Schools
Bishop Guertin High School Settles With Sex Abuse Victim
Former student Larissa Troy filed her lawsuit a year after she learned her abuser's criminal record was known to Bishop Guertin's admin.
NASHUA, NH — Bishop Guertin High School officials won’t have to explain in court why they knowingly employed a convicted sex offender as a teacher after the private school reached a settlement agreement with the survivor.
Former student Larissa Troy filed her lawsuit in 2018, a year after she learned her abuser’s criminal record was known to Bishop Guertin’s administrator when he was hired in 1990. Her alleged abuser, Brother Shawn McEnany, died in 2017.
Find out what's happening in Nashuafor free with the latest updates from Patch.
The terms of the settlement are not public. The resolution without trial closes a lawsuit that started almost a decade ago. Lawyers for Troy and Bishop Guertin did not respond to requests for comment.
Troy was forced to take her complaint to the New Hampshire Supreme Court after Bishop Guertin’s lawyers had it dismissed on statute of limitations grounds. Under the law, which changed in 2020, Troy’s deadline for filing a lawsuit lapsed in 2007, 12 years after her 18th birthday.
Find out what's happening in Nashuafor free with the latest updates from Patch.
But the Court ruled in 2023 that Troy’s lawsuit could proceed since her complaint focused on the school's failures in hiring McEnany. Troy did not find out until 2017 that former headmaster Brother Leo Labbe knew McEnany was an abuser when he hired him in 1990. Essentially, the Court ruled that Troy’s complaint did not expire in 2007 because she did not discover Bishop Guertin’s coverup until 2017.
Labbe reportedly did not consider McEnany a danger to students, and did not take any precautions in bringing him to the school, according to court records.
“Leo Labbe, the official responsible for the hiring, ‘believed that it was safe’ to hire McEnany ‘because (Bishop Guertin) was, at the time, an all-boys school.’ Prior to hiring McEnany, Labbe did not consult with a psychological or mental health professional as to whether McEnany would pose a risk to female students,” the Court’s 2023 ruling states.
Troy was among the first female students to attend the school in 1992. In November of 1995, when she was a senior, McEnany allegedly forced himself on her in a classroom, according to the lawsuit. The lawsuit alleges at least one other incident of sexual assault.
After she was assaulted, Troy went to the school’s Dean of Students Susan Mansor, according to court records. Mansor accused Troy of making up the abuse.
“Ms. Mansor warned the plaintiff that she ‘would be in a lot of trouble at home and at school’ if she continued to repeat the ‘story,’” court records state.
McEnany taught Religion and led student spiritual retreats at the Nashua private high school despite the fact he was legally barred from teaching in Maine following his 1988 conviction for sexually assaulting a 15-year-old girl at the St. Dominic Regional High School in Auburn. McEnany received two suspended jail sentences and was hired at Bishop Guertin two years later.
Bishop Guertin is owned and operated by the Brotherhood of the Sacred Heart religious order. The Roman Catholic order operates 11 schools independently throughout the United States. At the time of his first conviction, Sacred Heart brothers ran St. Dominic.
The mother of the Maine victim told the Portland Press Herald in 1997 that the Brothers of the Sacred Heart at St. Dominic tried to keep her from going to police in 1988.
“They wanted this kept quiet," the mother said.
Nashua police arrested McEnany in 1997 on charges of teaching as a convicted sex offender and failing to register as a sex offender. But the charges were eventually dropped in 1999 as prosecutors decided inconsistencies in law created problems for the case.
New Hampshire passed a law in 1989 barring anyone charged with a felony for sexually assaulting a child from teaching. McEnany was originally charged with a felony in Maine but ended up pleading guilty to two misdemeanors for “sexual contact.”
McEnany later stayed with the Brothers of the Sacred Heart in Rhode Island, and retired from active ministry in 2014.
Several brothers with Sacred Heart involved with Bishop Guertin were accused of abuse in the early 2000s, including Labbe. A class action lawsuit resulted in numerous settlements with purported victims. Sacred Heart settled child sexual abuse claims in June 2004 concerning accusations against brothers Guy Beaulieu, Roger Argencourt, Leon Cyr, Alfred Laflamme, and Labbe.
This article first appeared on InDepthNH.org and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
