ST. FRANCIS, Wis. — Arthur Budzinski says the first time the priest molested him, he was 12 years old, alone and away from home at a school for the deaf. He says he asked the Rev. Lawrence Murphy to hear his confession, and instead the priest took him into a closet under the stairs and sexually assaulted him.
Budzinski, now 61, was one of about 200 deaf boys at the St. John’s School for the Deaf just outside Milwaukee who say they were molested by the priest decades ago in a case now creating a scandal for the Vatican.
Murphy was accused of molesting boys in the confessional, in dormitories, in closets and during field trips while working at the school for the deaf from the 1950s through 1974. Murphy died in 1998 at age 72.
Another deaf student, Steven Geier of Madison, said Murphy molested him four times in a St. John’s closet in the mid-1960s starting when Geier was 14. The Archdiocese of Milwaukee entered mediation in 2004 with a number of people who claimed to have been victimized by priests. The archdiocese has paid compensation to Murphy’s victims, but spokeswoman Julie Wolf would not say how much. Budzinski said he received $80,000.
“Murphy’s actions were criminal and we sincerely apologize to those who have been harmed,” the archdiocese said in a statement Thursday. The Associated Press
