Assignment Record – Msgr. Robert C. Trupia Ordained: 1973 |
|
| Start | Stop | Parish/Assignment | Town/Accusations | State | Position | Notes |
1973 Tucson bishop was Francis Joseph Green (1960-1981) |
1976 | St. Francis | Yuma • A former St. Francis altar boy accused Trupia in a 1997 lawsuit of molesting him when he was a boy, from 1973-1974. • In another 2000 lawsuit Trupia was accused of holding a 13 year-old boy "prisoner" at St. Francis and molesting him for a week in 1975. The boy's mother had him stay with Trupia while she tended to her dying husband. • In 1976 Ted Oswald, a former police officer who was a lay brother at St. Francis was told by altar boys "what [Trupia] was doing to them". Oswald had the boys write statements, which he took to Msgr. John Anthony Oliver, who was dean of the area. The boys' families were said to have been told Trupia was being sent for treatment of pedophilia. Trupia was pulled from St. Francis and sent to another parish, Our Mother of Sorrows in Tucson.
|
AZ | 2/3, 2/2, 4/4 | St. Francis had a school with 271-288 students.
|
| 1973 | 1976 | Tacona | AZ | Tacona was a mission of St. Francis. | ||
| 1976 | 1981 | Our Mother of Sorrows | Tucson • Trupia was one of two priests accused in a 1999 lawsuit of sexually abusing a teenage boy from 1976-1979, and with giving the boy alcohol and drugs. The other accused priest was, Rev. William T. Byrne. • In 1992 a mother told the bishop that Trupia sexually abused her altar boy son at Our Mother of Sorrows in 1977. • Trupia was accused in a 2004 lawsuit of molesting a Mother of Sorrows altar boy in 1979. The boy's mother alleged that she wrote to Bishop Moreno in 1992 and 1993, and that Moreno lied to her when he told her Trupia denied the accusatoins.
|
AZ | 2/3, 3/3, 4/4 Trupia taught sex education and ran a "Come and See" program for high school boys considering the priesthood. |
Our Mother of Sorrows had a school with 382-483 students.
Trupia is said to have been called "Chicken Hawk" by other priests of the diocese because he preyed on so many young boys. According to later depositions, at least two Tucson priests who expressed concern about Trupia's behavior with boys were "told to mind their own business" by chancellor Rev. John F. Allt, and the handwritten statements by the Yuma altar boys were removed from Trupia's file. Bishop Green sent Trupia to a Tucson psychologist for counseling in the late 1970s. Trupia denied the accusations against him. |
| St. John's Seminary | Camarillo • Trupia was accused of "numerous" molestations at the seminary. A plaintiff's attorney in 2002 stated that "Priests were bringing young boys and using St. John's as a hotel." |
CA | Trupia hosted "Come and See" weekends here. | Trupia was banned from St. John's in 1988 because he had been showing up unannounced with young men. There was also a complaint that he was seen sleeping with a young man at the seminary in 1982. | ||
1976 Green was succeeded by Manuel Duran Moreno (1982-2003) |
1992 | St. Thomas the Apostle | Tucson | AZ | Trupia served at this parish various times between 1976 and 1992. | |
| 1976 | 1992 | Vice Chancellor | Tucson | AZ | Trupia continues to be listed in the Directories under his chancery positions for 1989-1992, although he was on "sabbatical" for those years. | |
| 1976 | 1984 | Administrative Council | Tucson | AZ | ||
| 1976 | 1992 | Censor Librorum | Tucson | AZ | ||
| 1976 | 1980 | Office of Due Process | Tucson | AZ | Delegate | |
| 1977 | 1980 | Diocesan Consultors | Tucson | AZ | ||
| 1978 | 1992 | Matrimonial Tribunal | Tucson | AZ | Oficialis 1978-1984; Judicial Vicar 1984-1992 | |
| 1980 1982 |
1981 1992 |
Senate of Priests/Council of Priests | Tucson | AZ | Under "Senate of Priests" in the 1981 Directory is the phrase "sede vacante". | |
| 1981 | 1988 | Regina Cleri Center | Tucson • Trupia was accused in another lawsuit in 2001 of sexually abusing a 17 year-old male youth in the late 1980s. His accuser had been homeless and began sleeping over with Trupia at Regina Cleri in 1987; he lived with Trupia in 1988-1989. This accuser was given a chancery job, with Trupia as his supervisor. The living situation and chancery job were said to have been in exchange for sex. This was the 10th lawsuit with accusations against Trupia. |
AZ | ||
| 1987 | 1992 | Special Assignment | The "special assignment" is noted in the 1988-1992 Directories to be the Judicial Vicar position. | Rev. Joseph Baker, a Tucson priest, testified that in 1989 a police detective investigating Trupia contacted him. Baker and Bishop Moreno discussed the situation; Moreno is said to have responded with hostility, telling Baker that children might have been going to Trupia's room "to retrieve him for confessions". | ||
| 1989 | 1992 | Sabbatical Leave | Trupia received a scholarship from Catholic University in Washington, DC to pursue a PhD in canon law. | |||
| 1992 | 1994 | Absent on Leave | Silver Spring | MD | Trupia was suspended in 1992 after a woman sent a letter to the archbishop of Santa Fe, Robert Sanchez, and a copy to Tucson bishop Moreno, that Trupia sexually abused her altar boy son at Our Mother of Sorrows in 1977. Trupia threatened to expose sexual improprieties of high-ranking church officials if he wasn't allowed to retire on his own terms. In particular, Trupia was referring to the late bishop of Phoenix, James Rausch. Rausch is accused of having sexually abused a 17 year-old boy in 1979, then passing the boy onto Trupia and Rev. William Byrne. The youth became addicted to heroin. Several years later Trupia helped him through recovery; he also started a sexual relationship with him, then gave him job as an assistant at the marriage tribunal. Byrne worked there, too. The young man became increasingly bothered by what he said had happened between him and the two priests and Rausch. He said he tried to speak with Morenowho wasn't receptive. He said he then spoke with Bishop Green who "asked me if I would be willing to agree to keep the story quiet so as not to cause harm to the church". Green is said to have then given the young man a full time job at the marriage tribunal. He worked there for six years. The diocese later called Trupia "a notorious and serial" sexual predator. |
|
| 1994 | 1995 | Silver Spring | MD | Trupia did consulting work for the Monterey, CA diocese from 1994-2001. | Trupia is not indexed in the 1995 Directory, nor is he listed under "Absent on Leave" in the Tucson diocesan pages. | |
| 1995 | Oct. 2001 | Absent on Leave | Silver Spring | MD | A Yuma police officer investigating Trupia in 1997 said the diocese would not tell where Trupia was, even though they were sending Trupia checks. Trupia was jailed briefly in early 2001 on charges of molesting boys in Yuma in the 1970s, but was released because the charges violated the criminal statue of limitations. Trupia had been living in Silver Spring for nearly a decade as of 2001. |
|
Oct. 2001 Moreno was replaced by Gerald Frederick Kicanas (2003-) |
2004 | Absent on Leave | Ellicott City | MD | Trupia was found by a reporter in Feb. 2003 to have been living in Ellicott City, MD, in a condo owned by a Msgr. Charles G. Fatooh, of the Monterey CA diocese. Neighbors said Trupia was seen with "young men", whom they assumed were Trupia's sons. Trupia was laicized in 2004. He had fought laicization for 12 years. |
Source: Official Catholic Directory (New York: P.J. Kenedy and Sons, 1974-2004) • Suit Names Diocese in Abuse Case, By Pamela Hartman, Tucson Citizen, April 15, 1999
|