United States
BishopAccountability.org, an "online archive established by lay Catholics," reports that over 3,000 "civil lawsuits have been filed against the church" in the United States, some of these cases have resulted in multi-million dollar settlements with many claimants.
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Dallas paid $30.9 million in 1998 to twelve victims of one priest. In July 2003 the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Louisville paid $25.7 million to "settle child sexual-abuse allegations made in 240 lawsuits naming 34 priests and other church workers."
In 2003 the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston also settled a large case for $85 million with 552 alleged victims.
In 2004, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange settled nearly 90 cases for $100 million.
In April 2007 the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon agreed to a $75 million settlement with 177 claimants and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle agreed to a $48 million settlement with more than 160 victims.
In July 2007 the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles reached a $660 million agreement with more than 500 alleged victims, in December 2006, the archdiocese had a settlement of 45 lawsuits for $60 million.
In September 2007 the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego reached a $198.1 million "agreement with 144 childhood sexual abuse victims."
In July 2008 the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Denver agreed "to pay $5.5 million to settle 18 claims of childhood sexual abuse." The Associated Press estimated the total from settlements of sex abuse cases from 1950-2007 to be more than $2 billion. According to BishopAccountability reports that figure reached more than $3 billion in 2012.
Most sex abuse cases are subject to the law of each state. As of April 2010 many sex abusers associated with the Church in several countries have been tried by secular authorities and some convicted and sentenced to imprisonment.
Addressing "a flood of abuse claims" five dioceses (Tucson, Arizona; Spokane, Washington; Portland, Oregon.; Davenport, Iowa, and San Diego) got bankruptcy protection. Eight Catholic diocese have declared bankruptcy due to sex abuse cases from 2004-2011.
According to Donald Cozzens, "by the end of the mid 1990s, it was estimated that more than half a billion dollars had been paid in jury awards, settlements and legal fees." This figure grew to about one billion dollars by 2002. Roman Catholics spent $615 million on sex abuse cases in 2007.
As of March 2006, dioceses in which abuse was committed or in which abuse allegations were settled out of court had made financial settlements with the victims totaling over $1.5 billion. The number and size of these settlements made it necessary for the dioceses to reduce their ordinary operating expenses by closing churches and schools in order to raise the funds to make these payments. Several dioceses chose to declare Chapter 11 bankruptcy as a way to litigate settlements while protecting some church assets to ensure it continues to operate.
By 2009, U.S. dioceses have paid more than US$2.6 billion in abuse-related costs since 1950.
In many instances, dioceses were forced to declare bankruptcy as a result of the settlements. At least six U.S. dioceses sought bankruptcy protection. In some cases, the dioceses filed bankruptcy just before civil suits against them were about to go to trial. This had the effect of mandating that pending and future lawsuits be settled in bankruptcy court. The sexual abuse scandal costs each of the 195 diocese "an average of $300,000 annually."
Read more about this topic: Roman Catholic Sex Abuse Cases/Archive 4, Lawsuits and Their Effects
Famous quotes related to united states:
“What makes the United States government, on the whole, more tolerable—I mean for us lucky white men—is the fact that there is so much less of government with us.... But in Canada you are reminded of the government every day. It parades itself before you. It is not content to be the servant, but will be the master; and every day it goes out to the Plains of Abraham or to the Champs de Mars and exhibits itself and toots.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The rising power of the United States in world affairs ... requires, not a more compliant press, but a relentless barrage of facts and criticism.... Our job in this age, as I see it, is not to serve as cheerleaders for our side in the present world struggle but to help the largest possible number of people to see the realities of the changing and convulsive world in which American policy must operate.”
—James Reston (b. 1909)
“The House of Lords, architecturally, is a magnificent room, and the dignity, quiet, and repose of the scene made me unwillingly acknowledge that the Senate of the United States might possibly improve its manners. Perhaps in our desire for simplicity, absence of title, or badge of office we may have thrown over too much.”
—M. E. W. Sherwood (1826–1903)
“An alliance is like a chain. It is not made stronger by adding weak links to it. A great power like the United States gains no advantage and it loses prestige by offering, indeed peddling, its alliances to all and sundry. An alliance should be hard diplomatic currency, valuable and hard to get, and not inflationary paper from the mimeograph machine in the State Department.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“To the United States the Third World often takes the form of a black woman who has been made pregnant in a moment of passion and who shows up one day in the reception room on the forty-ninth floor threatening to make a scene. The lawyers pay the woman off; sometimes uniformed guards accompany her to the elevators.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)