By Daniel Trotta
Dec 8 (Reuters) – The Roman Catholic Church in New York and more than 1,300 accusers on Monday announced they have agreed to mediation to settle sexual abuse claims that could result in one of the largest payouts ever by the church in the United States.
Similar cases against the Catholic Church in the United States have resulted in billions of dollars in payouts, as priests and church lay workers were found to have sexually preyed on children for decades while being protected by the church hierarchy.
With civil litigation against the Archdiocese of New York due to come to trial next year, the archdiocese agreed to negotiate settlements over the next two months, said attorney Jeff Anderson, who represents some 300 of the 1,311 accusers whose claims date from 1952 to 2020.
Settlements would have to be accompanied by full disclosure of wrongdoing and measures to prevent future abuse, Anderson said.
In announcing the negotiations, the Archdiocese of New York acknowledged a “darkness” in its past and said it hoped to achieve a global settlement that would provide victim-survivors with “the most financial compensation possible.” The archdiocese said it has laid off staff, cut costs and put real estate assets up for sale in hopes of raising $300 million for victims.
“As we have repeatedly acknowledged, the sexual abuse of minors long ago has brought shame upon our Church. I once again ask forgiveness for the failing of those who betrayed the trust placed in them by failing to provide for the safety of our young people,” Cardinal Timothy Dolan said in an open letter.
A payout of $300 million would rank as one of the largest ever by a U.S. archdiocese. Anderson said the total payout could surpass the record $880 million paid to a similar number of accusers by the Los Angeles archdiocese in 2024. That settlement was mediated by retired Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Daniel Buckley, who will also mediate the New York case.
“The time for reckoning is now, and it’s long past due,” Anderson said.
The church said its effort to compensate victims was “complicated” by its ongoing legal struggles with Chubb Insurance Companies, which it said has refused to pay sexual misconduct claims for policies that the church had taken out for decades before 2000.
Chubb in turn accused the archdiocese of tolerating and covering up child sexual abuse for decades and called for more transparency, saying the archdiocese has refused to share “what they knew and when.”
“The insurance that the Archdiocese bought covers accidents, it does not provide compensation for knowingly allowing a pattern of abuse to persist for many years,” Chubb said in a statement. “There’s a reason insurance doesn’t cover this kind of behavior as it would reward those who facilitate criminal conduct rather than those who take vigilant steps to mitigate risk and protect children from abuse.”
(Reporting by Daniel Trotta in Carlsbad, California; Editing by Leslie Adler)
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