A 1994 memo about Buntel said the priest showed pornography magazines to young visitors in his rectory bedroom, where -- although the door was shut -- the smell of marijuana seeped out. The memo reported that Buntel had oral sex with males ages 15 to 21, who saw bags of cocaine and piles of money in his room.
Most galling of all, said Joe Gallagher, co-founder of an advocacy group here called the Coalition of Catholics and Survivors, "This person was never reported to the authorities."
MacLeish, the attorney, said he had "no idea" where Buntel is now.
For Father Robert Burns, the trail of abuse began in Youngstown, Ohio, where he was a priest from 1975 to 1981. Church officials there determined that he had sexually abused young boys, and, in 1981, they sent him to a counseling program for pedophiles in Massachusetts. Soon, Burns was applying for a temporary position in the Boston archdiocese.
James W. Malone, then-bishop of the Youngstown diocese, alerted Boston officials to Burns' sexual history. He urged them not to assign him to church work where he might have contact with young boys.
In reply, Father Gilbert S. Phinn, director of personnel for the Boston archdiocese, promised that Burns' placement would be handled with "sensitivity and concern." Yet Burns was eventually placed in two parishes, first in Jamaica Plain, Mass., and then in Charlestown, Mass., where he regularly came into contact with minors. Boston archdiocesan authorities did not warn the local churches of his record, even though they had written "problem: little children" in a 1982 internal memo about Burns.
It took nine years for a flurry of accusations to surface that Burns had sexually molested a series of boys. In one case, attorney Laurence E. Hardoon said his 14-year-old client was "anally raped" by the priest in the rectory of a Boston church. As the allegations grew, Burns was removed from his post. Church leaders urged him to once again undergo counseling for pedophilia.
In 1991, Cardinal Bernard Law officially terminated Burns' assignment in Boston.
"Life is never just one moment or one event and it would be unrealistic to have too narrow a focus. It would have been better were things to have ended differently, but such was not the case," Law wrote to Burns. "Nevertheless I still feel that it is important to express my gratitude to you for the care you have given to the people of the Archdiocese of Boston "
Burns pleaded guilty in 1996 to sexually molesting two boys under the age of 13 in New Hampshire. He was sentenced to two consecutive four- to eight-year terms.
He was formally stripped of his clerical duties three years later by order of the Vatican. In a letter to Rome, Law said the archdiocese had "mistakenly accepted [Burns'] word of contrition as a pledge against further acts of sexual molestation of children. Despite treatment for this behavior, Father Burns continued to commit these egregious acts."
Another priest whose records were made public Tuesday was accused in 1975 of pushing his 58-year-old housekeeper down the stairs of his residence and pulling out large clumps of her hair. In response, then-Bishop Daily urged that Father Thomas B. Forry be terminated.
Instead, he was reassigned to another parish south of Boston. In 1984, archdiocesan officials received a letter from a woman claiming an 11-year sexual relationship with Forry. Some years later, the woman contacted the archdiocese to allege that Forry had sexually abused her son.
Forry went on to serve as a chaplain in the Army and at a prison. "I am confident that you will render fine priestly service to those with whom you come in contact," Law wrote to Forry in 1994.
Forry's assignment to the Emergency Response Team of the Boston Archdiocese was ended in February of this year. There was no indication of any legal action taken against him. There was no answer at Forry's residence Tuesday night in South Boston.
Even those who have spent nearly a year surrounded by the scandal said they were stunned by the array of offenses detailed in the new documents. Almost as appalling, said Gallagher, of the Coalition of Catholics and Survivors, was the absence of compassion for victims on the part of church leaders.
"At this point in time, we have not seen a single reference to the issue of pastoral care for the victims," Gallagher said.
Coming out of Boston, where the clerical abuse scandal first unraveled, the disclosures carry special weight, Clohessy said.
"There is no other archdiocese in the country where the extent of the problem has been so clearly identified," he said. "But having said that, I am not saying Boston is the worst."
Phil de Albuquerque, a kitchen designer who has protested outside Law's cathedral for nearly a year, said the new material filled him with sadness. "I think that after today, every Catholic is a victim," he said. "A victim of deceit and betrayal."
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