PROVIDENCE (RI)
Boston Globe
March 4, 2026
By Edward Fitzpatrick, Globe Staff
Neronha said that former Providence Bishop Thomas J. Tobin had repeatedly sought leniency for credibly accused priests, recommending that the Vatican not remove them from the priesthood
PROVIDENCE — For more than two hours, Rhode Island Attorney General Peter F. Neronha stood at a podium, detailing credible reports about the sexual abuse of more than 300 children by priests in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence.
And at times during the uncommon news conference, his outrage was palpable.
At one point, Neronha said that former Providence Bishop Thomas J. Tobin had repeatedly sought leniency for credibly accused priests, recommending that the Vatican not remove them from the priesthood. Rather, Tobin suggested “a life of prayer and penance” for each accused priest, he said.
Neronha ticked off examples — the Rev. Timothy Gordon in 2012, the Rev. Barry Meehan in 2013, the Rev. John Allard in 2013, the Rev. B. Samuel Turrillo in 2016 — in which Tobin wroteto the Vatican, saying, “At this time, I do not believe Father to be a danger to young people.”Get Rhode MapA weekday briefing from veteran Rhode Island reporters, focused on the things that matter most in the Ocean State.Enter EmailSign Up
“It’s the same language,” Neronha said. “I like to think it’s not cut and paste. But I’ll let the words speak for themselves.”
On Wednesday, Neronha released the results of a seven-year investigation into the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence. The resulting 288-page report identified 75 clergy, including 61 who were diocesan priests or deacons, 13 religious order priests, and an extern priest who were credibly accused of abusing more than 300 children between 1950 and 2011.
Among the clergy was the Rev. Francis Santilli, whom Dennis Laprade reported in 2014 for sexually abusing him when Laprade was an altar boy at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Providence in the 1980s.
Laprade, who attended the press conference, at the time also identified two brothers that he suspected had also been abused by Santilli. But Neronha said there’s no indication from the records the attorney general’s office received that the diocese attempted to contact those brothers.
Tobin permitted Santilli to remain in the ministry, Neronha said. In 2021, a third party contacted both the diocese and law enforcement to identify the same two brothers as victims of Santilli, he said. That resulted in a criminal in investigation, and the diocese then removed him, referred him to the Vatican, and placed him on the credibly accused list, he said.
Still, Neronha said, Tobin advocated for Santilli in 2022, writing to tell the Vatican, “The accusation regarding Fr. Santilli’s behavior are repugnant, given the nature of the actions and the age of the victims. Under no circumstances should Fr. Santilli return to public ministry.”
“Nevertheless,” Tobin wrote, ”Fr. Francis Santilli has also exercised his priesthood for over 40 years in an exemplary fashion, and without scandal.”
Neronha paused, and asked “ if anybody out there — whether you’re sitting in this room or around in the public — can reconcile those two phrases?”
“It makes you angry, honestly,” he said. “ I just don’t know how you square ‘an exemplary priesthood’ with molesting children. I just don’t know how you square it.”
Neronha said he would have liked to ask Bishop Tobin that question. But he said the diocese refused to make any personnel available for interviews in the investigation.
“If he’s got an answer, he’s free to send it in,” Neronha said of Tobin.
In a video response released Wednesday, Providence Bishop Bruce Lewandowski apologized to survivors.
“As the church, we have a sacred duty to protect children and vulnerable people,” Lewandowski said in the video. “As your bishop, I take this responsibility very seriously. There are no credibly accused clergy in active ministry. Today’s Catholic clergy here in Rhode Island are good and holy men serving Christ and his people with devotion and out of genuine pastoral concern.”
The diocese also released a statement that stressed that “wide-ranging reforms” have been put in place in recent years, and that the report shows “no evidence of recent child sexual abuse by clergy.”
“The report does not have the force of law but rather offers untested perspectives of the Attorney General — the bulk of which focus on historical cases of abuse from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, and which have been previously documented, already subject to civil and criminal litigation, and well-publicized in the media,” the statement read.
When asked about the response from the diocese, Neronha said the diocese “isn’t yet ready to own for what they’ve done here.”
He said, “The notion that this is history, the notion that they own it, the notion that they care about victims, is belied by that very statement,” Neronha said.
Laprade, 56, of North Providence, said Wednesday’s report is “absolutely not history.” He said officials from the diocese still have not spoken to him about the abuse by Santilli. “Not once have they reached out to me,” he said.
“Santilli was left in a parish for many years with students and who knows who might come forward in the future?” Laprade said. “But if they did listen to me, they would’ve pulled him.”
Laprade said Wednesday’s report makes a big difference to survivors of clergy abuse.
“It is telling us that we are credible,” he said. “I still am not credible by the Catholic Church, but the attorney general said I was credible.”
Edward Fitzpatrick can be reached at edward.fitzpatrick@globe.com. Follow him @FitzProv.