Religious orders' files show LA sex abuse

LOS ANGELES -- In therapy sessions, the priest confessed the shocking details he'd kept hidden for years: He had molested more than 100 boys, including his 5-year-old brother. He had sex with male prostitutes, and frequented gay strip clubs.

The admissions of the Rev. Ruben Martinez are included among nearly 2,000 pages of secret files unsealed Wednesday that were kept on priests, brothers and nuns who belonged to religious orders but were accused of child molestation while working within the Los Angeles archdiocese.

The papers, released under the terms of a $660 million settlement reached in 2007, offer the first glimpse at what religious orders knew about the men and women they posted in Catholic schools and parishes in the Los Angeles area.

The archdiocese itself released thousands of pages under court order this year for its own priests who were accused of sexual abuse, but the full picture remained elusive without the orders' records.

The documents cover five religious orders that employed 10 priests or religious brothers and two nuns, all accused in civil lawsuits of molesting children. Among them, the accused had 21 alleged victims between the 1950s and the 1980s.

Some of the files, including those of the nuns, don't mention sexual abuse at all; others appear to have large gaps in time and missing documents. They included documents from the Oblates, the Marianists, the Benedictines and two orders of religious sisters.

That the files don't reflect some of the alleged abuse doesn't mean it didn't happen, said Ray Boucher, lead attorney for some abuse victims. "Much of this went unreported. You're talking about kids that were terrorized and frightened in so many different ways, with no place and no one to turn to."

At more than 500 pages, Martinez's file is among the most complete, and it paints a devastating picture of a troubled and repressed child who joined the priesthood to satisfy a domineering and devout father.

The Los Angeles archdiocese settled eight lawsuits over Martinez's actions in 2007, but had little documentation on him in its own files, even though the priest worked in its parishes for years in the 1970s and 1980s.