NOLA Catholic Clergy Sexual Abuse Lawsuit Investigation

If you’ve experienced abuse by a member of the clergy at a parish in the Archdiocese of New Orleans, we recommend you file a claim as soon as possible.

On May 1, 2020, the Archdiocese of New Orleans filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy, which is different from chapter 7 (the type of bankruptcy people file when they’re broke). The federal bankruptcy judge will be setting a claims deadline. Any claims not filed by the deadline will be forfeited.

The bankruptcy allows abuse survivor to avoid filing a formal lawsuit, helping them keep their allegations more private. We are helping survivors file for free.

Here are some of the potential benefits to having to pursue your claims in bankruptcy court as opposed to filing a formal lawsuit:

• claim process is less complicated and faster;
• survivor experiences are more confidential; and
• depositions (intense questioning by lawyers from the church) will not happen.

If you’re a survivor of clergy abuse, our attorneys are here to help you understand what your options are.

Many states have recently passed laws giving victims of sexual abuse more time to seek justice. According to NOLA.com, local members of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) have asked the Louisiana legislature to consider such a law extending the statue of limitations for sex abuse survivors.

In California, people who have experienced childhood sexual abuse now have a three-year window to file claims, no matter how long ago the abuse occurred. This window will last until the end of 2022.

Similarly, in New York, victims of childhood sexual abuse now have until age 55 to file a civil lawsuit and until age 28 to file criminal charges.

According to CBS news, the Catholic Church has spent $10.6 million lobbying against these laws in the northeastern U.S. alone. But despite these efforts, many states continue to explore and pass these laws expanding justice for survivors.

On November 2, 2018, the Catholic Church issued a report regarding clergy abuse which included more than 60 names of priests who have been accused of sexually abusing a minor.

Read the report here: 2018 Report Regarding Clergy Abuse

Some court filings allege that the list is undercounted, and further, that the New Orleans Saints helped shape the list by offering advice on which names should and should not be included. (According to the Washington Post, the football team’s owner, Gayle Benson, is a friend of Archbishop Gregory Aymond.) However, the Saints have claimed they only did “minimal” public relations work on the Roman Catholic sexual abuse crisis.

The archdiocese encompasses eight civil parishes in the New Orleans metropolitan area: Jefferson, Orleans, Plaquemines, St. Bernard, St. Charles, St. John the Baptist, St. Tammany, and Washington.

Led by an archbishop, the Archdiocese of New Orleans is the center of a larger ecclesiastical province that encompasses the entire state of Louisiana. The Metropolitan Province of New Orleans include the suffragan Dioceses of Alexandria, Baton Rouge, Houma-Thibodaux, Lafayette, Lake Charles, and Shreveport.

According to NOLA.com, the Archdiocese of New Orleans is now one of 27 dioceses out of the Roman Catholic Church’s +200 dioceses and religious orders in the U.S. to seek bankruptcy protection in response to the church’s sex abuse crisis.

According to the WSJ, the Catholic church has pioneered the use of bankruptcy to contain the costs of sexual abuse cases; other organizations to follow suit include USA Gymnastics and Boy Scouts of America.