US Catholic diocese agrees to pay $323m to child sexual abuse survivors
Published By admin with Comments 0
A Roman Catholic diocese in Long Island, New York, announced a new bankruptcy settlement on Thursday that would pay more than $323m to about 530 sex abuse survivors who alleged they were abused by priests when they were children.
The diocese of Rockville Centre, which serves about 1.2 million Catholics in Nassau and Suffolk counties, said earlier this year that it did not think a bankruptcy settlement would be possible after abuse survivors rejected the diocese’s previous $200m settlement offer.
US bankruptcy judge Martin Glenn in Manhattan, who is overseeing the case, said the deal represented “enormous progress” after the bankruptcy came “within a hair’s breadth” of failure.
Rockville Centre will contribute $234.8m to a settlement fund, with four insurers contributing $85.3m. The settlement will also receive funding from another insurer that is being liquidated in a separate insolvency proceeding and from attorneys representing abuse survivors.
Diocese spokesperson Eric Fasano said the settlement would ensure “the equitable compensation of survivors of abuse while allowing the church to continue her essential mission”.
A mediating attorney who worked on the settlement agreement, Adam Slater, added in a statement to the Guardian: “Importantly, this is the largest Diocese settlement in the history of New York State, and also the largest Catholic bankruptcy settlement ever.”
Content retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/sep/26/new-york-catholic-diocese-rockville-centre.
