Catholic Diocese of Spokane sues its lawyers in sex abuse cases

TribTown
September 19, 2014

http://www.tribtown.com/view/story/15a3ea27429b48dab183b439418aa2bd/WA--Spokane-Diocese-Lawsuit

SPOKANE, Washington — A lawsuit filed by the Catholic Diocese of Spokane against the lawyers who led it through a 2004 bankruptcy related to sex abuse lawsuits is set for a February trial.

Bishop Blase Cupich (SU-pitch) quit using the legal team at the Paine Hamblen law firm after he arrived in 2010.

He has since pursued a malpractice complaint that accuses the firm of failing to use a strategy that could have saved the diocese millions of dollars and prevented a new round of priest sex-abuse claims.

The Spokesman-Review (http://bit.ly/1v0haeV) reported Friday that those claims reached 230 in the past year. However, more than 150 of the 230 people who filed future claims had their cases rejected by a former federal judge tasked with reviewing the claims and awarding payouts.