BishopAccountability.org
	Delaware Diocese Proposes $750,000 Average Payment to Victims of Sex Abuse The Bloomberg January 11, 2011 http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-01-11/delaware-diocese-proposes-750-000-average-payment-to-victims-of-sex-abuse.html The Catholic Diocese of Wilmington, with oversight of churches in Delaware and part of Maryland, offered to pay $74 million to end more than 150 sexual-abuse lawsuits and exit bankruptcy. The proposal would pay those who have been sexually assaulted by a priest an average of $750,000, the diocese said in its proposal, filed yesterday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Delaware. Under a previous offer, victims would have been paid about $349,000, on average. "Lawyers and some survivor-claimants have said that the parishes want to buy their way out of litigation cheaply," the diocese said in a disclosure statement describing the offer and the reorganization plan. "But a settlement fund of $74 million -- two-thirds of which would come from non-debtor entities -- is hardly 'cheap.'" In 2009, the Delaware diocese became one of at least seven in the U.S. to file for bankruptcy to settle lawsuits from current and former parishioners who say they were sexually molested by priests. The bankruptcy case is In re Catholic Diocese of Wilmington Inc., 09-13560, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of Delaware (Wilmington). To contact the reporter on this story: Steven Church in Wilmington, Delaware, at schurch3@bloomberg.net. To contact the editor responsible for this story: David E. Rovella at drovella@bloomberg.net.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.