BOSTON (MA)
NBC [Boston, MA]
September 30, 2026
By Oscar Margain and Marc Fortier
Andrea Joy Campbell’s office announced the findings of their investigation into child sexual abuse in the Catholic dioceses of Fall River, Springfield and Worcester.
Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell’s office released a bombshell report on Catholic diocese in Worcester, Springfield and Fall River.
A Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office investigation found evidence that more than 270 Catholic clerics abused nearly 1,000 children across the dioceses of Worcester, Springfield and Fall River over several decades.
Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell released the findings Wednesday following a seven-year investigation into clergy sexual abuse and how church leaders responded to allegations.
[CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL 203-PAGE REPORT.]
“Behind every one of those numbers is a child whose safety was violated, a family that was changed forever and a survivor who carried that abuse for years, and in many cases decades. They continue to carry this trauma even today,” Campbell said at a press conference Wednesday. “I know many survivors have been waiting a long time to see these findings made public. I understand the frustration that comes with that wait. It is my hope that today is a meaningful step forward toward truth, accountability and healing that survivors deserve.”
The report documented 275 accused clergy and 944 survivors across the three dioceses, including 92 accused clergy and 469 survivors in Fall River, 93 accused clergy and 259 survivors in Springfield, and 90 accused clergy and 216 survivors in Worcester.
“This investigation was not about demonizing a faith or a church,” Campbell added. “Rather, it was about seeking justice.”
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VIDEO: Findings announced on child sex abuse in Fall River, Springfield and Worcester Catholic dioceses
Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell’s office released a report Wednesday detailing the findings of their investigation into child sexual abuse in the Catholic dioceses of Fall River, Springfield and Worcester.
The report noted that its count of accused clergy was not filtered by an assessment of the credibility of individual allegations and that the true scope of the abuse may never be known.
Investigators reviewed more than 300,000 pages of documents and interviewed more than 100 people, including survivors and diocesan officials and employees.
Previous investigations had exposed institutional failures in the Archdiocese of Boston that allowed widespread abuse. But Campbell said the report presented, “for the first time, a full public accounting of the abuse, the misconduct and the institutional failures at these three dioceses that allowed that abuse to happen.”
Despite the scope of the investigation, only three cases were referred for prosecution and one resulted in criminal charges, according to the Campbell’s office.
Campbell said investigators encountered significant legal barriers when reviewing allegations dating back decades.
“Some of the conduct we identified was not a crime under Massachusetts law at the time the incident occurred. We cannot apply a criminal law retroactively. In other cases, the statute of limitations had already expired,” Campbell said.
Attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who has represented more than 80 survivors of clergy sexual abuse, called for changes in Massachusetts.
“We have to change our ways in Massachusetts. Otherwise, it’s not going to be work. It will just be a word salad,” Garabedian said.
Garabedian also described the toll he has witnessed among survivors.
“I have lost six clients, six survivors, to suicide during my representation,” he said.
The report did not publish a comprehensive list identifying all 275 accused clergy. Many of the individual cases described in the report did not identify the accused person by name.
Advocates with BishopAccountability.org called for greater disclosure.
“This is information that the Catholic Church does not deserve to keep secret,” codirector Anne Barrett Doyle said. “We still have bishops keeping secrets. We still have a prosecutor scared to release names. It’s highly discouraging.”
Terry McKiernan, another co-director of BishopAccountability.org, said the lack of transparency echoed what happened before the Boston Archdiocese clergy sexual abuse scandal became a national story nearly 25 years ago.
“The secrecy that sparked this conflagration back in 2002 is still happening,” McKiernan said. “These records don’t belong to the grand jury. They don’t belong to the AG. They certainly don’t belong to the church. Even though the church holds that … it’s absolutely essential that these names be known.”
“It’s the responsibility of the chief law enforcement officer of the state to make sure that those children are safe. And naming names is the way to do that,” he said.
Campbell singled out the Diocese of Worcester for its approach to publicly identifying accused clergy.
“Worcester is the only diocese in Massachusetts that does not have a public list of credibly accused clergy,” Campbell said.
The report said Worcester had shared names of credibly accused priests with the Worcester County District Attorney’s Office since 2002, and had disclosed individual names through its website and diocesan newspaper, but had not maintained an accessible consolidated list.
The Worcester Diocese welcomed the release of Wednesday’s report, but defended its position.
“The Vatican Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, consistent with a statement by Pope Francis in 2019, has stated that lists should not be published of cases which have not been found guilty of a canonical crime. Such lists can be a cause for deep division among many members of our Church who see this as publicly branding as guilty those who never have been charged by law enforcement or had a chance to defend themselves in a court of law,” the Worcester Diocese said in a statement. “That does not stop the diocese from responding to the victims.”
Meanwhile, Bishop Edgar de Cunha of the Diocese of Fall River apologized to survivors.
“To all survivors of child sexual abuse, I am deeply sorry. We as a Church failed you when you were most vulnerable. As a Diocese we are firmly resolved to continue to do all we can to help you heal, to make certain we are accountable, and to protect our children so that no other child suffers as you have,” he said in a statement.
In a statement Wednesday, Springfield Bishop William D. Byrne called “a humbling reminder of the need for continued vigilance in properly handling all instances of child sexual abuse when reported to us.”
“I am grateful for the courage and guidance of the many survivors who have come forward through the years,” Byrne’s statement continued. “We welcome the recommendations put forth by Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell at her press gathering this morning.”
Garabedian said the attorney general’s report “further supports the painful truth that Catholic priests have sexually abused innocent children for decades while Bishops and Catholic leaders coldly practiced cover up of that sexual abuse.”
“It is time for the sexual abuse by Catholic priests and the cover up of that sexual abuse by Catholic leaders to immediately end,” he added.
Several survivors used the release of the report to call on Massachusetts lawmakers to eliminate the statute of limitations for certain child sexual abuse crimes.
Former clergy member and abuse survivor Robert Hoatson said the effort had lasted decades.
“I am a victim myself of clergy abuse. So for 51 years, we’ve tried to get laws changed,” Hoatson said.
Edna Wallace said she was sexually abused by a nun while living at an orphanage in the Worcester Diocese.
“I am 67 now, and it’s about time that my story be told,” she said.
Billy Giblin said he kept his abuse secret for approximately 40 years and had attempted suicide.
“I’m a survivor of clergy abuse from a priest who is still an acting priest in Massachusetts,” Giblin said. “I hope Massachusetts can really do the right thing and open that window at any age to come forward.”
The attorney general’s report documents how church leaders failed to adequately respond to allegations of child sex abuse and protect children from further harm, including instances where they transferred accused and offending priests to other parishes without explaining why they were being moved; returning priests to ministry following treatment without proper supervision; and failing to report allegations to law enforcement.
“The findings of this investigation are difficult to hear and certainly difficult to read. For years, the dioceses of Fall River, Springfield and Worcester knew that children were being abused by priests, and they did not do what they should have done to stop it,” Campbell said. “Instead, too often they protected the reputation of the church rather than protecting children.”
“Serious abuse was characterized as loneliness, poor judgment, boundary violations or personal difficulties facing the priest,” she said. “The priest was treated as someone who needed sympathy or help. The child was too often treated as someone whose story needed to be questioned.”
In one case in 2006, after the church received a report that a priest had sexually abused a child, the victim didn’t hear back from the church for 13 years, during which time the priest remained in service without any restrictions, even chaperoning overnight school trips in 2008, 2009, 2012 and 2013. Even after another report about the same priest in 2014, the diocese took no action against the priest until 2020. He was ultimately suspended and removed from ministry.
“This is what we mean when we talk about institutional failures,” Campbell said. “And the people who paid the price for these failures were our children.”
No new indictments were handed down as a result of the investigation, the attorney general’s office said, but one case that was referred to the Worcester District Attorney’s Office did result in criminal charges being issued in district court.
State Sen. Joan Lovely said she and state Rep. John Lawn had been working to remove the statute of limitations.
“To have a statute of limitation that starts at the age of 53, the magic age of 53, I always questioned that. It doesn’t make any sense. So we’ve been working very hard myself and Representative Lawn to remove that statute of limitation, and to have an indefinite look back,” Lovely said. “We have a responsibility to make sure we protect our children. And that’s what this law does.”
“These legal limits do not change what the investigation found,” Campbell said. “They do not make the abuse less serious and they certainly do not diminish the harm that was done to children and survivors.”
Campbell also publicly revealed that she was a survivor of sexual abuse by a family member and described the investigation as difficult for members of her office.
“It is personal for so many folks on a deeper level,” she added.
Campbell said she hoped releasing survivors’ stories and documenting the institutional failures would lead to additional accountability and changes.
“This is a re-catalyst, of us in many ways, putting these survivors stories out there with the hopes that more meaningful change will come about to bring about accountability and justice,” Campbell said.
The Attorney General’s Office said the report was intended to document the systemic failures that allowed abuse to continue, support survivors and help prevent future abuse. Campbell also left open the possibility of future prosecution in cases where charges could legally be brought.
Based on its findings, the attorney general’s office said it is now calling on the Fall River, Springfield and Worcester dioceses to take five steps to protect children:
- Putting survivors first and using trauma-informed practices when receiving and responding to allegations;
- Properly reporting and investigating allegations through consistent, thorough and independent processes;
- Meaningfully enforcing and monitoring restrictions placed on accused and offending priests;
- Increasing transparency, including by making information about credibly accused clergy publicly accessible; and
- Strengthening institutional oversight and culture to ensure child-protection policies are consistently followed and enforced.
They are also calling on the state Legislature to pass the following legislation:
- Eliminating the $20,000 charitable immunity cap for civil claims involving child sexual abuse;
- Eliminating the statute of limitations for civil claims involving child sexual abuse; and
- Creating an indefinite lookback period to give survivors whose civil claims have already expired an opportunity to seek justice.
Resources for victims of sexual assault are available through the National Sexual Violence Resources Center and the National Sexual Assault Telephone Hotline at 800-656-4673, and Massachusetts provides this list of statewide and resources for sexual assault survivors.
Click here to read the full response from the Diocese of Worcester and click here to read the full response from the Diocese of Fall River. Click here to read the full response from the Diocese of Springfield.