This is the article that appeared in the April 2024 edition of Catalyst, our monthly journal. The date that prints out reflects the day that it was uploaded to our website. For a more accurate date of when the article was first published, check out the news release, here.
Catholic League president Bill Donohue asked Maryland Attorney General Anthony G. Brown to end the investigation of clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. It has yielded not a single indictment and the alleged offenders are either dead or missing.
February 27, 2024
Hon. Anthony G. Brown
Maryland Attorney General
200 St. Paul Place
Baltimore, MD 21202
Dear Attorney General Brown:
It is exasperating, to say the least, to learn that your office wants to continue its investigating of clergy sexual abuse of minors in the Catholic Church. After all, the results of the 463-page interim report on the Archdiocese of Baltimore released last April on this subject turned out to be a total waste of money. It did not result in a single indictment.
There is a good reason why nothing came of the probe: of the 156 individuals who were accused of molestation dating back to the 1930s, 104 of them—two-thirds—are dead. Another third are alive, but none is in ministry; it is unknown whether they are alive or dead.
Of the 156 individuals, the archdiocese had already published the names of 152 of them. Two were nuns, four were male teachers, five were deacons, one was briefly in the seminary in Maryland before being kicked out, and 144 were priests.
Most of the abuse took place in the 1960s and 1970s. Between the mid-1930s and the mid-1940s, there were zero instances of alleged abuse. Between 1990 and 2019, there were virtually no instances of alleged abuse. Which begs the question: Why is the investigation being extended?
What makes this particularly disturbing is the fact that a USA Today study of the sexual abuse of minors in the public schools, in every state, found that Maryland public schools had such a horrific record that the researchers gave it an “F.”
Yet there is no probe of the public schools. Why is this?
Why is it that the law in Maryland says that those who successfully sue a private institution can be awarded as much as $1.5 million, but if the exact same offense were to take place in a public institution, the award is capped at $890,000? This smacks of discrimination—we all know which private institution stands to be investigated and which private ones will be given a pass.
This is madness. The scandal in the Catholic Church is long over, not only in Maryland but across the nation (see my book The Truth about Clergy Sexual Abuse: Clarifying the Facts and the Causes).
At this point, given all that we know of the 2023 report, it makes no sense to pursue this matter any further. That is why I am requesting that you finally end the investigation.
Sincerely,
William A. Donohue, Ph.D.
President
cc: Maryland Gov. Wes Moore
Maryland lawmakers
Baltimore Archbishop William E. Lori
