The “Trauma-Informed” Consultants Behind the Lucrative Sexual Abuse Investigations in New Hampshire

After reading “Vatican Bans Publishing Lists of ‘Credibly’ Accused Priests,” a veteran researcher spells out the ties and connections among the players.

April 3, 2025 by Claire Best, Los Angeles, CA

The Diocese of Manchester list of accused priests should be studied as an example of how flawed these lists are.

Not included in the list of accused or convicted priests is Father Francis Talbot who was convicted and died in prison and who had worked at the Youth Detention Center. That is significant given the fact that the State of New Hampshire has over 1300 cases of child sex abuse claims against it currently. Sex abuse that allegedly took place at the Youth Detention Center where Father Francis Talbot had worked. Ironically, the State lumps within the definition of a Child Placement Agency as being the Department of Children Youth & Families (DCYF), Catholic Charities and their successors.

Nixon Peabody and Divine Millimet law firms represent Catholic Charities and the Diocese. Nixon Peabody is one of the law firms suing the State for the alleged victims of the Youth Detention Center abuse. Nixon Peabody also sorted out the quick settlements for the Diocese for the alleged priest sex abuse.

The list of “credibly” accused priests was published in July 2019 which is after the first victim of child sex abuse at the YDC came forward and an investigation had begun. Coincidentally, Nixon Peabody’s Attorney David Vicinanzo, had sent a letter to the Clerk of Merrimack County DA’s office earlier in 2019, asking for the Grand Jury Criminal Investigation Report on St Paul’s School to remain private. He represented a number of “intervenors” (faculty and administrators) at the school who did not want their names made public. He also represented “pro bono”, the New Hampshire Coalition Against Domestic & Sexual Violence (NHCADSV) who lobbied his former partner from Nixon Peabody, then Attorney General (and now Chief Justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court), Gordon MacDonald, for the investigation.

And they got a contract with the school out of it, replete with an “independent compliance officer” and “trauma informed” training. The NHCADSV had hired Brian Harlow of SNAP to join them in 2012 to expand their business. Harlow was the first alleged victim to be solicited by Jim Rosenberg of prior AG Phil McLaughlin’s office to come forward for the Diocese investigation in 2002 which led to the list of “credibly” accused priests being created. Brian Harlow and the NHCADSV endorsed Gordon MacDonald for the NH Supreme Court.

MacDonald had once asked Father Gordon MacRae if he would mind having his name used for two claims against the Diocese (which were false) for a quick settlement. MacDonald was upset with Dorothy Rabinowitz of the WSJ when she published the names of these false claimants. He said there had been a nondisclosure agreement (NDA) but she pointed out that Father Gordon MacRae was not a party to any NDA.

Years later, Gordon MacDonald hired for the St Paul’s School investigation James F McLaughlin. He was the police detective who in 1992 had framed MacRae while investigating priests of the Diocese of Manchester. During the St Paul’s School investigation, James F McLaughlin’s name was added to the list of corrupt police officers but MacDonald failed to reveal this. Then he argued to keep the list private. Eventually McLaughlin’s name slipped out and he had multiple closed-door hearings to get his name removed from the list. These meetings involved not only the AG’s office but also a lawyer for the NH Banking Commission. Journalists and others have only received heavily redacted copies of his disciplinary records but he was known to his own police department as dishonest in the 1980s — well before he framed Father Gordon MacRae, and that the State of New Hampshire ignored the Brady v Maryland 1963 Supreme Court ruling which requires the State to provide exculpatory evidence to a defendant.

In 1998, McLaughlin’s name appeared in a Federal Entrapment case in which he was “the Government” who sexualized minors under 12 years old. (US v Paul Gamache). And yet he was hired by the NH AG’s office for the Diocese investigation and the St Paul’s School investigation. I discovered from Right To Know emails received from the AG’s office that the Attorney General knew there was a conflict of interests between the police department and prosecutor’s office and the Attorney General’s office in the investigation into St Paul’s School in September 2017. But it failed to let the public know this.

One wonders what it knew in the Diocese investigation in 2002 and what it failed to reveal to the public and Diocese. Jim Rosenberg now works for Shaheen & Gordon lawfirm. He represented Andrew Thomson, a State witness who the prosecutor admitted had been given a deal in the Owen Labrie trial which preceded and laid the land for the St Paul’s investigation. That deal was sealed in the trial and when it was revealed months later, the prosecutor retracted her words and the school’s attorney (a former AG of course) said no such deal had been made.

Shaheen & Gordon are allegedly the law firm paying Julie Curtin who is one of the “trauma informed “ investigators for the Diocese of Manchester and on its site. Curtin was the principal police detective in the Owen Labrie and St Paul’s investigations. She lied on a sworn affidavit for his arrest warrant (revealed by a SANE nurse in trial under oath) and she had also tampered with evidence — providing a redacted Facebook post. The prosecutor was taken by surprise when the full unredacted post was supplied by the defense — she’d never seen it before. It was exculpatory.

The DOJ no longer funds “Start by Believing” and “trauma informed” training that had been adopted in New Hampshire. SNAP got caught out for a kick back scheme with lawyers. It had to apologize to a priest in another state for framing him using media. The NHCADSV appears to have taken over where SNAP left off and gets kick backs from settlements brought by attorneys it refers complainants to. Bishop Accountability is an interesting site — I noticed articles have been removed from it which are inconvenient for the AG and US Attorney for New Hampshire and Jim Rosenberg relating to St Paul’s School and the Owen Labrie case.

I am informed that there was some internal discord at Shaheen & Gordon over the revenue they expect to get from the claims against the Yourh Detention Center. Coincidentally, they threatened me with a defamation suit in 2021 for statements I had made about their client, the NHCADSV, being involved in a “Kids for Cash” type scheme. It’s not defamation if it is true.

And if the Vatican could do one thing that would help Catholic and Episcopalian institutions around the world who have become subjected to these media fueled witch hunts, it would be to stand up and call out the profiteering and racketeering that has been going on with these law firms, victims advocacy groups, and the police, prosecutors and media they are in business with. All these people did was create sensationalist headlines and then set out to create evidence out of no evidence and hide evidence that was exculpatory. Follow the money and look at the lawfirms and non-profits and see how they got rich.

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Editor’s Note: For more on this story see “Vatican Bans Publishing Lists of ‘Credibly’ Accused Priests” by Fr Gordon MacRae and William A. Donohue, PhD.

Betrayed by Victims’ Advocates

This riveting account by a survivor of adolescent sexual abuse first appeared in the Catholic League Journal, Catalyst, in April 2020. It is republished with permission at Beyond These Stone Walls.

April 15, 2020 | Catalyst

As an adolescent victim of homosexual clergy abuse, I know the challenges that men face in coming forward. Many of us are silenced in shame after being abused. Aggravating the recovery process is that, despite the evidence, there is an ongoing agenda to cover up the homosexual nature of the abuse crisis, disenfranchising more than 80% of us victims.

Recovery is difficult enough without predatory advocacy groups and their lawyers trolling us for profit and politics.  The added torment of being told the problem isn’t related to homosexuality only compounds our pain.  For this reason, I am grateful to the Catholic League for giving me the opportunity to relay the difficulties facing victims of homosexual abuse in particular, with all due respect and recognition of the grief suffered by victims who were subjected to heterosexual abuse.

For all of us men who were robbed of the opportunity to allow our sexual identities to mature before being assaulted, the abuse may be ruinous, to the point that some victims never speak of it.  Sadly, the odds of suicide attempts are 2-4 times higher among women and a staggering 4-11 times higher for men compared to those who are not abused.  These statistics do not account for the compounded effect of betrayal of our faith caused by our spiritual fathers.

I never spoke a word about my abuse until seven years later, feeling safe only to disclose under the seal of confession.  The problem was that I didn’t know that the priest behind the confessional screen was an active homosexual.  So, when I confessed to him, and he offered to help me, I didn’t know I was being solicited.

I was 22 years old, it was 1989, and there was no public knowledge of the predatory homosexual cadre in our Church.  Over the ensuing 18 months the priest from the confessional provided pastoral counseling, but I was also subjected to lewd homosexual conversation and harassment.  It was complicated, I was benefitting from his counseling as I was preparing for medical school and hoping to get better, so I tolerated his sporadic foulness.  I became dialed into my faith like never before, attending mass and praying on my knees every night.  I seemed to be recovering.  But that all ended one night when he phoned me, ostensibly drunk, blurting out the most appalling sexual propositions.  It was truly devastating.  After that I could no longer sit through a mass.  I left the Church, vowing I would never speak about my abuse again.

Decades would pass before I found myself in professional counseling.  Not knowing I had PTSD, I was dealing with severe anxiety.  I didn’t intend to tell the psychologist about the abuse, however, he got to the source, and thus began my recovery.  I was 44 years old, with a wife and four kids.  We had made the difficult decision years earlier to educate our kids in Catholic schools.

I’d like to share some experiences I had in the recovery process to benefit other survivors and their families to learn from my mistakes, and for members of the Church to understand what happens to us victims when we step forward.  Recovery is a difficult course to navigate with plenty of bad actors and hidden agendas out there.

The first step I took after coming forward was to learn what happened to my abuser.  I found the “Bishop Accountability” website and read that he had been incarcerated in Oklahoma for assaulting boys there.  On that webpage I saw a banner ad for a group called “Road to Recovery”.

I reached out, and had an immediate response by founder and former priest, Bob Hoatson.  In that first email he asked if I would like an attorney.  I was surprised by this, it wasn’t why I was contacting him, I declined the solicitation and told him I only wanted to get better.

I took his counsel thinking he was an expert on clergy abuse.  He appeared on CNN with Anderson Cooper and was in countless newspaper articles.  He became a significant influence on me.  Ultimately, under his influence, I brought a suit against the Church and I would leave the Church, again.  I drew the line when Hoatson encouraged me to get my children out of the Church.  Nonetheless, my family was going to mass without me with a negative effect on us.

Hoatson introduced me to the petulant attorney, Mitchell Garabedian, at the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) conference in Chicago.  SNAP proclaims to be a support group for survivors, but what I experienced was anything but support for survivors.  SNAP invited the shark attorneys, used the victims like chum, and watched the frenzy unfold.

I saw Jeff Anderson, the mega-sex abuse plaintiff attorney, giggly and excitedly prance around the conference to funnel money to SNAP.  All the attorneys raised their hands to show how much they “cared”, but it was an obvious pledge to their motherlode, SNAP.  Anderson offered to match all donations up to $50,000.  I thought Anderson was entirely inappropriate and found his exuberance personally offensive for the occasion.  I watched in disbelief as survivors were subjected to the machinations of SNAP.

After the victims were commoditized with attorneys in the conference room, we broke into small groups.  I was looking forward to this part, thinking someone could tell me how to break through.  Our group leader, Patrick Wall, was an ex-priest.  I thought, “surely these ex-priests, Hoatson and Wall, must be good people and can help.”  Instead, what happened in my small group had no therapeutic value. From my years of training in medicine, my assessment was that Mr. Wall had no skills in facilitating a group like this.  There were about 10 men in my group and nothing was accomplished.  Nothing.

Then, Wall told us he was an attorney working in Jeff Anderson’s practice.  My heart sank, my eyes welled up with tears.  I went to the SNAP conference to get better, and I had hoped they would help, but all I saw was SNAP aligning victims with attorneys for money and to weaponize victims against the Church.

I left the small group session deflated, and sat in the hallway.  A woman came asking if I was OK.  I told her that SNAP wasn’t what I thought it was going to be.  She said, “I’m sorry that you feel that way.”  I asked if she was part of SNAP.  She said no, “I am an attorney, here to see how I can help.”  She handed me her card.  I felt sick and had to get out of there.

I found David Clohessy, the president of SNAP, in the hotel lobby.  He authored an article about my abuser.  I wanted to know where he got his information and where I could learn more.  When asked, he couldn’t remember writing the article.  He couldn’t give me any information about my abuser.  I thought, “how can someone write an article and not remember a single thing about it?”

What I’ve come to learn over the years is that SNAP will regurgitate negative news about the Church to multiply the exposure.  That’s why Clohessy didn’t remember his article.  He did not offer to help me, he only apologized for not knowing anything.

Soon after the conference, a whistle blower, Gretchen Hammond successfully sued SNAP.  She witnessed SNAP taking kickbacks from the attorneys.  I was happy and felt vindicated that someone stood up for victims against SNAP.

Fast forwarding through the years, I was able to prosecute my abuser with a loophole in the statute of limitations.  He was convicted, sentenced to prison, and will likely expire there.  On December 23rd, 2017, I had a remarkable and unexpected reversion to our Faith.  Being back in the Faith brought joy that superseded the happiness I was seeking in counseling.

Hoatson made some disparaging remarks about my return to the Church and my communication with him fell off.  In reflection, I realized how he funneled victims to Garabedian, manipulating them much like SNAP.  I asked Hoatson what his financial relationship was with Garabedian, he only said “Mitch takes good care of me.”

In September of 2018, I was traveling across the Great Rift Valley in Africa, leading a team on a medical mission.  I received an email from Hoatson in our satellite-equipped safari truck.  He sent me his press release in response to the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report.  It read, “homosexuals don’t rape minors, predators rape minors.” He went on, “sure, some homosexuals rape minors, and some heterosexuals rape minors,” leading the reader to believe that there is no difference.  He also implored Catholics to embrace homosexual and transgender priests.

I confronted him, asking him to add facts to his press release and tell the truth.  I replied, “Bob, I was raped by a homosexual and you’re telling the press that I wasn’t.  How do you think that makes me feel?”  He told me I was the only survivor who felt that way.  I reported this to Cardinal Tobin, in New Jersey, where Hoatson’s organization is located.  I learned that I am not the only survivor who feels disenfranchised by the position that homosexuality has nothing to do with the crisis.

The effort to protect and harbor active homosexual priests in the Church adds insult to victims’ injury.  Many point to “clericalism” as a cause.  Alright then, let’s recognize that homosexuals far and away outpace heterosexuals in using clericalism as a means to an end.  Can we stop with this politically correct nonsense?  We are the Church, forever counter-cultural, with no duty to bow to the gay agenda.

Sometimes I hear words of hope.  Like Pope Francis’ statements on homosexuals in ministry.  Recently our local rector sent out a notice about screening homosexuals from entering the seminary.  In response, I immediately sent a $1,000 donation in gratitude.

Today, SNAP continues to smear our Church.  Recently, Clohessy appeared in my city with TV coverage accusing our Bishop of not including my abuser on a list of accused, highlighting my abuser on the news.  But he was never in this archdiocese.  I contacted the TV station and SNAP multiple times asking them to correct their false reporting but they never responded.  SNAP created false news, smeared the Church, their mission accomplished.  SNAP also recognized Bob Hoatson with an award last year.

Navigating the recovery process is tough.  There are forces vying for victims’ money and souls.  However, for me, it was my return to the Catholic Faith that pulled me through the effects of abuse.  I am grateful to God for that.

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Related:

David Clohessy Resigns SNAP in Alleged Kickback Scheme

Weapons of Mass Destruction

Coming Home to the Catholic Faith I Left Behind by Michael Ciresi