BishopAccountability.org

Diocese of Rockville Centre threatens bankruptcy in face of child sex-abuse lawsuits

By Kathianne Boniello
New York Post
June 13, 2020

https://nypost.com/2020/06/13/li-diocese-threatens-bankruptcy-in-face-of-child-sex-abuse-lawsuits/

Catholic Diocese of Rockville Centre
Photo by Al Bello

One of the nation’s largest Catholic dioceses is threatening bankruptcy if a Long Island judge doesn’t pause the nearly 100 child sex-abuse lawsuits it faces.

The Diocese of Rockville Centre, which serves more than 1.4 million Catholics in Nassau and Suffolk counties, claims it’s in an “ever-more serious financial situation,” straining under the legal costs of defending itself in court while its income has been devastated by the coronavirus pandemic, according to court papers.

For two weeks during New York’s months-long virus shutdown, which canceled mass and church gatherings, the diocese received no money from parishioners — donations that usually account for 40 percent of the diocese’s income, it said.

Important dates on the Catholic calendar, including Holy Week and Easter Sunday, brought in a measly $363,000 from Long Islanders, down 60 percent, Rockville Centre claims.

The diocese, currently led by Bishop John Barres, has shelled out $3.7 million so far defending itself against 94 lawsuits filed against it under New York’s Child Victims Act, which provides a legal window to revive decades old abuse claims. So far, two Catholic dioceses upstate, Rochester and Buffalo, have filed for bankruptcy because of CVA cases.

A bankruptcy proceeding could put all the property owned in the diocese “at risk,” said Michael Dowd, a lawyer for alleged victims who called the threat “callous.”

“They are pitting parishioners against the young people who suffered horrific abuse in a continuing attempt to  refuse to accept responsibility,” he said.

The diocese called bankruptcy “a last resort” that is “not an attempt to turn its back on victims or shield predators from any punishment they deserve.”

Rockville Centre lost its challenge to the law’s constitutionality in April when Nassau Supreme Court Justice Steven Jaeger ruled the law “a reasonable response to remedy the injustice of past child sexual abuse.”

The diocese, which is appealing Jaeger’s decision, argues if it must continue to litigate the CVA cases while the appeal is ongoing, it will also be forced to end a program which has so far paid out $57 million to 320 abuse victims.




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