Retired Queens High School Coach Accused Of Sexual Abuse: Lawsuit

BRIARWOOD, QUEENS — A former student at Archbishop Molloy High School in Queens says his track coach sexually abused him for years and the school failed to take action, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday under the New York Child Victims Act.

The former student claims that Brother Patrick Hogan, who also taught science and religion, molested him in his office dozens of times over a four-year period, according to the complaint filed in Queens County Supreme Court.

His lawsuit says the school and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn "knew or should have known" about Hogan's behavior and they failed to provide a "safe and secure environment" for students.

Hogan retired from Archbishop Molly in 2017, according to the school's website.

The Diocese of Brooklyn, which also oversees Queens, said in an emailed statement to Patch that Archbishop Molloy is an independent Catholic school: "The diocese has no control over the staffing or the supervision of teachers in that school," spokesperson Adriana Rodriguez said.

School officials did not respond to a request for comment.

The case is one of more than 1,400 lawsuits filed since last summer, when a new state law opened a one-year window for survivors of childhood sexual abuse to take legal action against their abusers, regardless of how long ago the incidents happened.

State lawmakers are now debating whether to extend that yearlong "look-back" window, according to the New York Daily News.

"The Child Victims Act offers adult survivors like our client an opportunity to finally pursue justice against those institutions that methodically and systematically facilitated the cover-up of the sexual victimization of children," Laura Ahearn, a lawyer representing the former student, said in a statement to Patch.

In the lawsuit against Archbishop Molloy and the diocese, the former student said he met Hogan in 1976, when he joined the high school track team that Hogan was coaching. (Patch's policy is to not name individuals who identify as survivors of sexual assault.)

The former student claims that Hogan told him to take off his pants and underwear, then spanked and fondled him, court records show. The student said the abuse happened about 50 times over the next four years.

The diocese, the suit says, "abetted the concealment of criminal conduct by failing and refusing to report allegations of child sexual abuse to appropriate New York civil."

The former student claims the diocese and the school had a duty to protect him but "failed to adequately and completely supervise Hogan," the complaint reads.

This story has been updated to add statements from the Diocese of Brooklyn and the former student's lawyer.