Suits name two ex-downstate priests

BELLEVILLE -- Two priests -- including one on the losing side of a $5 million sexual-abuse verdict last summer -- are being sued in three new St. Clair County lawsuits for alleged sexual misconduct.

Steven Kern and two men identified only by initials filed the lawsuits Wednesday.

Kern and another plaintiff allege separately they were abused as teens at St. Theresa's Parish in Salem in the 1970s by the Rev. Raymond Kownacki.

Last August, a jury in Belleville awarded $5 million to a former altar boy who claimed he was abused for years by Kownacki. That verdict is being appealed.

The third new lawsuit accuses the Rev. Jerome Ratermann of abusing him at a Waterloo church.

Both priests were removed in the 1990s, and neither was charged criminally.

Kownacki and Ratermann have unlisted home telephone numbers.