Sex-abuse case against priest will go to court

YOUNGSTOWN -- A judge has ruled that a lawsuit filed last year by two local men alleging sexual abuse at the hands of a priest will go forward.
Judge James C. Evans of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court dismissed a section of the lawsuit accusing the Diocese of Youngstown of fraud and conspiracy for covering up the acts.
The rest of the suit, filed in May 2002 by Thomas and Vincent Casey, remains active, the judge ruled.
The suit says that Monsignor Robert E. Reidy sexually molested the Casey brothers during their childhood in the late 1960s, mostly at their Struthers home. Reidy, 67, retired last year.
Reidy, the diocese and Bishop Thomas J. Tobin had filed a motion asking that the suit be dismissed. In a 20-page decision handed down Wednesday, Judge Evans ruled that the plaintiffs did not prove the allegations of fraud and conspiracy, so he dismissed that portion of the suit.