The Priest, the Troop, and the Boys of New Albany

The Boys In The 1989 Investigation

On July 24, 1989, the Rev. Thomas L. McLaughlin pleaded guilty in Logan County Common Pleas Court to attempted gross sexual imposition involving a twelve-year-old boy. Franklin County juvenile detective Terry Shepard had been investigating allegations involving seven boys, most of them from Franklin County, and the plea agreement meant McLaughlin would not face additional charges involving boys from other counties. United Press International reported the agreement the next day, identifying the priest's cottage near Russells Point and Indian Lake as the place where the alleged encounters had occurred. The case that reached court concerned one boy, while the allegations involving the others remained part of an investigation that the reported agreement brought to a close without further prosecutions.

Shepard told UPI that the investigation began in January and that the allegations stretched back at least fourteen years, a period covering McLaughlin's assignments in more than one Ohio community. The detective described boys who had come to know the priest through their families' church activities and who were reluctant to testify against him. Speaking in the middle of the prosecution, Shepard said it had been difficult for the young men to talk about what had happened because of the regard in which they held McLaughlin. He also said the Diocese of Columbus would not permit investigators to speak with the priest. The news account preserved that criticism from a detective involved in the case, alongside the far more difficult position of the boys whose allegations had brought the authorities there.

Judge Ronald E. Hadley was expected to sentence McLaughlin after the plea. McLaughlin received an eighteen-month sentence and served approximately a year in prison, according to BishopAccountability’s historical chronology and reporting by the Columbus Dispatch. By the time of the prosecution, he had already been removed from his New Albany assignment and entered treatment at St. Luke’s Institutional Center in Suitland, Maryland.

The Priest Who Helped Found The Parish

McLaughlin had spent roughly nine years at St. Mary Church in Marion before moving to New Albany in 1983. His years in Marion overlap with the period the detective described, and a later Marion Star examination of local clergy history reported another allegation involving a boy from that community. The assignment history is important because the police investigation extended across county lines, following events said to have occurred before McLaughlin became a founding pastor in New Albany.

The Diocese of Columbus purchased seven acres of land in New Albany in 1980 and established a mission two years later. The first Mass was celebrated at New Albany Elementary School, with services subsequently held at the local Lions Club and, after a rectory was purchased, in a detached garage. Bishop Herrmann named McLaughlin founding pastor in April 1983, and the mission formally became Church of the Resurrection that July. By 1985 the congregation had opened its first worship center, giving the priest a prominent role in a young parish that was still establishing its place in the community.

McLaughlin was removed from the New Albany pastorate before his July 1989 guilty plea. UPI reported that he had been undergoing treatment at St. Luke’s Institutional Center in Maryland since December 1988, and the parish's published history identifies Jerome Rodenfels as the priest who succeeded him. The removal brought McLaughlin's tenure at Church of the Resurrection to an end after he had helped the congregation grow from a mission meeting in borrowed spaces into an established parish.

The Name In The Boy Scouts Files

Less than a month after McLaughlin pleaded guilty, the Boy Scouts of America opened an ineligible-volunteer file bearing his name. The published index dates the entry to August 21, 1989, identifies him as a Roman Catholic priest, and associates him with Troop 160 in New Albany. The Los Angeles Times later included his name among the historical Scouting exclusion records it made searchable in 2012. An attorney-compiled catalogue identifies the file as case 539.

The Boy Scouts kept the ineligible-volunteer files to identify adults the organization considered unsuitable for service. McLaughlin’s August entry became publicly accessible when historical Scouting records were released decades later, placing a dated administrative action alongside the July prosecution. For the boys who had spoken to investigators, the criminal agreement meant their allegations would not all have a courtroom outcome; for Scouting, the same summer produced an exclusion entry under the priest’s name.

The Diocese And The Civil Cases

McLaughlin's conviction was followed by civil litigation brought by victims against the priest and the Diocese of Columbus. BishopAccountability's chronology describes a suit brought by two victims and settled in 1992; a Columbus Dispatch examination published in April 2002 also reported confidential settlements in litigation involving McLaughlin and the diocese. Thomas Tyack, an attorney who represented the plaintiffs, told the newspaper that the confidentiality agreement prevented him from discussing their case. The prosecution had left a public account of one boy's guilty-plea case and the additional allegations received by police, while the later civil litigation ended with terms that the parties kept confidential.

When the Dispatch returned to the issue of clergy abuse in 2002, the diocese said it had promptly reported past allegations to the appropriate authorities and would continue to refer future allegations to law enforcement. In its 2019 letter releasing a list of credibly accused clergy, the diocese described its standing reporting practice as having been adopted in 2002. The assertion in 2002 stands alongside Shepard’s earlier account that the diocese would not permit investigators to interview McLaughlin, a complaint he made while the original criminal case was still underway. The 2019 list included McLaughlin, identified as deceased and laicized, alongside other clergy determined by the diocese to have been credibly accused of sexually abusing minors.

A Later Investigation And The Parish'S Scouting Connection

The same parish appeared in another investigation decades later, after James Csaszar became pastor in July 2016. In November 2017 the diocese placed him on administrative leave over questionable communications with a minor and possible misuse of church funds connected to his preceding assignment at St. Rose Church in New Lexington. Bishop Frederick Campbell said the matter had been referred to law enforcement. When the state investigation became public the following spring, reporting described a sixteen-year-old boy whose mother had provided hundreds of pages of messages and who told investigators he felt manipulated and threatened, while denying a sexual relationship with Csaszar. Csaszar likewise denied sexual contact, and the inquiry closed after his death in December 2017. The reported conduct concerned his earlier New Lexington assignment; the connection to Church of the Resurrection was his later appointment there.

The distinction between the two investigations rests in what happened to each case. McLaughlin pleaded guilty to a criminal sex offense involving a twelve-year-old, and the diocese later placed him on its list of credibly accused clergy. The Csaszar inquiry, involving allegations about communications and finances at another parish, ended after his death without a criminal trial or a finding of sexual assault. Both men held the pastorate of Church of the Resurrection at different times, which brings their histories into the same institutional chronology without making their alleged conduct equivalent.

Church of the Resurrection also continued to take part in diocesan Scouting life long after the 1989 prosecution. The Catholic Times documented Scout Day ceremonies at the New Albany parish in several years between 2013 and 2025, including the presentation of religious awards to young people from different Scouting organizations. At the 2015 ceremony, the diocese honored Troop 50 from St. Mary Church in Marion, the parish where McLaughlin had served before New Albany. A later diocesan report identified St. Mary as that troop's sponsor, documenting the involvement of those two Catholic communities in Scouting events decades after the priest's appointments.

The case that reached court in July 1989 concerned a twelve-year-old boy, while allegations involving six others had been part of the investigation. McLaughlin’s name entered the Boy Scouts’ ineligible-volunteer files in August, and the later civil cases ended in confidential settlements. The detective’s contemporary account survives alongside those institutional actions, including his description of boys struggling to testify against a priest they respected. The boys had brought the allegations into view long before any of these later records became public.