More Clergy Abuse Victims Than Previously Known

The Illinois Attorney General’s Office has released a 2023 report on clergy abuse. In his introduction to the report, AG Kwame Raoul laid out the numbers. The Catholic diocese in the state had publicly listed only 103 substantiated child sex abusers prior to the initiation of the Office’s investigation in 2019. The new report specifies that 451 Catholic clerics and religious brothers were found to be perpetrators. Their victims amounted to a minimum of 1997 children in diocese across the state. If you were the victim of clergy abuse, you may be entitled to compensation. Call the seasoned Chicago clergy abuse lawyers of Moll Law Group to determine your legal options.

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The AG Office’s investigation has led to significantly greater transparency around the scope of clergy abuse. In the last two decades, it’s become increasingly clear that dioceses across the country and around the world purposefully shuffled priests reported to be sexual abusers of children to different parishes once there was a complaint. This resulted in many more children being abused. Knowing this information has allowed survivors not only to come forward and receive care but has also allowed justice to be sought against individual perpetrators and the authorities and system that shielded their grotesque behavior. Often child sex abusers were hiding in plain sight, as Raoul notes. Prior to progressive laws removing the statute of limitation many were left unable to hold their abusers accountable in civil court. This report allows for public accountability and may lead to healing for survivors.

The AG’s Office investigated all six of the Catholic diocese in Illinois, including in Chicago, Belleville, Joliet, Peoria, Rockford, and Springfield. When the investigation started, only two dioceses had posted a list of substantiated abusers on their website, with the Archdiocese of Chicago listing 68 abusers and the Diocese of Joliet listing 35 abusers, but a few months in, the other four dioceses also posted lists of substantiated abusers. Additionally, a clergy abuse hotline was set up. The investigators engaged in over 600 confidential contacts with survivors of child sex abuse by Illinois Catholic clerics.

From 2019 until the investigation was complete, the AG’s office asked the six dioceses to add the names of more clerics and religious brothers to their public lists. Investigators advocated to representatives and attorneys of the dioceses that there was enough information to substantiate child sex abuse claims for many more people that had been identified before. Sometimes investigators brought information to dioceses that the dioceses did not previously know; some clerics had been established earlier as child sex abusers by different Catholic entities. The Office also asked that dioceses change their transparency and disclosure policies.

The total number of child sex abusers across the Illinois dioceses by the time the report was released was 494. The breakdown was as follows:

• Archdiocese of Chicago         275
• Diocese of Joliet                     69
• Diocese of Belleville              43
• Diocese of Peoria                    51
• Diocese of Rockford               24
• Diocese of Springfield            32

It can take time for survivors to feel able to come forward with accounts of sexual abuse they experienced as children at the hands of those they and their family trusted. Often the true losses from these experiences are revealed over time and the harm can be long-term or even permanent—there may be significant damages, including pain and suffering, emotional distress, and mental anguish. Please call the seasoned Chicago clergy sexual abuse of Moll Law Group for a consultation if you were the victim of clergy abuse. We represent children and families around the country. Billions have been recovered in cases with which we’ve been involved. Please complete our online form or call us at 312.462.1700.