Chicago Priest Faces 30 Years for Theft

A Roman Catholic priest has been charged with stealing nearly $200,000 from St. Margaret Mary Parish and spending the money to support a lavish lifestyle.

Father Mark Sorvillo, 54, who surrendered to Chicago police on Wednesday, is charged with felony theft of more than $100,000, from a church, a class X felony punishable by up to 30 years in prison.

According to the charges brought by the Special Prosecutions Bureau of the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office, Sorvillo’s looting of the parish funds depleted the church’s treasury to the point that the parish school was almost closed.

As pastor of the church at 2324 W. Chase Ave., Sorvillo had access to the parish’s cash collection and systematically looted the funds between 1998 and his resignation last February.

Prosecutors allege that he cashed checks to himself for more than $30,000 that were not part of his salary nor was he entitled to the funds. In a three-year period ending in 2000, Sorvillo used a secret parish money market account to support personal expenditures for such items as tickets for the Lyric Opera and Notre Dame football games and for a summer cottage.

Using a credit card, Sorvillo went shopping on an almost daily basis ostensibly for parish expenses, but the funds were actually for personal expenses that he tried to cover up when questioned.

In addition, the priest acknowledged that he improperly kept for himself all parish baptism and some marriage stipends.

In November 2004, Sorvillo told parishioners of his plans to close the parish school due to the parish’s declining financial condition. Parishioners demanded an accounting and a few months later an audit showed wide fluctuations in the parish’s cash collections. Shortly afterwards, he ceased using parish funds for his personal use. But in December 2005, the Christmas Eve mass collection reflected that no money had been collected in what is traditionally one of the most heavily attended services of the year and one of the most profitable.

An investigation in early 2006 revealed continuing financial irregularities and in February Sorvillo admitted to church officials that he had been looting the collection money.

Sorvillo used the funds for food, liquor, overseas travel to Paris, London and Venice and to shop at retail stores such as Neiman Marcus and Saks Fifth Avenue.

# # #