The Daily Standard
Story Archive
Holy Rosary Catholic Church and School in St. Marys where former priest Tony Cutcher, priest Barry Stechschulte and former deacon Marty Brown served.
CELINA - A Mason-area priest who ordered the destruction of potential child pornography while serving at Holy Rosary Parish in St. Marys over a decade ago is returning to the area.
Priest Barry Stechschulte will soon relocate to the Holy Cross Parish, which includes churches in Coldwater, Fort Recovery, St. Anthony, St. Joseph, Philothea, Sharpsburg and St. Peter in Mercer County.
The new assignment comes after Stechschulte resigned as pastor from St. Susanna Parish in Mason in July, following complaints from parishioners for not reporting potential child pornography that was found in 2012 on a computer used by former Holy Rosary priest Tony Cutcher.
The events were widely reported in Cincinnati media this summer.
Several parents at Holy Rosary School remain concerned to this day about what Stechschulte did - or rather didn't do - that potentially enabled Cutcher. Cutcher was later investigated in Montgomery County in 2021 for inappropriately texting a teen boy and eventually resigned the same year.
Former Holy Rosary deacon Marty Brown first found the pornography on Cutcher's old work computer in October 2012 when he was refurbishing it so it could be used elsewhere, according to a St. Marys Police Department report that was taken in 2018, six years after the incident was first reported.
"He (Brown) advised that Tony (Cutcher) had downloaded male pornography on the parish computers," detective sgt. Lucas Turpin wrote in the police report. "Marty (Brown) said that after finding the images on the computer, he advised Father Barry (Stechschulte), who then came over and looked at the images. He said that he was instructed by Father Barry (Stechschulte) to destroy it. Marty (Brown) advised that he took the (hard) drive out of the computer and took a blowtorch to it, destroying it."
Stechschulte told police that on the computer "he found two file folders, one containing male homosexual pornography and the other file contained pictures of boys," according to the report.
"I asked him (Stechschulte) when he was talking about boys if he meant nude with him stating he did not look at it much because he was so taken aback by the situation," Turpin wrote in the report. "He said he can only recall boys with no shirts on. I asked him if the kids were obviously underage with him saying yes and that they were preteen, probably between 8-10 years of age. I asked him if he remembered if any privates were visible with him saying that he could not recall as he was taken aback by it."
Also in the report, Brown told police he believed Stechschulte was finally reporting the incident after six years because he felt guilty for not doing so when it happened.
In a letter to the St. Susanna Parish community in July 2024 prior to his resignation, Stechschulte said he regretted his decision to have the hard drive destroyed and that he realized "not reporting it was a terrible mistake."
"In 2018, I did personally report what had occurred in 2012 to law enforcement and cooperated with their investigation," he wrote. "I wish that I could redo my initial decision from 2012. I am deeply sorry for the distress this has caused all of you."
He continued that he is "utterly committed to maintaining a safe environment" at the church and "following the policies and protocols of the archdiocese Decree on Child Protection."
Prior to the discovery of the hard drive, Cutcher had been reassigned as pastor at St. Peter Catholic Church in Huber Heights. He was later put on administrative leave in 2021 and eventually resigned from active ministry that same year due to allegations he was inappropriately texting a 14-year-old male student at St. Peter School.
According to a police report obtained via a public records request from the Montgomery County Prosecutor's Office, Cutcher sent the boy texts that included telling the boy he was "incredibly handsome," asking about his love life, saying he missed him, that he had had a fun dream about him and saying a restaurant called BJ's made him think of "something else … the second word is 'job' … think below the belt."
Jennifer Schack, director of media relations at the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, said that in April 2021, Cutcher resigned from active priestly ministry and consequently, his faculties as a priest were removed.
Due to the destruction of the potential child pornography by Brown in 2012, St. Marys police were unable to press any kind of charges when it was finally reported six years later, police chief Jake Sutton said. In addition, the statute of limitations for tampering with evidence charges is six years, according to Auglaize County Prosecutor Edwin Pierce.
"As soon as we were notified of a possible violation or a crime being committed, we immediately started an investigation," Sutton said. "Through that investigation (in 2018), we learned obviously a lot of facts that did not lead us to the point where either we had probable cause for an arrest or proof beyond a reasonable doubt, which we need in court."
During that investigation, police had two computers from St. Peter Catholic Church in Huber Heights, multiple thumb drives from Cutcher's office at St. Peter and four desktop computers from Holy Rosary sent to the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigations (BCI) for analysis. BCI returned them with no evidence of a crime found.
"The information that we were given at the time did not give us any type of probable cause that there was child pornography that is contrary to law on those computers," Sutton said. "… And that's the thing here is that if it had the opportunity to be investigated, it could have had a totally different outcome one way or another. But unfortunately, it is frustrating to me as a law enforcement officer that we never had the ability to even look to see if it was contraband or if it was evidence of a crime. Now we see how the cards have been played and how the fallout has come from it."
Teresa Dinwiddie-Herrmann, co-founder of Ohioans for Child Protection, said destroying the hard drive rather than reporting the potential child pornography put any number of children in possible danger.
"If Cutcher would've been removed then, how many boys would he not have texted? We don't know," she said. "We know prolific predators can have 150 victims in their lifetime. We know prolific offenders will offend through their elder years. So the time between 2012 and 2018, turning someone in, if he had other victims, you know, he could have saved kids."
She maintained Stechschulte's failure to report the pornography is extremely alarming.
"Here's the other thing: Father Barry (Stechschulte) said he wanted to destroy that hard drive because he didn't want other eyes in the parish to see it," she said. "He wanted to protect children or people in the parish from seeing it. Did he then go and ask if there was any red flag behavior that parents saw with their children and Father Cutcher (together)? Did they do any investigation whatsoever to see if there were potential victims in the area?"
Dinwiddie-Herrmann, who said she's a lifelong Catholic herself, added that because of delayed disclosure, Cutcher's behavior is still a problem. Child sex abuse survivors may wait years or even decades to disclose abuse, she said.
"We might say, 'Oh, that's just a problem in the past.' Well, no, you might have that thought because most victims don't report until decades later," she said. "If people are reporting now about what happened to them in the '90s, that's because that is what happens a lot of times with victims. So many times we are not going to know about current victims until later."
Dinwiddie-Herrmann, whose organization took root after her priest Geoff Drew was removed following allegations and later pleaded guilty to nine counts of rape, serves as a sort of advocate for parents across Ohio who are dealing with similar clergy-related issues.
Dinwiddie-Herrmann said she's in contact with multiple Holy Rosary School parents who have expressed dismay about the irresponsibility of Stechschulte not reporting what was found on Cutcher's computer. A few of the parents have pulled their children from the Holy Rosary school in St. Marys due to the situation, she said.
The parents declined to talk to The Daily Standard.
She said that Holy Rosary parents are also concerned about Holy Rosary Principal Lora Krugh's alleged failure to report the potential child pornography at the time it was discovered in 2012.
Schack maintains that Krugh did not know there was or could have possibly been child pornography on any Holy Rosary School computer.
In a letter shared by Schack from Krugh to Holy Rosary School parents, Krugh said the same.
"At no point in my career as an educator has anyone - including Deacon Brown or Father Stechschulte - ever told me that there was or could possibly be child or other pornography on a computer or any other parish or school property," she wrote. "I was never shown inappropriate or pornographic images by Deacon Brown or Father Stechschulte, and I was not aware of, nor did I play any role in, the destruction of the computer's hard drive."
Brown remained the deacon and facilities director at Holy Rosary Parish until August 2024.
Schack said that Brown stepped down from his position as facilities director at St. Patrick and Holy Rosary parishes.
Brown was also placed on a leave of absence from his active ministry as a deacon, according to Schack.
When asked how parishioners could trust members of the clergy given the Holy Rosary situation, Schack said that all members of the clergy as well as all parish employees are required to complete Safe Parish training and ongoing quarterly bulletins.
"The Archdiocese of Cincinnati has trained more than 98,000 people in the area of child protection since 2012," she said. "The Archdiocese of Cincinnati has a comprehensive system in place for promptly responding to incidents of abuse."
Schack said the system in place includes complete background checks and fingerprinting on all clergy, employees and volunteers; ongoing required training for clergy, employees and volunteers on recognizing the signs of abuse of children and vulnerable adults; procedures for reporting suspected abuse; immediate reporting of all allegations of abuse to the appropriate civil authorities; a Child Protection Review Board that is comprised primarily of lay people; training of children in Catholic schools and religious education programs on warning signs and appropriate responses for their own protection; and onsite independent audits of policies and procedures by an outside firm.
Schack encouraged any potential victims of abuse to come forward.
"In addition, if anyone suspects abuse on the part of any agent of the Archdiocese, please report it to the appropriate law enforcement agency, as well as through the report misconduct link on catholicaoc.org website," Schack said. "If you see something, please say something."
Cutcher, Stechschulte and Brown could not be reached by the newspaper for comment.
Stechschulte is expected to begin his new assignment at the Holy Cross Parish in Coldwater on Oct. 14, according to the Archdiocese of Cincinnati website.
Priest Barry Stechschulte will soon relocate to Holy Cross Parish which includes churches such as Holy Trinity Church in Coldwater among other churches in Fort Recovery, St. Anthony, St. Joseph, Philothea, Sharpsburg and St. Peter in Mercer County.
Holy Cross Family of Parishes office in Coldwater where priest Barry Stechschulte will begin his new assignment on Oct. 14.
