A sixth lawsuit in North Dakota accusing a former religion teacher at Fargo Shanley High School of molesting a teenage boy in the 1970s was filed on Tuesday.
By: Dave Roepke, INFORUM
A sixth lawsuit in North Dakota accusing a former religion teacher at Fargo Shanley High School of molesting a teenage boy in the 1970s was filed on Tuesday.
Kevin Price alleges in a complaint in Cass County District Court that in 1978, as a student at Shanley, he was sexually assaulted by Brother Raimond Rose on what he said were school-sponsored trips.
Patrick Noaker, a lawyer from St. Paul who is representing Price and five other plaintiffs in the North Dakota cases, said the accusation mirrors the earlier ones ? an assault in an out-of-town hotel room after Rose supplied a male student with alcohol. The assaults are alleged to have occurred in Bis-marck and near Jamestown, N.D.
It marks the 19th sexual-abuse lawsuit filed against Rose. In addition to the six North Dakota cases, lawsuits are filed in Minnesota, Wisconsin and California. The 20th will be filed in a few days, accusing Rose of sex abuse at a juvenile correctional facility in Red Wing, Minn., Noaker said.
Price?s lawsuit lists Rose, Fargo?s Catholic Diocese, Shanley and the Christian Brothers of the Midwest, a Catholic religious order of which Rose was a member, as the defendants.
Rose, who was a religion teacher at Shanley, hasn?t been charged with a crime related to the claims. In the earlier cases, he?s declined to respond to the allegations by citing his rights to avoid self-incrimination.
Like previous plaintiffs, Price argues the Diocese, the school and the Christian Brothers knew that Rose had been accused of molesting boys prior to the alleged incident in 1978 and shouldn?t have put him in contact with children.
Attorneys for the Diocese and Shanley and for the Christian Brothers claimed in written answers to earlier lawsuits that they had not been made aware of the reports, including one that the plaintiffs say was made to Shanley officials in 1977.
The defendants have not filed responses to Price?s lawsuit yet.