ERIE (PA)
Times News
Dec. 10, 2019
By Ed Palattella
Catholic Diocese of Erie’s compensation fund payouts reach $5.9 million, adding to previous costs of about $6 million.
The Catholic Diocese of Erie’s financial reckoning over the clergy sexual abuse crisis has reached nearly $12 million, rising by about $3 million over the past four months.
The diocese’s newly created victims’ compensation fund has paid out $5.9 million since the fund started accepting claims on Feb. 15.
The $5.9 million includes $3 million in payouts the fund has made since around the time the deadline for filing claims expired in mid-August, Bishop Lawrence Persico said in the most recent update.
The $5.9 million is in addition to more than $6 million that the diocese previously paid to cover abuse claims and associated expenses.
‒ The diocese spent $4 million in legal fees and related costs to investigate and publicize claims of abuse in advance of the release, in August 2018, of the groundbreaking Pennsylvania grand jury report on the abuse crisis in the Roman Catholic Church statewide.
‒ The diocese also paid about $750,000 to abuse victims, mainly for counseling, before the creation of the compensation fund, which is designed to cover claims in old cases.
‒ And the diocese in March paid $2 million to settle a claim with a victim of David L. Poulson, a former priest in the 13-county Catholic Diocese of Erie. The claim was not part of the compensation fund because the Poulson case was new enough to fall within the statute of limitations for filing civil suits.
Poulson pleaded guilty in October 2018 in Jefferson County to molesting the victim and another man when they were boys and Poulson was serving as a pastor in 2002 and 2010. Poulson, 66, was sentenced to 2½ to 14 years in state prison.
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