ST. PAUL — The attorney for a man who says he was molested by a priest in the Duluth diocese as a boy is asking a jury to award the man $11.7 million.

Attorney Jeff Anderson told jurors in Ramsey County Wednesday that his 52-year-old client had been sexually abused by the Rev. James Fitzgerald at St. Catherine’s parish in Squaw Lake about 37 years ago. Anderson says that because of the abuse the man has been unable to trust people, struggled in school, and has never been in a serious relationship.

The case is the first clergy sex abuse lawsuit to be argued in front of a jury in Minnesota since a state law was passed in 2013. The Child Victims Act opened a three-year window for lawsuits in older clergy abuse cases.