Former O.C. Priest Is Charged Again

A Roman Catholic priest, convicted of child molestation in the Midwest before being transferred to Orange County in 1976, was charged Wednesday in Milwaukee with nine new felony counts involving sexual abuse of three minors in the early 1970s.

According to court records filed by the Milwaukee district attorney’s office, Father Siegfried Widera also took one of the victims on an 11-week car trip from Wisconsin to his new job in the Diocese of Orange, though none of the charges involve that journey.

It’s not known whether the priest, who now lives in Arizona, has been arrested. Neither authorities nor Widera, 61, could be reached for comment Thursday.

Orange Bishop William Johnson accepted Widera despite a warning letter from Milwaukee Archbishop William Cousins that the priest had a “moral problem having to do with a boy in school.” Johnson and Cousins are deceased.

In Milwaukee, Widera was convicted of sexual misconduct with an adolescent boy in 1973 and sentenced to three years’ probation. He also was ordered by his archbishop to undergo counseling.

The latest charges allege incidents that took place from 1970 to 1973 involving 9- to 12-year-old boys. According to documents, some of the assaults took place in the priest’s van, in a rectory and in a parochial school locker room. Each of the nine counts carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.

“The only word for this is appalling,” said Maria Schinderle, Orange diocese spokeswoman, who believes that Johnson was never told about Widera’s actual criminal record. “I just wish we would have known about this in 1976. Our heart goes out to the victims.”

The district attorney’s office said it was allowed to file the criminal complaint after more than 25 years because the clock on the statute of limitations stopped in 1976 when Widera left Wisconsin.

Widera was stripped of his ability to function as a priest in 1986, shortly after another boy’s mother complained to the Orange diocese. Widera was sent to a New Mexico treatment center for eight months. He has not been defrocked; he still is considered a priest.

This month, a 25-year-old Orange man who was the subject of the 1986 complaint filed suit against the Milwaukee and Orange dioceses. He alleged that the two bishops conspired to move Widera to Orange County, where he is accused of sexually abusing at least four more minors.