Once again I'll be quoting; this time out of the New York Post, and todays issue -13th-quote:

LET U$ PREY

Priest fleeced flock member for 500G: suit

By DAREH GREGORIAN

The Monsignor of an East Side Catholic church swindled an elderly parishioner out of $500,000 - including a $100,000 that he used to buy a luxury condo on the Jersey Shore, an explosive lawsuit charges.

Monsignor John Woolsey (right) allegedly betrayed the trust of Rose Cale, who died last year at the age of 88.

Now the executor of her estate, family friend Janet Naegele, has filed a suit against the Archdiocese of New York and the Pastor of St. John the Martyr Church over Cale's "unconscionable and reprehensible conduct" in draining away the devout Catholic's life savings.

Woolsey, "in his capacity as a respected and trusted spiritual leader of the Catholic Church, induced Rose ... to give him over $490,000 in cash and stocks during the course of three years," and "misappropriated for his own 'personal use' a portion of the $241,500 in charitable donations Miss Cale made directly to St. John the Martyr Church," Manhattan Supreme Court suit says.

"Woolsey exercised undue influence on Miss Cale and was able to manipulate her to his personal gain," the suit says.

When the representatives for Cale's estate confronted archdiocese officials about pastor's alleged wrongdoing, "the archdiocese absolved itself of any responsibility, claiming that Monsignor Woolsey was "an independent contractor," the suit says.

Woolsey, 66, could not be reached late yesterday. Joe Zwilling, a spokesman for the archdiocese, said he had not seen the suit and couldn't comment.

Cale, who lived on East 77th Street with her brother Frank, went to the East 71st Street church almost everyday in the 20 years before she died, and started going to St. John's in 1997, said her lawyer, Brain Caplan.

"From 1997 through 2003, Miss Cale attended Mass almost everyday at the church," and she and Woolsey saw each other at "at least three to four times per week," the suit says, adding that he gave her holy communion and heard her confessions.

She had "great trust and confidence" in him, and "over time, [he] interjected himself into Miss Cale's daily affairs of both a personal and business nature" - going with her on doctor's appointments and dining with her, the suit says.

In 1999, "Woolsey told Miss Cale about his 'hopes and plans' to purchase a condominium on the Jersey Shore" - and she gave him $100,000 from her estimated $1.2 million stock fortune to do so, the suit says.

He also started to advise her about her stock portfolio - convincing her to drop her broker of 20 years and use his brokerage firm - all the while telling her not to tell her friends and family what she was doing, the suit says. Later that year, he even had her "sign and transfer over various stocks into her portfolio to him personally" - with additional stocks going into "a joint account in both their names."

She also started paying for his personal expenses - and then hired his lawyer to write her will in 2000, which named Woolsey as her executor and sole beneficiary, the suit says. It left nothing to her 84-year-old brother, who had lived with her his entire life and who was getting by on Social Security payments, the suit says.

 In 2002, she "woke up and smelled the coffee," and changed her will, cutting Woolsey and the church out, Caplan said. After she died , Naegele asked Woolsey to return the money he'd gotten, the suit says. "Monsignor Woolsey refused this request and stated that he had only recieved in total $80,000 in stock and payment from Miss Cale and didn't see anything wrong with accepting " it, the suit says.

They later discovered it was far more. The suit seeks the return of the money, and Caplan said he hopes it will lead the church to put in place guidelines to ensure something like this doesn't happen again.

End quote; the caption script Quote:

Suit rips $ins of the father

HOLY CON-MUNION: Monsignor Johm Woolsey with benefactor Rose Cale, who worshipped daily at St. John the Martyr on East 72 Street (inset) and may have given him half a million dollars.

End Quote.

Everytime I try writing it comes out in a condescending manner, so I'm going to quote something. This caught my is earlier in the month; so to quote the Times Herald Record on the-7th-

Archdiocese becomes first to seek bankruptcy

Portland, Ore.- The Portland Archdiocese said yesterday that it will fill for bankruptcy because it can't afford to pay the potential cost of sexual abuse lawsuits, becoming the first Roman Catholic diocese in the nation to seek such relief.

The chapter 11 bankruptcy action freezes the start of a priest abuse civil trail involving the late Rev.Maurice Grammond, who was accused of molesting more than 50 boys in the 1980s. Grammond died in 2002.

Plaintiffs in two lawsuits involving Grammond have sought a total of more than $160 million. The archdiocese and its insurers already have paid more than $53 million to settle more than 130 claims by people who say they were abused by priests.

Dozens of other claims are pending, and at yesterday's news conference, church officials aid that they could not afford what the plaintiffs are asking.

"The pot of gold is pretty much empty right now," said archbishop John VVlazny, who warned parishioners last year in a letter that the archdiocese might go bankrupt.

James Devereaux, one of the plaintiff sin the lawsuit that had been scheduled to go to trail yesterday, vowed that in spite of teh announcement, "We will continue our fight to finally get the archdiocese to accept the sin of its crimes."

David Slader, a plantiffs' attorney, said the church was simply trying to avoid the details of the lawsuit coming out in court. "The bishop hasn't begun to touch  his pot. He is lying," Slader told reporters.

No other U.S. diocese has ever declared bankrupcy, according to Fred J. Naffziger, a buisness law professer at Indiana University.

Tom Stilley, the attorney handling the archdiocese's bankruptcy filing, also said it was the first such case, but added other dioceses are considering the same step.

Chapter 11 bankruptcy frees an orginization from the threat of creditors' lawsuits while it reorganizes. However, it could also open church records to public scrutiny, and could require church leaders to cede some control to courts.

End quote; the captions I'll have to figure later, but this is caption script Quote-

Norman Wicks Sr., right, who claims he was sexually abused by a Catholic priest as a child in Albany, N.Y., talks outside the Archdiocese of Portland yesterday as he and his son, Norman Wicks Jr., walk the sidewalk with a picket sign in Portland, Ore., while the archdiocese announced that it will file for bankruptcy.

Archdiocese of Portland Archbishop John Vlazny gestures yesterday as he answers questions during a press conference in Portland Ore. Vlazny announced that the Portland Archdiocese will file for Chapther 11 bankruptcy in the face of dozens of pending cases accusing Roman Catholic clergy of sexual abuse.

End quote.