Vatican City - A federal judge in Kentucky has ruled that the Holy See is a foreign state that enjoys certain immunity protections, placing restrictions on a lawsuit by three men who allege the Vatican covered up the sexual abuse of children by priests.
According to a ruling obtained Friday by The Associated Press, Judge John G. Heyburn II of the U.S. District Court in Louisville rejected the victims' argument that the Holy See is an international religious organization and ruled that it is a foreign state subject to provisions of the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act.
The ruling is significant because it says that the Holy See's religious activity is irrelevant to the immunity protections it enjoys as a foreign state. It could have implications for other cases in which the Holy See is named as a defendant in the clerical sexual abuse scandal.
The 1976 act restricts when foreign states can be sued in American courts, although it provides exceptions, such as when the states engage in commercial or certain harmful activities in the United States.
The act also requires that service of a lawsuit follow strict protocols. In this case, it required documents to be translated into Latin and served to the Vatican foreign minister, Archbishop Giovanni Lajolo.
In his ruling, issued Thursday, Heyburn said the suit had actually been sent to Lajolo's boss, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, and that "strict compliance" with the act was necessary.
"That compliance is admittedly difficult and is made more so by the absence of any accommodation from the Holy See," Heyburn wrote.
But because the victims made "good faith efforts," the judge gave them 60 days to properly serve Lajolo with the documents.
William McMurry, lawyer for the plaintiffs, said he was encouraged that Heyburn hadn't dismissed the suit outright, and had only found a technical problem with the way the papers were served.
"We have 60 days to correct a technical error, after which we can get to the merit of the case, and ultimately a court will determine that the Vatican can be held accountable in American courts for the sexual abuse of children by Roman Catholic priests in this country," he said in a phone interview.
McMurry filed the suit last year on behalf of three men who say they were abused as far back as 1928. The lawsuit alleges a cover-up by the Vatican to protect priests who molested American children.
McMurry, who in 2003 represented 243 abuse victims in reaching a US$25.7 million settlement with the Archdiocese of Louisville, is seeking to have the suit certified as a class-action case.
The case is believed to be the first sexual-abuse suit to name the Vatican as sole defendant and would be the first class-action suit against the Vatican regarding clerical sexual abuse.
It is similar to one in Texas which names Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI as a defendant in a sex abuse case. The U.S. Justice Department told the court last month that the case should be dismissed because Benedict enjoys immunity as head of state of the Holy See. The judge in that case hasn't ruled.
If the judge finds that Lajolo was properly served, McMurry will still have to establish jurisdiction by convincing the court that an exception to the immunity protections of the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act should be granted.
The lawsuit argues that the Holy See engaged in both commercial and harmful activity in the United States and that the case should go forward.
The Vatican's lawyer, Jeffrey Lena, declined to comment.