PITTSBURGH (PA) and PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and Philadelphia Inquirer
June 29, 2018
By Peter Smith, Angela Couloumbis, and Liz Navratil
The Roman Catholic dioceses of Greensburg and Harrisburg last year sought to shut down the statewide grand jury investigating sexual abuse by priests in six dioceses, including their own, contending that the creation of the grand jury lacked a legal justification.
But the supervising judge of the 40th statewide grand jury dismissed the argument, according to newly unsealed records.
It’s the first indication that any of the six dioceses under scrutiny actually took steps to quash the investigation, which is looking into seven decades’ worth of allegations of sexual abuse and cover-up in the dioceses of Pittsburgh, Greensburg, Erie, Harrisburg, Allentown and Scranton.
Supervising Judge Norman A. Krumenacker III’s order, originally under seal like virtually all grand jury deliberations to date, was recently unsealed in Westmoreland County Common Pleas Court.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.