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Abstract: 

The Catholic child sexual abuse scandal forever changed the face of the Catholic Church in 2002, when victims made public accusations of sexual abuse going back decades. The news, which originated in Boston, revealed sexual abuse by the clergy in the U.S. as early as 1985, when Gilbert Gauthe, a priest in Louisiana, pled guilty to 11 counts of molestation of boys in his charge. (“Timeline: U.S. Church Sex Scandal,” BBC News, Sept. 7, 2007; available at http://news.BBC.co.uk/2/hi/ americas/3872499.stm .) Since 1985, there have been a few monetary settlements awarded to these victims, including the 1998 settlement in Dallas, in which the diocese paid $31 million to victims of priest Rudolph Kos. (Timeline, supra.) But it was not until 2002 when, by frustrated attempts to hide the abuse, hundreds of victims of priests came forward to report abuse they had suffered decades before.

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Affiliations:  1: John Jay College of Criminal Justice.