THE US: Lawyers for the victims of alleged clerical sexual abuse in Boston have vowed to pursue the archdiocese through the courts today, following the decision of its finance committee on Friday to renege on a massive settlement agreed previously with 86 victims of Father John Geoghan.
The decision, against the advice of Cardinal Bernard Law, has sent shock waves through the city and is likely to deepen the crisis of legitimacy faced by the church authorities. Many feared the decision was likely to have a dramatic effect on the archdiocese's annual collection yesterday. It raised $16 million last year and is crucial to the running of the local church.
The 15-member finance committee of lay business people appointed by the cardinal - which has never before flouted his wishes - went back on an agreement it had already approved, arguing that the Geoghan settlements, set to cost $15 million to $30 million on top of previous payments of $30 million to abuse victims, would leave the archdiocese unable to meet the flood of new claims it now faces. Lawyers say up to 500 local plaintiffs are now lining up to sue the church.
Instead, the finance committee says it wants to establish a $50m fund out of which all victims will have to be compensated.
Mr Mitchell Garabedian, the lawyer for the Geoghan victims, reacted angrily, telling the Boston Globe that the cardinal's lawyer had assured him on Thursday that the agreement would be honoured. He claimed that he had been repeatedly told the finance committee's role was purely advisory.
Mr Garabedian said the cardinal was "despicable for the way he lied to my clients. How does this entity call itself a church when they treat children so shamefully, when they allow children to be raped and then they lie to them like this."
He expressed scepticism that the finance committee was acting against Cardinal Law's wishes.
The Archdiocesan chancellor, Mr David Smith, in a statement on Friday and in subsequent interviews, said the Geoghan settlements alone -- without factoring in the new flood of plaintiffs -- could have placed "at risk the mission of the church".
The plight of plaintiffs is complicated by a Massachusetts law limiting the liability of charities to settlements of $20,000. The church is a charity but has in the past been willing to settle for more in order to avoid litigation and possible challenges to the state law that now seems inevitable. Lawyers say it is not applicable to crimes as serious as rape.
According to the Globe, the crisis facing the archdiocese, whose insurance cover is substantially exhausted, is likely to force it to sell a number of major properties, most notably St John's Seminary, the Chancellory, and Cardinal Law's own residence, all on land that Boston College has already signalled its interest in.
Geoghan, an active priest from 1962 to 1998, was recently convicted of fondling a 10-year-old boy in 1991 but has been accused of molesting up to 130 boys over 30 years. Cardinal Law has admitted transferring him from parish to parish while aware of Geoghan's admitted proclivities.
