Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell released a report Wednesday finding that nearly 1,000 children in recent decades were abused by more than 270 clerics within the dioceses of Fall River, Springfield and Worcester.
The attorney general's office is calling on those dioceses to take additional steps to protect children and improve their response to survivors.
Campbell said the report is the result of an investigation that began in 2019 under then-Attorney General Maura Healey.
"While previous investigations and public reporting had exposed institutional failures in the Archdiocese of Boston that allowed widespread abuse, this is the first comparable public accounting of the institutional failures within the Fall River, Springfield and Worcester dioceses," Campbell's office said in a press release.
The report finds that "decades of failures by diocesan leaders to adequately respond to allegations of child sexual abuse and protect children from further harm."
Campbell wrote in a statement that her office is "unable to seek criminal charges" on the identified incidents, whether due to the deaths of the people involved, misconduct that was not a crime when it occurred or the statute of limitations. While the report resulted in no new indictments, three cases were referred to the appropriate district attorneys' offices, and one resulted in criminal charges being issued by the Worcester County District Attorney's Office, per the report.
Campbell also called for changes to state law to the statute of limitations on civil claims for child sexual abuse cases.
The attorney general's office is calling on the dioceses of Fall River, Springfield and Worcester to take additional several additional steps to protect children and improve their response to survivors.
At a Wednesday press conference, Campbell specifically called on the Worcester diocese to maintain a list of credibly accused clergy members.
"I want to be especially clear about Worcester. The Worcester diocese has a tremendous opportunity to do something that would bring about justice," she said. "Worcester is the only diocese in Massachusetts that does not have a public list of credibly accused clergy. Every other Massachusetts diocese has one. Worcester needs to create one and publicly maintain one, too."
Raymond Delisle, chancellor and spokesperson for the Worcester diocese, said in a statement to GBH News that the diocese "welcome[s] the AG's report.
Delisle added that the Worcester diocese issued its own report in 2004 that was updated in recent years.
"Both reports point out that the vast majority of cases occurred 40-60 years ago," he wrote. "Our procedures over the past three decades, including the way we screen candidates for ordination, as well as the awareness and safety training which was implemented in all our parishes and ministries, have made an enormous difference."
Delisle also pointed to a section of the report where the diocese defends its decision to not release a list of credibly accused clergy.
"There is no other precedent for the publishing of lists of the accused in society - even of those accused in other positions of trust such as medicine, education or law enforcement," the report reads. "Such lists can be a cause for deep division among many members of our Church who see this as publicly branding as guilty those who never have been charged by law enforcement or had a chance to defend themselves in a court of law, given the fact that many decades have passed between the alleged abuse and the reporting of that abuse, or because they were already deceased when the allegation was first received."
Messages left with the dioceses of Fall River and Springfield seeking comment on the report were not immediately returned.
This is developing story.
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