Holy Spirit Roman Catholic Church (Brighton, MI; Diocese of Lansing)

POLICE REPORTS

The following summaries and quotes are from police incident reports for each of the indicated days:

Sept. 13, 2005 - An attorney with the Diocese of Lansing contacted the Michigan State Police to report that a church employee discovered a list of "inappropriate websites" that had been accessed using the parish priest's computer. From that written list, the state's Computer Crimes unit determined that most of the sites were no longer active (typical of child pornography sites); the sites that could be investigated were considered "adult gay porn sites".

The detective indicated that "Further investigation will be done to enable me to seize the rectory computer."

Oct. 7, 2005 - The Diocese called the priest on Sept. 19 and relieved the priest of his duties at the parish; he left in two days. Also during this time, an investigator from the Michigan Attorney General's "Internet Crimes Against Children" Unit contacted employees at the parish. It was at this time, in September, that the priest became aware of the criminal investigation initiated against him. According to the police report "Due to these issues, [the priest] had a number of days to destroy potential evidence before he was removed from Holy Spirit."

It was not until October 18 that consent to search the priest's computer was secured.

Oct. 25, 2005 - According to the Computer Crimes Unit, the computer "had been cleared of any and all data" (devoid), and "the hard drive had either been cleaned by a professional with professional software or the hard drive was removed and replaced with a new hard drive."

During a meeting on November 16, a parish council member admitted that he "removed the hard drive from the computer and replaced it with a new hard drive" prior to the investigator's seizure of the computer; the parishioner "had the computer hard drive in his possession". Two days later, warrants to search the parishioner's home and office for the hard drive were obtained. The warrants were not served due to the parishioner's voluntary cooperation at this point.

The parishioner "first became aware of an investigation when [the priest] called him while [the priest] was driving back from a meeting with the Bishop of Lansing [September]. The parishioner stated that Father called and asked if [he] knew how to completely erase a computer hard drive." At this time, the priest revealed to the parishioner the pornography allegations against him.

The parishioner told the priest that "he would try to find out how to erase a computer hard drive for him". Discovering that hard drives cannot be completely erased, the parishioner ordered and purchased a new hard drive (Sept. 21, 2005). The parishioner told the investigator that he and the priest then replaced the hard drive, and that the priest took possession of the original hard drive. According to the parishioner, the priest then gave the hard drive to an employee of one of the Ave Maria entities in Michigan. After a short period, the Ave Maria employee "shipped it back to [the priest]". Investigators finally obtained the original hard drive in a sealed shipping package sent by the Ave Maria employee.

The parishioner told investigators that any questionable pornographic material found on the priest's computer was likely due to the priest's "ministry that provides guidance to catholics who are gay".

December 12, 2005 - The Computer Crime Unit initially found "a fair amount of adult gay pornography", and evidence of searches for child pornography, but nothing illegal. Emails from the priest referenced "teen" and "young" pornography, along with a number of websites bookmarked under "teen" and "boy". The computer registry showed saved passwords for such sites as "BoysCherries". According to the parish employee who first reported the priest's activity to the Diocese, there was evidence that the computer user had spent "hours" on "BoysCherries", a site "depicting boys being violated by men for the first time". Later, the Unit found "possible child pornography in the computer's unallocated hard drive space", but this space is not consider prosecutable for a variety of technical and legal reasons. It is unclear if any civil proceedings remain open.

A reliable AveWatch source claims that the Michigan Bar is examining the parishioner who withheld the original computer drive from investigators for 21 days; that parishioner is an attorney. The priest in question currently has canonical proceedings in Rome, and remains on "administrative leave" from the Michigan parish.

AVE MARIA GETS INVOLVED

Rewind to late September, early October, 2005. Many events were happening: the Diocese suspended the priest in question from his church; the "Internet Crimes Against Children" Unit began to interview church employees; and the original computer drive was swapped-out for a new one after it was realized that hard drives cannot be completely erased.

Apparently, it was also during this early period that Fr. Michael P. Orsi, Chaplain and Research Fellow at Ave Maria School of Law, became involved. Fr. Orsi served for approximately four years as an assistant at Holy Spirit parish where the priest in question was pastor. Reliable sources report to AveWatch that Fr. Orsi admitted to directing Law School IT staff to help the priest in question with computer-related issues concerning hard drive memory and file storage/erasure. This help was offered from campus during the time after the priest in question had been informed of the Diocese concerns.

It is reported that AMSL Dean Dobranski learned of Fr. Orsi's direction of AMSL IT resources shortly after the incident occurred.

To be clear, this story is not, in any way, leading the reader to conclude that someone at AMSL is guilty of a crime. Nonetheless, there are very serious issues to consider:

1) At the time of the AMSL IT consultation, was Chaplain Orsi aware that an investigation had begun, or that one was about to begin, on the priest in question? Was the Chaplain aware that the priest in question had been suspended, or was likely to be suspended, from his pastorate due to computer-based pornography?

2) What did the Ave Maria College employee do with the hard drive while it was in his possession? Why was it shipped back to the priest in question rather than simply driven across town? Were Ave Maria resources involved in the shipping? Was Ave Maria College President Dan Guernsey aware of this incident, and was any action taken on his part?

3) Was the AMSL Chaplain behaving appropriately when using Law School resources (i.e. the IT employee) in a manner that could have resulted in the destruction/tampering of evidence in a criminal investigation?

4) What did the Dean know? Did he, the Chaplain, or the Ave Maria employee report to the investigators? [A search of police reports found no indication that any Ave Maria employees approached investigators about their roles.]

5) What did Tom Monaghan know, given that daily/weekly reports are made to him by the Law School's Dean? Monaghan's attorneys at Butzel-Long were consulted by the Dean about the matter. This further suggests that Monaghan himself was aware of the situation. Even if Butzel-Long's opinion was that nothing illegal occurred, why was there no evidence of Monaghan reprimanding Orsi nor of Monaghan reporting the incident in an effort to help police investigators (assuming Monaghan knew about his employee's behavior)? Orsi is a highly vocal advocate for moving AMSL to Monaghan's for-profit South Florida real estate development.

6) If the alleged behavior of the Chaplain was repeated today by one of the School's faculty, would it violate the Dean's current "appropriate use" standard:
(a) that resources cannot be used to undermine the School and
(b) that "activities that are affirmatively injurious to the Law School during the course of one's employment at AMSL are not acceptable"?

Interestingly, Orsi is an outspoken public advocate that ordained gay priests not be put under "one strike, you're out policies", and that "with ephebophiles, those attracted to teenagers, some arrangements could be made". Orsi says further: "With our belief in the infinite value of even one Mass, can we afford not to allow even the condemned to do what God appointed them to do. The bishops and the laity shouldn't forget that these priests are still and always will be God's chosen ones." Orsi is reported to have denounced, from the pulpit, those who harbor supsicions and concerns about the priest in question.

AveWatch makes no assessment on the role of gay "ephebophile" or "condemned" priests. AveWatch makes no definitive judgment on the guilt or innocence of the priest in question, recognizing that police reports are not necessarily the whole of the facts. AveWatch also makes no judgement on the degrees of culpability of persons involved.

What AveWatch finds deeply disturbing, based upon the statements presented, is that the resources of a Catholic law school could have been used to ultimately frustrate public safety, the integrity of a civil and canonical assessment of a serious accusation, and the consequences that are sometimes necessary to lead one to full repentance. At minimum, the Dean's "appropriate use" rubric appears to have been grossly violated.

AveWatch did due diligence and sent a copy of this story to Robert Falls & Co., the PR firm of Tom Monaghan, asking for answers to the aforementioned clusters of questions. AveWatch offered ample time for a reply, hoping for a detailed thoughtful response. Falls replied mere hours later:

Each and every allegation concerning the incident in question -- which is not accurately portrayed in the article--was fully and thoroughly investigated by an outside law firm (the same law firm that has been widely praised for its recent internal investigation into the death of a student at Eastern Michigan University) and no wrongdoing by any person connected w/AMSL was found to have occurred--specifically including Father Orsi or anyone in the IT department.
Robert F. Falls
Robert Falls & Co. Public Relations

Falls failed to take advantage of this invitation to make specific corrections, answer questions, and account for the behavior of Tom Monaghan and his employees at the Law School and the College. AveWatch already recognized (1) that Butzel-Long was consulted, and (2) that no accusations were being made concerning criminal activity. Do Falls and Ave Maria have a truncated understanding of "wrongdoing"? Tom Monaghan appears to draw the line for himself, and his administrators, at the lowest public mark - what is "legal". Yet, for his faculty, he draws the line at the most obscure personal mark - what is thought to be "injurious" to Monaghan's idiosyncratic view of "best interests" and "mission"... a view that is tied to Monaghan's deep conflicts-of-interest.

Police investigators were denied access to the pornographic hard drive for 21 days; it is unclear just how many Ave Maria employees knew of, or handled, the hard drive during that time. Police investigators, based on obtained police reports, appear to have been denied the opportunity to connect Ave Maria's doings with other evidence in the case... facts unavailable to Monaghan's private lawyers in their internal assessment of "wrongdoing".

If the Chaplain (Fr. Orsi) offered IT's help while knowing about the accusations against the priest in question - and if the Dean (Bernard Dobranski) and the School's Chairman of the Board (Tom Monaghan) knew of the institutional assistance offered to the priest in question, but made no report to investigators - then the Chaplain, the Dean, and the Chairman should resign from the Law School. There can be no confidence reposed in persons who value freedom from embarrassment above the integrity of a civil and canonical assessment of a serious accusation - especially when engaged in a Catholic legal endeavor.

The security of not only a university, but a K-12 school and a town full of families also relies on such confidence.

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Central issue - Based on the aforementioned documentation, why didn't anyone within the Ave Maria chain-of-command, including Tom Monaghan, see fit to report the involvement of Ave Maria employees to the police?

UPDATE, 7/10/2007 (2:30pm EST) - The wife of the parishoner who first discovered and reported the computer pornography made a statement at 12:37pm CST on Fumare. AveWatch confirmed the following as originating from Laura Flynn (unedited):

I pity Fr. Orsi. I do not know him as well as some of you. I have heard & enjoyed his homilies often at Holy Spirit Church, and I have thought him to be intellectual and often humorous.

A short time after my husband went tearfully to the Bishop to disclose the awful contents on Fr. T's computer, we were concerned for this priest's spiritual welfare. We asked the diocese if they would see to this, and they said no, because everyone was "lawyered up". So my husband and I decided to approach Fr. Orsi, since he knew him and we thought he would share our concern.

As we began to express our concern, Fr. Orsi quickly became aggitated, angry and short with us. He said, "You don't know what you were looking at!" My husband replied, "With all due respect, Father, YOU don't know what I was looking at!" With a few curt words, the conversation was over and other than occasional glares, we never received anything further from him.

As I said, I pity Fr. Orsi. I don't blame him for believing the denial of Fr. T, because this priest was well-loved and very "conservative". It would have been natural for him to believe him on first hearing. Where some blame does fall is in Fr. Orsi's lack of priestly vocation to love and serve Christ's flock. His unwillingness to even hear us, let alone try to understand the cross we had been bearing for about 18 months at that time, was disheartening to say the least. His arrogance in this situation was shocking to me.

I am not a lawyer. I am a simple, home-schooling mother of 7 children. But facts are facts. We have hard evidence of these facts.

As I said, I am truly sorry for him. I am sorry he does not have the humility to acknowledge his mistakes.

If, believing the priest, he used Ave Maria for anything, perhaps that was imprudent. But if he learned what was truly on that computer, and still defends him, then shame on him. And shame on him for treating our family so poorly.

We have suffered incredible injustice in this event. My husband was fired in May. We have no income or health insurance while Fr. T sits in his cabin up north with full pay and benefits.

Christ promises the gates of hell will not prevail against the Church. I believe that. I think all of this is the purging of the priesthood and the Church. In the long run, it is good. Truth is good and will set us free. Jesus will come back to a holy and spotless Bride! May we too, be holy.

If all of us today would offer a sincere prayer for both these priests, perhaps this blog will have served a positive service.

Tags: boyscherries, accountability