Prosecutors ‘forced' to drop charges against predator priest
Flickr | Steve Snodgrass
CHICAGO (STMW) - Cook County prosecutors Wednesday said they were forced to drop an aggravated criminal sexual abuse charge against a convicted child molester and defrocked Catholic priest because the alleged victim was reluctant to cooperate, the Chicago Sun-Times is reporting.
Daniel McCormack, who is at a state-run mental health facility pending a hearing on whether he is a sexual deviant person, wasn’t in court before Judge Dennis Porter.
Neither was the victim of the 2005 alleged incident.
McCormack, 47, was sentenced to five years in prison after he pleaded guilty in 2007 to abusing five other children while he was a parish priest at St. Agatha.
Two years ago, he was charged in the other case involving another minor boy at the same West Side parish.
Prosecutors on Wednesday called out to see if anyone representing the complainant was in court. When no one responded, they told Porter they were moving to dismiss the charge.
“The victim in this case went to police and made a complaint and after reviewing the facts and circumstances, the state’s attorney’s office brought charges in good faith. However, as the case has progressed through the courts, the victim has chosen not to cooperate with the prosecution,” the state’s attorney’s office said in a statement Wednesday.
“As a result, the state’s attorney’s office was forced to dismiss the charges this morning.”
Earlier this month, another Cook County judge ruled that one of McCormack’s alleged victims will be able to seek punitive damages against the Chicago Archdiocese at trial — allowing other victims the opportunity to do the same and effectively offering jurors the chance to punish the archdiocese for McCormack’s actions.