Cardinal Blase Cupich, archbishop of Chicago, on Monday called abuse “repugnant” but said the church in 1992 began overhauling its policies and programs and cooperated fully with the state’s review. In a joint statement issued Friday ahead of Raoul’s announcement, the state’s Catholic dioceses said the attorney general’s investigation prompted a yearslong review of their policies and unspecified changes. It also accuses them of frequently dragging their feet to confront accused clergy and of failing to warn parishioners about possible abusers in their midst, sometimes even decades after allegations emerged. The lengthy report describes Illinois church leaders as woefully slow to acknowledge the extent of the abuse. Raoul continued the investigation, and he said Tuesday that 25 staff members reviewed more than 100,000 pages of diocesan documents and engaged in more than 600 confidential interactions with contacts. The review began in 2018 under Raoul's predecessor, Lisa Madigan, who released a blistering report as she prepared to leave office.
“These perpetrators may never be held accountable in a court of law, but by naming them here, the intention is to provide a public accountability and a measure of healing to survivors who have long suffered in silence.” “It is my hope that this report will shine light both on those who violated their positions of power and trust to abuse innocent children, and on the men in church leadership who covered up that abuse,” Raoul said, crediting the accusers for making the review possible. CHICAGO – More than 450 Catholic clergy in Illinois sexually abused nearly 2,000 children since 1950, the state’s attorney general found in an investigation released Tuesday, revealing that the problem was far worse than the church had let on.Īttorney General Kwame Raoul said at a news conference that investigators found that 451 Catholic clergy abused 1,997 children in Illinois between 19, though he acknowledged that the statute of limitations has expired in many cases and that those abusers “will never see justice in a legal sense.”
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