COLUMBUS, Ohio — Predators who groom children for sexual abuse may soon be prosecuted as criminals after the Ohio Senate unanimously passed a bill Wednesday that now heads to Gov. Mike DeWine for approval.
Child advocates credited the WCPO 9 I-Team’s reporting on two former Archdiocese of Cincinnati priests with getting the attention of lawmakers and the public.
“After your Father Cutcher reports there was definitely an uptick of parents calling the statehouse and asking lawmakers to do something,” said Rebecca Surendorff, co-founder of Ohioans for Child Protection. “I submitted your investigative reports to all the senators in Ohio along with a link to the bill so they can understand how this plays out in our community.”
Former Dayton priest Tony Cutcher and former Cincinnati priest Geoff Drew were both mentioned during public testimony at the Ohio Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Dec. 4.
There was no opponent testimony against the bill, so child advocates are hopeful DeWine will sign the bill in January, making Ohio the sixth state in the nation to criminalize the grooming of a child for sexual abuse.
“The messages begin innocently enough and then they take a dark turn,” Surendorff said on Dec. 4, who showed lawmakers four binders containing hundreds of text messages that Cutcher exchanged with a 14-year-old boy.
The priest starts to discuss sex acts with the child on multiple occasions. Any reasonable person can tell this was not sex ed, this was an adult manipulating a child for a purpose,” Surendorff said. “Our laws fell short again.”
Police never charged Cutcher with a crime.
“Every time that there has been the release of a story or an investigative piece, I have received emails or calls from either a victim or someone involved who knows a victim and wants to do something to help or has a story to share,” said Teresa Dinwiddie-Herrmann, co-founder of Ohioans for Child Protection.
Cutcher’s 22-year career in active ministry ended in 2021 after a scandal. He resigned as pastor of four churches and two schools north of Dayton, including St. Peter in Huber Heights and Our Lady of the Rosary.
St. Peter’s business manager and music director had reported him to the archdiocese for texting an eighth-grade male student for more than a year, leading into his freshman year of high school.
Some of the text messages include:
- “Just looking for an excuse to see you,” to which the child responds, “But you saw me yesterday.” Cutcher responds, “I know. It’s been over 24 hours!”
- “Wow. You are incredibly handsome.”
- “Are you all brown and tanned?”
- “I will miss you.”
- “How’s your love life?”
- “I really miss your office visits.”
- “I sure do miss talking to you.”
- “You were in my dream last night … It was one of those fun dreams … I’m a lot younger in my dreams.”
- “You have become quite important to me lately.”
- “You’re gonna need to send some selfies with your new clothes.”
- “I swear as soon as the weather breaks again I’m gonna bike ride over to your neighborhood.”
- “You need to come back now. I miss you already.”
- The child describes how his family is having takeout dinner from BJ’s to which Cutcher responds, “Oh the restaurant, I always think of something else when someone says BJ’s … I won’t tell you the thing but the second word is ‘job.’ (Think below the belt).”
When I asked Cutcher during a June interview if these texts were okay to send to a 14-year-old boy, he responded, “No.”
“His interview especially, I don’t know how anyone could watch that and not be affected in some way,” Dinwiddie-Herrmann said.
Surendorff also testified to lawmakers about Drew, the former pastor of St. Ignatius of Loyola in Green Township who pleaded guilty to raping an altar boy early in his career when he was a music minister at St. Jude.
“Father Geoff Drew began his career as a music minister at my elementary school where he was abusing little boys. He went on to become a priest despite documented concerns and his last assignment gave him superintendent-like power at St. Ignatius the largest Catholic in Ohio. My four kids were all students there at the time of Geoff Drew’s arrest,” Surendorff testified.
Drew is set to be released from prison in August 2026 to an uncertain future as a registered sex offender. WCPO examined his case in new detail using text messages, audio and video interviews, and thousands of pages of documents obtained from police and prosecutors through public records requests.
It revealed that priests, parents, and church and school officials knew about Drew’s inappropriate behavior with boys for decades, ranging from lingering hugs and shoulder massages to vacations and camping trips where alcohol was served and a boy blacked out from drinking too much.
“Drew’s 2019 arrest and 2021 conviction create a frightening picture of red flag sexual grooming behavior with minors over the course of three decades in three Ohio counties,” Surendorff testified.
Republican state Reps. Bill Seitz (Cincinnati) and Cindy Abrams (Harrison) introduced the grooming bill, House Bill 322, in late 2023, and it passed the House earlier this year.
“The Geoff Drew case is what led to the statute on grooming,” Seitz told WCPO in March. “Because folks were concerned that he was being passed around from parish to parish and up to no good to whichever parish he went.”
The act creates the offense of “grooming” to allow prosecutors to investigate and file charges against those who show a pattern of conduct with the goal of persuading a child to engage in sexual activity and keep it quiet.
The crime of grooming is a first- or second-degree misdemeanor that increases to a felony in certain circumstances, such as if the victim is younger than 13, or if the offender supplies drugs or alcohol to the victim or has a prior conviction.
“Part of forgiving and moving on is making sure the same wrongs don’t happen again,” Surendorff said. “It’s not enough to just push it behind you, you have to enact some change. And children don’t have lobbyists in Columbus.”
The act also changes the penalty for those who fail to register with the Child Sex Abuse Registry to an up to $2,500 civil fine, instead of a criminal penalty.
It also extends from two to four years, the statute of limitations for criminal prosecution against mandatory reporters such as teachers and doctors who fail to report child abuse or neglect.
