FORT WAYNE (IN)
The Journal Gazette
September 18, 2018
By Rosa Salter Rodriguez
Diocese expected to release about 20 names
The Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend will release names today of “credibly accused” priests and deacons of sexually abusing minors, according to a statement released Monday.
The names will be posted on the diocese’s website, www.diocesefwsb.org, at 1 p.m. and through diocesan media channels, the statement said, fulfilling a pledge the Rev. Kevin C. Rhoades, the diocese’s bishop, made at a news conference Aug. 17.
The list will likely include about 20 names, according to previous statements by the diocese and BishopAccountability.org, an independent, nonprofit website chronicling Catholic clerical sexual abuse for about two decades.
In late 2003, the late Bishop John M. D’Arcy issued a public accounting saying 17 priests in the diocese had been found to have sexually abused 33 individuals since 1950. Sixteen abused minors and one had abused an adult, he said then.
D’Arcy, who had actively pushed for removal of abusive priests in his previous assignment in the Archdiocese of Boston, did not provide names at that time. But he said he had “removed” 12 from ministry and others were dead.
He said a large part of the accusations took place in the 1980s and the last one involving physical contact took place in 1987. The diocese between 1985 and 2002 paid about $1.36 million to settle claims, pay lawyers and provide counseling for priests and victims, he reported.
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