By Tim Redmond
UPDATE: Statement from Archdiocese included below
The board chairman of the Shrine of St. Francis in North Beach forced a young Church employee to have sex with him and beat her repeatedly with a paddle given to him by a high-ranking official of the Archdiocese of San Francisco, a lawsuit filed last week charges.
The suit expands in great (and frankly, horrifying) detail the allegations made last year by Jhona Mathews, who worked at the Shrine in North Beach.
According to the complaint, filed in San Francisco Superior Court Jan. 29, Bill McLaughlin, a Kentfield resident who was in charge of construction activities at the Shrine, repeatedly forced Mathews to have oral, anal, and vaginal sex with him, including in the church sacristy.
Mathews’ lawyer is Sandra Ribera.
Among the more explosive allegations: McLaughlin was close friends with Monsignor James Tarantino, then the vicar general of the Archdiocese – and Tarantino gave McLaughlin the paddle that was used to brutally spank Mathews.
McLaughlin has since been removed from his duties at the Archdiocese, and Tarantino has been reassigned to St. Mark’s Church in Belmont. The lawsuit raises the critical question: How could this abusive activity have gone on – in the building where the monsignor lived – without his knowledge? (more after the jump)
