness," an article for Catholic Exchange earlier this year, I wrote of These Stone Walls:

"Sitting in his cell on an empty plastic bucket in front of an old Smith-Corona typewriter, Father MacRae has produced some remarkable writing about the scandal of the last decade, about the church in Western culture, about fidelity, false witness, and prison itself...The amazing result is These Stone Walls, an eye-catching, conscience-grabbing blog that is both riveting and spiritually uplifting. This blog's fidelity to the Church, and to the truth, has been deemed by many to be the finest example of priestly witness the last decade of scandal has produced."

If that is the truth - and I believe it is - then Father David Deibel's advocacy for Father Gordon MacRae, and his recent advocacy for Father Frank Pavone and Priests for Life is the second finest example of priestly witness the last decade of scandal has produced. It takes great courage to stand up for the truth, but even greater courage to stand up to an institution grown too complacent about compromising truth and justice. I shudder to think of the fate of these two priests without the canonical advocacy of Father Deibel in the current climate.


The Wall Street Journal commends Father David Deibel for the courage of his advocacy. So does The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, and The National Center for Reason and Justice. So do the many thousands of readers drawn to These Stone Walls and Priests for Life on a daily basis.

The Church owes a great debt of respect and admiration for the work of Father David Deibel, an advocate for Father Frank Pavone and Father Gordon MacRae, and for Church law itself. There is a far more expert opinion on the matter of this dauntless pursuit of truth and justice, and I defer to it.

Click here to read: "The Duty of a Priest: Father Frank Pavone and Priests for Life"

A Touch of Deja Vu: The Case against Rev. Gordon MacRae

by Ryan A. MacDonald



Whatever you think about the guilt of Catholic priests accused over the last two decades of the Church's sex abuse scandal, this short post may alter that view. I won't do your thinking for you or tell you what to conclude. Some things just speak for themselves. Pay a little attention to the details and look for common denominators, and then sometimes a light just goes on in your mind. This may be one of those times. Read the following citations from the story behind the story in the case against imprisoned New Hampshire priest, Father Gordon MacRae, then draw your own conclusions.

On the evening of November 14, 1988, a transcript of an episode of the "Geraldo Rivera" Show was faxed from its studio to the Keene, New Hampshire office of Detective James McLaughlin. The title of the show was "The Church's Sexual Watergate." I have a copy of the transcript indicating the date and origin of its transmission and a discovery number identifying it as part of Detective McLaughlin's "investigation" file. Here's an excerpt:

Source: "The Church's Sexual Watergate," Geraldo Live: 11/14/1988:

Geraldo: "What did the priest do to you, Greg?"

Greg Ridel: "Around the age of 12 or so, he and I went to a YMCA. And I was an altar boy at the time. And the first time I was ever touched, he began stroking my penis with his foot in a hot tub, I believe it was, at the YMCA. From there it went to what you might call role playing in the rectory where the priests live."

Shocking stuff! Jump ahead about a year and a half. Keene, NH Detective Jim McLaughlin has an interview with "Todd," a young man about to bring a lawsuit accusing a Catholic priest who was in the area several years earlier. Here's an excerpt of that police report:

Source: Case No. 90035705 Dated 06/06/1990, p. 006:
“Father [Stephen] Scruton was a regular at the YMCA.
Todd went to the YMCA with Father Scruton ••• When they did arrive they decided to use the hot tub. Todd showed me on
a diagram where he and Father Scruton were seated. At one point Father Scruton took one of his feet and placed it between
Todd's legs and rubbed his genitals ••• The touching was intentional and not a mistake. A rubbing motion was used by
Father Scruton ••• I asked Todd where he stood on civil lawsuits."

Now jump ahead another year and a half. Detective Jim McLaughlin has another interview with another young man from Keene about to file another lawsuit against another Catholic priest. Here's an excerpt of that police report:

Source: Case No. 93010850 Dated 08-27-1992 p.004:
"When Jonathan Grover was twelve or thirteen years of age he would spend nights in the Keene rectory . . . After racquetball
at the YMCA Father MacRae would have Jonathan Grover take a whirl pool with him and at times Father Scruton would join
them. It was during these times that Grover would be seated in the whirlpool and both Father MacRae and Father Scruton
would be joined in conversation and they would alternate in rubbing their foot (sic) against his genitals. Grover was unsure
if the priests were acting in concert or if they were unaware of each other's actions."

If the above three accounts were written by novelists, two of them would surely be accused of plagiarism. But that's not the only problem with that third account. Jonathan Grover was twenty-three years old when he sat in Detective McLaughlin's office allegedly relating this story. I write "allegedly" because, contrary to his own policies and protocols, the detective did not create a single audio or video recording of this or any interview in the entire MacRae case. We don't know who related what to whom.

What we do know, however, is that Father Gordon MacRae was never assigned to the Keene parish where these things were claimed to have happened until Jonathan Grover was fourteen years old. Father Scruton was never assigned to the Keene Parish until Grover was sixteen years old. Yet all three are there in that hot tub when Grover was twelve, just like the kid in the “Geraldo” transcript.

Strangely, another refutation of the third YMCA hot tub account above comes from “Todd,” the claimant in the second account. He revealed that at the times all these events were claimed to have occurred, he was a sixteen-year-old employee of the Keene YMCA, and says the YMCA’s strictly enforced rules would have barred Jonathan Grover from any use of the YMCA hot tub until he was sixteen years old.

In subsequent reports, Detective McLaughlin wrote of giving Grover a copy of Father MacRae’s resume “to help him with his dates.” Father Scruton was never mentioned again. By the time this case was over, Jonathan Grover had $195,000.00 in his pocket provided in settlement by the Diocese of Manchester with no corroboration of the account. When Father MacRae objected from his prison cell, he was simply dropped as a defendant giving him no standing to object.

The mysteries do not end there. About a year and a half after Detective McLaughlin wrote that third report describing a simultaneous sexual assault of Jonathan Grover by two priests, Fathers MacRae and Scruton, the detective responded to a question under oath:

Question: “Have you ever had a conversation with Rev. Stephen Scruton regarding Gordon MacRae? If so, please indicate
the date of the conversation(s) and provide a copy of your report(s) of the conversation(s).”

Answer: “On occasion, I have had conversations with Reverend Stephen Scruton, however I have no recollection of ever
discussing any actions of Gordon MacRae with the Reverend Scruton.”

The discrepancies in the above account of claims against Father Gordon MacRae are typical of this case. There's a lot left unexplained. One of MacRae's accusers, for example, was "an employee" of Detective McLaughlin "in a family-owned business" at the time he accused the priest. But a closer examination of the file reveals that this accuser never actually went to the detective at all. It was the other way around, and what served as probable cause for this detective launching a child sex abuse investigation was - are you ready for this? - a rumor that Father MacRae had once given the 15-year-old boy a ride home from school. According to the detective’s 1988 report, this alone “pointed to possible pedophilic activity on the part of MacRae.”

Armed with his suspicion, the detective interviewed twenty- six present and former teenaged acquaintances of the priest.
Not one would accuse him. Then, finally, the detective interviewed Jon Plankey, his employee, who supplied what the detective wanted. First, he claimed, MacRae had attempted to solicit 15-year-old Plankey for sex. Then, months later, he added that MacRae also took lewd photographs of him.

The photographs were never found. The photographs were never even looked for. Nothing in the case file indicates that the detective did anything at all to corroborate or refute the young man's claims about photos. Questioned a dozen years later by a Wall Street Journal reporter, however, the detective admitted, "there was never any evidence of child pornography."

The detective's police report omitted a few other important details as well. Before accusing Father MacRae, Jon Plankey also accused a county employee of soliciting him for sex. Then he accused a Congregational church choir director of soliciting him for sex and taking lewd photographs of him. Then he accused another man of soliciting him for sex.

He finally hit pay dirt, however, when he accused a Catholic priest. Jon Plankey has repeatedly declined to be interviewed or to answer any questions about this case, but his brother seemed eager to talk. He says the entire Plankey claim was a fraud brought for settlement money.

The above accounts are not the only such stories defying credibility in the case against Father Gordon MacRae. There are other accounts with even bigger holes than the above. Most alarming has been the role of the New Hampshire news media and victim advocacy groups like BishopAccountability. The above discrepancies have been hiding in plain sight for years, but New Hampshire seems not to have any news venue with the means or the will to investigate beyond what is fed to them by police and prosecutors.

The people at BishopAccountability have been quick to post on their website all the dirt they could find about Father Gordon MacRae. However, they have been entirely unresponsive to my repeated requests that they also publish reports I have investigated and researched - reports that directly refute information BishopAccountability staff has previously published without any attempt at corroboration. In other words, these victim "advocates" have the story they want. Nothing else is necessary.

For more information on the troubling case against Father Gordon MacRae, I invite you to read the following links:
"Should the Case Against Father Gordon MacRae be Reviewed?"
"Truth in Justice: Was the Wrong Catholic Priest Sent to Prison?"
"How Psychotherapists Helped Send An Innocent Priest to Prison."
"To Azazel: Father Gordon MacRae and the Gospel of Mercy."

To Azazel: Father Gordon MacRae and the Gospel of Mercy

By Ryan A. MacDonald


"Aaron shall lay his hands on the head of the live goat and confess upon him all the sins of the people of Israel. The goat shall bear all their sins to a solitary place in the wilderness - to Azazel." (Leviticus 16:21-22; 28)

From his cell in the New Hampshire State Prison, Father Gordon MacRae wrote a letter awhile back to a priest of his diocese asking for help with a few questions about a parish where they once both served. The priest’s answers could have helped with a legal effort to revisit the wrongly imprisoned priest’s case. Though Father MacRae’s letter to his brother priest was courteous, it was also cautious, and for good reason.

During the nearly 17 years Father MacRae has been in prison, the Diocese of Manchester has had both public and private faces in his regard, as well as a pre-2002 disposition and a post-2002 disposition. One needs a scorecard to keep track. For years, the diocese has vaguely insisted that the imprisoned priest, through unnamed third parties, refused contact with other priests despite their efforts to be supportive. MacRae just blankly stared when asked about this. The response of the priest to whom he recently wrote, however, reflected the more private, post-2002 demeanor of MacRae's diocese. Written on church stationery, the priest's reply was chillingly brief: "I can't help you, and don't see the necessity of entertaining any further correspondence."

A few years earlier, Father MacRae wrote to another New Hampshire priest who published an op-ed article calling for a change in canon law so that accused priests can be administratively laicized by their own bishops - a sort of ecclesiastical equivalent of lethal injection. It took a degree of courage for the imprisoned and thoroughly vilified Father MacRae to write to that priest asking for an opportunity, from the point of view of the accused, to present a case for why the canonical rights of priests must be protected in these typically decades-old claims. Father MacRae's letter came back to him unopened, and placed in a larger envelope with a terse note attached: "Communications with you are neither prudent nor welcome.”

A year later, an interested writer traveled from Washington to visit Gordon MacRae in prison. When the planned visit was derailed because of an unannounced change in prison visiting rules, the writer instead attended Mass at a Catholic church near the Concord, New Hampshire prison. After Mass, the writer asked the priest if he had ever visited Father MacRae in prison. Reportedly, the priest's demeanor changed instantly. "You should stay away from MacRae," the priest said. "He can't be trusted. He abandoned his faith and has no interest in seeing the bishop or other priests." When asked if he had ever even met Father MacRae, the local priest admitted that he had not. Asked the source of his opinion, he said it is common knowledge in the diocese.

There are other examples, mostly of unresponsive silence from the priests in his diocese to whom Father MacRae has written over the years - with two brief but graceful exceptions. But even those replies seemed in no way to appreciate the reality - the utter, inexcusable scandal - that Father MacRae has been in prison for almost 17 years just 15 miles from the Chancery Office of his diocese, and yet he has never been visited by a priest of his diocese. Long time prison chaplain Russ Sweeney now retired, refuted the impression that MacRae refused visits from other priests:
"I have been told by priests that Diocesan officials claimed Father MacRae refused, through unnamed third parties, to be visited by any priest. During my ten years as [prison] chaplain, no one in the Diocese of Manchester ever asked me to arrange a visit with Father MacRae who often expressed bewilderment at the lack of contact. It remains my belief that Father MacRae is for some reason viewed differently from other priests who have been incarcerated."

Why he is viewed differently is unknown, and if Father MacRae himself knows, he isn’t saying. Those who know him say that throughout his ordeal he has declined to say or write a single word criticizing his bishop or fellow priests in public. The only apparent difference between the MacRae case and three other New Hampshire priests who have been in prison - and the fifty others who have been accused - is that Father Gordon MacRae is the only one who has maintained that the claims against him were a fraud. He is serving a sixty-seven year sentence imposed after he three times refused a "plea bargain" in which he was offered a sentence of one to three years.

It should be noted that Bishop John McCormack used to visit Father MacRae once per year, his last visit being a spontaneous 15-minute meeting after an Advent Mass at the prison four years ago. Bishop McCormack does not respond or responds "unresponsively," to most of MacRae's mail. A few years ago the imprisoned priest wrote to his bishop and to the New Hampshire Attorney General asking for information about the process by which communications he thought were privileged ended up published on-line.

The Attorney General responded with a detailed explanation. She insisted that all Diocesan files were obtained as a result of a Grand Jury subpoena, and that under state law Grand Jury files are confidential. “The Diocese had to waive confidentiality, and did waive confidentiality, for the priests’ files to be published.” Bishop McCormack did not respond at all to MacRae’s inquiry, and that seems to be the point at which all visits and communication ceased.

The previous Bishop of Manchester, the late Bishop Leo O'Neil, never even met Father MacRae during the five years that his tenure overlapped with the priest's imprisonment. Auxiliary Bishop Francis Christian has not seen or spoken with Father MacRae since before his trial seventeen years ago.

The demeanor of the two Manchester priests, who responded as they did to Father Gordon MacRae's letters, though certainly not reflective of the Gospel, might even be understandable to the more vindictive among us if MacRae’s bishop and diocese indeed believed him to be guilty. That is by no means clear, however. Documents released by the diocese and the state as a result of a 2003 agreement with the New Hampshire Attorney General - the first of its kind in the nation - reveal significant doubt, and much duplicity, about the matter of Father MacRae's actual guilt. At the time they wrote those memos, church personnel clearly did not anticipate that the memos would ever see the light of day.

In a 2001 confidential memo to Bishop McCormack, diocesan attorney Bradford E. Cook wrote: "There were certainly imperfections in the judge's handling of [MacRae's trial]." In regard to the actual claims against Father MacRae he wrote: "Whether it was all trumped up or totally manufactured is impossible to know .... That it was embellished is clear.” The diocesan attorney cited that a number of other priests where Father MacRae served were also accused - some by the same people who accused MacRae: "It is impossible to discount that one or more of them may have been involved with one or more of [MacRae's accusers]."

In another confidential 2001 memo, diocesan Chancellor Rev. Edward Arsenault noted that errors occurred in MacRae's trial, and cited the unfairness of the diocese's refusal to assist him with an appeal forcing him to rely on a public defender for his only remaining hope for justice. Arsenault recommended that the diocese deal with the matter of funding an appellate defense for MacRae by coming up with a remedy for "the lack of base remuneration" from the diocese as required by Church law. On the very verge of these Church officials finally stepping to the plate to help their priest, the 2002 national scandal implicated Bishop McCormack and cast Father Gordon MacRae back into the abyss.

Two persons, a New Hampshire attorney and a former television news producer, have attested under oath that in 2000 Bishop McCormack told them of his belief that Father MacRae is innocent of the claims for which he is in prison, then demanded secrecy, saying, "None of this can ever leave this room."

After spending ten years providing spiritual counseling to prisoner Gordon MacRae behind bars, former prison chaplain John Sweeney wrote to a Church official in 2004:
"Father MacRae has consistently put the perceived needs of the Church and priesthood above his own. I remain
concerned that Father MacRae may not have fully defended himself because he feared compromising other priests and
Church officials."

Guilt or innocence is irrelevant to mercy. The sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic priesthood was the result of a blatant, widespread failure of fidelity and leadership. It was a failure by bishops to discipline their priests and to protect the most vulnerable among us according to the laws of the Church. It was a failure by priests to engage in fraternal correction as they are bidden by Scripture and the Church. It was a failure by some priests to put the needs and well-being of the Church's citizens above their own. It was a failure of the institutional Church to place integrity and justice above image and the status quo clerical culture with its, at best, opaque machinations.

Now here we are some nine years and over two billion dollars later, and the failures of our spiritual leaders are now compounded by a failure of mercy, a failure to live courageously the mandate of the Gospel of Mercy. In a defensive missive to Rome, Bishop McCormack wrote that he and the diocese would risk public ridicule if they helped Father Gordon MacRae. So be it. If bishops and priests are so prepared to abandon their own, what hope is there in the Church for any of us?

The pretense in New Hampshire that Father Gordon MacRae is somehow the poster priest for abuse is absurd. With but a few heroic exceptions, the conduct of priests toward their accused brothers in prison - some of whom are guilty and some apparently not - has been appallingly self-serving and scandalous. Our Church deserves better stewardship of the Gospel of Mercy.

Hebrews 13:3 exhorts us to, "Remember those who are in prison as though in prison with them." The two priests who responded to their imprisoned brother’s letters by throwing them back in his face - and others who have scapegoated the accused among their brothers - need a long, reflective retreat. They have brought scandal upon the faithful.

***


(Ryan A. MacDonald’s commentaries on the priesthood scandal have been published in Homiletic & Pastoral Review, Catholic Exchange, Catholic Lane, These Stone Walls, and other venues.)

HOW PSYCHOTHERAPISTS HELPED SEND AN INNOCENT PRIEST TO PRISON

By Ryan A. MacDonald



Therapists should be held professionally and civilly liable when they promote junk science to help convict innocent men.

On September 23, 1994, Rev. Gordon MacRae, a New Hampshire Catholic priest, was convicted of raping a male counseling client more than a decade earlier. At the time of Fr. MacRae’s trial, accuser Thomas Grover was 28 years old. His core testimony was simple. Grover stated that, in 1983, he sought MacRae out for counseling for his drug addiction in the months preceding his 16th birthday. He claimed that during each session he was berated, made to cry, and then forced to submit to oral sex in a Church rectory office. His claim that these events occurred during counseling sessions enhanced the charges to five counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault. When asked by defense counsel why Grover, at almost age 16 – being 5’ 11 and weighing in excess of 180 pounds – would return from week to week after having been raped, Grover answered, “I don’t know – I repressed it.” When the defense pressed for an explanation, Grover said, “I had out of body experiences; I don’t remember how I got there.”

During this remarkable testimony, a woman in the spectator section of the court was taking copious notes. She wasn’t with reporters in the press section. When defense counsel approached her during a break, she identified herself as “a student interested in the trial.”

Following Thomas Grover’s testimony, the prosecution was permitted to call to the stand an expert witness, Leonard Fleischer, Ed.D., whose role was purportedly to “educate” the jury about Child Abuse Accommodation Syndrome, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and “delayed reporting.” His description of PTSD included a reference to “out of body experiences” even though, as a witness, he was not present during Thomas Grover’s testimony. During the trial, however, Dr. Fleischer was seen in a restaurant with the “student” who had been taking notes during Grover’s testimony.

Thomas Grover also testified that between ages 15 and 27, he was treated in six drug abuse treatment centers, the first being Beech Hill Hospital in New Hampshire. Dr. Fleischer then testified that he had once been a therapist at Beech Hill Hospital, and “in my experience 70% to 80% of the males who had been treated at Beech Hill Hospital were sexually abused.”

On appeal, the State conceded that this uncorroborated statistical testimony by Dr. Fleischer should not have been allowed. The state appellate court agreed, but determined that it was “harmless error beyond a reasonable doubt.” In post-trial interviews with jurors, several stated that their verdict was swayed solely by Dr. Fleischer’s testimony. One juror said she voted for guilty because she watched the defendant carefully during the trial, “and he did not look remorseful.” The jury never heard that this trial came after MacRae’s rejection of the State’s plea offer of a sentence of one to three years. He rejected this offer twice before trial and again following Thomas Grover’s testimony. After the trial, he was sentenced by Judge Arthur Brennan to a term of up to 67 years – more than 20 times the maximum of the State’s proffered deal.

PAULINE GOUPIL, M.A.
Far more troubling was the role played in this trial and its aftermath by psychotherapist Pauline Goupil (now working under the name of Pauline Vachon), M.A. As defense counsel Ron Koch (pronounced “Coke”) stood at the defense table to cross-examine Thomas Grover, Mr. Grover turned in protest to the judge. This 28-year-old, 220 lb. man complained that he did not want to see the defendant during the trial and therefore could not answer Mr. Koch’s questions if he stood in the middle aisle by the defense table. In apparent disregard of the Constitutional right of defendants to confront an accuser at trial, Judge Brennan ordered defense counsel to cross-examine Thomas Grover from a position in the court as far from the defendant as possible.

Later, during a break in the trial, an observer approached the defense attorney. The issue, she said, had nothing to do with the lawyer standing near the defendant. The observer pointed out the presence of a woman seated with spectators on the center aisle. The observer reported seeing that woman influence Thomas Grover’s testimony using hand signals. The observer pointed out that defense counsel had been blocking Grover’s view of her when he was standing near Father MacRae during cross examination.

The observer claimed that when defense counsel asked Mr. Grover to explain to whom he first brought his sexual abuse claims, the police or a contingency lawyer, Thomas Grover looked directly at the woman seated at the center aisle at which point she gestured with her index finger over her eye and down her cheek. Grover, the observer said, then began to sob uncontrollably causing the judge to declare a recess. The observer pointed the woman out, and defense counsel approached her.

The woman identified herself as Pauline Goupil, M.A., Thomas Grover’s therapist. The defense approached the bench, the jury was dismissed for the day, and Pauline Goupil was ordered to the stand. Ms. Goupil testified that she had been retained by Thomas Grover’s contingency lawyer, Robert Upton, to counsel Grover throughout the trial and keep him “clean and sober.” Ms. Goupil stated that she had a practice specialization in treating victims of sexual abuse and assault.

For an entire afternoon, Pauline Goupil, M.A. testified about her role, and vehemently protested defense attempts to obtain her file. Pre-trial, the defense moved for copies of all of Thomas Grover’s treatment records, but few were available and the defense was never told of Grover’s on-going treatment with Pauline Goupil.

In the end, the judge ruled that he would conduct an in-camera review of Ms. Goupil’s treatment file which she was ordered to produce the next day. She was then barred from the court for the remainder of trial. The presence of Ms. Goupil, and the matter of her giving Grover hand signals during his testimony, was never heard by the jury and the defense counsel did not move for a mistrial.

Pauline Goupil’s file was submitted that day for in-camera review. In it was a letter from Ms. Goupil to Thomas Grover in which she chastised him for not showing up for her sessions, and assured him:
“I have good news. Jim [Keene, NH sex
crimes detective James F. McLaughlin] told me that MacRae is being offered a plea deal he will have to accept. So
there will be no trial. We can just move on with the settlement phase.”

Neither the letter, nor Pauline Goupil’s coaching of Thomas Grover’s testimony ever became known to the jury.

Once Pauline Goupil’s role in the case was known, however, Thomas Grover was put back on the stand. He testified that Ms. Goupil arranged for him to be drugged before his testimony, and that was why he could not remember specifics. Thomas Grover claimed that part of the residual effect of the abuse he suffered was chronic unemployment due to his emotional state. He was asked by defense counsel how – since he could not hold a job – could he afford weekly therapy with Ms. Goupil. Grover stated, “She worked something out with my lawyer. She’ll be paid after the settlement.” Earlier in his testimony, Grover denied having any awareness of plans to sue the Catholic Church.

Pauline Goupil had just three years earlier obtained a B.A. in psychology from “The School of Lifelong Learning,” and an M.A. in counseling from Antioch College in Keene, NH where Leonard Fleischer, Ed.D., was a faculty member and mentor. Months after the trial ended and Fr. MacRae was sentenced to prison for life, Pauline Goupil was seen in the prison visiting room by the same observers who reported her hand gestures during trial. She was visiting her son who, five years earlier, was convicted at age 19 of multiple charges of serial rape for which he is serving a lengthy sentence. Her son’s convictions came just a few years before Pauline Goupil began a practice specialization in treating victims of sexual assault.

Two years after Gordon MacRae’s criminal trial, Pauline Goupil (now working under the name of Pauline Vachon) offered extensive testimony in a lawsuit against the Catholic Church brought by Thomas Grover and his brothers. Her testimony was in support of Grover’s attempt to defeat the state’s three-year statute of limitations on tort actions by claiming, successfully, that the statute of limitations should begin to toll only when a victim becomes aware he was injured and makes a causal connection with abuse.

Toward that end, Pauline Goupil testified that Thomas Grover’s particular version of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder caused him to “suppress” all emotional awareness of the abuse he suffered, and caused him to forget many crucial details of that abuse until his pre-trial treatment sessions with her.

From the 1996 testimony of Pauline Goupil, M.A.:

Q: Now, one of the ways that a person avoids trauma is inability to recall important aspects of the trauma?

Ms. Goupil: Yes.

Q: That’s not true in Tom’s case is it?

Ms. Goupil: Yes, it is true.

Q: Didn’t he tell you all about this trauma?

Ms. Goupil: He told me some incidences of trauma, but there were some details that were very relevant that I heard when I was sitting in court that he had never spoken with me about that he could remember. One of the symptoms of [PTSD] is that the person forgets information that is really quite relevant to the trauma.

Q: How do you know that he forgot these things?

Ms. Goupil: The point [is] that a person who suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder will forget relevant information, meaning that it’s relevant to the trauma that they experienced, but they will remember irrelevant information.

Q: Tom remembered this trauma, isn’t that right?

Ms. Goupil: Parts of the trauma.

Q: Is it fair to say that, as you understand it...that he did not forget any aspect of what happened to him that he had reported to you?

Ms. Goupil: He did forget some aspects of what happened to him.

Q: No. That he had reported to you.

Ms. Goupil: Your questions are very complicated.

Q: All right. Let me start again...It was apparent that he had always remembered the things that he told you?

Ms. Goupil: No, that is not apparent.

Q: Okay. Tell me. Did he say, “I just remembered these.”?

Ms. Goupil: Yes.

Q: And what did he say that he just remembered?

Ms. Goupil: I can’t tell you any specific memory because all the memories are just sort of there, but he would come into a – I can’t name a particular session – I would have to consult the file – where he would say...you know, something happened and I just remembered it.

Elsewhere in the 1996 lawsuit transcript, Pauline Goupil testified about her diagnosis of Tom Grover:

Q: ...Now did you review your records in the time that you were away about the number of visits that you had with Tom?

Ms. Goupil: Yes.

Q: ...And what’s the total number?

Ms. Goupil: Twenty-eight.

Q: And those sessions each lasted about an hour in the usual course?

Ms. Goupil: Fifteen minutes.

Q: And the diagnosis you made was when? At the end of the line? At the beginning?

Ms. Goupil: At the beginning. It usually takes two or three sessions to make an assessment.

Q: You said you gave him a dual diagnosis?

Ms. Goupil: Yes.

Q: One thing I heard was Post Traumatic Stress Disorder?

Ms. Goupil: Uh-huh.

Q: The other problem?

Ms. Goupil: Substance abuse. In remission.

Q: ...So, now we’re talking about PTSD, and you’re diagnosing it with regard to someone who has had a sexual experience.

Ms. Goupil: That’s correct...In 1980 PTSD was taken out of the battlefields and brought into the battlefields of persons who have been abused because the symptomatology was very obviously similar to people who were returning from war.

Q: ...Would you say psychotherapy is an art, science, or both?

Ms. Goupil: My degree is a Master of Arts so I guess it’s probably an art.


Author's note: During an ongoing investigation of this matter, Thomas Grover and Pauline Goupil declined to be interviewed or to answer any questions relative to the case of Rev. Gordon MacRae.

Pornchai Moontri at the Narrow Gate

By Ryan A. MacDonald






"The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior." I was once very disappointed to hear a judge say that as he imposed sentence on a young man in his court. Imagine being known and judged for the rest of your life solely for the worst mistake you have ever made, with no hope for atonement or restoring your name.

In the 1980's and 1990's, the balance between rehabilitation and punishment shifted in American prisons and courts. Sentences grew longer - much longer - and the path out of prison became far steeper. Former U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger once wrote:

"We must accept the reality that to confine offenders behind walls without trying to change them is an expensive folly with short-term benefits - winning battles while losing the war."

Justice Burger was right. The current rate of incarceration in the U.S. is almost five times the world average. But should everyone who is in prison remain in prison? Is punishment, and not redemption, all we can hope for?

Last year, the Catholic Church welcomed Pornchai Moontri into a life of faith. On September 10th, 2011 Pornchai will turn 38 years of age. Exactly half his life - 19 years - has been spent in prison. At the age of 18, Pornchai committed an act of violence that took a man's life. It was not what he set out to do. For the next thirteen years in Maine's prisons, Pornchai was locked away and labeled as beyond redemption. He responded accordingly. Pornchai was locked in a high security cell for 23 hours a day because he could not, or would not, control the rage that burned within him. After thirteen years with a dismal prison record, Pornchai was transferred to a New Hampshire prison. The story of what happened next is well told, and you should read it for yourself. It is simply amazing! (see "Pornchai's Story" under "Commentary").

Three years ago, the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights published "Pornchai's Story" as "The Conversion Story of 2008." It got a lot of notice. Pornchai received many comments about his journey to faith including personal letters from Cardinal Michai Kitbunchu, the Archbishop of Bangkok, and from the United States Ambassador to the Holy See as well as the late Father Richard John Neuhaus, among others. "Pornchai's Story" was reprinted in Thailand andat an online site on prayer and conversion here in the U.S. The response to his story was remarkable, as is the path that brought him to this point in his life.

When Pornchai Moontri was sentenced at age eighteen to 45 years in prison, the judge cited her belief that Pornchai had "many opportunities" in the United States to "turn his life around." Anyone who reads "Pornchai's Story" is left to wonder exactly what those opportunities were. If the judge knew the entire story of Pornchai's life up to the point at which he committed his awful crime, it is doubtful that she would have characterized his life in terms of "opportunity."

But the judge did not know the whole story, and still doesn't. Justice will one day require that Pornchai stand before a human judge again, and with an advocate who will present the entire truth. That day is, hopefully, not too far away.

In the meantime, Pornchai has stood before a far greater Judge, and the result is simply extraordinary. In the last five years, Pornchai has enrolled in and completed programs in Interpersonal Violence, Commitment to Change, Anger Management, Victim Impact, Life Skills, and others. He has been awarded certificates for over 600 hours of post-secondary education in Culinary Arts, Computer Sciences, and advanced mathematics. He has taken every course in mathematics that the prison Education Department has to offer. Pornchai is rather modest about his giftedness in math, a skill he generously uses to tutor other inmates. Math is the most common obstacle for inmates trying to obtain their G.E.D. high school equivalency diplomas.

One young inmate wrote in a letter in Pornchai's prison file:

"I had been unable to pass the G.E.D. math exams and pretests. I just could not understand the math. For almost three
months, Pornchai Moontri worked with me several hours per week. Today I received my G.E.D. grade report: I got a 500
in math and passed all the others for a total score of 2630. I never in my life believed this would be possible. I have my
G.E.D. today because of Pornchai Moontri.”

Pornchai has also been cited twice by prison officials for his volunteer work as a mentor and teacher in a prison program for young, first time offenders called Fast Track. Pornchai developed and implemented a challenging physical fitness curriculum, and personally led the inmate participants in twice per day endurance routines. These young men admired and respected Pornchai who had an enormous influence on them. When others in prison were recruiting young inmates for gangs, Pornchai was teaching them math, helping them build self-confidence, and speaking openly with them about his path to redemption. Pornchai now spends his spare time studying the Catholic faith to which he is preparing to commit himself. He completed an excellent ten-part correspondence course in Catholic studies sponsored by the Knights of Columbus, and is now enrolled in theology courses at Catholic Distance University. His grade point average for his first two university level theology courses is 98%.

I asked Pornchai Moontri if he understands the moment at which his life changed course so radically. It wasn't the company he keeps these days, or the thanks he receives for his service to others. It wasn't the letters from prominent people, or his becoming aware of his giftedness in math. It was hearing the Word of God. Specifically, it was hearing Matthew 7:13:

"Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide, and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter it
are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few."

The Gospel that we Catholics hear Sunday after Sunday left Pornchai thunderstruck. He said he now asks himself every day and in everything he faces, "What is the Narrow Gate for me?" This Gospel passage planted a seed sown by God Himself in the depths of Pornchai's soul. No human could have accomplished within Pornchai what God has accomplished. Pornchai was called upon to change, and the change was fundamental in his very core.

We who welcome Pornchai to a life of faith also agonize with him. When his prison sentence is over, he will be punished yet again. Like all who have committed crimes on U.S. soil, he is ordered to be deported to his native Thailand from which he was taken at the age of eleven in 1985. Pornchai also spends his days studying Thai, a language he never learned to read and write and one he hasn't heard spoken for 25 years. Pornchai hopes to seek some clemency from his remaining sentence so that he may go to Thailand at an age at which he can still build a life. His atonement, he says, is to be a life of service to others. Is our country beyond mercy? No number of years or decades in prison can restore the life lost through Pornchai's crime. However, he clearly is no longer that young man driven to despair. It is time for the justice system to revisit justice.

Pornchai has chosen the name "Maximillian" as his Christian name. It is a name I have read before on These Stone Walls. It permeates the very cell where Pornchai lives, and has profoundly influenced his world. Pornchai Moontri has fallen into the hands of the Living God.