Archdiocese of Portland turns over records on priests

Portland, Oregon —

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Portland has turned over 97 boxes of records on priests accused of molesting children after promising last November to provide the documents to insurance companies seeking to reduce potential settlement costs.

The 10 insurers hope to use the files to show church officials knew about the sex-abuse allegations against 37 priests but ignored them, which could invalidate liability insurance policies. Otherwise, the insurers may have to pay settlements and legal fees that could exceed $16 million.

A Portland-based lawyer for the insurers, Joseph A. Field, complained to church lawyers that they had "dumped" some 200,000 pages of documents "in an unreasonable and unusable form."

Field said the church told the company that scans the documents into electronic form to block insurers from original source files or file labels, leaving them unable to sort the files or take inventory.

"I wouldn't say we dumped them," archdiocese spokesman Bud Bunce said yesterday. "I'd say we gave them what they wanted."

Read the article at The Seattle Times Dated June 22, 2005

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