Catholic Church sex abuse cases in the United States

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Dallas paid $30.9 million in 1998 to twelve victims of abuse by one priest ($ in present-day terms). The investigation led to the criminal prosecutions of five Roman Catholic priests and brought the issue of child rape and sexual assault of Roman Catholic children to national attention. The coverage of these cases encouraged others to come forward with allegations of abuse, resulting in more lawsuits and criminal cases. In 2003, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston settled a large case for $85 million with 552 alleged victims. In July 2003, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Louisville paid $25.7 million to "settle child sexual-abuse allegations made in 240 lawsuits naming 34 priests and other church workers." In 2004, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange settled nearly 90 cases for $100 million. In April 2007, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon agreed to a $75 million settlement with 177 claimants and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle agreed to a $48 million settlement with more than 160 victims. In July 2007, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles reached a $660 million agreement with more than 500 victims; in December 2006, the archdiocese had a settlement of 45 lawsuits for $60 million. In September 2007, the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego reached a $198.1 million "agreement with 144 childhood sexual abuse victims". In July 2008, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Denver agreed "to pay $5.5 million to settle 18 claims of childhood sexual abuse." The Associated Press estimated the total from settlements of sex abuse cases from 1950–2007 to be more than $2 billion. Addressing "a flood of abuse claims," five dioceses (Tucson, Arizona; Spokane, Washington; Portland, Oregon.; Davenport, Iowa; and San Diego) filed for bankruptcy protection. In 2018, bankruptcy court approved an offer from the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis to pay victims of clergy sexual abuse a total of $210 million in settlement, which was the second largest settlement for any United States Catholic Diocese and the largest by any United States Catholic Diocese in bankruptcy. On February 9, 2020, it was reported that five Catholic dioceses across the state of New Jersey had paid over $11 million to compensate 105 claims of sex abuse committed by Catholic clergy. On May 5, 2020, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia announced that it now expected to pay $126 million in reparations. The archdiocese also said its Independent Reconciliation and Reparations Program, which was established in 2018, has received a total of 615 claims, and had settled 208 of them for $43.8 million as of April 22, 2020. The U.S. dioceses have tallied complaints from 17,000 victims to whom they paid about $4 billion since the 1980s. That figure could double given recent lookback laws that give them more time to sue. In October 2024, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles will pay $880 million to compensate 1,350 victims (who were minors at the time) of sexual abuse by approximately 300 of their clergy members dating back decades. This is the largest settlement involving the Catholic Church, and including the $740 million the LA Archdiocese had previously paid, the combined payout is set to total $1.5 billion. ==Scope and nature of the problem==

Sexual abuse by priests occurs worldwide, although the overwhelming majority (approximately 80%) of reported cases of sexual abuse of minors occurs in the United States. In 2008, the Church asserted that the scandal was a severe problem. At the same time, the Church estimated that it was perpetrated by "no more than 1 percent" (or about 5,000) of the around 400,000 Roman Catholic priests worldwide. In 2002, following the revelations of sexual abuse in Boston, many Catholics and other commentators identified the abuse as being principally homosexual pederasty. There were cases in cities across the United States, including but not limited to Boston, Chicago, Eureka, California, Honolulu, Los Angeles, Orange County, Palm Beach, Philadelphia, Portland, Oregon, and Toledo, Ohio. John Jay Report In 2002, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) commissioned the John Jay College of Criminal Justice to conduct a comprehensive study based on surveys completed by the Roman Catholic dioceses in the United States. The product of the study, titled the John Jay Report, indicated that at least 10,000 allegations had been made against 4,392 priests in the United States. This number constitutes approximately 4% of the priests who had served during the period covered by the survey (1950–2002). Of the abused, 81% were male, and 19% were female, 22% were younger than age 11, 51% were between the ages of 11 and 14, and 27% were between the ages of 15 and 17 years when first abused. Within the youngest age group, 64% of abused children were male, while within the older age groups, 85% were male. There does not appear to be a single primary cause of the abuse patterns within the Catholic clergy; however, the report suggests that many of the abusive priests experienced childhood sexual abuse firsthand. The report also identified some subsets of abusive behavior: pedophilia (96 priests) and ephebophilia (474 priests). The John Jay study have been heavily criticized.''' while advising "that there were likely to be thousands more." Only two criminal charges were brought, as either the priests involved had died or the statute of limitations had run out, a situation the grand jury stated made them "sick". The grand jury recommended to the Pennsylvania Legislature that: • the statute of limitations for child sexual abuse in Pennsylvania be eliminated ==Actions of the Catholic hierarchy==

Historically, the Church has typically addressed sexual abuse as an internal matter, not reported to civil authorities. Abusive priests were usually sanctioned under canon law and sometimes received treatment from specialized Catholic service agencies. For example, 6,000 pages of documents released in a Milwaukee court case showed a pattern of ongoing abuse by a large number of priests who were being systematically switched to different assignments while church administrators failed to inform secular law enforcement agencies. Offenders reported to authorities Some, but relatively few, offenders were reported to civil authorities. Abusers moved to different locations The Church was widely criticized when it was discovered that some bishops knew about the crimes committed, but reassigned the accused instead of seeking to have them permanently removed from the priesthood. In defense of this practice, some have pointed out that public school administrators acted in a similar manner when dealing with teachers accused of sexual misconduct, as did the Boy Scouts of America. Some bishops have been heavily criticized for moving offending priests from parish to parish, where they still had personal contact with children, rather than seeking to have them permanently removed from the priesthood. Instead of reporting the incidents to police, many dioceses directed the offending priests to seek psychological treatment and assessment. In response to these allegations, defenders of the Church's actions have suggested that in reassigning priests after treatment, bishops were acting on the best medical advice then available, a policy also followed by the US public school system when dealing with accused teachers. Some bishops and psychiatrists have asserted that the prevailing psychology of the times suggested that people could be cured of such behavior through counseling. Many of the abusive priests had received counseling before being reassigned. Critics have questioned whether bishops are necessarily able to form accurate judgments on a priest's recovery. The priests were allowed to resume their previous duties with children only when the bishop was advised by the treating psychologists or psychiatrists that it was safe for them to resume their duties. Accused clergy allowed to leave country On March 6, 2020, a joint investigation conducted by ProPublica and the Houston Chronicle was published which revealed that the Catholic Church transferred more than 50 credibly accused U.S. Catholic clergy to other countries after sex abuse accusations surfaced against them. Failure to report alleged criminal acts to police Sexual abuse has been institutionalized, routinized and tolerated by the church hierarchy for decades. American professor of religion Anthea Butler says that in these actions the church acted as a criminal syndicate, and many believe that the Catholic Church is guilty of a grave moral failure for allowing massive sexual abuse of children. In response to the failure to report abuse to the police, lawmakers have changed the law to make reporting of abuse to police compulsory. An example of this can be found in Massachusetts, USA. Handling of evidence William McMurry, a Louisville, Kentucky lawyer, filed suit against the Vatican in June 2004 on behalf of three men allegedly abusing as far back as 1928, accusing Church leaders of organizing a cover-up of cases of sexual abuse of children. In November 2008, the United States Court of Appeals in Cincinnati denied the Vatican's claim of sovereign immunity and allowed the case to proceed. The Vatican initially stated that it did not plan to appeal the ruling. ==Awareness of the problem==

Some date the current sexual abuse scandal to an article published in the National Catholic Reporter in 1985. After that, the scandal remained at the fringes of public attention but did not become a point of national attention until the mid-1990s when a number of books were published on the topic. The topic became the focus of intense scrutiny and debate after The Boston Globe published a series of articles covering cases of sexual abuse. In 2002, criminal charges were brought against five Roman Catholic priests in Boston, (John Geoghan, John Hanlon, Paul Shanley, Robert V. Gale and Jesuit priest James Talbot) which ultimately resulted in the conviction and sentencing of each to prison. The ongoing coverage of these cases by The Boston Globe thrust the issue of sexual abuse of minors by Catholic priests into the national limelight. The coverage of these cases encouraged other victims to come forward with their allegations of abuse resulting in more lawsuits and criminal cases. ==Prosecution by civil authorities==

In June 2012, Msgr. William J. Lynn, of the archdiocese of Philadelphia, became the first senior official convicted in the United States for covering up the sexual abuse of children by priests he oversaw. Lynn was convicted of child endangerment for, as the official in charge of handling abuse complaints, reassigning known abusers to new parishes instead of keeping them away from children. He was sentenced to three to six years in prison. The largest numbers of sex abuse cases have been in the United States; some have led to multimillion-dollar settlements with many claimants. The Roman Catholic Diocese of Dallas paid $30.9 million in 1998 to twelve victims of one priest. On December 3, 2020, New York City priest Fr. George Rutler, the prestigious pastor of the Church of St. Michael in Manhattan who gained notoriety for criticizing high-profile Irish politician Leo Varadkar's homosexuality, was arrested on charges of groping female security guard Ashley Gonzalez. ==Response of the Church==

Although many cases could not be prosecuted because the statute of limitations in civil law, the Church's canon law allows for prosecution of many of those cases. The Catholic Church responded to the scandal at three levels: the diocesan level, the episcopal conference level and the Vatican. Responses to the scandal proceeded at all three levels in parallel with the higher levels becoming progressively more involved as the gravity of the problem became more apparent. Before The Boston Globe coverage of the sexual abuse scandal in the Boston archdiocese, handling of sexual abuse allegations was largely left up to the discretion of individual bishops. After the number of allegations exploded following the Globe's series of articles, bishops in the United States felt compelled to coordinate a response at the episcopal conference level. Although the Vatican did not respond immediately to the series of articles published by The Boston Globe in 2002, it has been reported that Vatican officials were monitoring the situation in the United States closely. The dioceses in which abuse was committed made financial settlements with the victims totaling over $1.5 billion as of March 2006. John F. Allen Jr., Vatican correspondent for the National Catholic Reporter, has commented that many American Catholics saw the Vatican's initial silence on The Boston Globe stories as showing a lack of concern or awareness about the issue. However, Allen said that he does not know anyone in the Roman Curia who was not horrified "by the revelations that came out of the Globe and elsewhere" or that "would defend Cardinal Law's handling of the cases in Boston" or "would defend the rather shocking lack of oversight that revealed itself [although] they might have different analyses of what should have happened to him". Response of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops As the breadth and depth of the scandals became apparent in dioceses across the United States, it became apparent to the American bishops that a joint response was warranted at the episcopal conference level. John F. Allen Jr. characterized the reaction of the USCCB as calling for "swift, sure and final punishment for priests who are guilty of this kind of misconduct." In contrast to this, Allen characterized the Vatican's primary concern as wanting to make sure "that everyone's rights are respected, including the rights of accused clergy" and wanting to affirm that it is not acceptable to "remedy the injustice of sexual abuse with the injustice of railroading priests who may or may not be guilty." In 2019, more than 2.6 million background checks were conducted on clergy, employees and volunteers, and more than 2.6 million adults and 3.6 million youths were trained on identifying warning signs of abuse and how to report them. Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, which advocates for survivors of clergy sex abuse, expressed concern about a section of the report indicating that only 60% of parishes nationwide were performing safety audits on their own. Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People In June 2002, the USCCB unanimously promulgated a Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, sometimes referred to as the Dallas Charter. The charter committed the Catholic Church in the U.S. to the goal of providing a "safe environment" for all children and youth participating in activities sponsored by the Church. To accomplish this, the U.S. bishops pledged to establish uniform procedures for handling sex-abuse allegations against lay teachers in Catholic schools, parish staff members, coaches and other people who represent the Church to young people. The thrust of the charter was the adoption of a "zero tolerance" policy for sexual abuse. The USCCB instituted reforms to prevent future abuse by requiring background checks for Church employees. In June 2014, the chairman of the USCCB's National Review Board reported that Bishop James Conley's Lincoln Diocese and three eparchies had yet to comply with the USCCB's charter requiring every diocese to submit its procedures for the protection of children to the Review Board for an audit. Essential Norms In June 2002, to ensure that each diocese/eparchy in the United States had "procedures in place to respond promptly to allegations of sexual abuse of minors", the USCCB also issued "Essential Norms for Diocesan/Eparchial Policies Dealing with Allegations of Sexual Abuse of Minors by Priest or Deacons". In October, the USCCB and the Holy See established a commission of four bishops from the Holy See and four bishops from the United States to review the norms. In November, the U.S. bishops were invited to accept the commission's work, but not to propose amendments. Following the document's approval, the USCCB issued the revised version of the norms. According to the USCCB, the Essential Norms constitute "'particular' canon law", that is, canon law for the Catholic bishops in the United States. National studies The National Review Board engaged the John Jay College of Criminal Justice of the City University of New York to conduct a study analyzing allegations of sexual abuse in Catholic dioceses in United States. The time period covered by the John Jay study began in 1950 and ended in 2002. The product of the study was a report to the National Review Board titled "The Nature and Scope of the Problem of Sexual Abuse of Minors by Catholic Priests and Deacons in the United States" and commonly referred to as the "John Jay Report". It was published in February 2004. The John Jay report indicated that some 11,000 allegations had been made against 4,392 priests in the USA. This number constituted approximately 4% of the 110,000 priests who had served during the period covered by the survey (1950–2002). In 2008, the Church asserted that the scandal was a very serious problem but, at the same time, estimated that it was "probably caused by 'no more than 1 per cent' (or 5,000) of the over 500,000 Roman Catholic priests worldwide. • Failure by the hierarchy to grasp the seriousness of the problem. • Overemphasis on the need to avoid a scandal. • Use of unqualified treatment centers. • Misguided willingness to forgive. • Insufficient accountability. Diocesan awareness of the problem In response to criticism that the Catholic hierarchy should have acted more quickly and decisively to remove priests accused of sexual misconduct, contemporary bishops have responded that the hierarchy was unaware until recent years of the danger in shuffling priests from one parish to another and in concealing the priests' problems from those they served. For example, Cardinal Roger Mahony of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, said: "We have said repeatedly that ... our understanding of this problem and the way it's dealt with today evolved, and that in those years ago, decades ago, people didn't realize how serious this was, and so, rather than pulling people out of ministry directly and fully, they were moved." Diocesan response to allegations of sexual abuse Some bishops have been heavily criticized for moving offending priests from parish to parish, where they still had personal contact with children, rather than seeking to have them permanently removed from the priesthood by defrocking. The Church was widely criticized when it was discovered that some bishops knew about some of the alleged crimes committed, but reassigned the accused instead of seeking to have them permanently removed from the priesthood. In response to these allegations, defenders of the Church's actions have suggested that in reassigning priests after treatment, bishops were acting on the best medical advice then available, a policy also followed by the US public school system when dealing with accused teachers. Some bishops and psychiatrists have asserted that the prevailing psychology of the times suggested that people could be cured of such behavior through counseling. Many of the abusive priests had received counseling before being reassigned. Critics have questioned whether bishops are necessarily able to form accurate judgments on a priest's recovery. The priests were allowed to resume their previous duties with children only when the bishop was advised by the treating psychologists or psychiatrists that it was safe for them to resume their duties. According to the John Jay study, "3 percent of all priests against whom allegations were made were convicted and about 2 percent received prison sentences." ==Media coverage and public opinion==

Media coverage The Boston Globe In 2002, The Boston Globe publicized their research of sex abusers within the Catholic church, being primarily priests within the Boston Archdioceses. Through the research and interviews conducted, The Boston Globe uncovered upwards of 130 victims of sexual abuse by a single priest. Anglican writer Philip Jenkins supported many of these arguments stating that media coverage of the abuse story had become "a gross efflorescence of anti-Catholic rhetoric". ==Response of the Vatican==

Pope John Paul II In 1993, Pope John Paul II addressed the sexual abuse issues via a letter. This letter was sent to American Bishops. This is said to be the first time the Vatican addressed the sexual abuse cases that were occurring. Pope John Paul II stated, "Woe to the world because of scandals!" Pope Benedict XVI Pope Benedict XVI apologized for the sexual abuse of minors by Catholic clergy and pledged that abusers would not be allowed to become priests in the Catholic Church. A document obtained by The Associated Press shows Pope Benedict XVI laicized nearly 400 priests over just two years for sexually molesting children. Pope Francis The Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors () was instituted by Pope Francis on 22 March 2014 for the safeguarding of minors. It is headed by Boston's Cardinal Archbishop, Sean P. O'Malley, O.F.M. Cap. 2020 Vatican report on McCarrick In October 2018, the Holy See announced that it would conduct an investigation into how allegations against Theodore McCarrick, a former cardinal and Catholic Archbishop of Washington, D.C. from 2001 to 2006 were handled. McCarrick was laicized in February 2019, following credible allegations of repeated sexual misconduct towards children and seminarians. The Report was published on Tuesday, Nov. 10, at 2p.m. local time in Rome, under the title "Report on the Holy See's institutional knowledge and decision-making process related to former Cardinal Theodore Edgar McCarrick (from 1930 to 2017)". Summarizing the key findings of the Report, Andrea Tornielli said: Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI were both blamed in the Vatican report for allowing McCarrick to rise in power although they both knew of sex abuse allegations against him. ==Impact on the church==

Compensation payouts According to Donald Cozzens, "by the end of the mid 1990s, it was estimated that ... more than half a billion dollars had been paid in jury awards, settlements and legal fees." This figure grew to about one billion dollars by 2002. Roman Catholics spent $615 million on sex abuse cases in 2007. In 2002, one attorney reported total earnings of $60 million from suing the church. For some of the payments loans of up to $500 million were extended to four American dioceses in 2005–07 by Allied Irish Banks (AIB), based in the Republic of Ireland. Peter Sutherland had been chairman of AIB in 1989–93, and was the Consulter of the Extraordinary Section of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Holy See from December 2006. AIB had to be nationalized during the Irish financial crisis. Bankruptcies Many US dioceses filed for bankruptcy or Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection due to the cost of compensation to abuse victims. This has been criticized as a way to put further cases on indefinite hold. Chapter 11 protection avoids numerous costly individual trials, grouping them into one settlement. There is no discovery process about such matters as what church leaders knew as in a trial. Abuse survivors have called this a way to silence them. Joseph Piscitelli, a 1970s victim in the diocese of Oakland, California whose 2020 case was put on hold when the diocese declared bankruptcy in 2023, said "Oakland could get together enough money to build a $200m cathedral not too long ago, but they can't get the money together to pay the child victims whom they raped for decades". • Citing monetary concerns arising from impending trials on sex abuse claims, the Archdiocese of Portland (Oregon) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on July 6, 2004, hours before two abuse trials were set to begin, becoming the first Roman Catholic diocese to file for bankruptcy. If granted, bankruptcy would mean pending and future lawsuits would be settled in federal bankruptcy court. The archdiocese had settled more than one hundred previous claims for a sum of over $53 million. The filing seeks to protect parish assets, school money and trust funds from abuse victims; the archdiocese's contention is that parish assets are not the archdiocese's assets. Plaintiffs in the cases against the archdiocese have argued that the Catholic Church is a single entity, and that the Vatican should be liable for any damages awarded in judgment of pending sexual abuse cases. • In December 2004, the Diocese of Spokane, Washington agreed to pay at least $48 million as compensation to those abused by priests as part of its bankruptcy filing. This payout has to be agreed upon by victims and another judge. • On October 10, 2006, the Diocese of Davenport filed for Chapter 11 protection. The decision to file for bankruptcy was driven by many claims which focused on Bishop Lawrence Soens, who had been accused of fondling as many as 15 students during his tenure as priest and principal at Regina Catholic High School in Iowa City during the 1960s. Soens denies the allegations. A judge discharged one suit in October 2006. • On February 27, 2007, the Diocese of San Diego filed for Chapter 11 protection, hours before the first of about 150 lawsuits was due to be heard. San Diego became the largest diocese to postpone its legal problems in this way. The bankruptcy was dismissed November 16, 2007, on a motion by the Diocese after a settlement of $198 million was reached with 144 claimants. • On March 7, 2008, the Diocese of Fairbanks filed for bankruptcy after the failure of negotiations to settle 130 civil suits filed by Alaska natives who claimed to be abused by priests, and other church employees, beginning in the 1950s. • On October 18, 2008, the Diocese of Wilmington filed for bankruptcy as the first of some eight lawsuits (of more than 100 potential) was scheduled to go to trial the next day. • On January 4, 2011, the Archdiocese of Milwaukee announced that it would be filing for bankruptcy. The church was facing more than 23 lawsuits, and attempts to reach a mediated settlement with victims failed in December 2010. This came two days before the Bishop was scheduled to be deposed about these cases, and after the church had refused to release the names or personnel records of the accused priests. The opposing attorney said that the bankruptcy filing was an attempt to delay turning over church records on the cases. The Milwaukee archdiocese has already paid out over $29 million to settle 200 cases over the last 20 years. They said that these additional cases would cause hefty legal fees that the dioceses could not afford. The diocese has assets of about $98.4 million, but $90 million of that is restricted for specific uses. Prior to the bankruptcy Cardinal Timothy Dolan then an Archbishop, with Vatican approval transferred $57 million from diocesan funds to prevent victims awarded compensation accessing the money. • On January 17, 2015, the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization. • On December 7, 2015, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Duluth filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization. The bankruptcy follows a $8.1 million verdict against the diocese. • On February 19, 2020, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Harrisburg filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after disclosing to federal bankruptcy court it has more than 200 creditors and estimated liabilities between $50 million and $100 million, with assets of less than $10 million. The Harrisburg Diocese was the first Catholic diocese in Pennsylvania to seek bankruptcy protection. • On May 1, 2020, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. • On March 15, 2023, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany, NY filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Seal of the confessional One issue that is often raised by legislators and law enforcement is the confidentiality which is enjoyed between priest and penitent in the Sacrament of Penance. In the Catholic Church, the penitent's confession of sins is absolutely secret and can be revealed to no one. Western democracies, and in particular, the US government, have historically recognized and upheld this confidentiality, but , some challenges have been brought against this secrecy. In North Dakota, a bill was introduced which will compel Catholic priests to divulge the confessions they have heard to law enforcement, abolishing the priest-penitent privilege. Resignations In 2002, the Diocese of Manchester signed an agreement with the state's attorney general, acknowledging that past diocesan failures to protect minors from abusive priests were possible grounds for the diocese as an institution to be convicted under the state's child endangerment statute. On February 10, 2003, a special grand jury was conducted by the Suffolk County District Attorney's Office under the leadership of District Attorney Thomas Spota. "The grand jury concludes that the history of the Diocese of Rockville Centre demonstrates that as an institution they are incapable of properly handling issues relating to the sexual abuse of children by priests," the special grand jury said in a 180-page report based on a nine-month inquiry. Bernard Francis Law, Cardinal and Archbishop of Boston, Massachusetts, United States resigned after Church documents were revealed which suggested he had covered up sexual abuse committed by priests in his archdiocese. For example, John Geoghan was shifted from one parish to another although Cardinal Law had often been informed of his abuse. In December 1984 auxiliary Bishop John M. D'Arcy wrote to Cardinal Law complaining about the reassignment of Geoghan to another Boston-area parish because of his "history of homosexual involvement with young boys." ==Continued attention to issue==

While the Church in the United States claims to have addressed the issue, others maintain the only change is the Church has hardened its defenses while allowing abuse to continue. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops convened a meeting in Dallas on June 12, 2002, to address the sex abuse scandal. They announced a national policy of zero tolerance for those accused of molesting. In 2005, Dr. Kathleen McChesney of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops said that the crisis is not yet over because thousands of victims across the country are still reporting the abuse. She said: "In 2004, at least 1,092 allegations of sexual abuse were made against at least 756 Catholic priests and deacons in the United States. Most of the alleged incidents occurred between 1965 and 1974. What is over is the denial that this problem exists, and what is over is the reluctance of the Church to deal openly with the public about the nature and extent of the problem." In 2010, the Associated Press reported that the number of allegations, victims, offending clergy dropped in 2009 to their lowest point since data started being collected in 2004. Dioceses and their insurers paid $104 million in settlement fees, attorney fees and other costs, down from $376 million in 2008. In 2013, a group calling itself Catholic Whistleblowers began to launch a public campaign to encourage improvement in implementing the zero-tolerance policies on child sexual abuse by clergy members. The group said that despite annual audits of the policies by the bishops commission since 2004—which show improvements—"vigilance is necessary because some bishops are violating the ... policies, and abusive clergy (who now number 6,275, according to the bishops' count of those accusations that they deem credible) still have access to children", according to a media report. One focus of the group's activity has regarded a priest in the Archdiocese of Newark. "Several of the whistle-blowers ... [a]long with some New Jersey politicians ... have called for the resignation of the archbishop of Newark, John J. Myers" in the matter. The group has also "sent a letter to Pope Francis asking him to take several significant steps to heal victims and restore the church's credibility". The Whistleblowers has a steering committee of 12 priests, nuns and lay people. "Rev. Thomas P. Doyle—perhaps the church's most famed whistle-blower—recently joined the group"; and a news conference was scheduled for late May 2013; the report also said. In July 2020, the U.S. Roman Catholic bishops said that 4,434 sex abuse allegations against clergy were filed in the 2018–19 audit year, triple the number seen the previous year, with much of the increase stemming from a wave of lawsuits and claims by survivors of decades-old molestation. They reported paying out $281.6 million during the year. 37 of the new allegations were made by people who were minors in the audit year ending June 30, 2019. On December 21, 2018, another measure was signed into law requiring the New York Department of Health to notify victims of their legal rights as they navigate the medical and criminal justice systems. This measure also extends a victim's right to consult with a rape crisis organization and receive updates on the status of their case as well. The bill was sent to Cuomo's desk on February 7. Cuomo signed the bill into law on February 14, 2019. On May 8, 2020, Cuomo extended the statewide statute of limitations deadline to file sex abuse lawsuits, which was originally set for August 14, 2020, to January 14, 2021. On May 13, 2020, a challenge to law's constitutional legality which was filed by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rockville Centre was tossed after a Nassau County Supreme Court justice ruled that the law does not violate due process. Establishment of third-party reporting system against bishops On June 13, 2019, during a meeting in Baltimore, The "third-party system", which was approved by a vote of 205 to 16 with 3 abstentions, ==See also==