What makes James Griffith stand out amid the scandal over sexually abusive clerics is how many chances the Catholic church hierarchy had to tell the public about him — and how many times it failed to do so.
Deacon James Griffith was moved to Chicago and other church jurisdictions after being convicted of a child sex offense in 1988 in Louisville, Kentucky.
More than a decade after pleading guilty in 1988 to sexually abusing a young boy in Louisville, Kentucky, Deacon James Griffith was moved by his religious order to a monastery next to Immaculate Conception School in Norwood Park.
The Passionists — the Catholic religious order that at the time was overseeing the church and school just north of the Kennedy Expressway on the Northwest Side — say he was assigned there in 2002 “to work in the provincial office” on the third floor.
But they didn’t initially tell Immaculate Conception parishioners about his child sex crime conviction or a lawsuit accusing him of molesting another Louisville boy in the 1970s.
Griffith’s past came out in 2003, the year after he was moved next to Immaculate Conception. And when upset parents and other church members packed a meeting with a top priest there, the deacon was soon sent packing.
Amid the latest, ongoing scandal regarding the sexual abuse of minors by clergy, many Catholic dioceses and religious orders now post lists on their websites naming abusive clergy and detailing their past assignments.
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