August 15, 2018
A Pennsylvania grand jury report released Tuesday reveals decades of child abuse allegations against more than 300 accused “predator priests” as well as claims that Roman Catholic Church leaders, including Bishops, covered up the crimes and obstructed justice in order to avoid liability.
More than 1,000 child victims were identifiable from the church’s own records, according to the report.
“We believe that the real number — of children whose records were lost, or who were afraid ever to come forward — is in the thousands,” the grand jury said.
“Today, Pennsylvanians can learn the extent of sexual abuse in the dioceses and for the first time we can begin to understand the systematic cover up by church leaders that followed,” Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro said at a news conference in Harrisburg on Tuesday.
Among the most horrific findings in the grand jury report:
- A ring of predatory priests that allegedly manufactured child pornography on diocese property and used whips, violence and sadism on their victims.
- That same group of priests gave boys they favored gold cross necklaces, which, the report states, “were a signal to other predators that the children … were optimal targets for further victimization.”
- One priest allegedly abused five sisters in a single family despite prior abuse reports that were never acted on. The priest collected samples of the girls’ urine, pubic hair and menstrual blood, according to the report.
- Lack of discipline for priests who admitted to abuse: A priest who confessed to raping at least 15 boys, some as young as 7. A bishop later said that the priest was “a person of candor and sincerity” and complimented him “for the progress he has made” in controlling his “addiction.”
- A priest who quit after years of child abuse complaints and asked for — and received — a reference letter for his next job — at Walt Disney World.
- The report said that abuse complaints were kept in a secret archive and church officials actively hid abuses and crimes, failed to discipline priests or report the allegations to law enforcement.
- “Priests were raping little boys and girls, and the men of God who were responsible for them not only did nothing; they hid it all,” the report said.
Although the statute of limitations currently protects these and other priests, the Pennsylvania state legislature is actively looking to change the law to allow for both criminal and civil liability.
The report, which was the result of a roughly two-year investigation, had remained under seal during pending court challenges from clergy. Clergy members had until last week to seek to have their names redacted from the long-anticipated report.