Church, sex abuse victims settle

2002-09-04 09:04

Christopher Noble

Boston - The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, at the centre of a damaging child sex scandal, has reached a tentative, $10 million settlement with the alleged victims of one of Boston's most notorious paedophile priests, a lawyer for the church said on Tuesday.

J. Owen Todd, who is the attorney for Boston's Cardinal Bernard Law, said he had been told by Mitchell Garabedian, who represents 86 plaintiffs with lawsuits pending against defrocked priest and convicted paedophile John Geoghan, that the plaintiffs were ready to settle.

"It seemed that he had his ducks in a row," Todd said. "He felt that all his clients were prepared to settle."

Todd said the archdiocese made the $10 million offer in late July and Garabedian worked on the offer with his clients ever since.

He said he was cautiously optimistic the settlement would stand up. If the deal were approved by a judge, the plaintiffs could receive the money before the end of September, Todd said.

Unlike a previous, $15 million-to-$30 million settlement, announced in March but abandoned by the archdiocese in May, the church's insurance would cover the entire amount of the current deal, Todd said.

"The funds are allocated," he said.

Garabedian and the archdiocese could not be reached for comment.

No end to legal troubles

A settlement in the Geoghan matter, one of the highest profile cases in the national scandal over sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests, would lift a dark cloud hanging over Cardinal Law and the Boston archdiocese.

It would also limit costly litigation and bring an end to a battle over enforcing the previous settlement. Garabedian went to court earlier this summer to try to force the archdiocese to adhere to the March settlement. The archdiocese had backed out of the deal, saying it was too expensive.

But a settlement would not end the legal difficulties for Law and the archdiocese. There are as many as 300 plaintiffs who have filed suits or are considering legal action. Dozens of Boston-area priests may be the subjects of these civil suits.

The settlement would also not directly affect the civil suits against Law and the archdiocese over alleged abuse by Father Paul Shanley, who faces civil and criminal charges over his alleged serial abuse of children around the archdiocese.

In one criminal case, Shanley has been accused of repeatedly raping a child, sometimes in the confessional of a church, in the 1980s.

The bulk of the civil suits allege that Law and other archdiocesan officials were guilty of a pattern of neglect for allowing Shanley to keep working as a priest even though they knew he was abusing children.

Simmering scandal

While it started with Geoghan's trial, the sex abuse controversy soon mushroomed into a global scandal involving dozens of priests and bishops. US Catholics were outraged when it emerged that senior Church leaders repeatedly shuttled priests from parish to parish even though they knew the clerics were sexual predators.

Since January the scandal, which Catholic scholars have called the worst crisis to afflict the church in modern times, has forced from office priests and bishops in the United States, Ireland, Poland, Germany and several other countries.

Geoghan, just one of several Boston-area priests facing criminal charges in the scandal, has been convicted of molesting a child and is serving a 10-year prison sentence.

He still faces at least one more trial on sexual abuse charges stemming from accusations by about 130 people that he molested them during his three decades as a Boston-area cleric.

- Reuters