Monica Yant Kinney: Ailing cardinal has a duty to testify if he is able

On Pages 115-117 of the 2011 grand jury report on clergy sex abuse in the Philadelphia Archdiocese, citizen jurors described the dilemma of whether to recommend criminal charges against former Archbishop Anthony J. Bevilacqua.

After enduring months of distressing testimony, they had "no doubt" Bevilacqua endangered children with his "knowing and deliberate actions." But they could not prove the cardinal complicit in the specific abuse cases before them.

And then there was the awkward matter of Bevilacqua's health.

The cardinal had been subpoenaed to testify before a previous grand jury in 2003 and 2004. He was 80 at the time, and, based on 1,200 pages of oratory (see philly.com/testimony), sharp and in fighting form.

But the grand jury that met in 2010 and early 2011 wasn't blessed with Bevilacqua's presence. His longtime attorney, William Sasso, told jurors the 88-year-old cleric suffers from prostate cancer and dementia. He required "24/7" nursing care, failed to recognize friends, and rarely left his seminary home.

Bevilacqua's doctors, Sasso relayed, advised against even mentioning the existence of a second grand jury; requiring a man so infirm to testify would prove "extremely traumatic."

The grand jurors acknowledged they were "not entirely sure what to believe" about Bevilacqua's condition in 2011.

But, "based on these issues relating to the evidence and the cardinal's health, we have reluctantly decided not to recommend charges against the former archbishop."

A case of conspiracy

Bevilacqua escaped scrutiny but remains a potential material witness in the criminal case against Msgr. William Lynn, his trusted secretary for clergy.

Lynn is the highest-ranking U.S. Catholic cleric ensnared in the sex scandal and the only church official charged with shuffling pedophile priests to unsuspecting parishes. He faces charges of child endangerment and conspiracy.

Lynn's case concerns the alleged sexual assault of two boys in the late 1990s, one of whom claims to have been passed around by two priests and a Catholic schoolteacher.

The allegations are not trifling; nor is the impact Bevilacqua could have on the trial, slated to begin early next year.

But, given reports of the cardinal's condition, prosecutors want a judge to order him to testify on video "before his health and memory deteriorate further and he becomes unavailable."