GUILTY MO - Bishop Robert Finn for failure to report abuse by priest, Kansas City, 2011

Bishop Robert Finn today avoided facing a criminal misdemeanor indictment in his handling of a priest facing child *advertiser censored* charges by agreeing to enter into a diversion program with the Clay County prosecutor.

Authorities have pledged not to prosecute Finn, the leader of the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, if he lives up to the terms of a five-year diversion agreement.

Clay County Prosecutor Daniel L. White also said that a grand jury indicted the Rev. Shawn F. Ratigan on three counts of possessing child *advertiser censored*. The new indictment supersedes a state criminal complaint that charged Ratigan on May 19. Ratigan, 46, also faces a 13-count federal indictment of possessing, producing and attempting to produce child *advertiser censored*. He remains in federal custody.
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Monsignor backed the four altar boys up against the wall, shoulder to shoulder. Then he forced them to perform sexual acts on each other and on him.

When it was over, just minutes before Mass was to begin, he issued a warning.

“If you ever tell,” he said, his gruff voice booming in the long, narrow room, “you’ll be kicked out of the Catholic Church, your parents will disown you, and you’ll die and go to hell.”

For 30 years, no one breathed a word.
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And then earlier this year, all of the vivid memories and the indignation were stirred up again when the local diocese came under fire in the wake of the Rev. Shawn Ratigan’s indictment on child *advertiser censored* charges. Couzens realized that if he didn’t speak out, the story would never be told — and no one would truly understand what he says happened to him, Brian Teeman and Chuck Caffrey.
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An open box of shells lay on the bed.

A shotgun was on the floor, Brian Teeman’s lifeless body next to it.

His mother, just home from grocery shopping, saw her 14-year-old son through a doorway. Hysterical, she pushed Brian’s younger sister into a corner and ordered her not to move.

Then she rushed into the master bedroom, standing over Brian, still dressed in the dark blue pants, blue button-down shirt and white Nike tennis shoes he’d worn to his Catholic high school.

She spotted a green sticky note on the edge of the white bedspread. She picked it up, hands trembling, and recognized Brian’s handwriting.

All it said was, “I didn’t want to get yelled at. Love, Brian.”

It made no sense.
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For those 28 years, Don Teeman told Couzens, they had no clue why Brian committed suicide. Eventually, Don just took the blame and decided it had to be something he did.

But in the back of his mind, Don always wondered if something had happened to Brian at Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary School in Independence, perhaps involving sports or bullying.

Couzens recalls the emotional reaction of Don’s wife that July day:

“Rosemary stood up and hugged him and just hovered over him and said, ‘Honey, I’m so sorry I blamed you all these years.’ ”
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When they finished, Couzens walked slowly to the grave, knelt and brushed a leaf off Brian’s stone.

And then came the tears. Couzens sobbed so hard his body shook. Jackie put her arm around him, and before long, everyone was hugging and crying.

“Brian doesn’t have a voice,” Couzens said, taking one last look at the grave. “I’ll be his voice.”

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Jon David Couzens said in an interview that he looked forward to telling his story in court, even though he knew it would be painful.

“I’m willing to be an open book, to have my life exposed — even some of my wrong choices — for the sake of saving just one child,” he said.

Those who track the issue say that although thousands of civil suits have been filed in the U.S. alleging sexual abuse by priests, only a few dozen have gone to trial.
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Jackson County prosecutors leveled criminal charges against Finn, a first for anyone in the Catholic hierarchy, for his role in deflecting an official investigation into allegations of child sex abuse by former priest Shawn Ratigan. Finn was found guilty in 2012 of a misdemeanor charge while Ratigan received a 50-year prison sentence for his crimes the following year.

The convictions were the most visible among many embarrassments for the local Catholic diocese since Finn took over in 2005. They were also costly to the local diocese, with estimates for legal bills and settlements exceeding $5 million.
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