CAMDEN (NJ)
CBS News [Philadelphia, PA]
February 18, 2026
By Joe Holden
The Diocese of Camden has agreed to a $180-million settlement resolving decades of sex abuse claims made against former priests.
The diocese is simultaneously reorganizing its finances through Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Compensation for those making claims will come once the settlement is approved, attorneys said.
The deal calls for greater transparency about the scandal that affected people like Andrew Napoli.
“It’s horrific,” Napoli said.
The Gibbstown native came from a devout Roman Catholic family. He was a student at Saint James High School in Carneys Point in the late ’80s and early ’90s.
That’s when he met the school’s principal, Father Peter Osinski.
The sexual abuse by Osinski happened repeatedly inside the now-closed high school, and elsewhere, according to a federal lawsuit.
“And it affects your whole life,” Napoli said.
The suit alleged: “Osinski threatened Plaintiff, telling him that if he ever revealed Osinski’s violent sexual abuse, he would kill Plaintiff’s family.”
Osinski was charged, convicted and spent several years in prison for his crimes. He was removed from the priesthood in the early 2000s, according to records reviewed by CBS News Philadelphia. He died in 2014.
Napoli said the scars of trauma lingered for a long time.
“I was pretty disconnected. I was drinking and had a million jobs,” he said via a Zoom interview from his Virginia home. “I’m going to end up dead if I don’t start addressing the trauma of my life.”
Napoli agreed not only to come forward — he also served as a member of the committee that negotiated the $180 million settlement for more than 300 survivors.
“I’m on my own path and journey of healing, and to be able to be a part of this committee in such a direct way is what I want to be doing with what happened to me,” Napoli said.
Attorney Alex MacMaster, of the firm Laffey Bucci D’Andrea Reich & Ryan, said the settlement addresses not only the sexual abuse claims but the systemic cover-up by former church officials.
“Our clients and the survivors of this horrific abuse finally seeing justice,” she said. “They have waited a long time.”
An apologetic Bishop Joseph Williams said he commends those hurt by the church for what he said was having the perseverance to tell the truth.
“These are human beings,” he said in an on-camera interview inside Immaculate Conception Cathedral. “They love the church, and they were hurt by the church that they loved, and that’s a heartbreaking thing.”
Napoli, a therapist and social worker, wanted his work with the settlement to send a message.
“We did as much as we could to ensure that the Catholic Church would be held accountable,” he said.