Priests and Judge in Abuse Case Spar Over Legal Fees

  Most of them sat silently behind their lawyers at the crowded defense table in the packed courtroom, where observers included several other priests and a phalanx of news reporters.

But the Rev. James Brennan,  who is accused of raping a boy in the 1990s, drew the ire of the judge when he and his lawyer said that they had expected the Philadelphia Archdiocese to pay his legal fees if he were acquitted.

 The court session was intended to determine whether the defendants should have a preliminary hearing, in which the evidence against them would probably be laid out. That decision was postponed until March 25, but not before the judge, Renee Cardwell Hughes, engaged in several sharp exchanges with Father Brennan and his lawyer over the pay arrangement.

  Judge Hughes said that if the archdiocese were paying only if he were acquitted, he might not act in his own best interest.

She said that such an arrangement would give him a disincentive to negotiate with the prosecutors, because his legal bills would not be paid “if you speak against the archdiocese.”

  In a dramatic moment, the judge ordered Father Brennan to rise and, in frustrated and furious tones, declared that he did not understand what he had done and was not giving her straight answers.

  Father Brennan, a slight man wearing a pullover sweater, acknowledged that he was confused, and one of his lawyers, A. Charles Peruto Jr., jumped up frequently to challenge Judge Hughes, despite her order that he remain seated.

 “He’s trembling back here,” Mr. Peruto declared of Father Brennan at one point.

 The emotion in the courtroom seemed to echo the emotion in this city over the abuse scandal, which burst into public view last month with a scathing grand jury report that led to the suspension last week of 21 priests. The grand jury has accused the archdiocese of protecting itself rather than the victims.

  The issue of the payments for Father Brennan became muddled after the court session, when a spokeswoman for the archdiocese said it was not paying Father Brennan’s legal bills and had made no such arrangement.

 “Absolutely not,” the spokeswoman, Donna Farrell, wrote in an e-mail.

“I am told,” Ms. Farrell continued, “that the defense for Father Brennan made that request, but there has been no meeting, no discussion, and the archdiocese does not plan to pay for his defense.”

The archdiocese is, however, paying for all of the legal bills for another defendant, Msgr. William J. Lynn, the highest church official in the country to face charges of endangering the welfare of children. The fees will be paid regardless of the outcome of Monsignor Lynn’s case, according to his lawyers and the archdiocese.

   Jeffrey Lindy, one of Monsignor Lynn’s lawyers, said, “It would be highly unusual for the archdiocese not to pay,” noting that the monsignor was not charged with abusing minors but with covering up such abuse. 

  Stephen Gillers, a professor of law at New York University and an expert in legal ethics, said the arrangement  was not uncommon, and could even be compared with cases in which corporations guarantee legal fees for employees who might be required to repay the company under some conditions. But, Profesor Gillers noted, arrangements to pay legal fees only if acquitted could result in divided loyalties, for both lawyer and client.

  Later in the hearing, Father Brennan said he had not paid his lawyers but then he said he had, with money from his bank account and from his brother. Judge Hughes reacted incredulously. She reminded him that she had spent taxpayer money for his court-appointed lawyer during the grand jury investigation because he had told her that he could not afford a lawyer.

“You lied to me,” she scolded. “You jerked me around while you played this game and came to me in tears.”

   Mr. Peruto, his lawyer, said Father Brennan’s brother had come up with the money only after the grand jury inquiry and added that Father Brennan had misspoken in court because he was nervous.

Father Brennan said in a brief interview after the appearance that he thought the judge’s questioning was “harsh,” and Mr. Peruto said she had shown bias toward the prosecution.

Mr. Peruto also said Father Brennan’s legal defense, if his case ever went to trial, could cost at least $50,000.