Ex-Cardinal McCarrick had 2nd beach house linked to mysterious debt and unusual history - NorthJersey.com

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Abbott Koloff and Deena Yellin NorthJersey.com

Published 4:19 PM EDT Sep 8, 2020

Even as Vatican officials pressured former Newark Archbishop Theodore McCarrick to sell a Sea Girt home in the late 1990s after allegations that he sexually harassed seminarians on overnight trips there, the archdiocese was securing yet another shore home for McCarrick in an even grander location — on a spit of land in Brick Township that juts out into Barnegat Bay.

The second home, never before disclosed to the public, allowed McCarrick to flout the Vatican’s efforts to restrain his lifestyle as he continued his rise through the American church hierarchy. The home came into the archdiocese's hands after a long and tangled chain of ownership involving a local pastor who owed a large debt to his parish in the Metuchen Diocese, a demand by the diocese to have the pastor’s heir hand the home over to cover the debt, and the ultimate transfer of the home to the Newark Archdiocese.

A lengthy review of decades-old deeds, wills, death certificates and other documents by The Record and NorthJersey.com, as well as interviews with former top McCarrick aides and others familiar with the second beach house at Curtis Point on a Jersey Shore barrier island, reveals that:

• Monsignor Francis Crine, a former pastor at St. James Church in Woodbridge, who co-owned the Curtis Point house as well as a boat and a condo in St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands, owed a mysterious, unexplained debt totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars to the parish.
• In 1989, when Crine died, the Metuchen Diocese pressured Walter Uszenski, the parish school principal who had co-owned the home and inherited Crine’s share, to transfer the house to the parish for a sale price of $685,000 to cover the debt. No money apparently changed hands.
• The parish subsequently sold the house to the Metuchen Diocese for $1.
• A few years later, the Metuchen Diocese sold the home to the Newark Archdiocese.
• While pastor at St. James, Crine had also served in a top post under McCarrick in the Metuchen Diocese before McCarrick moved on to head the Newark Archdiocese.
• During Crine’s time as St. James pastor, priests assigned to the parish included some  who were later accused of child sex abuse there and in other parishes, as well as a priest who was later charged with stealing $500,000 from a parish where he became pastor.
• One former St. James parishioner who accused a priest of abusing him said Crine had to have known that the priest was inviting boys into the rectory for overnight stays to smoke and drink beer.

McCarrick: A timeline of events involving two Jersey Shore homes used by Newark Archbishop McCarrick

Mysterious debt

Theodore McCarrick, 90, who had been one of the most powerful American prelates in the Roman Catholic Church, last year became the first American cardinal to be defrocked after church officials revealed he’d been credibly accused of child sex abuse, allegations that first surfaced two years ago. But church officials had known for decades about allegations that McCarrick sexually harassed adult seminarians at the Sea Girt home, where he allegedly watched them undress and pressured them into sharing his bed.

In 1997, McCarrick had Newark Archdiocese officials sell the Sea Girt house, apparently under pressure from the Vatican, based on interviews with several priests. Yet months earlier, Newark church officials had purchased a different property for McCarrick in Brick, on Curtis Point in Barnegat Bay, which allowed him to continue playing host to friends at the shore, where he was known to court potential donors. There are currently no known allegations of abuse occurring at the Curtis Point home. McCarrick's attorney, Barry Coburn, declined to comment for this story.

The home had been purchased 10 years before by Monsignor Francis Crine, the pastor of St. James parish in Woodbridge. Crine had worked closely with McCarrick when the prelate led the Metuchen Diocese, serving as his personnel director. McCarrick took over as the Archbishop of Newark in 1986.

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When Crine died in 1989, Metuchen church officials claimed he owed them money and demanded the home as repayment, according to Ocean County property records and interviews. The home was given to the St. James parish. It was transferred twice more by church officials over the years, ending up in McCarrick’s hands.

In recent weeks, church officials have said they do not have information about the property transactions or the nature of the debt owed by Crine, declining to allow The Record and NorthJersey.com to interview an attorney who represented them in the transactions.

Crine was 57 when he died of cardiac arrest at an airport in St. Thomas, where he owned a condominium. Years before, he told at least one priest at his parish that he received a large inheritance that enabled him to buy a property in Spring Lake at the Jersey Shore. Later, in 1987, Crine purchased the Curtis Point home with Walter Uszenski, a friend who was principal of the St. James parish school.

In his will, Crine referred to Uszenski as “my close friend” and named him an executor of his estate. They had paid $562,500 for the Curtis Point home, according to Ocean County property records. The pastor owned two-thirds of the property. Other records show the two men also owned a boat together. Crine’s will called for Uszenski to be given full ownership of the Curtis Point house and the boat. The St. Thomas condo, meanwhile, was to go to Uszenski and his wife.

George Pappas, the attorney who handled Crine’s estate, said that after Crine’s death Pappas and Uszenski were called to a meeting with an attorney representing the Metuchen Diocese, who demanded that the church take possession of the Curtis Point home because “there was a debt of some kind.” He said he did not remember the name of the attorney who represented the diocese at the meeting.

Pappas said Uszenski agreed to make the transfer. According to the deed, Uszenski sold the house to the St. James parish in October of 1989, six months after Crine’s death: “The within conveyance by Walter Uszenski is made to satisfy a debt of decedent, Francis A. Crine, to Grantee [St. James] in the amount specified herein.”

The sales price was listed as $685,000 but Pappas said he didn’t believe money changed hands.

“I think we just returned it for the debt,” Pappas said of the house.

Pappas, who described Crine as a “wonderful gentleman,” said he believes the boat also may have been turned over to the church. He could not recall the nature of the debt or the amount.

“I know there were allegations of stuff that came up at the meeting,” Pappas said, but added that he couldn’t remember the details. “I specifically remember there was a debt of some kind to the church and Uszenski turned the property back to the diocese.”

Thomas Sharlow, the attorney who represented the church in the transfer, declined to comment, saying he couldn’t discuss matters involving a client. And Metuchen Diocese officials declined a request by NorthJersey.com to interview Sharlow. They also denied a request to interview the diocese’s current leader, Bishop James F. Checchio.

A Metuchen Diocese spokesman, Anthony P. Kearns III, told The Record and NorthJersey.com in a statement that transactions related to the property “dated back to a time at least three or four bishops ago” and that “we cannot begin to try and understand the rationale regarding decisions that were made so long ago.”

In a subsequent statement, Kearns said Sharlow had advised the diocese that "there was no need" for him to comment for this story "as a matter of ethics, attorney client privilege, and based purely on the fact that he has no additional information or facts about this transaction." The spokesman also said Sharlow didn't participate in the meeting described by Pappas.

Kearns said the property's history — brought to the diocese's attention by The Record and NorthJersey.com — was "troubling and disheartening" and "raises the question as to why this property was ever owned by the parish in the first place." He added that "safeguards are now in place to ensure something like this cannot happen again" and that "the path in the future will remain clear and transparent."

The story continues below the document which can also be seen here.

Ocean County property records show Crine and Uszenski had taken out two mortgages on the Curtis Point home, debts that totaled almost $500,000. Neither mortgage was repaid when the parish took possession of the home. The second mortgage, which was a short-term loan, was paid off in 1995 after the parish gave the home to the Metuchen Diocese for $1. In April 1997, Metuchen sold the home to Newark for $386,000 but the first mortgage wasn't repaid until later that year, after Newark sold the Sea Girt home.

Metuchen Diocese officials did not have information about the mortgage payments.

Uszenski did not respond to requests made through an attorney to be interviewed for this story. Several years ago he stepped down from his job as superintendent of the Brick Township public schools after being charged with theft and misconduct for allegedly gaining special school services for his grandson. Last year, he was admitted to a program for first-time offenders that allows for criminal charges to be expunged.

Charges of child sex abuse — and theft

Crine was assigned to St. James for more than 15 years. During that period, the rectory was home to a number of priests who later faced accusations of child sex abuse and theft. Three are listed by the church as credibly accused of having sexually abused children — including Romano Ferraro, who is serving a life sentence in Massachusetts for sexually assaulting a boy decades ago.

McCarrick approved Ferraro's move from the Brooklyn Diocese to the St. James parish in 1984. By then, church officials in Brooklyn knew Ferraro had abused children, according to church documents made public last year. Metuchen officials have said neither McCarrick nor his successor "had any records to indicate Ferraro had a history of sexual misconduct."

Ferraro stayed at St. James for a short time before being moved to another Metuchen parish. Diocese officials have said he was "terminated" in January of 1987 for an unrelated matter — shortly after he told children just before Christmas that Santa Claus was dead and their parents had been lying to them.

Another priest who worked at St. James in the 1980s was accused in 2018 of taking $500,000 from a Somerset County parish where he had been working for many years as pastor. Church officials removed him from that position. The Somerset County Prosecutor's Office said last week that the allegations are related to an "active on-going investigation which is under legal review." 

In a 1994 lawsuit, former St. James parishioner John Crowe alleged that he was abused by one of the priests at St. James from 1978 to 1981, starting when he was an 11-year-old altar boy. At the time, the church was part of the Trenton Diocese, prior to the creation of the Metuchen Diocese in November 1981. The accused priest, Frank Bruno, left the priesthood and is listed by the church as having been defrocked with multiple credible allegations of child abuse.

Crowe’s lawsuit, which he said had been settled, also named Crine because he was the pastor of the church at the time. In a recent interview, Crowe said that Crine was “kind of aloof,” and didn’t converse much with the altar boys. Crine and Bruno, he said, did not get along.

“I assumed it was because he knew what was going on,” Crowe said of Crine. “Not that anyone exhibited any concern for children.”

He said it would have been hard to miss that Bruno was hosting several boys at a time for overnight stays at the rectory, giving them cigarettes and beer. “If you were in the rectory at that time, it would be impossible not to know,” Crowe said.

Crowe said that, years after Crine’s death, he worked as a teacher at a public school where Uszenski had become the principal. He said Uszenski once told him, without prompting, that people “thought he made out” as a result of Crine’s will, but that wasn’t the case because “there was more owed on it than it was worth.” Crowe said Uszenski did not explain further. Crowe said he thought Uszenski was talking about the St. Thomas condo, which he said was known to people in the parish, not the Curtis Point home.

Mark Dobrovolsky, a retired priest who worked at St. James in 1981 and 1982 after Bruno left the parish, said Crine was “a nice guy” who was known for playing the organ at priests’ funerals, which is how he came to the attention of McCarrick. Dobrovolsky said he didn’t believe Crine and McCarrick were friends — that their relationship was strictly professional.

He said Crine told him that a large inheritance from an uncle allowed him to purchase a home in Spring Lake, which records show was sold prior to the purchase of the Curtis Point property.

The story continues below the photo gallery.

Crine and Uzsenski were "very close," Dobrovolsky said, adding that Crine would "give you the impression Walter was like a son. He was like Frank’s protégé.”

Dobrovolsky said he never heard about the Curtis Point home, which was purchased years after he left St. James. While he was in the parish, he said there wasn’t a hint of financial problems, adding that Crine was “always conscious of money” and “fiscally responsible.”

“He would not have given me the impression that he would live beyond his means,” Dobrovolsky said.

Another priest who was later assigned to St. James said through an attorney that “living in that parish was hell.” The priest and the attorney asked that their names not be used. The priest remembered that Crine, upset about the preparation of dinner, once threw a bowl of clam chowder against a wall.

The priest said he went to McCarrick to complain about the dynamic in the rectory, but “got kicked out of his office.”

Alarms raised about McCarrick and seminarians

In the years leading up to Newark’s purchase of the Curtis Point home, McCarrick appears to have been fending off accusations made by seminarians.

Two seminary professors have told The Record and NorthJersey.com that they raised an alarm to superiors about McCarrick in the late 1980s, after seminarians complained about having to take trips to the Sea Girt home with McCarrick. And The New York Times has reported that a former seminary student went to Metuchen church officials in 1994 to allege that he’d been abused by McCarrick.

Robert Hoatson, a former priest who is now a victim’s advocate, told The Record and NorthJersey.com that about that time he was told by a Newark Archdiocese official that McCarrick was going to sell the Sea Girt home. Hoatson was a member of the Christian Brothers order and was considering becoming a priest in the Newark Archdiocese. He said McCarrick encouraged him to make that move.

But Hoatson had misgivings — he had heard about seminary students being harassed during stays at the Sea Girt house, so he asked an archdiocesan official about it.

“Oh, that stopped,” he said he was told.

He said the official told him the Vatican’s representatives in the U.S. had ordered McCarrick to sell the Sea Girt house.

Hoatson said he’d heard about the Curtis Point home after the Newark Archdiocese purchased it in 1997, and he drove by out of curiosity. He said he saw another archdiocesan priest sunning himself in front of the house.

Anthony Figueiredo, who was McCarrick’s secretary in the mid-1990s, said he visited the Curtis Point house once — but doesn’t recall the year. He does remember going out on a boat that was docked at the home. He said he did not know about the history of the home and the property transfers, but that “McCarrick would know all of that.”

“He named Crine as personnel director” in Metuchen, Figueiredo said. “They were close professionally. He wouldn’t name him and not know everything about him inside and out.”

McCarrick continued his rise through the church hierarchy in the United States, moving from Newark when he was given the plum assignment as head of the Washington D.C. archdiocese in 2001.

One year later, McCarrick’s successor in Newark, Archbishop John J. Myers, sold the Curtis Point home to a private party for $750,000.

The new owner said the house was demolished in 2012 after being severely damaged during Superstorm Sandy, and was replaced with an entirely new structure. He said his neighbors didn’t know the identities of the priests who had once used the house, but remembered them as being generally quiet.

A little more than one month after the Newark Archdiocese sold the Curtis Point home, it purchased a house in Hunterdon County for $700,000 that was to be Myers’ weekend retreat and eventual retirement home.

The house became the focus of a controversy when church funds were used to build an expansive wing with three fireplaces and an indoor exercise pool. Earlier this year, after Myers moved to a senior facility in Illinois, church officials said they would sell the home. It remained in their possession as of last week.

Abbott Koloff is an investigative reporter for NorthJersey.com. To get unlimited access to his watchdog work that safeguards our communities and democracy, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: koloff@northjersey.com Twitter: @abbottkoloff 

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