Clergy abuse scandal goes back decades

LANSING (MI)
WILX 10 NBC

September 27, 2019

The Catholic Church scandal has been making a lot of headlines in the last couple years but it goes back more than three decades.

It would be almost impossible to say when the first accusation of sexual abuse by clergy was made, but we know the church opened a treatment center for troubled priests in 1947.

The first major criminal case didn’t come to light until almost 40-years later.
What’s believed to be the first criminal case involving a pedophile priest happened in Louisiana.

Gilbert Gauthe was indicted on 34 counts of sex crimes against children. He pleaded guilty in 1986 and was sentenced to 20-years in prison.

Eleven years later, a jury in Dallas awarded 119-million dollars to 11-survivors of clergy sex abuse.

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