"There's sadness at Mooney, but there's also a great deal of sadness at our Lady of Peace in Canton," says Bishop George Murry of the Youngstown Diocese. Bishop Murry says members of the diocese are shocked by the removal of Father Thomas Crum from the ministry.
The Bishop placed Crum on administrative leave after an anonymous victim came to him May 22, alleging a sexual relationship had taken place between the then teenage victim and Crum at Cardinal Mooney High School in 1975. The victim told Bishop Murry the relationship lasted a year. The Bishop says Crum has admitted to the affair and has apologized for bringing shame on the diocese.
"It's a very sad situation that a young person was sexually abused by someone that he trusts."
After a preliminary investigation was complete, Bishop Murry gave the information to diocesan attorneys who then turned the investigation over to the police. Since then, Crum has checked himself in to a psychiatric facility. "When I spoke with him and told him I wanted him to do this for his own good and he agreed to do it," says the Bishop.
To find out why someone would choose to come forward so many years later after the statute of limitations for filing a criminal complaint had run out, we turn to the director of the "Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests in Ohio." "The biggest reason why they finally come forward is they don't want to see another child ever abused like they were," says Judy Block Jones.
So far, no other victims have stepped forward.
