F. Ray Mouton, the Lafayette attorney who helped expose a church sexual abuse scandal that would spread across the globe, died in Jefferson, La., on Thursday.
As a young, successful attorney in Lafayette, Mouton in 1984 took on the defense of local priest Gilbert Gauthe, who admitted to sexually abusing 37 children and served 20 years for his crimes.
What followed was an unraveling of unforeseen proportions, exposing the systematic abuse — and subsequent cover-ups by the institution — within the Roman Catholic Church. Billions have been paid out by Catholic dioceses across the country, including the Diocese of Lafayette, on allegations of sexual abuse of minors…