Josh Kaul on the Clergy and Faith Leader Abuse Initiative
Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul discusses impacts of an ongoing state Department of Justice effort to enable survivors to report abuse by religious authority figures and prosecute sex crimes.
FREDERICA FREYBERG:
In criminal justice news, the Walworth County district attorney this week charged 92-year-old defrocked former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick with sexual assault. The criminal complaint says McCarrick repeatedly sexually abused the victim in the 1970s. The charges stem from a 1977 incident at a Geneva Lake residence. McCarrick also has charges pending in another state and in 2019, Pope Francis defrocked McCarrick for sexually abusing minors and adults. McCarrick is the only U.S. Catholic cardinal ever to be criminally charged with child sex crimes. The Wisconsin charges are the result of a report made to the attorney general’s Clergy and Faith Leader Abuse Initiative. That tip line and online reporting systems started nearly two years ago, and…
