Biglaw

The Biglaw Firm Defending The Catholic Church

The sexual abuse allegations out of Pennsylvania have attracted a major Biglaw firm.

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If you’ve been paying attention to the news at all over the last week, you’ve surely heard about the Pennsylvania grand jury report outlining the sexual abuse of thousands of victims at Catholic dioceses across Pennsylvania. Much has been made of Cardinal Donald Wuerl’s role as the former bishop of Pittsburgh, where he allegedly failed to remove priests accused of abuse from their ministries.

Now, he’s lawyered up.

According to a report by Law.com, Wuerl has tapped Biglaw giant Jones Day to represent him on matters relating to the grand jury report:

In confirming Jones Day’s representation of Wuerl on issues involving the grand jury, Wuerl spokesman Ed McFadden added that Jones Day had previously represented the cardinal on other matters. The firm worked with the Archdiocese of Washington general counsel Kim Viti Fiorentino on a settlement relating to Zubik v. Burwell, which involved the U.S. Health and Human Services Department’s mandate for employers to provide contraceptives under the Affordable Care Act that the Catholic Church found morally objectionable.

This isn’t the first time that Wuerl has worked with Jones Day. The partners he’s worked with previously on other legal matters include former partner and current solicitor general Noel Francisco and some other heavy hitters:

The lawyers now representing Wuerl were not immediately made known, but in prior matters involving the Archbishop of Washington the Catholic Church has turned to Jones Day partners Eric Dreiband and David Raimer, and then-partner Noel Francisco, now serving as U.S. solicitor general. Francisco was part of the Jones Day team representing the Catholic Church’s challenge to the ACA.

Wuerl, through his in-house lawyer, has already been on the offensive regarding the grand jury report:

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[Archdiocese of Washington general counsel Kim Viti Fiorentino], Wuerl’s in-house lawyer, has attacked the Pennsylvania grand jury report and its depiction of Wuerl. In an interview with her archdiocese’s weekly newspaper published Tuesday, Fiorentino said the investigatory process and resulting report, “narrowly targeted the Catholic Church in six dioceses in Pennsylvania and was generated in a process that suffered from significant legal flaws.”

He even has a website set up, TheWuerlRecord.com, to tell his side of the story. We’ll see if this aggressive strategy changes now that Jones Days is on board.

headshotKathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).

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