Two priests who until recently lived on the campus of Fordham Preparatory School in the Bronx sexually abused teenagers there in the 1960s and '70s, two groups that advocate for sex-abuse victims said on Tuesday.Leaders of the two groups — the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests and BishopAccountability.org. — who said they were making the accusations public for the first time, criticized the school's administrators for allowing the priests to reside there for years after the abuse complaints were made known.
One of the priests, Fr. Eugene O'Brien, was the principal and president of Fordham Prep in the early '70s, when one accuser said he was molested, the groups said. A lawsuit the accuser filed was settled in 1997 for $25,000 by the school, the Archdiocese of New York and the Order of the Society of Jesus, or Jesuits, which runs Fordham Prep.
The advocacy groups sent to The New York Times a copy of the settlement agreement, with the accuser's name excised. Fr. O'Brien could not be reached for comment.
The other priest, Fr. Roy A. Drake, was a science teacher at Fordham Prep in late 1968 when he raped Richard Cerick, Mr. Cerick says. In an interview, Mr. Cerick, who was not a Fordham student, said he had been invited by a friend who attended the school to join him for a weekend ski trip with Fr. Drake. He said the attack occurred in the priest's apartment on campus the night before they left on the trip.
Joseph Zwilling, spokesman for the archdiocese, said that archdiocesan lawyers were familiar with Mr. Cerick's claim against Fr. Drake, but that he could not confirm the terms of the 1997 settlement involving Fr. O'Brien. In general, Mr. Zwilling said, religious orders like the Jesuits handled their own personnel and legal affairs.
Fr. Thomas Slon, executive assistant to the head of the Jesuit order in the New York area, said he would not comment on the accusations. He, too, said that he was familiar with Mr. Cerick's complaint, but that he would not confirm or deny the terms of the 1997 settlement concerning Fr. O'Brien.
Mr. Cerick, now a 53-year-old New York lawyer, said he had kept the incident secret until 2003, when he became aware of the scandal over sexual abuse by priests. He began searching the Web for any mention of Fr. Drake.
After discovering that the priest was living at Murray-Weigel Hall, the Fordham Prep residence for Jesuit faculty members, he said, he decided to alert the school's administrators.
He filed his first complaint against Fr. Drake in 2005, he said.
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