GREAT FALLS-BILLINGS (MT)
The Billings Gazette
December 21, 2017
By Clair Johnson
A Committee of Unsecured Creditors in the bankruptcy of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Great Falls-Billings is suing the church, alleging that more than $70 million in real property and other assets are part of the church’s estate and should be available for creditors and survivors of sex abuse by church officials.
The adversarial complaint, filed late Monday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, said getting the disputed assets issue resolved “is critical” to the church’s estate because it will “determine the magnitude of distributions to its creditors, including survivors of the childhood sex abuse enabled by (the diocese) or whether (the diocese) can continue to avoid being held accountable to the survivors.”
Attorney James Stang, of Los Angeles, California, who represents the unsecured creditors committee, said on Wednesday the committee’s goal is to reach a negotiated settlement and that the complaint is “part of the process.”
The committee represents eight sex abuse survivors, Stang said.
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