Other Christian institutions & contexts Catholic Advance and Stoddard County, Missouri, USA · 2020

United States: retired priest Frederick Lutz charged with forcible sodomy after Missouri attorney general's clergy probe

Record class

Core record

Evidence status

Charged

Authority role

parish priest, St. Joseph Parish, Advance, Missouri

Organization

Diocese of Springfield-Cape Girardeau

Spiritual nexus

The victim was a minor attending parish religion classes under Lutz's pastoral authority as priest of St. Joseph Parish; the diocese's own admitted 2002 knowledge of the allegation, left unreported to civil authorities for 18 years, is the institutional mechanism that let the statute of limitations run before the 2019 state investigation surfaced the case at all.

Pastoral or clerical authority

Evidence structure

Proceedings

2020-02-19 · arrest, arraignment and grand jury indictment

Stoddard County, Missouri (venue later changed to Cape Girardeau County). Frederick Lutz, 76, retired in 2011, was arrested in Springfield, Missouri on a Stoddard County warrant charging forcible sodomy, two counts of second-degree statutory sodomy and felony sexual abuse, arising from the Missouri Attorney General's church-personnel-records investigation. Prosecutors alleged Lutz assaulted a 17-year-old who attended religion classes at St. Joseph Parish, Advance, in 2000; the diocese acknowledged it had known of the allegation since 2002. Lutz pleaded not guilty at arraignment. A grand jury indicted him on March 3, 2020 on two counts of forcible sodomy and two counts of deviate sexual assault, and venue was changed to Cape Girardeau County.

Documented coercion mechanisms

clerical and pastoral authority
access to a minor through parish religion classes
diocesan knowledge of the allegation withheld from law enforcement from 2002 until the 2019 state investigation

Primary record

Sources

regional broadcast news contemporaneous reporting KFVS12, 'Retired Catholic priest in southeast Mo. pleaded not guilty on child sex abuse charges' (Feb. 19, 2020).: Reports the arrest, charges (forcible sodomy, second-degree statutory sodomy, felony sexual abuse), bond, and not-guilty plea; states the diocese acknowledged 2002 knowledge of the allegation.
alt weekly investigative press contemporaneous reporting Danny Wicentowski, 'Attorney General's Priest Abuse Probe Yields First Charges,' Riverfront Times (Feb. 21, 2020), archived at BishopAccountability.org.: Identifies the Lutz case as the first prosecution to emerge from the Missouri Attorney General's statewide clergy investigation.
regional broadcast news contemporaneous reporting KY3, 'Grand jury indicts ex-Springfield, Mo. area priest on several charges' (Mar. 2020).: Reports the March 3, 2020 grand jury indictment on two counts of forcible sodomy and two counts of deviate sexual assault, and the change of venue to Cape Girardeau County.
national catholic press status update Catholic World Report, 'Two lawsuits accuse Missouri dioceses of "shameless cover-up" of sexual abuse' (Sept. 20, 2024).: States that, as of September 2024, individuals named in the 2019 Missouri attorney general report had still not been prosecuted — the basis for this record's 'charged' rather than 'convicted' evidenceStatus and its needs-follow-up audit flag.

Related record

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