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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Clergy abuse claims down, report says

Rachel Zoll Associated Press

NEW YORK – The nation’s Roman Catholic bishops and religious orders received 714 clergy sex abuse claims in 2006, the second consecutive year that the number of allegations has dropped, according to a new report on the church’s child protection reforms. The vast majority of claims date back decades.

Costs related to abuse cases also decreased – by about 15 percent over the last year – mainly because of a decline in what dioceses paid to settle molestation cases.

Dioceses and religious orders paid nearly $399 million in 2006 for settlements with victims, attorney fees and support for accusers and offenders. For 2005, that figure was $467 million – considered the highest ever for a single year.

The findings, set for release today, are part of an annual review that the bishops first commissioned in 2002 as they implemented reforms to better safeguard children at the height of the clergy sex abuse scandal.

The declining number of claims – there were 1,092 in 2004 and 783 the next year – could be taken as evidence that the church is gradually gaining control over the crisis.

But more work is needed to address the problem, a key church official said.

“The bishops have done a lot and have spent a lot of money in a lot of different areas, but it’s not all done, as you can tell by the number of victims still coming forward,” said Teresa Kettelkamp, executive director of the bishops’ Office of Child and Youth Protection.

Catholic leaders say abuse-related costs have exceeded $1.5 billion since 1950. More than 13,000 molestation claims have been filed since then.

As in previous years, most people who made allegations in 2006 said they had been molested decades ago.

Forty-three percent of the claims involved priests who had not been accused of abuse before, and most of those accused are either dead, missing, or have already been removed from church work or the priesthood, making the new allegations difficult to prove. In dioceses alone, bishops said 11 percent of the 2006 claims could not be proven or were considered to be false.

Only 17 of the people who came forward with complaints last year were under age 18.

John Moynihan, a spokesman for Voice of the Faithful, a lay reform group that has been pushing for more transparency in church leadership, said he considered the number of claims filed last year “huge” in light of how long the crisis has dragged on.

The survey of nearly all 195 U.S. dioceses and non-geographic regions called eparchies was conducted by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University.

An accompanying audit, by The Gavin Group Inc., a consulting firm led by a former FBI official, checks whether the nation’s dioceses are implementing the reforms spelled out in the bishops’ Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People.