Are the Victims of the San Diego Catholic Diocese Getting Screwed - Again?
According to KNSD News yesterday morning,
The San Diego Catholic Diocese has filed for bankruptcy. The move comes after negotiations to settle nearly 150 lawsuits alleging clergy sexual abuse failed. As part of the process, the Diocese will provide information on its assets, and a plan to compensate alleged victims. The first of the lawsuits were supposed to go to trial this morning in San Diego. The filing makes the San Diego Diocese the largest in the U.S. to file for bankruptcy protection.
It seems unimaginable that the catholic church could do anything more to these people! They endured abuse by priests that were entrusted not only with the safety of the parish’s children but their immortal souls. “We are talking rape on a daily basis for years in some instances,” said attorney John Manly, who is representing a number of the plaintiffs. That really should be more than enough to endure, shouldn’t it?
Then to have the diocese cover up these crimes for decades, compounding their suffering - well, you’d think the abuse would stop there, wouldn’t you?
Now, while admitting their wrongdoing, they choose to declare bankruptcy to protect their assets rather than their parishioners? Where is their compassion, their fairness, their morality? You’d think a church would KNOW better - DO better - wouldn’t you? And if you can’t expect a church to do the right thing, who can you expect this from?
The Lawsuits
More than 850 civil lawsuits have been brought against the Roman Catholic dioceses in California since the state temporarily lifted the statute of limitations for filing sex-abuse claims in 2002. These lawsuits were not brought against the priests or other church workers, some of whom are dead; they were brought against the diocese, claiming that it allowed the abuse to happen. There really doesn’t seem to be any dispute over the church’s culpability at this point.
So far, the San Diego diocese has reached settlement with 43 people, but there are still 143 lawsuits that are unresolved. Plaintiffs in other priest-abuse cases in California have been awarded between $1 million and $1.6 million each, according to attorneys Irwin Zalkin and Michael Zimmer, representing more than two dozen people in lawsuits against the San Diego diocese.
Other Bankruptcies
The San Diego diocese is the first in California to seek bankruptcy protection. Four other dioceses in other states have preceded them in bankruptcy, including Davenport, Iowa; Spokane, Washington.; Tucson, Arizona.; and Portland, Oregon. The San Diego diocese is larger than any of these, with 98 churches, 50 schools, and nearly one million parishioners. According to Zalkin & Zimmer, the San Diego diocese is one of the richest in the nation, with more than $600 million in real estate, based on tax assessor’s values. And they’re declaring Chapter 11?
Tucson, which filed for bankruptcy in 2004, is the only one of the four to have emerged from bankruptcy so far, with a $22.5 million judgment. Parishes contributed about $2 million, $15 million came from insurance and about $5 million came from the diocese.
In Spokane, the diocese declared bankruptcy in 2004 after facing a $48 million judgment. Most of the settlement money will come from insurance. Parishes have agreed to contribute $10 million, and the diocese will pay $12 million.
In Iowa, the Catholic Diocese of Davenport has no plans to sell churches, but is preparing to sell the bishop’s house as well as a single-family house and a 25-acre farm.
In San Diego, it is unclear how much of the settlements will be paid by insurance, or whether the rest of the money will come from the diocese. As Rod Valdivia, chancellor of the San Diego Diocese, explained in an e-mail:
The vast majority of property is actually that of parishes and Catholic schools, and under Church Law, they are the rightful owners.
This sounds like any corporation doing what they can to protect their assets, doesn’t it? The San Diego Diocese has much to protect.
The Reaction
Attorneys Zalkin and Zimmer wrote in a press release last week:
After five years of dealing with Bishop Brom and his team of lawyers, it has become very apparent that Bishop Brom is more concerned with preserving the secrecy and cover up of the truth of what was done to children of his diocese over the last 40 years or more than he is over the well being of and reconciliation with those injured souls.
According to Mary Grant, regional director of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP):
Brom is terribly afraid of upcoming civil trials where he will have to to disclose under oath and in open court, how much he knew about and how little he did about predator priests.
The Diocese’s Position
Bishop Robert Brom last week wrote in a statement to parishes that while the Diocese of San Diego is continuing to seek just settlements with plaintiffs in sexual-abuse cases,
good stewardship demands that the settlements not cripple the ability of the Church to accomplish its mission and ministries.
That sounds just like a business decision. Has the church’s focus shifted from a spiritual or at least philanthropic one to existing first and foremost as a business? If so, shouldn’t they lose their tax-exempt status? If so, isn’t it time someone put them out of business?
And what is this “mission” they speak of? It appears that their mission is to acquire and preserve massive wealth. Such a mission has led them to deny their followers and to protect those who were purely evil. This “misson” is headed far from any path of righteousness. They’d do well to go back to their own teachings, from Matthew 6:24:
No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.
Some lessons are just timeless.
Related Stories:
Group to protest outside of San Diego church Sunday, North County Times, Feb. 24, 2007
Too Early for Parishes to Tell What Bankruptcy Filing Might Mean, North County Times, Feb. 24, 2007
Negotiations in priest sex-abuse cases to resume this week, North County Times, Feb. 24, 2007
S.D. Diocese Could File Bankruptcy, North County Times, Feb. 19, 2007
Related Stories
POSTED IN: News, Politics & Religion
13 opinions for Are the Victims of the San Diego Catholic Diocese Getting Screwed - Again?
A Abuse survivor
Mar 1, 2007 at 3:55 pm
A a survivor of childhood sexual abuse in San Diego, I want to thank You for having stating the facts so well, People like you are what gives victims the courage to speak up, thank you!!! And I know God has blessed you!
Kay Goodnow
Mar 1, 2007 at 6:48 pm
The criminal enterprise known as leaders of the (Corporate) Roman Catholic Church pretend to be the ultimate arbiter of right and wrong.
They do not understand the message brought by Christ or, perhaps they have chosen to ignore it.
vinnie
Mar 1, 2007 at 7:43 pm
It is absolutely lewd how survivors are being screwed. The hierarchy lives in the land of milk and honey and will not easily depart with their money. They’re use of scare tactics is appalling and they have the laity bawling. Like stuck pigs they squeal; afraid of missing their next meal. The survivors are the needier, but the bishops are greedier. What you do to the least of my brethren, you do to me. God’s words the bishops refuse to see.
Carole A. Lane
Mar 1, 2007 at 9:49 pm
Thanks “A Abuse survivor” for your kind words. I hope that everyone who can stand up and rebuke this action by the diocese does so VERY, VERY LOUDLY and continuously. It’s immoral and they should be called to account for their actions. God bless you too.
Carole A. Lane
Mar 1, 2007 at 9:53 pm
Hi Kay, You’re right. I can’t imagine any religious doctrine that could be guiding them. If this is their understanding of their religion, then I’m certain that they’re no longer qualified to lead, if they ever were.
Carole A. Lane
Mar 1, 2007 at 10:10 pm
Vinnie, vinnie, vinnie,
Your post is terrific. So clever, so terse.
I’m so pleased and impressed that you said it in verse.
I hope that you’ll yell it for all that you’re worth
(but tomorrow, take a moment to honor Seuss’ birth).
sauerkraut
Mar 4, 2007 at 7:30 pm
The filing, I believe, is not an effort to screw anyone. Without assets, how can the Church engage in its missions? They will pay. Maybe later than sooner, but they will pay. They paid in Boston; they will pay in SD.
Carole A. Lane
Mar 4, 2007 at 10:32 pm
Sauerkraut, I appreciate your comment, but I’m afraid I don’t understand why you think the catholic church, and this diocese in particular, has no assets.
Their real estate holdings alone have been estimated at $600 million, and the news has reported their their actual assets may be over a billion. It’s hard to imagine any entity crying poor with all of that, not to mention the full assets of the catholic church.
The previous settlements in California have reached $1 million to $1.6 million, so even giving $2 million to each of the remaining 143 victims, they wouldn’t exactly be out of business, would they?
Evelyn
Mar 13, 2007 at 12:43 pm
Court case or no, the damage has been done, by both sides. Win or lose, the diocese has lost face and the parishioners are left hanging their heads with only the strength of their faith in God to sustain them – certainly NOT their church! Let’s face it, the church is run by men and NO man is infallible. Only one Man was infallible. Here’s wishing the Catholic parishes in San Diego a very blessed lent in spite of all the failings of men and the distractions and obvious influences of evil at the most liturgically important time of the year! I do hope that the diocese has seen to it that those clerics be defrocked!
Carole A. Lane
Mar 13, 2007 at 12:47 pm
Very well said, Evelyn. God bless you too.
Mr Williamson
May 17, 2008 at 12:40 am
I know of at least one case that the claim of abuse by the female is completely and absolutely false.
A total lie and fabrication to steal $1.3 from the Catholic Church. The female judge did a great dis service of not letting the cases go to trial to weed out those who were molested and deserving of the money and counseling and those who soulless liars who jumped on the bandwagon to make a quick million.
Carole A. Lane
May 18, 2008 at 9:52 pm
That’s a terrible disgrace, Mr Williamson. There will always be opportunists to take advantage of disasters and tragedies, and I can only hope that they get what they deserve, either through their Karma in this life, or worse, after.
Kay Goodnow
May 19, 2008 at 6:32 am
Mr. Williamson, it was Brom who “opted” out of going to trial. He chose to avoid the public humiliation of having not only his records of the abuse revealed, but the assets of the diocese as well.
$1.3 million to a woman you allege lied about her abuse is a drop in the bucket compared to what Brom allowed to happen to all victims.
The settlement itself was a cleverly designed manner in which Brom could ‘opt out’ of admitting to enabling sexually immature predator priests, AND, it let him brainwash his flock to believe that he did it for them.
It’s been nearly a year. Why write about this now?
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