LANSING (MI)
Detroit News
May 6, 2019
By Beth LeBlanc
Attorney General Dana Nessel’s office is working around the clock and then some in its review of thousands of pages of information seized from Michigan’s seven Catholic dioceses.
More than 25 assistant attorneys general are assigned to the investigation, in addition to their other assignments, and several regularly work for free on the weekends to process the “massive” amounts of information, said Nessel’s spokeswoman Kelly Rossman-McKinney.
The department will be in a position to announce charges related to the investigation soon, Rossman-McKinney said.
The volunteers were recognized by Nessel on social media Sunday when she posted a photo of attorneys examining paperwork in a room crowded with boxes and filing cabinets.
“They get no extra compensation, and remain responsible for their regular caseload during the week, but these lawyers are so dedicated to protecting the public that they sacrifice spending time with their families in order to protect yours,” Nessel wrote on Twitter.
Many documents under review were seized during simultaneous raids on Michigan’s seven Catholic dioceses in October, a couple of months after former Attorney General Bill Schuette began an investigation into clergy sexual abuse and the church’s handling of such complaints.
The search warrant for the October raids remains under seal in a Lansing district court “to preserve the integrity of the investigation,” Rossman-McKinney said.
The review started shortly after a grand jury investigation in Pennsylvania found hundreds of abuser priests had molested more than 1,000 children since the 1940s. Michigan’s investigation will investigate cases dating back to the 1950s.
The investigation is expected to last roughly two years. In March, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer asked the state Legislature for a $2 million supplemental allocation for the investigation, money that would come from state settlement funds.
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.