Jose I. Ugarte
Ordained: 1971
Jose I. Ugarte was a native of Spain who was incardinated in the Los Angeles Archdiocese in 1971. In 1983, Ugarte was accused of sexually abusing a 17 year-old and some degree of sexual involvement with three other young men. In 1993, Ugarte was accused by a doctor of having drugged and raped a young boy in a hotel in Ensenada and of taking boys every weekend to a cabin in Big Bear. But rather than turn Ugarte over to the authorities, Cardinal Mahony decided to send him back to Spain, made him sign a document promising not to return to the United States without permission for seven years, not to celebrate Mass in public and to seek employment in “a secular occupation in order to become self-supporting.”
