An investigation led by the Illinois attorney general has found hundreds of Catholic Church clergy sexually abused nearly 2,000 children between 1950 and 2019 — a number of cases far higher than the church had publicly disclosed. Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul released the findings Tuesday, acknowledging that the statute of limitations in many of those cases has expired. The probe began in 2018, culminating in a report that’s nearly 700 pages long, detailing how 450 clerics in Illinois’s six dioceses, including the prominent Archdiocese of Chicago, abused hundreds of children with impunity for the past seven decades. The report also accuses Catholic leaders of covering up the abuse.
Illinois Investigation Finds Nearly 2,000 Children Abused by Catholic Church Clergy Since 1950
HeadlineMay 24, 2023