Among the new allegations:

• Former bishop Michael Bransfield had a policy of concealing all information about incidents of sexual abuse of children by diocesan personnel unless the victim or victim’s family agreed to the disclosure, according to notes dated 2006 by Ellen O’Hara, former chancellor for the diocese;
• The diocese did not inform parents after learning “a female teacher at a Catholic school in Kanawha County” provided a teenage student with alcohol and drugs, and engaged in multiple instances of sexual abuse of the student in 2006, sometimes on school property;
• As of May 2008, background checks had not been performed on as many as 22 employees and volunteers at a Catholic school in Kanawha County dating back to August 2007. Bransfield was made personally aware that the background checks had not been completed;
• The diocese hired a music teacher in 2012 at a Catholic high school and a local parish in northern West Virginia after performing an “inadequate” background check and not performing a criminal background check. The teacher sexually abused a student at the high school. The teacher’s contract was not renewed and he or she resigned. The incident was reported to local law enforcement.

“Their experiences confirm what we’ve alleged, that the Catholic Church has been covering up, concealing and denying information that it’s harbored child molesting priests for some time,” Morrisey said at a news conference about the filing.

Along with new allegations, the amended complaint brings new causes of action against the diocese.

Under state consumer protection laws, the original complaint alleges that the church's advertised services of a safe learning environment were not delivered and it failed to warn consumers of the dangers of its schools and camps.

On Tuesday, Morrisey expanded the scope to argue the diocese gained an unfair advantage over other schools and camps by concealing the reality of the alleged abuse.

“We believe, through the diocese’s concealment and covering up of wrongdoing by its priests at its schools, the schools and the camps received an unfair advantage over the competing schools in the area,” he said.

In mid-April, the diocese responded to Morrisey’s suit, asking a judge to dismiss the matter. Its lawyers argued the attorney general “inappropriately uses Catholic Schools as the doorway by which to enter the realm of separation of church and state.”

They argued diocesan schools are not covered by consumer protection laws and are outside Morrisey’s jurisdiction. They accuse him of using “decades old allegations” to make a “factual leap” that depicts the schools as unsafe environments. They also dispute several of the factual allegations Morrisey lodged, and argue that the historical allegations that are true are not evidence of a current unsafe environment.

A spokesman for the diocese could not immediately be reached to comment on the amended filing. 

At the conference Tuesday, Morrisey repeated his call on the Catholic Church to release its report into Bransfield, who resigned in September. Following Bransfield’s resignation, Pope Francis authorized an investigation into Bransfield in connection with allegations of sexual harassment of adults.

That investigation has since concluded and been sent to the Holy See.

“I call on the Catholic Church today to release the Bishop Bransfield report. The public deserves to know what is in that information,” Morrisey said Tuesday.

The amended complaint also corrects a claim in the original filing regarding Ronald Cooper, a custodian at Madonna High School, in Weirton. Cooper failed to disclose on his 2011 job application that he had been convicted of third-degree statutory rape in Washington in 1985, and that he pleaded guilty to first-degree robbery.

The original complaint stated he was a teacher.