Victims of JRR Tolkien’s son among hundreds in line for larger Church sex abuse payouts

By Catherine Pepinster
Telegraph
July 19, 2020

https://www.pressreader.com/uk/the-sunday-telegraph/20200719/281908775454736

Archbishop of Birmingham wants to offer ‘compassionate, listening response to victims and survivors’ of clergy including Fr John Tolkien

Hundreds of people abused by Catholic clergy could be in line for larger compensation payouts after a landmark decision by the Archbishop of Birmingham.

The Telegraph can reveal that the Church has agreed to triple the compensation paid to a survivor of abuse by Father John Tolkien, the son of J.R.R. Tolkien, author of The Lord of the Rings.

The Archdiocese of Birmingham took the unprecedented decision to reopen previous financial settlements to two abuse victims, a year after it was severely criticised by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) for its handling of cases.

Com­pen­sa­tion is nor­mally af­ter claims are set­tled on a full and fi­nal ba­sis, but the Arch­dio­cese has agreed that it needed to rec­tify fur­ther what hap­pened to two vic­tims. Lawyers told The Tele­graph the de­ci­sion could pave the way for other com­pen­sa­tion cases to be re­opened. Richard Scorer, a spe­cial­ist lawyer on abuse at Slater and Gor­don, said it was the first time in his 25 years deal­ing with cases in­volv­ing the Catholic Church that it had in­creased the fi­nan­cial repa­ra­tion to a vic­tim af­ter a case had been set­tled.

“They have recog­nised their con­duct was wrong. It may well pave the way for other survivors to seek fur­ther com­pen­sa­tion,” Mr Scorer said.

Around 750 survivors of abuse by Catholic priests in Eng­land and Wales have been paid on av­er­age £10,000 com­pen­sa­tion each. If this were tripled, it could mean the Church pay­ing out more than £22mil­lion.

Tolkien tar­geted young boys, of­ten dress­ing up his abuse in a quasi-re­li­gious cer­e­mony with his vic­tims sur­rounded by can­dles. His vic­tim, whose com­pen­sa­tion was tripled to £15,000, wants to see a road in Stoke-on-Trent, named Tolkien Way af­ter the priest, re­named. The IICSA re­port into Birm­ing­ham found that more than 130 al­le­ga­tions of child sex­ual abuse were made against 78 in­di­vid­u­als as­so­ci­ated with the Arch­dio­cese over 75 years. Of those, Fr Tolkien, who died in 2003, was among the most se­ri­ous offenders.

The de­ci­sion to triple the com­pen­sa­tion was made by the Arch­bishop of Birm­ing­ham, Bernard Longley.