A longtime Roman Catholic priest in Alabama has voluntarily left the clergy after a woman alleged to his superiors that he offered her financial support in exchange for “private companionship,” including sex, starting when she was 17.
Robert Sullivan’s self-imposed removal from the priesthood — known as laicization — was announced Wednesday, the day before the American Thanksgiving holiday, in a public statement in Birmingham, Alabama, by Bishop Steven Raica.
The woman who accused Sullivan, Heather Jones, made her allegations in an official written statement to the Diocese of Birmingham which she then shared exclusively with The Guardian in August. Jones, now 33, also alleged that Sullivan paid her hundreds of thousands of dollars to keep quiet about their arrangement, supporting her claim with financial and email records, along with a copy of a legal agreement.
Raica’s letter said a subsequent church investigation into “significant payments alleged to have been made by then-Father Sullivan … found no connection between the allegations and diocesan, parish or school funds.”
“These four months since the allegations emerged have been challenging in the life of our local church,” Raica’s letter added. “I am grateful for the patience and resilience of everyone who has been directly or indirectly affected by this issue.”
Members of the priesthood from which Sullivan, 61, has chosen to resign, vow to be abstinent and teach that sex outside of marriage is sinful. In addition, people under 18 are classified as minors — and sexual contact with them considered abusive — under policies that U.S. Catholic bishops adopted in the early 2000s amid the church’s decades-old clergy molestation scandal around the world.
However, there is no indication that Sullivan attracted the attention of secular authorities. The legal age of sexual consent in Alabama is 16. And law enforcement investigators have in some cases been reluctant to act on cases of religious clergy accused of having inappropriate sexual contact with teenagers who have reached the legal age of consent.
Alabama is also not among the US states with laws that say a power imbalance makes consensual sex impossible between clergy and legal adults who are under the spiritual guidance of clergy.
In her statement to Sullivan’s superiors, as well as in an interview with The Guardian, Jones recounted growing up in foster care after being removed from her mother’s custody “due to severe neglect.” She wrote that she did not lack reliable “adult support” during her formative years and so tried to make ends meet by working as a dancer at an “adult stable” outside Birmingham.
Jones said he was 17 when he met Sullivan at that facility, where he was able to get a job despite being under the applicable age limit. Sullivan was a regular patron, offered to tip her during shifts, and soon offered to “help change [her] life” if he called him on a phone number, he slipped it, she wrote.
Sullivan then proposed “to form an ongoing relationship that would include financial support in exchange for a private company,” Jones wrote. Jones said Sullivan continued to take her shopping, dining, drinking and to hotel rooms in at least six different cities in Alabama, in part to have sex — starting when she was 17 and continuing for several years.
He was said to have initially presented himself as a doctor, although Jones later learned he was a priest.
“At the time, I was a minor with no experience navigating adult relationships and no understanding of how power and influence could be used to manipulate someone vulnerable,” Jones wrote in her complaint. “I hesitated, but finally agreed because of his persistence and the desperate state I was in.”
Jones said he struggled with depression, addiction and emotional instability during his arrangement with Sullivan. She said she eventually spoke out against him because Sullivan continued to work closely with families and their children as the otherwise popular pastor of Our Lady of Sorrows Church in Homewood, Alabama, leaving her concerned that “others may be vulnerable to the same kind of manipulation and exploitation” she described as enduring.
Additionally, in 2020, Raica appointed Sullivan to serve as one of the vicars general of the Diocese of Birmingham, meaning he held a high-ranking administrative position.
Sullivan told congregants at the Aug. 3 Notre Dame Mass that he was taking “personal leave.” He did not provide a reason, but Jones had by then filed her complaint against him with the diocese.
Raica issued a letter to his diocese’s congregants informing them of the allegations against Sullivan and the reason for his leave on August 13, the same day The Guardian reported Jones’ story. That letter also said the diocese had forwarded Jones’ allegations to the Vatican’s body that investigates cases of clergy misconduct.
Sullivan later asked Pope Leo XIV “to be released from all obligations” to the priesthood, Raica’s statement Wednesday said. The pontiff granted the request on Monday, Raica’s letter said.
Jones did not immediately comment on Sullivan’s layoff.
Sullivan was ordained a priest in 1993, according to an earlier post on Our Lady’s social media.