TTSOML #53: Gatti Introduces Me To Greg Smith

Gatti's office was in Salem, Oregon, at least an hour away from where I lived. Becauwe of the distance, much of our correspondence occured over the phone. There were a few email exchanges, and several meetings at his office, but that was about it. Gatti said to come to his office to discuss my case and told me he wanted me to meet Greg Smith.

Greg Smith did not seem to like me, from the moment he first laid eyes on me. Ryan said later that the two were a good team, in a "good cop-bad cop" sort of way. Of all things, it was implied Dan Gatti was the good cop (see Dan's autobiography for the S&M dungeon scene).

Smith took one hard look at me, after breezing into the office. Dan asked him to sit down and introduced us. I noticed Greg's shirt, a long-sleeved flannel number with deer figures all over it. He wore blue jeans. Greg said, abruptly, "You don't have a case." I looked over at Dan, who had his hands folded together, in the air. He was pressing his fingertips together and unpressing them and looking at me. "Dan says I DO have a case and he's already taken it." I said. Greg repeated, "No, you don't have a case."

The last time I had met with Dan, he grilled me hard and later said he thought trial would be traumatic for me, as he'd just tried out my reactions in a "mock cross-examination". He didn't say I didn't have a case though, because he'd already been excited to take my case and told me what torts we were using. Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress, Section 1983, and Defamation. The first two were the big ones. The first tort was for what the monks had done after counseling me so long, and the second one was for improperly using state police to further their own agendas. I pushed for the Defamation one myself, because I found out from people in town that I was being slandered by the Abbey, of being "potentially dangerous" and crazy, when no one in my life had ever made such a claim. Ever. The first people in my life to make such allegations, were the Roman Catholic monks of Mt. Angel Abbey and their attorneys. There was nothing preceding this. And at the same time they made these allegations, they lied and claimed their poor monk, Br. Ansgar Santogrossi, was a victim of a seductress and only trying to get away. They claimed he had no interest in me, thinking I guess, that I didn't have copies of his hand-written love letters to me, and emails. I guess they felt comfortable lying, just like Clinton did about Lewinsky, until someone proved them wrong with evidence, even when they knew what the truth was.

It takes a blue dress.

Good conscience, honor, code of conduct, dignity, self-respect, honesty, and respect for women...I think those values must have gone out the window with the 1950s.

I happened to have the letters. At any rate, large numbers of people had not SEEN those letters so it was a game to them to disseminate misinformation and slander about me before the truth got out on my side.

So the Abbey slandered me, and enlisted police to give me citations for things I didn't do, which Dan Gatti agreed perfectly fit violations of Section 1983.

I said to Smith, "I had a case before, so why don't I have a case NOW?" Smith said, "He didn't TOUCH you." His opinion was that all the other things were not enough. He felt there couldn't be damages if I had not been touched sexually. Even though I'd been assaulted physically by another priest, and cited falsely, slandered, and harassed to no end by the same monks who had me working for their church at their Abbey library and who counseled me and gave me oil annointings, blessings, promised me our communications were bound by confessional secrecy, and gave me medals of St. Benedict, to sleep with at night and wear around my neck.

I told Smith I didn't have to be touched, that what they had done was enough and I had damages to show for it and had had panic attacks for the first time in my life, and depression and had had to try antidepressants for the first time because of the shock of their actions. I also told him about all the car vandalisms which started happening, which mechanics even confirmed were not the norm, and I had records from AAA to prove how often some of the tows were. I told him how I had been threatened with harm and the destruction of "your good name" and how they then proceeded to defame my character. I listed how my case fit the torts, and Greg startled back. Dan said, looking at him with a big smile, "I TOLD you she was smart." and then he made some further comments about my intelligence. I guess Greg had taken one look at me and heard my high pitched valley-girl voice and assumed I was an airhead. But I had been given the torts and law books, by Dan and Ryan, and I read them, cover to cover, and learned the legal language as well as I could.

Dan reassured me, "You DO have a case, but it's harder to prove and could go 50/50 either way with a jury." Basically, they were getting so many calls from men who had been molested as boys and teens, they had better odds with those cases, than mine, was what I was hearing. And yet Dan had still been sure of my case, because my character and background checked out so well, he felt a jury would believe me.

Greg leaned forward and said what he'd like to do is have me testify for their other cases, and to go forward to make a statement to the media. They wanted me to go on television.

Television.

Greg got really excited and said how great it would be for people to see me on T.V. because I looked so sweet and innocent (fresh-faced) and they would be able to see I was honest and credible. He and Dan asked me to agree to say I was NOT going to file my own case, but that "this is what happened to ME" and show them photos of the shack in the woods, and how I believed in the other victims of clergy abuse.

At that moment, I got sucked into their persuasive coaxing and I agreed I would do this. And then Dan said something which made me think about things later. He asked me if I had ever written any suggestive or sexually explicit emails or letters to any monk. I was shocked he asked and said NO! I hadn't even written anything slightly suggestive and not even romantic. Br. Ansgar had probably written the most romantic things, if anyone did, about how I was his "rose in my desert" and he wanted me to have a special relationship with him (thereafter was when he called me on the phone and said "I love you" and asked me not to go out with other men on dates).

So I said I hadn't written anything suggestive and Dan just looked at me. I said it again, "No!" I wondered why he asked and then after he mentioned, a few minutes later that he'd had lunch with Dick Whittemore. I realized later that Dick Whittemore must have been trying to psych Dan out and told him he "had" things on me, such as suggestive letters, when he didn't. Dan told me Dick DID say the Abbey was hostile towards me, which I obviously knew already.

After the meeting, I talked to Ryan and I was really disappointed. "Ryan, Dan told me I DID have a case, and I read those torts, and they FIT, and I can prove it too." Ryan said he understood and said Greg probably had influenced Dan. Maybe Dick also worked out a deal with Dan, telling him they'd give him something else in exchange for getting me to drop my case.

They just wanted me to hold up photos of the shack in the woods now, and say what happened to me, and that I wasn't filing a case, but this was my story.

In the meantime, I had these tickets for things I didn't do. I told Dan I had taken photos of the flyers on the cars for the Catholic bazaar, after I was cited for doing the same thing in town, and told him I had other evidence. I sometimes wonder if I hadn't had these things, if someone would have tried to nail me instead of worrying about unequal application of the law.

I found out the tickets were never filed with the D.A. in the area and the legal people there thought something was fishy. At any rate, the Abbey decided to drop charges or told their church-going police to drop them and it was dismissed, through Dan.

After Dan had taken my case for the Abbey and clergy abuse, I was hit by an oncoming car in another freak accident. It was a hit and run and I sometimes question how it happened, just like I question other things, looking back now.

For example, when I was held hostage, we were told by police no one else was involved but everyone else I talked to says it sounds more like he had been a hired hit man.

I don't know. At any rate, I'm trying to just put down the facts of what happened that started the chain of events which led to where I am now.

Meeting Dan was in 2003 at the end, or 2004. I'd have to look back. I was hit by the car as I tried to cross a street. There were several witnesses standing by who told the police I hadn't done anything wrong, traffic-wise. I had been returning to my house after dropping off a work application at a grocery store. Prior to that I had told my friend, Christa Schneider that I was going to leave to go do this and then come back. She asked me which store I was going to and when I was leaving and I told her.