Milwaukee Archdiocese To Release Records On Handling Priest Sex Abuse

According to yesterday's Pierce County Herald, the Milwaukee Catholic Archdiocese has agreed, as part of its bankruptcy plan, to release records showing how it dealt over the last 40 years with priests accused of child sexual abuse. Some 3000 pages of documents will be released on July 1 on the Archdiocese website. In a Chapter 11 Update posted on the Archdiocese website,  Archbishop Listecki describes at length the documents that will be released and a summary of what they will reveal. The documents will include depositions of Archbishop Weakland, Bishop Sklba and Cardinal Dolan taken in the Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding. Archbishop Listecki said:

I believe sharing these documents publicly will finally bring to a close a criticism that the Church continues to hide or conceal information, or that there are “secret files” tucked away in our archives.  I can assure you, there are not.

The documents apparently do not deal with priests in religious orders or non-clergy church personnel accused of abusing children.