Milwaukee Federal Judge Rules against Dolan’s “cemetary Scheme” to Hide 55 Million from Sex Abuse Victims

By Peter Isely
SNAP Wisconsin
January 12, 2013

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Before the Milwaukee Archdiocese filed for Federal Bankruptcy two years ago, former Archbishop Timothy Dolan, now Cardinal Archbishop of New York, moved tens of millions of dollars into a newly invented, unnecessary, and sham “cemetery trust” so that church officials could later claim that they did not have the resources to provide restitution and aid to victims of clerical child molesters.

On Friday, Federal Judge Susan V. Kelley ruled that the archdiocese could not hide these assets from the 570 victims of childhood sex crimes who have filed cases in bankruptcy court.

When Dolan’s creative accounting was discovered and challenged by the court appointed Creditors Committee, he publically scoffed and dismissed charges that he had hid money or that he would ever be engaged in shady and questionable financial practices.

Then it was learned through documents filed in court that Dolan had taken Milwaukee church money to pay pedophile priests a “signing bonus” to quietly leave the priesthood and disappear into unsuspecting communities, including finding new employment working directly with children.

Friday’s ruling in Milwaukee, especially It’s dismissal of the argument that the court examining anything church officials do is some kind of attack on religious freedom, is a major defeat for Dolan. And it sends a message to the new cadre of bishops Dolan leads that they cannot wield social, financial and political power without embracing and exercising public transparency, corporate responsibility, and good citizenship–particularly when it concerns the fundamental duty of all social institutions to protect children.

In fact, another Wisconsin diocese has recently argued in court that the First Amendment of the US Constitution shields their corporation from any examination whatsoever of their institutional practices, even if it involves a bishop transferring a known pedophile priest into a parish where he goes on to rape and assault children.

Contrary to what Dolan and his fellow bishops seem to think, American religious liberty is not just for them. It is also for children. The US Constitution and US Courts must protect children to freely worship and practice their faith and hold to account any and all religious officials, including Dolan, who put the protection of sex offender clerics over the basic human rights of youngsters here in the US and, indeed, around the globe.

(SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, is the world’s oldest and largest support group for clergy abuse victims. SNAP was founded in 1988 and has more than 12,000 members. Despite the word “priest” in our title, we have members who were molested by religious figures of all denominations, including nuns, rabbis, bishops, and Protestant ministers. Our local website is SNAPwisconsin.com. Our national website is SNAPnetwork.org.)