Her former students believe that Sister Cathy was murdered as part of a cover-up to protect a priest at the school, A. Joseph Maskell, who Cesnik suspected was guilty of sexual abuse of students. He later became a Methodist minister, but before that (and before Cesnik had taken her final vows as a nun), he'd asked her to marry him. The unsolved slaying of Sister Catherine Ann Cesnik in Baltimore in 1969 hit another dead end Wednesday when police learned that DNA from a long-deceased priest did not match crime scene evidence . On May 17, the Baltimore Sun reported that his DNA did not match a sample that was taken. Leads dried up quickly and no one came forward with information about Cathy's whereabouts, and the search dragged on for months. Well, for all the fans with remaining questions, there has been an update in the murder case. Teresa Lancaster also mentioned times when he would take them to a gynecologist Dr. Christian Richter for check-ups, during which he would occasionally assault them on the table (Richter would later deny being a part of the abuse). They were last known to have been at shopping centers in the area, the same as Cesnik. 9:08 PM EDT, Tue May 9, 2017, Sister Catherine Ann Cesnik; Rev. They filed a $40 million civil lawsuit against him, the Baltimore Archdiocese, the sisters who ran the school, and a local gynecologist. One of the major theories that The Keepers hypothesizes is that Maskell either killed Sister Cathy or had her killed. Despite the fact that Father Maskell's DNA does not match the DNA found at the crime scene, Armacost notes that the results don't necessarily clear him as a suspect. By Hoskins says at a minimum she wants to see records on Father Maskell. He was permanently removed from the ministry in 1994. Pamela Lynn Conyers, 16, was last seen at the shopping mall in Glen Burnie on October 16, 1970, police said. I do believe in so many other things than I ever did before. They got in touch with the local police, reporting that Cesnik had gone missing. After Maskell died in 2001, the two women decided to go public, using their real names. Often, survivors would choose to remain anonymous, and the crew of The Keepers respected that choice and removed their stories, names, and/or faces from the series. "Buried in Baltimore: The Mysterious Murder of a Nun Who Knew Too Much", "Justice for Sister Cathy is Long Overdue", "With New Lead, Police Reopen Old Murder Case", "Timeline: The Sister Catherine Cesnik Case", "Sister Catherine Cesnik Case: Missing Nun's Body Found in Lansdowne", "Baltimore Priest Victim: Police Were in on Sexual Abuse", "Jane Doe et al. Catherine Anne Cesnik was born on November 17, 1942, in the Lawrenceville neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. They were always invited to come to her apartment, where she checked in on the situation regarding Maskell. Catherine Cesnik's disappearance scared a lot of people. No one really knows exactly what happened to Cesnik. [7], In 2017, CBS Baltimore reported allegations from three women that during Cesnik's tenure at Archbishop Keough High School, two of the priests, Joseph Maskell and E. Neil Magnus, were sexually abusing the girls at the school in addition to trafficking them to others. Many have speculated on the identity of this mysterious Brother Bob, with most pointing to Ed (Edgar Davidson) as being the most obvious answer, but some are now speculating that Father Robert Flaherty is Brother Bob. Her life had been threatened and she had allegedly been abused by the priest. On the evening she disappeared, Sister Cathy was reportedly counseling one of the abused girls when Maskell unexpectedly showed up. She joined the School Sisters of Notre Dame when she was 18. The exact area couldn't actually be reached by car, meaning that she would've been forced to walk there, or possibly carried. The service at the at Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Pinehurst, North Carolina lasted 1 hour. She "was found strangled and stabbed to death in a small creek . The 26-year-old nun had been missing for nearly two months. Police dropped him as a target before he died. In 1994, two women identified only as 'Jane Doe' and 'Jane Roe' alleged that Maskell had raped them when they were students at Sister Cathy's school. One of the initial persons of interest was a Jesuit priest who had been romantically involved with the pretty nun, and had once asked her to marry him, before she took her vows. . Locating that stash, investigators found, among other things, nude pictures of underage girls. Oddly, her Ford Maverick, which she had recently purchased, was found just a block from her apartment parked illegally in a no parking area and unlocked. The theory that she was killed because she knew something about abuse that was going on by priests within the church continues to be a theory, but is not the only theory. Rather conveniently, they also couldn't find any other corroborating statements regarding Joseph Maskell's abuse (Jean Wehner's lawyers had no trouble). I've talked to the hunter that found Cathy, and he said that since the day he found her the police have never talked to him. Sister Cathy Cesnik was reported missing after she failed to return home from a shopping trip in November 1969. 'After that we had to break away from him. The news shook a lot of people, to put it lightly. She was found dead two months later. RELATED:16 TV Shows Too Disturbing To Binge-Watch, Most dont believe Gerry Koob when he talks, but a member of the police force, Detective Roemer, claimed that Koob confessed to having a sexual relationship with Sister Cathy before her disappearance. 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Joyce Maleckis murder is explored as much as it can be as being potentially connected to the murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik, but theres still so much that Abbie, Gemma, and audiences dont know. (Aside from reports that Maskell invited uniformed officers to assault the girls). But some thirty women soon came forward with accounts of sexual abuse at the school. On January 3, 1970, the body of Catherine Cesnik was found by two hunters. Gerard Koob it depends on the report) found her car unlocked around 4:40 a.m. on the day after her disappearance. Without getting into a bunch of complicated legal jargon, victims of abuse would've had three years to come forward. While the case remains open, allegations of sexual abuse by Father Maskell, and Sister's Cathy's plan to blow the whistle along with a possible cover up by the Catholic Church with close ties to law enforcement are at the heart of the horrendous case. After that, it seemed like she paid a visit to Muhly's Bakery inside the Hecht Company store in Edmondson Village. And you know it really just began as us with our camera, taking these trips to Baltimore not knowing that it would ever even become anything.. Frightened and feeling threatened by the strapping, dominating clergyman who was popular with churchgoers for his Sunday masses the girl decided to keep secret her gruesome discovery. They say they were trying to find enough evidence for viewers to conclude that the nun's murder, and the sexual abuse must be related. ', They were told to 'stop harassing him,' he said. Jean Wehner also added that, one day, Cesnik took her aside, just to ask if the priests were hurting her. Really, the whole thing raises a lot of questions, summarized by Huffpost. Grace Elizabeth Montanye, 16, met a stranger at a shopping mall on Sept 29, 1971, northwest of Baltimore, according to police. More: Every Original Series Cancelled By Netflix. An autopsy revealed a skull fracture caused by a blow to Sister Catherine's left temple by a blunt instrument. Not two decades. There are a lot of different stories about how Maskell threatened the girls into silence, and Huffpost has the details. Wehner, who reported her allegations about Maskell to the Baltimore Archdiocese in 1992, claimed that the only nun at the school who sought to help the abused girls was Sister Cathy. RELATED:10 Best True Crime Shows On Netflix. [13], Netflix produced a seven-part documentary series about the case called The Keepers, which debuted on May 19, 2017. Sister Catherine Ann Cesnik was 26 when she disappeared in 1969; her body was found weeks later. prior to the release of the Netflix documentary series 'The Keepers', for DNA testing involving the murder of Cathy Cesnik. When he was removed from the ministry he fled to Ireland, where he lived for a time before returning to the Baltimore area, according to police. Police have also looked into whether Cesniks death is related to the deaths of three other young women in the Baltimore area around the same time. The Baltimore police has since reopened its investigation. The women have since been more vocal about the abuses they suffered at Joseph Maskell's hands, and all the stories are universally awful (via Huffpost). Cesnik, a 26 . Both . In The Keepers another Keough graduate - Jean Hargadon-Wehner - talked on camera about her abuse by two priests, Neil Magnus and Joseph Maskell, and other men at the school. Many believe a quiet cover-up orchestrated by the Catholic Church and . Audiences reacted poorly to how cold, smarmy, and arrogant Sharon May appeared to be, and with good reason: they have every reason to believe she was very much involved in a cover-up for the Archdiocese of Baltimore, evident enough from her complete inaction throughout the case. 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