Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - In light of the recent arrest of Fr. Jeffrey Nowak, a priest on administrative leave from the Buffalo Catholic Diocese, advocates assisting victims and survivors of clergy sexual abuse are calling for transparency from the Diocese and Bishop Michael Fisher regarding Nowak's conduct and accusations against him.
The group consisting of attorneys and victims of clergy abuse are calling on Bishop Fisher to release details of Nowak's Code of Canon Law No. 489 secret files, which dates back to 2012 when Nowak was ordained.
Nowak was arrested back on July 8 in Lackawanna, where he was charged by criminal complaint with receipt and possession of child pornography.
The group feels the Diocese of Buffalo negligently supervised, and believe the files on Fr. Nowak contain documents of scandal and the files of all accused priests in the Diocese. Members add his victims and the public deserve to know what has been sitting in his secret file since, at least, 2012.
"What did the Diocese of Buffalo know about Fr. Jeffrey Nowak, and when did they learn it?" asked attorney Mitchell Garabedian on Tuesday in a press conference.
"Canon Law 489 files are files that are kept by a Diocese, and the only person who has access to those files is the bishop. He has a sole lock and key. Documents in the Canon Law 489 files are highly sensitive, and they contain documents of 'scandal' unquote. It is time for Bishop Fisher to release publicly what is in those Canon Law 489 files concerning Fr. Jeffrey Nowak and every other priest."
Three Bishops were, or are responsible for the supervision of Fr. Nowak’s behavior during his time as an ordained priest: Bishop Richard Malone (2012–2019); Albany Bishop Edward Scharfenberger, Apostolic Administrator of the Buffalo Diocese (2019-2021); and current Bishop Michael Fisher (2021-Present). The group asks where all three were when it came to supervising Fr. Nowak, especially after he was placed on administrative leave in 2019 after accusations of inappropriate contact with children and harassment of a seminarian.
"Fr. Jeffrey Nowak seems to be walking trouble," Garabedian said.
"It is very important for the healing of clergy sexual abuse survivors and for the safety of children that the Catholic Church come clean and tell us the truth and practice transparency. What is in this Canon Law 489 secret files about Jeffrey Nowak? What did the Church do to protect children, or what didn't they do?"
Since Fr. Nowak’s ordination in 2012, he had four assignments in seven years.
"When he left St. John Vianney in Orchard Park, there must have been something in there that forced him to be assigned, believe it or not, to a school that's highly irregular, and he was the administrator of the school. Now, in those days, there were plenty of people, in a sense, to staff those schools, and they didn't need to take a diocesan priest out of diocesan ministry and put him in charge of a school, which meant, to me, that they were putting the fox inside the hen house. It's just unbelievable," said Robert Hoatson, president and co-founder of Road to Recovery and a survivor of clergy sexual abuse.
The group strongly feels the policies of the Catholic Church encourage sexual abuse of children, and this is the latest case to prove that nothing has changed within the Church. They feel documents such as the “Dallas Charter” (which was revised recently to favor clergy over victims) and Papal demands to stop clergy sexual abuse are empty gestures.
"We're here in 2026, and we were here how many years ago in Buffalo, trying to get things done, and still the Buffalo victims are still being revictimized and retraumatized," added Hoatson.
What is needed, according to the group, is the criminal prosecution of not only of men like Fr. Nowak, but transparency and a truly independent investigation of the Diocese of Buffalo.
