The Catholic religious order must pay $ 2.4 million in New Orleans. Abuse of the New Orleans clergy

In a historic verdict, a federal jury in New Orleans ordered a Catholic religious order to pay nearly $ 2.4 million in damages to a man who said he was sexually abused by one of his members in the late 1960s.

John Lousteau, 68, said he was sexually abused while attending a one night’s summer camp for boys in the Holy Cross School in New Orleans. He argued that his attacker was the director of the camp, Stanley REPUCCI, who belonged to the order of the Sainte-Croix who led the school.

The legal victory of Lousseau and his lawyer, Kristi Schubert of the law firm of Lamothe, is the first since the Supreme Court of Louisiana in 2024, confirmed a law of the State allowing the survivors of agricultural aggression to undergo civil damage, regardless of how long the abuses occurred. Previously, Louisiana’s law prevented anyone over 28 years from requesting such damage. Experts have established that the average age that an adult reports sexual abuse on children was 52 years.

The verdict, returned Wednesday, would be the first time that a jury in Louisiana has given such damages to a victim of sexual assault whose abuses date back to so many decades.

It also occurs while the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans tries to leave the protection against the bankruptcy of chapter 11 by offering to pay an average of less than $ 400,000 each at around 600 victims of an office mistreatment scandal which disrupted the organization for decades. The declaration of bankruptcy in 2020 indefinitely frozen individual prosecution against the archdiocese.

The case of Lousteau is not linked, but the amount of the sentence suggests how the abused survivors could be entitled if the efforts of the archdiocese to reorganize are unsuccessful and can again be prosecuted by the victims on an individual basis.

In his trial, Lousteau told how he had fought against alcohol and drug addiction after his abuse of repucci, who has died since. Lousteau had previously revealed how he had also struck with post-traumatic stress, depression, anxiety and insomnia, conditions which intended him for what he described as a “burst of dumpster of a life”.

Lousteau said that Holy Cross officials had offered advice and “sympathetic words” while indicating that his account on his abuse was “credible”.

However, the prescription ultimately did not pay his advice, then stopped putting the calls from his lawyer, he said.

The lawyers of the Holy Cross and the school argued in part that Lousteau had not done more to limit the consequences of his abuses.

On Wednesday, after a three-day trial, a jury of the New Orleans Federal Justice Palace concluded that there was a preponderance of evidence that Lousteau had been attacked as a fee by repucci and that the officials of the Holy Croix-as an employer of the aggressor while he was alive-was to Loustreau about $ 2.38 million in damages.

School lawyers did not immediately comment. A statement by a spokesperson for the Holy Cross said that she “evaluated her options in the future”. Organizations could ask a court of appeal to reduce the sentence.

Schubert refused to comment on the verdict, saying that requests after the trial was possible.

At one point, a federal judge appointed Jay Zainey – known for his devotion to the Catholic faith – judged that the law allowing proceedings like Lousteau was unconstitutional. This decision was largely interpreted as potentially a decisive victory for all Catholic institutions to settle abuse complaints in a more affordable manner.

But the decision of the Supreme Court of the State confirming the law effectively canceled Zainey’s decision.

Survivors of the aggression of the clergy whose statements are trapped in the financial reorganization of the archdiocese of New Orleans could vote in September, if it is necessary to accept the amounts he proposes, which represent on average less than 17% of what Lousteau won at the trial against Holy Cross. Lawyers representing hundreds of these survivors oppose the colony.