Former Delbarton School student wins $5 million award
Delivering a historic verdict that could ripple through the religious and legal communities, a jury in Morristown awarded $5 million in compensatory damages Wednesday to a former Delbarton School student who said he was sexually assaulted at the elite Catholic prep school in 1976.
The jury at the Morris County Courthouse was unanimous in determining the assault had occurred, but found the order of Benedictine monks that operates Delbarton was not negligent for allowing the Rev. Richard Lott to commit the abuse.
Nonetheless, jurors detemined Lott to be 35% liabile for the damages suffered by the plaintiff, who was 15 at the time of the incident, and the order to be 65% liable.
The five-week-long trial is not over. Jurors will reconvene on Tuesday to determine whether the Order of St. Benedict of New Jersey should also pay punitive damages in the closely watched case.
The plaintiff, now in his 60s and identified in court papers only as “T.M.” sued Lott, Delbarton, the adjacent St. Mary’s Abbey and the Benedictine Order. Officials knew of allegations against Lott and other clergy for years, yet fostered a “culture of silence” at the Morris Township school, T.M.’s attorneys argued.
The case was a milestone, the first of about three dozen sexual assault lawsuits against Delbarton to reach a jury, though the school has settled others. It’s also believed to be the first case to go to trial among hundreds in New Jersey seeking damages from the Catholic Church for clergy sexual abuse.
T.M. and his attorneys declined to comment until the punitive phase is complete. Representatives for Delbarton could not immediately be reached for comment.
Since the trial started, the courtroom gallery has been packed with the ex-student’s supporters, many of whom identify as victims of clergy sexual abuse, some at Delbarton. T.M. hugged his lawyers and some of those victims as they left the courtroom on Wednesday.
A “substantial monetary award would send a powerful message about institutional accountability and the willingness of the legal system to provide justice for survivors of clergy abuse,” Mark Crawford, the New Jersey director for SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said in an interview earlier this month.
The defendants denied wrongdoing throughout the trial, pointing to discrepancies in T.M.’s story. Lott said he was assigned to say Mass at an off-campus church in Lakewood the night the abuse allegedly occurred.
Delbarton’s attorneys also asked jurors to view their clients’ actions “through the lens of 1976.” It was a different time when the order “did not expect monks to be sexual beings,” defense attorney James Barletti said in his closing argument on Monday, Oct. 6.
Former Delbarton School student wins $5 million award in historic clergy sex assault trial
William Westhoven & Alex Nussbaum
NorthJersey.com
October 8, 2925
