Lawsuit: Wealthy Catholic donor offered money to make complaints against Metairie deacon go away
The civil court case details allegations against V.M. Wheeler, who was arrested in March for alleged sexual abuse of a minor.
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Updated: 8:10 PM CDT Jul 26, 2021
WDSU Digital Team
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Lawsuit: Wealthy Catholic donor offered money to make complaints against Metairie deacon go away
The civil court case details allegations against V.M. Wheeler, who was arrested in March for alleged sexual abuse of a minor.
Share
Updated: 8:10 PM CDT Jul 26, 2021
WDSU Digital Team
A prominent donor to the Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans offered $400,000 to an alleged sexual abuse victim to settle his claims and stop cooperating with police in a criminal investigation, according to a lawsuit filed Friday in Jefferson Parish. The court complaint details allegations against Virgil Maxey "V.M." Wheeler III, a local attorney and former deacon at St. Francis Xavier Church in Metairie who was arrested in March. The Jefferson Parish district attorney has not yet determined whether it will pursue charges against the 63-year-old. Wheeler is the sole defendant in the civil case. The plaintiff is identified as John Doe.There have been few details surrounding what led to Wheeler's arrest before the lawsuit was filed last week. It said Wheeler befriended the plaintiff's parents who lived on the same street in Metairie.According to the lawsuit, "Wheeler began grooming a 10- or 11-year-old John Doe and his older brother by taking them to restaurants, movies, and buying them gifts. Wheeler likewise groomed John Doe's parents by spending time at their home and earning their trust."The boys would go over to Wheeler's house to play video games and were allowed to watch R-rated movies there, the lawsuit said. The boys' parents were having marital problems at the time, and Wheeler's house became a refuge, the plaintiffs' attorneys claim. The first instance of molestation was in a movie theater when Wheeler groped John Doe's genitals, according to the lawsuit. Wheeler also allegedly convinced the plaintiff to take showers with him and sleep in the same bed, where John Doe would be groped and engaged in heavy petting. The lawsuit alleges that on at least three occasions, between 2001 and 2002, the sleepovers progressed to Wheeler performing oral sex on the boy.When Wheeler tried to get John Doe's brother to sleep with him, the older boy refused and told his mother he never wanted to be alone with Wheeler again, according to the lawsuit. It also said the mother called Wheeler and shared what her older son had revealed, letting him know the boys would not be allowed to go to his house or be alone with him again.The lawsuit said John Doe is not the only child Wheeler has abused, but it offered no additional information on that claim. Archbishops informed of allegationsThe mother of John Doe discussed what had happened with her son with then Archbishop Philip Hannan after she learned that Wheeler wanted to become a deacon, according to the lawsuit. In 2018, current Archbishop Gregory Aymond ordained Wheeler to serve under Father Andrew Taormina, the pastor at St. Francis Xavier who the lawsuit describes as Wheeler's good friend.The lawsuit said the mother had informed Taormina in 2017 about her son's allegations against Wheeler, but these claims weren't documented. Shortly after Wheeler was made a deacon, Aymond called John Doe's father and told him "that 'someone' had told him that Wheeler may have engaged in inappropriate behavior with one of more of his (Doe's father) sons. John Doe's father confirmed to Amyond that Wheeler had done so..." based on what his older son had relayed, the lawsuit said.Aymond asked the father to meet with John Doe, and the two went the to archbishop's residents next to Notre Dame Seminary in September 2018, according to the lawsuit. John Doe told Aymond about the sleepovers and movie theater abuse but didn't disclose the showers or oral sex, the lawsuit said, because he had yet to disclose those details to his parents.John Doe and his father told Aymond about Wheeler's "general manipulation and harassment of their family, including the grooming and luring the boys to his home for sleepovers," the lawsuit said. Aymond said Wheeler's behavior was "grooming" and that the archbishop "knew that these were felonies that he should have reported to the police..." The brother of John Doe confirmed Wheeler's history with the family in a 2018 teleconference with Aymond and archdiocese counsel Wendy Vitter, according to the lawsuit, providing further grounds for Wheeler's removal from the ministry. Aymond did not defrock Wheeler until the summer of 2020 after John Doe disclosed the oral sex, the lawsuit said. A spokesperson for the archdiocese declined to comment to WDSU on the lawsuit or provide an update on where its internal investigation into Wheeler stands.'Influential Catholics' come to Wheeler's defenseThe lawsuit details efforts from "numerous influential Catholics" who advocated for Wheeler's return to the ministry.Vinny Mosca, an attorney and former mayor of Harahan, arranged a meeting with John Doe's parents in order "to see if there was a possibility for an amicable and expeditious resolution to this matter," the lawsuit said. Mosca "attempted to discourage the initiation of criminal charges because it would be a 'media feeding frenzy' and negative press for John Doe and his family," according to the lawsuit. Mosca told WDSU that he has known and represented the plaintiff's family for 35 years and was asked by a partner at Chaffe McCall, where Wheeler worked, to meet with them. He dismissed suggestions that he is one of the influential Catholics referenced in the lawsuit."I'm annoyed the plaintiff would go into all sorts of contentions about the archdiocese," Mosca said, adding that he was only offering the family his opinion as an attorney and not attempting to dissuade them from any particular course of action.Since his meeting with the family, Mosca confirmed he has been hired to represent Wheeler along with Metairie attorney David Courcelle. In February, one of John Doe's attorneys received a phone call from "a very wealthy and well-known benefactor of the Archdiocese of New Orleans" who is identified in the lawsuit as "Mr. R," according to the lawsuit. In the conversation, Mr. R told Doe's attorney he was calling on behalf of Wheeler and "Mr. K," who the lawsuit said had approached Doe's father months earlier about trying to "settle" the issue with Wheeler. Mr. R discussed "taking the mortgage on Wheeler's house so that they could offer to settle John Doe's claims against Wheeler because they wanted 'to do something for the boy.'" Mr. R said he had "$350,000 and 'another $50,000 to play with' to settle the claims." In order to reach a settlement, John Doe would have to stop "any cooperation with the JPSO in the ongoing criminal investigation into Wheeler's sexual assaults..."John Doe's attorney told Mr. R what he proposed was unethical, to which Mr. R responded, "Well, you just taught me something," the lawsuit said. The attorney told Mr. R he was bound to discuss any offer with his client, "notwithstanding the criminal component not being part of any potential settlement."Mr. R also told the attorney he had spoken to Aymond about the situation, referring to him as "Gregory" twice in the conversation, according to the lawsuit. In a second call to the attorney the next day, Mr. R said "he did not feel good about being involved" and "he had lost sleep the previous night... because he knew it was wrong of Wheeler to offer money for John Doe to stop cooperating with police."The civil lawsuit seeks damages that would be determined at trial. The archdiocese, which is not a plaintiff in the Wheeler suit, faces several damage claims tied to clergy sexual abuse and has already paid out millions in settlements. Pending cases were put on hold after the local church declared bankruptcy, a process through which a federal court will determine the value of its assets. Multiple creditors who are owned money by the archdiocese have a place in line to be repaid ahead of sexual abuse survivors, many who maintain the bankruptcy is a way for the church to shield itself from accountability. John Doe's attorneys, Richard Trahant, Soren Gisleson and John Denenea, represent clergy abuse survivors in some of the pending court case.