Another Roman Catholic Diocese (of Wilmington, Delaware) Seeks Bankruptcy as Salvation from Sex Abuse Claims
Julie
Times Online
October 19, 2009
A sex abuse case against Delaware’s Catholic Diocese of Wilmington
and a former priest will be delayed after the diocese filed for
federal bankruptcy protection on the eve of trial, AP reports. The
bankruptcy filing on Sunday delays a lawsuit that had been due to
start today in Kent County Superior Court, the first of eight
consecutive abuse trials scheduled in Delaware. In a separate
development, the Catholic hierarchy, religious, priests and laity in
Ireland are braced for the publication of a report on Friday into sex
abuse by priests in the Dublin archdiocese. The Government report is
the result of an investigation into how allegations of child sex abuse
involving a sample of 46 priests were handled by State and church
authorities between January 1975 and April 2004, when Cardinal Desmond
Connell retired as Archbishop of Dublin. The present Archbishop,
Diarmuid Martin, has repeatedly warned that the detail of this report
'will shock us all'.
Going bankrupt is not yet an option that has been considered in
Ireland. The different legal system in the US, which facilitates class
actions running to millions of dollars, explains why so many dioceses
have taken this course over there. The scandal, which in Boston forced
the resignation of Cardinal Bernard Law in 2002, rumbles on in all
kinds of ways, such as what happens to the graves of 'celebritiy'
priests and cardinals on land sold off by the Church to meet its
debts.
As AP reports, Wilmington is the seventh US Catholic diocese to seek
bankruptcy protection since the church abuse scandal first emerged
seven years ago in the Boston Archdiocese.
The Wilmington diocese covers Delaware and the Eastern Shore of
Maryland and serves about 230,000 Catholics.
One motive for bankruptcy, it is being claimed, could be to prevent
the emergence of the true horror of what happened to all those poor
children.
Thomas Neuberger, a lawyer for 88 of the Delaware victims, described
the bankruptcy filing as a 'desperate effort to hide the truth from
the public and conceal the thousands of pages of scandalous documents;
from being made public in court.'
He said in a statement: 'This filing is the latest, sad chapter in the
diocese’s decades long ’cover-up’ of these despicable crimes, to
maintain the secrecy surrounding its responsibility and complicity in
the sexual abuse of hundreds of Catholic children.'
The Rev Francis Malooly, diocesan bishop, said in a letter to the
diocese, posted in full by Rocco Palmo, that the decision was made
'after careful consideration and after consultation with my close
advisers and counselors' and that he believed 'we have no other
choice'.
He said that filing for bankruptcy 'offers the best opportunity, given
finite resources, to provide the fairest possible treatment of all
victims of sexual abuse by priests of our diocese.' He added that the
filing 'will enable us to fairly compensate all victims through a
single process established by the Bankruptcy Court.'
According to the Chapter 11 filing, the diocese’s assets are between
$50 million and $100 million and the estimated debt between $100
million and $500 million. Lawsuit plaintiffs as well as banks and
pensions were listed as creditors.
Under federal bankruptcy rules, a bankruptcy filing results in an
automatic stay or halt to all litigation in which the filer is a
defendant. The trial is delayed for the duration of the bankruptcy.
Bankruptcy protection has also been sought in abuse scandals by
dioceses in Davenport, Iowa; Fairbanks, Alaska; Portland, Oregon; San
Diego; Spokane, Washington; and Tucson, Arizona. The San Diego case
was dismissed.