Diocese Will Pay Record Settlement

The conviction of a priest who molested two altar boys will probably be overturned because of a recent Supreme Court ruling, but Roman Catholic Church officials in San Bernardino said Tuesday they will pay a $4.2-million settlement to the victims so the church can close the case with a “fair and just resolution.”

Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. John Kochis said Edward Ball’s three-year prison sentence, which he received in 2001 after admitting he sexually abused the brothers in the 1970s and early 1980s, probably will be vacated because of last week’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling that struck down a California law permitting the prosecution of decades-old molestation offenses.

Despite the ruling, the Diocese of San Bernardino thought the two abuse victims had a very strong civil case against the church because Ball had confessed to molesting the boys. Bishop Gerald Barnes also openly supports offering just and fair resolutions when a molestation case against a priest has merit, said Diocese spokesman Howard Lincoln.

“The Supreme Court decision did not weigh into this,” Lincoln said. “[Ball] was already in jail after pleading guilty to these crimes. We wanted a fair and just resolution. This case is unique with very unfortunate circumstances.”

The diocese has agreed to pay the two brothers $2.1 million, and the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart, the religious organization Ball belonged to while serving as a priest in San Bernardino, will also pay $2.1 million, Lincoln said.

Lincoln said the diocese agreed to the settlement -- the most ever paid by the diocese for a sexual abuse case -- because of the severity of the molestation.

Ball, 64, is jailed in Rancho Cucamonga while he awaits a July 11 hearing to decide whether he will be designated a sexually violent predator, which would mean he would be put into a state mental hospital following his prison release.

Kochis said Tuesday he is still trying to determine if Ball can be classified as a predator -- and kept in custody -- even if his current criminal case is vacated.

“There’s no case law on this, so it’s premature for me to render an opinion about a potential ruling on this,” Kochis said.

In 1992, Ball pleaded guilty to fondling three boys at Our Lady of Fatima Church in San Bernardino between 1990 and 1992 and served nine months in jail. Two years ago, he pleaded no contest to 31 counts of child molestation for sexually abusing the two altar boys at Our Lady of Assumption Church in San Bernardino.

Last week’s Supreme Court ruling overturned a portion of a California law that allowed the prosecution of certain sexual-offense cases even if the statute of limitations had expired, as long as district attorneys filed the charges within a year after the sexual abuse allegations were first reported.

The ruling affects about 800 cases statewide, including those of people convicted or who have charges pending against them. About 200 cases are in Los Angeles County.The high court’s decision will lead to the formal dismissal of charges against Msgr. Peter Luque, an Inland Empire Catholic priest accused of sexually assaulting two teenage boys in the 1960s, Kochis said. It also will halt a criminal investigation into a retired San Bernardino priest, Patrick O’Keeffe, who avoided criminal prosecution of an alleged 1972 molestation by moving to Ireland, he said.

Luque, 68, who has served parishes in Colton, San Bernardino, Riverside and Corona, was charged with sexually abusing a 16-year-old boy in 1966 in San Bernardino and faced 10 additional charges of molesting a teenage boy in 1967 and 1969 in Colton. The priest resigned in March as pastor of the 6,700-family St. Edward Catholic Church in Corona.

Luque will have his charges dismissed in a July 9 court hearing, said his attorney, Steven Harmon. “The Supreme Court decision is a return to sanity and fairness,” Harmon said. “In many of these older cases, witnesses have died, memories have faded, evidence has been lost. It is extremely unfair to proceed with prosecutions. That’s why the statute of limitations is rooted in our law.”

The sister of one of the boys Luque was accused of molesting said she and her brother are devastated by the dismissal and plan to file a suit this month.

“There should be more support for the people who were abused all those years ago, not less,” said the woman, who asked to be identified only by her first name, Susan. “I don’t care if it happened in 1800 or yesterday. A victim is a victim. A molestation is a molestation.”According to prosecutors and defense attorneys, the following Inland Empire cases also will be dismissed:

* Ronald Carr, 49, of Hemet. Carr, a Hemet city employee, had his case dismissed during a Riverside County Superior Court hearing Monday. Carr was previously offered a 32-year prison term as part of a plea bargain to 30 counts tied to the molestation of various female family members under age 16, according to his attorney, Harmon.

* Donald Farmer, 65, of Central California. Farmer was accused by four alleged victims of 1966 molestations near Lake Gregory in the San Bernardino Mountains while he was a priest. Farmer was charged with 14 felony counts.

* Charles Wesslund, 64, and his wife, Patricia Wesslund, 50, of Crestline. Charles Wesslund, a Los Angeles County fire captain, faced more than 60 charges for alleged molestations that occurred between 1981 and 1984. His wife’s four charges will be dismissed, Kochis said, but Charles Wesslund will be prosecuted on misdemeanor charges, including possession of narcotics and being under the influence.

* Kenneth Daniel, 59, of Redlands. Three alleged victims accused Daniel, a middle-school teacher in Redlands, of engaging in sexual misconduct. He faced five charges brought last year and is due in court for a July 25 hearing likely to be rescheduled for a dismissal.Richard Sipe, a former Benedictine monk who wrote the 1995 book “Sex, Priests and Power: Anatomy of a Crisis,” said this week’s settlement agreement by the Diocese of San Bernardino indicates that the Catholic Church may face more pressure because of the Supreme Court ruling.

“My impression of the significance of this settlement is that the church now has a larger problem on its hands,” said Sipe, who served as an expert witness for the brothers in their suit against the diocese.

“It can no longer point to these men as criminals to be handled in a different court. The church must now take responsibility for the training and teaching of these men. The moral weight on the church is now greater, not less.”

Attorney John Manly, who won a $5.2-million settlement on behalf of an Orange County man in 2001, said it was the largest pretrial settlement in U.S. history for a sex abuse case involving a priest.

Manly has filed 30 lawsuits in recent weeks accusing priests of molesting children in Southern California and is expected to file at least 20 more.

He applauded the San Bernardino settlement.

“I think this reflects the reality that the San Bernardino Diocese felt a jury would perceive their conduct as outrageous, egregious and inexcusable,” he said. “It also reflects the gravity of the injury to the plaintiffs.”

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Times staff writer Jean Guccione contributed to this report.