Another Former Brophy Priest Has Been Accused of Sexual Abuse

By Erasmus Baxter
Phoenix New Times
September 22, 2020

https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/another-former-brophy-college-preparatory-priest-accused-of-abuse-11495993

A Jesuit priest who taught at Brophy College Preparatory for seven years in the 1980s and coached the boy's football team is the latest Phoenix-area Catholic priest to be accused of sexual abuse.

In a lawsuit filed today, an anonymous alum now living in California alleges that Reverend James A. Sinnerud, S.J. engaged in sexual contact with him without his consent and when he was a minor incapable of giving consent. The lawsuit does not specify the nature or time frame of the alleged misconduct, but Sinnerud would have been been in his late 40s when he taught at Brophy.

The lawsuit alleges that Brophy, the western U.S. Jesuits chapter, and the Phoenix Roman Catholic diocese were negligent in protecting the plaintiff from Sinnerud and either knew or should have known about his abuse. It cites longstanding evidence of the Church's efforts to conceal an epidemic of child sex abuse by clergy, including a 2003 confession by the Phoenix bishop that he had moved priests around to conceal their misdeeds.