From the St Mary of the Angels vestry perspective, the main objective was to get Judge Murphy to dismiss the "conversion" or civil theft suit against Fr Kelley, which was brought by the Bush group in 2012. Mr Lengyel-Leahu argued again that this was a matter separate from the Rector, Wardens, and Vestry case heard by Judge Strobel in September 2015, and thus the Bush group's appeal of Judge Strobel's ruling has no bearing on it -- the appeals court determined in its 2014 opinion that the Bush group was not the legal rector, wardens, and vestry, regardless of the outcome of the current appeal.
It came out in discussion that the appeals court is nowhere near ruling on this appeal, which tended to take away from Mr Lancaster's January argument that the appeals court would rule quickly, and he would accept its ruling as dispository in the other related cases. Judge Murphy appeared to take the view that, if the appeals court was going to take longer, he was more inclined to dismiss the conversion case against Fr Kelley just to get the matter off his calendar.
Mr Lancaster, in another stunning tactical miscalculation, then announced that if Judge Murphy dismissed the conversion case, he would appeal it. Mr Lengyel-Leahu then said that clearly Mr Lancaster was not interested in the outcome of the case under appeal, that he would just keep appealing things no matter what. Judge Murphy seemed to think Mr Lengyel-Leahu had a very good, even amusing, point. As a result, he asked counsel to return on August 19 to brief the question of whether he should dismiss the case. I think I've come to read Mr Lancaster's posture, and he didn't strike me as looking like he'd won.
It looks as if the "Other Lawsuit", in which the St Mary's parish doesn't have an issue, is at an earlier stage and will go to trial next year, if then. A status conference will take place January 8, 2017.
