NEW ORLEANS (AP) - A Catholic priest accused of molesting four
boys years ago at a church-run shelter in Marrero has cleared his
name.
Attorneys for the accusers earlier this month filed an
acknowledgment in court that Monsignor Ray Hebert did not molest
their clients when they were children at Madonna Manor, a Catholic
institution in nearby Marrero Hebert supervised for a time as head
of Catholic Charities.
The admission comes four years after Hebert, 81, sued them for
defamation, according a story Friday in The Times-Picayune.
After the allegations were made public several years ago, a
spokesman for the Archdiocese of New Orleans said officials
believed Hebert was a victim of misidentification. Harold Dearie
II, a Metairie lawyer who waived his fee to take Hebert's case,
said this week he was convinced Hebert was the victim of mistaken
identity.
In the past five years, more than a dozen men who lived at
Madonna Manor as children have filed suits against the archdiocese.
They claim priests, nuns and lay employees beat, terrorized or
sexually abused them. The lawsuits also cover alleged abuses at
Hope Haven, a nearby sister institution, mostly during the 1950s
and 1960s.
The archdiocese last fall settled a package of lawsuits brought
by former residents of Hope Haven and Madonna Manor for $5.2
million, but other claims remain.
Four men named Hebert among their abusers. Hebert, a senior
pastor and church administrator, protested his innocence from the
beginning and sued to clear his name.
"I really don't know whether any of these men were abused or
not," Hebert said. "I know I did not abuse them, and I know I was
never aware they were abused by anyone else."
Shortly after the claims were first made, an archdiocesan review
panel advised then-Archbishop Alfred Hughes that the evidence
against Hebert was insufficient to warrant his removal from
ministry.
In 2008, one accuser said he found a photo indicating his
tormentor was not Hebert. Another accuser has died, a third was
found to be too emotionally disabled to proceed and the fourth
elected to withdraw as the defamation suit neared trial.


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