NEW MEXICO
Wall Street Journal
By TOM CORRIGAN
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Gallup, N.M., on Monday unveiled a $22 million reorganization plan, the bulk of which will be used to compensate 57 clergy sexual-abuse victims.
The plan, filed Monday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Albuquerque, N.M., lays out how the diocese expects to repay its creditors, the vast majority of whom say they were sexually abused by the diocese’s clergy decades ago.
The Diocese of Gallup, which serves about 60,000 parishioners in New Mexico, Arizona and several Native American reservations, filed for chapter 11 protection in late 2013. The filing halted more than a dozen lawsuits related to sexual-abuse allegations.
“It is impossible to overstate the tragedy of the abuse that was inflicted on the children and teenagers of the diocese,” lawyers for the diocese said Monday in court papers.
The bankruptcy plan, which is subject to the approval of Judge David Thuma, was largely drawn up in court-ordered mediation sessions after initial talks with the diocese’s insurance carriers and other participants broke down.
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