I'm confused - haven't the priests been arrested?

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OK, so there’s been a huge sex scandal by priests and deacons. There have been thousands of victims.

Why have I not seen reports of priests getting prosecuted for these crimes? I did a quick search for ‘arrests’ in these forums and I got no hits on priests getting arrested.

What am I missing?

It is terrible that Bishops have covered up these abuses, but the Pennsylvania grand jury identified priests (yes, most have died already) and so did the John Jay report and studies by the Ruth Institute. So … my burning question is; have the federal and state authorities also covered up these abuses???

It boggles the mind that all these abusers seem to be able to escape prosecution. This would never happen where I’m from. If someone is accused of molest (let alone abuse) a full investigation would be carried out and if found guilty, incarcerated.

That there is abuse is shocking already, but that there have been no criminal proceedings is even more unbelievable.
 
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Inquirer said:
but that there have been no criminal proceedings is even more unbelievable
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There have been criminal proceedings; you can find them with Google, and I think bishopaccountability.org.

Unfortunately, many cases were covered up at the time, and only came to light after the statute of limitations had expired.
 
So you’re saying that it would be the norm for such priests to be arrested and charged?
 
Inquirer said:
So you’re saying that it would be the norm for such priests to be arrested and charged?
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That would be up to law enforcement, after their own investigation. What should happen-- and all to often didn’t, in the past – is the diocese should report these cases to law enforcement. That’s what is required under the Dallas guidelines.
 
Many, perhaps even the majority of the abusers are dead, because many of the cases took place so long ago.

Those who are still living are being dealt with to the extent that the law will allow. If the statute of limitations have passed, survivors may still have the option of filing a civil lawsuit – but that sort of information is beyond my pay grade. 😃
 
There’s no evidence that widespread abuse is ongoing within the Catholic Church. Steps were taken 20 years ago when the first round of scandals broke out to improve the screening process for seminaries etc. So while some clergy have been prosecuted, the vast majority of exposed cases of abuse happened decades ago and can no longer be prosecuted.
 
This is why so many abused victims are fighting to have those statues removed. The limitations were put into place to stop situation that we saw during the kavanugh hearings. Where an accusers suddenly pops up 35 years later claiming abuse.

As for no more evidence the church has taken steps to prevent this from happening. You also have to understand that parents themselves no long allow those situations to occur in which a priest can be left alone with a child.

I never allowed a Priest to be alone with either of my two boys. Our oldest went to a private catholic school. It was made very clear by many of the parents that under no circumstance what so ever would their children be allowed to be alone with either a teacher or a priest.

Our oldest son had received after school tutoring and when I walked in to get him the door to that class room was always open.

The school leaders understood that trust factor had been broken and it wasnt the parents that did the breaking.
 
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