If you were an altar server, a Scout, or just one of the kids in the parish under Father Gilbert Gauthe: we believe you.

You won't need to explain who he was, not to us. In Broussard, New Iberia, Abbeville and Henry people still drop their voices when the name comes up, forty years on. He pleaded guilty, in a Lafayette courtroom, forty-one years ago this October, and the Diocese that kept moving him is being sued over him again right now, in the same courthouse. Whatever you carried out of those years, it was never yours to carry, and if you take one thing from this page let it be a date: June 14, 2027.

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6 questions. Your answers are private and go to one person.

The diocese that assigned him has its own page: Diocese of Lafayette

This applies to you no matter what

Nine Vermilion Parish families settled in 1984 and 1985; yours didn't, or was never asked. People have filed since anyway, in 1993, in 2024, in 2025, and nobody at the courthouse wanted to know why they'd waited. Neither will we.
You were under 18. In Louisiana right now that is the question that decides everything, which is why we ask it on the fourth screen. Under 18 then, and the claim is open today, provided it is filed by June 14, 2027.
A lawyer told you, twenty or thirty years ago, that it was too late. Back then that was the law; you had until 28. Then the law changed, in 2021, and on June 12, 2024 the Louisiana Supreme Court let the change stand. That same lawyer would tell you something different today.
You told somebody, your mother, a nun, the monsignor, and nothing came of it. The record on this page says the Diocese heard about him in 1974, at Abbeville, and again in 1980. You were not the first, and you won't be doubted for it here.
He was kind to you. Took you camping, let you stay over at the rectory, made you feel picked. That is exactly what the 1985 record describes, and it is not a mark against you.
You're asking for a brother, a husband, a friend who was one of his and can't do this himself. Reach out anyway.

Father Gilbert Gauthe: what the public record says, and when

None of what follows is ours. It is the Louisiana Supreme Court, the 15th Judicial District Court, the Diocese of Lafayette's own list, and the reporters who covered them, and every line links to its source. One thing on this page is not an allegation: Gauthe pleaded guilty in 1985, and we say exactly what to. Everything after that about the Diocese is a complaint that alleges, or a newspaper that reports, and we say which.

1972 to June 1983

Five assignments in eleven years, all in the Diocese of Lafayette: Sacred Heart of Jesus in Broussard, Our Lady of Perpetual Help in New Iberia, diocesan director of Scouting, St. Mary Magdalen in Abbeville, and from 1977 St. John in Henry, with its mission St. James in Esther. The assignment record, compiled from the Official Catholic Directory and the reporting of the day, carries the Diocese's knowledge alongside the dates: Bishop Gerard Frey confronted him in 1974 over a report of sexual contact with a young man and Gauthe admitted it; two Abbeville parents complained to the pastor about him; St. John parishioners wrote the bishop in April 1980 that his house had become a second home to unsupervised boys. He was suspended in June 1983 after a father went to a lawyer. BishopAccountability.org, assignment record.

December 7, 1984

The first suits were already on file. The Gastal family's cases against the Diocese sat in the 15th Judicial District Court in Vermilion Parish under Nos. 84-48174 through 84-48177, sealed by the trial judge. On December 7, 1984 the Louisiana Supreme Court set the sealing order aside as far as it blocked discovery. A few lines of order, and the file started to open. Gastal v. Hannan, No. 84-CC-1833 (La. Dec. 7, 1984).

October 14, 1985

Gauthe, then 40, pleaded guilty in state district court in Lafayette to 33 counts of pornography, crimes against nature and indecent behavior with juveniles. An aggravated rape count was severed. District Judge Hugh Brunson sentenced him to 20 years without parole, telling him his crimes 'have laid a terrible burden on those children, their families and society.' The same report said he had told his superiors as early as 1974, was transferred and sent to therapy, and was not removed until parents sued; by then the church and its insurers had agreed to pay nine Vermilion Parish families at least $4.9 million. Asked how many boys, he had said '35, 36, 37, something like that.' UPI, October 14, 1985.

February 4, 1998

Jason Harkins sued in 1992, 15th JDC No. 93-3086, after the settlements, after the sentence. He said Gauthe molested him in the summer of 1978, at a motocross event in Eunice, when he was eight, and that he had suppressed it until counseling in 1992. He named Gauthe, the Society of the Roman Catholic Church of the Diocese of Lafayette and three of its insurers. The trial court let the Church out on summary judgment, Gauthe having been off duty that day. The Third Circuit put it back in: 'the record, at this point, does not eliminate the possibility of the Church's liability.' The Diocese asked the Supreme Court to take it up; on April 24, 1998 the court said no. Harkins v. Gauthe, No. 97-912 (La. App. 3 Cir. Feb. 4, 1998).

December 18, 1998

Thirteen years on, the plea came back around to the Louisiana Supreme Court. In State v. Gauthe, No. 98-KP-1995, the court granted the State's writ 'because the plea colloquy in this case shows no ambiguity and so requires no extrinsic evidence for its interpretation.' Short, technical, and the reason it is on this page: it is the state's highest court, in its own reports at 731 So.2d 273, confirming the 1985 guilty plea as a matter of record. State v. Gauthe, 731 So.2d 273 (La. Dec. 18, 1998).

April 12, 2019

'Removed, 1983; resigned, 1983; convicted, 1985.' That's Gauthe's whole line on the list Bishop J. Douglas Deshotel released that day, the Diocese's own count of 33 priests and four deacons with, in its phrase, credible accusations of sexual abuse of a minor or vulnerable adult. The parishes beside his name are the four you already know from this page, Broussard, New Iberia, Abbeville, Henry, plus one you don't, St. Michael the Archangel in Crowley, given without years. A list entry is the Diocese's finding. The conviction word, for once, is a court's. Diocese of Lafayette list entry, as archived by ProPublica.

June 2024

Days after the Supreme Court's June 12 ruling, a man filing as John D. Doe sued the Diocese of Lafayette and St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church in the 15th Judicial District Court. His complaint says he became an altar boy at St. Mary Magdalen in Abbeville at 10 to 12, around 1976 to 1977, that his mother dropped him off on Saturdays to prepare vestments, and that Gauthe 'would take John D. Doe to a private room where the gowns were prepared and sexually abuse him.' It says the boy told his mother, and that the church and the Diocese pressured the family not to report it. Pleaded, none of it found. The Advocate ran the story on October 8, 2024, without a docket number, so we don't have one to give you either. The Acadiana Advocate, October 8, 2024, via BishopAccountability.

December 27, 2025

By the paper's count at least 13 suits hit the Diocese in 2025 (the newest on December 17), and about 50 have been pending in the 15th JDC since June 2024. 'Two of the most recent lawsuits allege abuse by former priest Gilbert Gauthe,' the paper wrote. A May suit over Our Lady of Perpetual Help in New Iberia says an altar boy abused by another priest there between 1975 and 1977 was, on one occasion, brought to Gauthe's bedroom in the rectory, where the complaint says he was raped. Reagan Thomas, who represents twelve Lafayette plaintiffs, two of them over Gauthe, said there had been 'no forward motion on any of these cases.' And the paper's last word on the man himself: released after ten years, he 'today lives in Dickinson, Texas, between Houston and Galveston.' The Advocate, December 27, 2025, via BishopAccountability.

We checked this on September 13, 2026, and the newest thing in it is from December 27, 2025. When something new gets filed or decided, it goes in here within 72 hours, with the link.

Who answers for what Father Gauthe did

Not him, in any way that pays. He is 80 or 81, out of prison since 1995, living on very little in Dickinson, Texas, as of the last report we have. The defendant in every suit on this page, 1984, 1993, 2024, 2025, is the Society of the Roman Catholic Church of the Diocese of Lafayette, the corporation on Carmel Drive that ordained him in 1971, moved him from Broussard to New Iberia to Abbeville to Henry, made him chaplain of its Scouts, and did not suspend him until June 1983. The parishes are named too: St. Mary Magdalen in the June 2024 complaint, and in 1993 the Diocese's own insurers. That is whose door the lawyer knocks on.

The theory is plain and it is pleaded, not ours: the Diocese knew, or had every reason to, and moved him instead of stopping him. The 1985 record has him telling his superiors as early as 1974. The assignment record puts a bishop's confrontation in 1974, a parents' complaint in Abbeville, a parishioners' letter in April 1980. The John D. Doe complaint alleges the family was pressured not to report. Whether that adds up to negligence, to concealment, to a Diocese answering for its priest, is what the 15th JDC is being asked to decide about fifty times over.

One thing we'll say because it bears on timing. The Diocese has not filed for bankruptcy, and plaintiffs' counsel said on August 28, 2026 there is no sign it will, but in July 2026 it put a bankruptcy lawyer on one of its Lafayette cases. If it ever files, everything in the 15th JDC stops and the 2027 date becomes a claims deadline a federal judge sets. Until then the courthouse is open.

Your deadline: the Louisiana rule for childhood sexual abuse claims, and the date inside it

What it means for his years. Every one of his assignments was between 1972 and 1983. If you were under 18 when it happened, anywhere in that stretch, the claim is open today and it has to be filed by June 14, 2027. Not started by then. Filed. If you were 18 or older at the time, you are on a different article, La. C.C. art. 3496.2, three years from a trigger a lawyer works out from your dates, and we won't promise that route from a web page.

Where the date comes from. In 2021 Louisiana rewrote La. R.S. 9:2800.9 so that a civil action for sexual abuse of a minor 'does not prescribe,' and in the same act it reached backward for the claims the old rule had already ended, which is the part the Diocese of Lafayette fought, all the way up, and for a stretch of 2024 had beaten: the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled its way on March 22, then reheard Bienvenu v. Defendant 1, No. 2023-CC-01194, and on June 12 went the other way, 5-2. (The old rule, for what it's worth, gave you until 28. A boy from Henry in 1980 was out of time sometime in the 1990s, before he'd have known there was a door.) The Legislature moved the close the same year. Its Senate Bill 246, Act 481 of 2024, says a revived claim may be filed 'on or before June 14, 2027.' The John D. Doe suit went in that June. That is how this door gets used.

Two more Louisiana things, because the lawyer will ask. If you are 21 or older when you file, the statute wants certificates from your attorney and from a licensed mental health practitioner before the Diocese can even be named, so you'll be asked, gently, whether you've talked to a counselor. And Louisiana does not generally allow punitive damages, so nobody honest will quote you a number from another state. Plainly, then: under 18 at the time, the door is open and it closes June 14, 2027. Over 18, a lawyer decides. Twenty minutes on the phone usually settles which.

Your situation still qualifies even if

It wasn't Gauthe. Another priest, a Scout leader, a teacher at the parish school. The claim is against the Diocese either way, and about fifty suits say so.
Nothing happened that you'd call sex. The counts he pleaded to include 'indecent behavior with juveniles.' The law's words are wide; you don't have to use them.
Your family took money in 1984 or 1985, or somebody signed something. Bring it. A lawyer has to read it before saying a word, and it doesn't shut the conversation.
You live in Houston now, or Beaumont, or Gulfport. Half of Vermilion Parish does. The claim follows the parish, not your address.
Maybe you've never told a soul and don't know if you could. Nobody here is going to make you. The person on the phone is one survivor, that's all, and you can hang up whenever you need to.
It was a Scout trip or a camping weekend, not a church. He was the Diocese's Scout chaplain from 1974. That counts.

Where he was

Diocese of Lafayette, 1971 to 1983, per the BishopAccountability assignment record and the Diocese's own list: Sacred Heart of Jesus, Broussard, about 1972 to 1973 · Our Lady of Perpetual Help, New Iberia, about 1973 to 1976 · diocesan director of Scouting and Boy Scout chaplain, from 1974 · St. Mary Magdalen, Abbeville, about 1976 to 1977 · St. John, Henry, and its mission St. James in Esther, 1977 to June 1983 · and, on the Diocese's list without years, St. Michael the Archangel in Crowley. Also the rectories, the Scout camping trips and the sacristy the 1985 record describes. The years are directory years and can be off by one; say yours as you remember them. The Diocese of Lafayette itself has its own page, diocese-of-lafayette-survivors, for anything that happened under another priest or in another parish. If it was somewhere else, tell us anyway.

Questions people are asking

Will anyone find out I came forward?

Not from us; your answers go to one person at ME2. And not from the court file either, if it gets that far: the man who sued in June 2024 is John D. Doe there, and the seven who filed that fall aren't named either; the statute lets the lawyer file first and hold the Diocese's name back until a judge has read the certificates in private. In 2024 one judge did make a plaintiff put his real name in, under seal. All of that gets explained to you by a lawyer before a single page is filed, and nothing is filed unless you say yes.

Was Gilbert Gauthe convicted?

Yes. He pleaded guilty; there was no trial. October 14, 1985, state district court in Lafayette, 33 counts, pornography, crimes against nature and indecent behavior with juveniles, 20 years without parole from Judge Hugh Brunson. It's all in the record above, with the wire report it comes from. Years later the Louisiana Supreme Court cited the plea colloquy itself, State v. Gauthe, 731 So.2d 273 (1998), so the plea is on the record twice over. He served ten years, then turned up in Texas, where in 1997 he pleaded no contest in Polk County to a charge of injury to a child (seven years' probation) and where, in 2010, he finished two years in the Galveston County jail for failing to register as a sex offender. You'll see 34 counts in some accounts. We went with the wire report filed from the courtroom that day.

Is Gilbert Gauthe still alive?

Yes, as far as anyone has reported. The last two sightings in print: a Daily Advertiser reporter who found him in San Leon, Texas, in April 2019 (he was 73 then, born in 1945 in Napoleonville, and told the reporter he had cancer), and The Advocate, which on December 27, 2025 put him in Dickinson, Texas. None of which changes the claim, which runs against the Diocese, and the Diocese is still on Carmel Drive.

People I grew up with settled with the Diocese of Lafayette in the 1980s. Isn't that done with?

Other people's settlements don't bind you. Nine families settled in 1984 and 1985; a man sued in 1993 and the Third Circuit kept the Church in his case; others have sued in 2024 and 2025. If your own family signed something, that's different, and a lawyer has to see it. Ask anyway. It costs nothing to ask.

Louisiana's statute of limitations for child sexual abuse, is it really gone? A lawyer told me years ago mine had run.

If you were a minor at the time, that lawyer is out of date. Act 322 of 2021 rewrote the statute, La. R.S. 9:2800.9, so those claims don't prescribe, and on June 12, 2024 the Supreme Court let that stand. The catch, and for his years it is the whole point: a claim that had already expired under the old age-28 rule comes back only if it is filed by June 14, 2027. That is Act 481 of 2024 talking. So the honest answer for anyone who knew him between 1972 and 1983 is the date, not 'no limit.' Anyone 18 or older at the time is on a three-year article, La. C.C. art. 3496.2, and a lawyer has to read the dates.

Who sees your form

Kerim Eravci · Survivor Advocate · Not a lawyer

I was a victim, and I waited. Not because I didn't know what happened to me (I knew every day), but because I'd decided it was over, mine to carry, nobody's business. When I finally went looking for a lawyer, the answer came back in two words I'd never thought about: statute of limitations. My time had run out while I was busy getting through it.

What that has cost me since is a long story, and I'll tell you the whole thing in private, if you want it. The short version is the reason my name is on this page: I'm here to help people do what I wish I'd done, which is find out where you stand while the door's still open.

I'm not a lawyer. I read what you send, I call you once, on your terms, and nothing gets filed unless you say so. Ask sooner than I did.

Kerim Eravci is not an attorney. He's a survivor.

What happens next. Three steps, nothing more until you say so.

You answer 6 questions. Nothing is filed. Nothing starts.
A survivor calls you, once. Not a robot, not a call center. Someone who has been where you are.
You decide. You find out your options. If you want to stop there, you stop there.

How this works

ME2 Survivors Alliance protects the heart. Licensed Louisiana attorneys do the legal work. We are not lawyers and we don't pretend to be.

You never pay a dollar

Every case is on contingency. There is no charge for the call, the review, or the case. The firm is paid only out of a recovery, and if there is no recovery you owe nothing.