William Lori, archbishop looks at Paul Jan Zdunek, chair of the Committee of Sex Abuse Survivors representing all victims in the Archdiocese of Baltimore’s bankruptcy case as they update the bankruptcy proceedings resulting from decades of child sex abuse within the Catholic church.
The Archdiocese of Baltimore’s bankruptcy case moved closer to the critical mediation phase Monday, as attorneys for the Catholic church, its insurance carriers and a committee of sex abuse survivors reached a tentative agreement on the terms for upcoming negotiations.
The agreement is tentative because the lawyers still need their clients’ approval for a last-minute detail hashed out in the hallways outside of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Baltimore: Whether the archdiocese will drop its breach-of-contract lawsuit against its insurers, and what the survivors’ role would be should they choose to refile it later.
Scheduled for a contested hearing Monday, attorneys in the case settled their differences in time to avoid debating legal issues in court. After being briefed on the tentative agreement, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michelle M. Harner credited the lawyers for “creating a mediation structure that’s acceptable to all.”
During mediation, attorneys and their clients get together with independent mediators to negotiate the amount of money the archdiocese and its insurers each have to contribute to settle survivor claims, as well as an eventual reorganization plan for the church featuring protocols designed to prevent the scourge of clergy sexual abuse from happening again.
The tentative agreement reached Monday would allow the archdiocese’s insurers to jointly nominate a third mediator, in addition to the two already proposed by the church and the survivors committee: Robert J. Faris, chief judge of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Hawaii, and attorney Brian J. Nash, an attorney who specializes in mediation.
Attorneys would be able to challenge the mediator proposed by the insurance companies.
Baltimore’s diocese, America’s oldest, declared bankruptcy Sept. 29, two days before Maryland’s Child Victims Act took effect. That law lifted previous time limits for people who were sexually abused as children to sue their abusers and the institutions that enabled their torment.
Legislators passed the child victims law following the release of a state attorney general report which found that 156 clergy and other officials in the Baltimore diocese tormented more than 600 children and young adults, dating to the 1940s. The abuse spanned the diocese’s jurisdiction, which covers Baltimore and nine counties in Central and Western Maryland.
When the archdiocese declared bankruptcy, survivors who planned to sue the church had to repurpose their stories into claims in the bankruptcy proceeding. Harner set a May 31 deadline for survivors to file. That deadline came and went with hundreds of claims being filing in the case, though the exact number has not been disclosed publicly.
Baltimore Archbishop William Lori recently struck a unified tone with leader of the survivors committee, Paul Jan Zdunek, but tensions remained with the church’s insurance companies.
The church sued its insurers alleging breach of contract for failing to cover, or indicating they would not provide coverage for, claims of sexual abuse of minors. The survivors’ committee, which was also at loggerheads with the insurance companies, sought standing in that lawsuit. The insurers pushed back on the committee’s request at the same time it sought to argue the lawsuit, asking for the complaint to be moved from bankruptcy court to the U.S. District Court in Baltimore.
That lawsuit still was pending as of Monday, but the archdiocese tentatively agreed with insurers to dismiss the complaint. They reserved the right to file suit again and, if they do, the attorneys tentatively agreed that the survivors’ committee would have standing in that case. The details over the lawsuit were the one item attorneys had to consult their respective clients with.
Which of the archdiocese’s insurance policies were applicable to the sexual abuse at the time it occurred — and how much money those companies are on the hook for — will be subject to mediation. The church and survivors’ committee each hired expert insurance lawyers to examine the policies, which are numerous.
Edwin Caldie, an attorney for the survivors’ committee, said in court Monday that the tentative mediation agreement the church and committee struck with insurers was the subject of great “cooperation” and “candor,” adding that the dialogue “created more trust and a bit of hope for the mediation process.”
After a Washington Attorney General’s Office investigation alleging that the Dioceses of Seattle, Spokane and Yakima used charitable funds to cover-up sex abuse was halted by a superior court judge on Friday, clergy abuse advocates are still demanding accountability.
Abuse survivors and reform advocates from the Catholic Accountability Project (CAP) traveled from Seattle to Spokane and Yakima on Tuesday promising that the AG investigation into alleged abuse cover-ups would be appealed to Washington’s Supreme Court.
“It was a very sad day last week for survivors in court to have that kind of a setback, but we’re very hopeful about what the attorney general has committed to do in appealing this case,” CAP advocate Sarah Pearson said.
Pearson helped to organize thousands of pages of abuse documentation ahead of the AG’s office filing investigating subpoenas against the three dioceses. She asserted that Bishop Thomas Daly’s office was actively avoiding addressing the issue.
“Those were 7,500 pages of evidence that contained some of the worst things I’ve ever read…and a large portion of that material is from the Diocese of Spokane,” Pearson said. “Bishop Daly of Spokane is actively obstructing that investigation by refusing to cooperate.”
Mary Dispenza, a co-founding member of CAP and a clergy abuse survivor, is looking forward to the AG’s office appealing the investigation subpoenas, which would allow investigators to review materials that could purportedly show the use of charitable funds to hide systemic child sex abuse across dioceses in Washington.
“For a while I thought ‘the Church is just too big, you cannot fight the Church,’ but I had to let go of that very quickly, because I want to win. I want to win for survivors, and for truth, healing and justice,” Dispenza said.
CAP cofounder Tim Law cited the 2023 Washington Supreme Court case Wolf v. State as a good sign that the Seattle Superior Court order turning down the investigative subpoenas could be overturned in favor of abuse survivors.
Wolf v. State ruled that the statute of limitations on filing sex abuse charges against an institution does not begin when the crime took place, but rather when the victim becomes aware of the negligence of the organization that allowed said abuse to happen. It opened the way for the prosecution of decades-old cases and was a major win for clergy abuse advocates.
CAP members say they met with Deputy Attorney General Todd Bowers and Assistant Attorney General Nathan Bays on Wednesday. As current AG Bob Ferguson (D) runs for governor, Pearson says that his office has assured them that the investigation into the Church will continue past Ferguson’s administration.
“It’s absolutely essential that survivors are central to the whole process. We are so pleased that we’ve been able to have this meeting–it was long overdue. We have made plans to meet again to continue discussing how survivors can be involved in this process–especially when it comes to outreach and support,” Pearson said.
The Diocese of Spokane referred back to a statement sent to media outlets on May 9 stating that it is unaware of any new abuse allegations and asserting that all information about sexual crimes committed by clergy has been shared with the public.
Peter Isely, an abuse survivor and CAP member, said that the dioceses are hiding behind lawyers and obfuscating their responsibility to be truthful about the use of charitable funds to protect the Church’s image.
“They have to be held accountable. There’s a principle of justice that a decent society uses when there’s an issue that involves children…What’s in the best interest of the child?…They refuse, categorically, to cooperate in a state-wide child abuse investigation,” Isely said.
CAP continues to call upon survivors to report clergy abuse to the attorney general by calling (833) 952-6277.
While the attorney general’s lawsuit is requesting permission to subpoena Catholic dioceses for alleged sex abuse documentation, several kinds of Roman Catholic priests do not fall under the direct authority of diocesan bishops. Members of religious orders, as well as Catholic sisters and nuns, are under the authority of their provincials.
A history of sexual abuse of Indigenous peoples and students at institutions run by religious orders such as the Franciscans, Dominicans and Jesuits has motivated CAP to call for additional subpoenas of Church institutions not under the direct authority of the Spokane, Seattle and Yakima dioceses.
In the long term, reform advocates hope that the Church will actively participate in healing from decades of silence in the face of abuse by religious leaders.
“It will never be the Church it can be until it deals with the past,” Dispenza said.
— Anthony Odiong, prohibited from ministering in Texas and Louisiana amid criminal investigation, arrested in Florida
Anthony Odiong delivering a homily in which he refers to members of the LGBTQ+ community as ‘monkeys and animals and chimpanzees’, in November 2023. Photograph: St Anthony of Padua church of Luling
A Catholic priest under criminal investigation for sexual misconduct with multiple women – and consequently prohibited from ministering in two states – has been charged with illegally possessing child abuse imagery depicting girls.
Anthony Odiong was arrested Tuesday as he was leaving his home in Ave Maria, Florida, on a warrant obtained by police in Waco, Texas, charging him with possessing child abuse images showing disrobed children. According to sworn statements in support of the arrest warrant that were obtained by the Guardian, police said they discovered the illicit pictures while investigating complaints from at least four women that made officers aware Odiong, 55, could be “a potential serial sexual assault suspect”.
The Waco police statements say that at least some of the women’s complaints are too old to prosecute due to statutes of limitation. But the police said statutes of limitation in Texas are irrelevant if “probable cause exists to believe that the defendant has committed the same or similar sex offense against five or more victims”. And they have asked anyone with information about Odiong to contact them as they weigh the possibility of charging him with the women’s complaints.
Odiong drew media scrutiny that eventually landed him on the police’s radar in February, when the Roman Catholic diocese of Austin – which administers Waco’s church institutions – revealed he was removed of his ability to minister there in 2019.
That revelation came nearly two months after Louisiana’s most important diocese had similarly suspended him. The suspensions stemmed from complaints by women – including two he encountered while they were at the Baylor University campus in Waco – who publicly accused Odiong of trying to use his influence as a priest to pursue sexual contact they either did not welcome or could not consent to participating in.
Anthony Odiong after his arrest in Florida on Tuesday.
Texas is one of about a dozen states with a law that says it is impossible for there to be a consensual relationship between clergymen and adults who emotionally depend on their spiritual advice.
And in March, less than a month after the Guardian published a report detailing how the prior allegations against him ranged from sexual coercion and groping to fiscal abuse, an unidentified person walked into the Waco police department and accused Odiong of sexually assaulting her in 2012.
Police subsequently secured judicial permission to access an email account belonging to Odiong and found messages from another woman who had never come forward explicitly detailing sexual encounters with the priest, including one where her colon was injured.
Investigators later spoke with the woman, who “came forward to admit that” she had met Odiong under “the same circumstances” and been subjected to some of the behavior his prior accusers had, according to the police’s sworn statements.
From there, a judge permitted police to search Odiong’s iCloud online data storage account. Waco police detective Bradley DeLange later wrote under oath that he “discovered images depicting a clearly prepubescent child”, which had been saved to the account in September 2020.
DeLange said there were also “two images of what is believed to be [another] child” with what appears to be an adult touching an unclothed body part.
While none of the images show the face of a child, DeLange said it was evident that at least some of the images displayed someone “under 10 years of age which … may enhance the eligible punishment that may be assessed”.
McClennan county, Texas, judge Thomas C West on 5 July signed off on DeLange’s request for a warrant to arrest Odiong in connection with the child abuse imagery, records show. The judge’s suggested bail was $1m.
Attempts to contact an attorney who has previously represented Odiong was not immediately successful.
Kristi Schubert, an attorney for most of the women who have spoken out against Odiong, said she hopes the cleric’s arrest convinces “Catholic leaders that priests who sexually abuse adults can no longer be given a free pass”.
“A predator is a predator,” Schubert said. “And if they will sexually exploit an adult, they aren’t safe around children either.”
It was not immediately clear when Odiong – who was clad in clerical garb at the time of his arrest – may be transferred to the custody of Waco police from Immokalee. He would be sentenced to at least 15 years in prison if eventually convicted of possessing child abuse imagery depicting a minor younger than 10.
Revival of questions
The charges against Odiong are almost certain to revive questions about the way Catholic church bureaucrats have managed his career, which began with his ordination in the diocese of Uyo, Nigeria, in 1993.
When it suspended him from ministry in 2019, the Austin diocese did not disclose that move to the public – but later the organization assured congregants that it had provided notification to Catholic church leaders in south-east Louisiana, where Odiong was allowed to work until this past December.
That’s when the New Orleans archdiocese declared that it had banned Odiong from ministering in its community, too. The archdiocese emphasized at the time that the allegations against Odiong exclusively involved adults – since May 2020, the institution has been in federal bankruptcy court trying to dispense of a mound of litigation associated with a decades-old clergy child molestation scandal.
The decision to remove Odiong from New Orleans’s archdiocese was the responsibility of the city’s archbishop, Gregory Aymond. As bishop of Austin in an earlier assignment, Aymond had invited Odiong to minister there beginning in 2006.
Aymond later became archbishop of New Orleans, and he invited Odiong to work there as well.
Over the years in Texas and Louisiana, Odiong was tasked with working at a church in Luling, Louisiana, south-west of New Orleans, as well as the St Peter Catholic Student Center – which is on Baylor’s outskirts and ministers to students of that university as well as McLennan community college.
Odiong was able to build a loyal following in the US in large part by claiming he had a special understanding with the Virgin Mary through prayer. The charismatic clergyman would hold so-called healing masses after which some parishioners reported recovering from major medical ailments, improving church attendance as well as boosting his popularity with both congregants and diocesan officials.
But cracks in the public image Odiong fostered began to form when one woman whom he encountered at Baylor reported him for making an unwanted sexual advance toward her shortly after she emerged from the sacrament of confession.
A second woman whom Odiong met at Baylor then recounted how he pressured her to leave her troubled marriage and enter into a “spiritual marriage” with him, at one point forcefully kissing her on the mouth and groping her.
A third woman from Pennsylvania who met Odiong while he studied for a master’s degree in theology from Franciscan University in Ohio alleged that he coerced her into an abusive, cross-state relationship from 2007 through 2018.
She said Odiong forced her to perform oral sex on him as well as give him significant sums of money. She said she could not consent to sexual activity with Odiong – or willingly give him money – because he was her spiritual adviser.
Those three women eventually told their stories to the Guardian as well as various church and law enforcement officials. In particular, the third of those women sought damages from New Orleans’s archdiocese through its bankruptcy proceedings in 2021 while also reporting him to the sheriff’s office which patrols Luling.
A sheriff’s office report obtained by the Guardian explains that the New Orleans archdiocese’s general counsel, Susan Zeringue, claimed she was not even given the complaint in question to investigate until this past December. The sheriff’s office ultimately concluded that there was not enough evidence to establish that a crime had occurred.
Notably, unlike Texas, Louisiana does not automatically criminalize sexual contact between a clergyman and an adult parishioner – in the way it does, respectively, between teachers and students of age as well as corrections officers and incarcerated grown-ups, given the inherently imbalanced power dynamics at play.
Nonetheless, at that point, the New Orleans archdiocese revoked permission to minister in its region from Odiong – who, like all Catholic priests, had promised to remain celibate. And that expulsion garnered enough media attention to trigger the Waco police investigation which led to his arrest.
Waco police have since sworn that Odiong would inflict sexually abusive acts against his accusers during private masses he celebrated with them or in sessions dedicated to spiritual counseling – all while “wearing priest wardrobe items”. He would then communicate constantly with his accusers over email, Facebook and text messages, Waco police said in documents.
‘All things shall be revealed’
The case against Odiong is among multiple pending criminal matters with links to New Orleans’ archdiocese.
A prominent one centers on a search warrant that Louisiana state police served on the archdiocese in April as part of an investigation into whether the institution and its leaders had operated as a child-sex trafficking ring responsible for “widespread sexual abuse of minors dating back decades” that was “covered up and not reported to law enforcement”.
Whether Odiong’s arrest attracts much interest from the Louisiana state troopers investigating the archdiocese with which he most recently worked remains to be seen.
But what Odiong has already made known is his defiance to the allegations against him.
Odiong told his followers that Austin and New Orleans church officials had run him out over his opposition to Pope Francis’s attempts to be more welcoming to LGBTQ+ people, who are not allowed to marry within the Catholic church.
He also apparently ignored orders to return to his home diocese of Uyo and openly boasted about having plans to work at a Catholic university whose campus is about one mile away from the $400,000 home outside of which Odiong was arrested.
His most recent Facebook post was an open letter in which he accused the Guardian of carrying out “a false, salacious, one-sided smear campaign” against him. He also said he looked forward to pursuing “any and all legal remedies” to clear his name as well as to “continue to faithfully serve God’s people”.
Odiong’s post generated about 180 generally supportive comments, including one which implored Odiong to “believe, in time, all things shall be revealed, all things shall be exposed”.
After Odiong’s arrest Tuesday, Waco attorneys Christopher King and Robert Callahan reportedly announced that they would sue both the priest and the Austin diocese for damages on behalf of one of the clergyman’s accusers.
The Waco police detective investigating Odiong, DeLange, said anyone with information that may be helpful to him can reach him by telephone at (254) 750-7609.
“If you have been victimized by Anthony Odiong anywhere in the United States, we need to hear from you,” said DeLange, who assured that the privacy of any new cooperating witnesses would be protected. “You are not alone, and you do not have to continue to live with the trauma of this experience alone.”
— Survivors of clergy sex abuse react to ruling in favor of Seattle Archdiocese
by Natalie Swaby
On Friday, a judge decided to not force the Seattle Archdiocese to turn over records that the Attorney General’s Office has been asking for since last July.
Ahead of the hearing, survivors of clergy sexual abuse made a point to be at the courthouse.
“For me personally I have been working hard for this day for 31 or 32 years, since I faced my abuse by a priest when I was seven,” said Mary Dispenza.
Wearing a pin with a picture of her at that age, Dispenza is now on a mission to expose what she said the Catholic Church has kept hidden.
The Seattle Archdiocese has released its official record of clergy credibly accused. There are more than 80 names on the list.
“I don’t believe that 80 is the accurate number at all,” said Dispenza, who believes it is much higher.
That’s why she was at the courthouse on Friday afternoon.
“Release the records to the public domain. By records I mean the stories how they happened, who was responsible so we can make a better future,” Dispenza said.
In court, the state made its case first.
“We ask for a ruling that the church is not immune from this investigation,” said First Assistant Attorney General Kristin Beneski.
The Attorney General’s Office launched an investigation into whether the Catholic Church used charitable funds to cover up child sex abuse.
“When you hide that fact that a member of the clergy is abusing children or other vulnerable people, but then you allow them to keep doing their job but in different locations, you are exposing people in those different location to that abuser,” said Beneski.
>“The Attorney General was not given the authority pursuant to a charitable trust act to supervise and to enforce a religious corporation that is tax exempt,” argued Theresa DeMonte, the attorney for the Seattle Archdiocese.
The judge’s decision was to deny the state’s application.
After the hearing, Attorney General Bob Ferguson talked about the remarks made by the attorneys for the Seattle Archdiocese.
“What I heard in there was wildly inconsistent with what I understand Catholicism to be. What I saw in there was shameful,” said Ferguson. “We can go all the way to the state supreme court.”
“When it comes to crimes i just don’t believe anyone should be exempt, and we are not going to give up.” Said Dispenza.
The Seattle Archdiocese released the following statement after Friday’s ruling, saying “sexual abuse in the Church is a heart-wrenching part of our history, and I am deeply sorry for the pain caused to victim survivors, their families and all Catholics.
“We remain focused on the need for healing and proper governance in these matters,” said Archbishop Paul D. Etienne. “While ironing out the legalities is important, I take no pleasure in today’s outcome. Because we are committed to preventing abuse, promoting transparency and continuously improving our processes, my offer to collaborate with the attorney general still stands.”
The exterior of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City is seen in a nighttime file photo. A New York state appeals court ruled unanimously April 23, 2024, in favor of insurers against the New York Archdiocese, arguing they should not be held liable for the church’s systemic failures on abuse.
By Ellen Moynihan
As the Archdiocese of New York and its insurance company, Chubb, battle over who is responsible for millions in potential payouts to survivors of clergy sexual abuse, a new group has entered the picture.
Announcing its presence in November with a full page ad in The New York Times, the Coalition for Just and Compassionate Compensation, which describes itself as an “alliance of survivors of child abuse and their advocates committed to ensuring that survivors receive the restitution that they deserve”, called on Chubb to stop fighting its responsibility in court and said their behavior was “callous”.
But in letters obtained by the Daily News, Chubb says it is, in fact, the archdiocese that’s being callous— all but accusing the coalition of being in cahoots with the archdiocese amid efforts to pressure the insurer to pay up.
Both the Archdiocese of New York and the coalition deny having any connection to each other. The CJCC said the group was working to hold the archdiocese responsible as well as insurance companies.
“We have no affiliation with the church – we are a broad coalition of advocates, survivors, and attorneys representing plaintiffs who are undergoing active litigation against the archdiocese and other institutions,” said a spokesman for the organization.
For the many victims of clergy abuse, the ongoing battle between the archdiocese and its insurers — punctuated by this latest chapter — is another blow in their efforts to seek justice after decades of denial by the Catholic Church.
Mary McKenna, New York spokeswoman for Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, a nationwide support group for abuse victims, said the delay in payments to victims makes their already abhorrent experiences worse.
“It’s an awful thing for the survivors,” she said.
“Of all the people that I’ve spoken to, the church has known since the beginning. They did know who was an abuser and who was abused,” said McKenna. “I don’t blame the insurance for not wanting to pay because the church is ultimately responsible for their actions.”
“Endless surreal nightmare”
The CJCC’s website was registered in October and the group launched the following month, according to a press release on their website. Their address is a post office box in Washington, D.C., and they have three trustees — a lawyer for sexual abuse victims, a survivor of childhood sexual abuse and a “communications expert.” A spokesperson for the group said they had two other members, both lawyers, and no salaried employees.
When The News asked the coalition to speak with abuse victims the CJCC represented, the group made one of their trustees available without mentioning his leadership position. A spokesperson for the organization later said he “just became” a trustee.
The trustee, Stephen Jimenez, was active in getting the Child Victims Act passed. He filed his claim the day the act went into effect in August 2019 and still has not been compensated.
He noted the Adult Survivors Act, enacted in 2022 to provide a one-year window for adult sexual abuse survivors to pursue litigation, has resulted in resolution of cases already, including the one against Donald Trump brought by E. Jean Carroll.
“Many of us feel this is a kind of endless surreal nightmare that keeps going on and on and on,” he said of himself and his fellow abuse survivors.
When The News asked if there were any other members of the CJCC who were victims of abuse, a spokesman for the group said there were almost 100 people, including survivors, lawyers and advocates, who have engaged in actions as part of the coalition.
“Everyone who is pushing to hold the insurance industry accountable as part of this effort can rightfully consider themselves a member of this coalition,” he said.
More than 3,000 claims
After the New York Child Victims Act of 2019 — signed by then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the newsroom of The Daily News — went into effect, allowing survivors of childhood sexual abuse to sue abusers and the institutions that harbored them, the floodgates opened with past victims seeking justice.
According to court filings, the archdiocese has been sued by over 3,000 claimants under the Child Victims Act. The Archdiocese of New York awarded more than $76 million to 400 claimants via their Independent Reconciliation and Compensation Program, said Joseph Zwilling, director of communications for the archdiocese.
The program was introduced by Timothy Cardinal Dolan in 2016, three years before the Child Victims Act passed, and was intended as a way for survivors of abuse to reach a settlement without hiring a lawyer. Participants in the program waived their right to pursue legal action against the archdiocese for the abuse.
“Cardinal Dolan did do a bishop’s reconciliation a few years back and he didn’t use the insurance company’s money, he used the church’s money,” said McKenna of SNAP, referring to the Independent Reconciliation and Compensation Program. “That was actually good for the victims. They didn’t have to relive the abuse. They didn’t have to wait years and years.”
Chubb is the insurer on about 60% of the unsettled claims that went to litigation, said sources, which are valued at $859 million.
But Chubb filed suit against the archdiocese in Manhattan Supreme Court in June 2023, arguing that the payouts to survivors are outside the scope of what insurance should actually cover.
“The ADNY and the CJCC know that insurance policies cover damages from accidents. You can’t buy insurance for intended acts the ADNY has admitted: concealing, tolerating and abetting child molestation, which continued for decades because of the ADNY’s cover-up and its unconscionable failure to stop the abuse when it had the knowledge and opportunity to do so,” a representative for Chubb said. “That’s what this case is about.”
In October, the archdiocese tried to have the case dismissed. Lawyers from firm Blank Rome, representing the archdiocese, wrote that “Chubb’s heavy-handed conduct highlights that this lawsuit is a tactical maneuver in what appears to be a nationwide corporate decision to walk away from sexual abuse claims from California to New York”.
Supreme Court Justice Suzanne Adams dismissed the case in December, but a unanimous ruling in state appellate court on April 23 found that the insurance company can proceed in its case against the archdiocese.
Enter the coalition
Amid the legal fighting, the coalition took out a full-page ad in The New York Times in November writing “Chubb has callously chosen to resist, delay, and deny restitution to survivors, all in a cynical effort to safeguard its bottom line.”
In January, the group sent a letter to New York Attorney General Letitia James urging her office to look into not only Chubb’s “conspiracy to defraud child victims act survivors”, but the insurance industry’s conduct as a whole.
Chubb has started to fight back, calling foul on the CJCC.
Days after the ad appeared in The New York Times, a lawyer for Chubb wrote to Blank Rome seeking clarity about how aligned the CJCC was with the archdiocese.
“The CJCC came out of nowhere and is not transparent about who set it up and who is funding it,” wrote John Baughman in November 2023. “Its constituent documents do not appear to be publicly available.”
The letter also points out a similarity in language used in both a reply brief filed by lawyers for the archdiocese in October 2023 and the open letter by CJCC published in The New York Times a month later.
“That brief asserted ‘Chubb seeks to welch on its decades-long contractual promises.’ The open letter mimics this wording by claiming that ‘Chubb is welching on its promise’,” wrote Baughman, noting it would be “an extraordinary coincidence” for two different people to come up with the same wording.
Baughman went on to write that the two organizations had people in positions of power who have worked together before.
“There are well-documented extremely close professional, political and personal connections between current and former ADNY officials and people affiliated with the CJCC.”
In another letter, Joseph Wayland, Executive Vice President and General Counsel of Chubb wrote to James R. Marsh and David Catalfamo of the CJCC calling out personal ties between the two groups.
“David Catalfamo, Executive Director of CJCC, and John Cahill, Chancellor of ADNY, have worked closely together dating back at least 20 years when they both served as top aides to former Governor George Pataki,” wrote Wayland on April 2.
“Mr. Catalfamo also served as the spokesperson for Mr. Cahill’s failed run for New York State Attorney General in 2014. Mr. Cahill was also one of the largest donors to Mr. Catalfamo’s own failed campaign for the New York State Assembly in 2022.”
Cahill contributed $4,700 to both Catalfamo’s 2020 and 2022 runs, according to data from the New York State Board of Elections. The only donations higher than that amount were from the Republican Assembly Campaign Committee.
Neither the archdiocese nor the coalition have responded to the letters.
Attorney Jeff Anderson says he has filed over 400 cases for clients against the Archdiocese of New York, and although the Child Victims Act gave those cases priority, no settlements have been made.
“The insurers, not just Chubb, but all of them—there’s a host of them—they have all locked horns and refused to pay,” said Anderson.
Other insurance companies used by the archdiocese include AIG, Travelers, The Hartford and Allianz, the lawyer said. Anderson believes Chubb should be responsible for the settlements, saying they had been paid “over a billion dollars of premiums in coverage over the years”.
“They are villainous in their refusal to pay,” said Anderson. “They make it impossible for Catholic bishops to make peace with the survivors.”
“The survivors are suffering mightily.”
Connection denied
The Archdiocese of New York told The News no relationship existed between them and the CJCC.
“We are aware of the work of the CJCC, and share a common belief that Chubb should live up to its moral and legal responsibility to honor the insurance policies that they issued and for which they were paid for decades,” said Zwilling, the archdiocese’s spokesman.
Zwilling denied that Catalfamo and Cahill’s shared background is relevant and said calling attention to it was a diversion tactic on Chubb’s part.
“The fact that two individuals worked together years ago is immaterial and simply a further attempt by Chubb to muddy the waters as they try to find a way to turn their back on victim-survivors in an attempt to protect their multi-billion dollar bottom line,” said the spokesman.
When asked about the contributions from Cahill to Catalfamo for his Assembly runs and their shared professional past, Catalfamo shot back, lobbing his own accusations at Adrienne Harris, the Superintendent of the New York State Department of Financial Services. The agency regulates financial institutions and insurance companies.
“If there are any connections that need to be examined, it’s between NY’s top finance watchdog Adrienne Harris and her personal ties to a trusted adviser to CHUBB’s CEO. Perhaps then we can all begin to understand why the Department of Financial Services has shockingly turned its back on victims begging her agency to simply require big insurance to follow guidance that is already in place,” said Catalfamo.
Harris is a former employee at law firm Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, which managed legal counsel for insurer ACE Limited when they acquired Chubb in 2015 and has said the firm’s Senior Chair H. Rodgin Cohen is a mentor. Harris left the firm in 2013, according to her LinkedIn page.
In response, a Chubb spokesperson reiterated their position on who should be making payments to survivors of abuse.
“The only ones turning their backs on victims are the ones who tolerated, hid and covered up sexual abuse of children for decades: the Archdiocese of New York. They can and should pay these victims now.”
The Department of Financial Services said they are keeping an eye on the case between the archdiocese and Chubb and will be holding insurers accountable “as appropriate”.
