PRINTER'S NO. 3026
THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF PENNSYLVANIA
HOUSE RESOLUTION
No.
763
Session of
2015
INTRODUCED BY ROZZI, KINSEY, DAVIS, BURNS AND O'BRIEN,
MARCH 24, 2016
REFERRED TO COMMITTEE ON JUDICIARY, MARCH 24, 2016
A RESOLUTION
Urging the district attorneys of the respective counties to
request that the Office of Attorney General investigate the
Roman Catholic dioceses of Pennsylvania for evidence of the
sexual abuse of children and recommend any legislative
remedies the office deems appropriate in order to ensure that
child victims of sexual abuse find justice.
WHEREAS, There is an international, national and Statewide
epidemic of children being sexually abused by clergy and
subsequent efforts to cover up the abuse by the Roman Catholic
Church; and
WHEREAS, The Investigating Grand Jury of September 26, 2001,
in the Court of Common Pleas, First Judicial District of
Pennsylvania, Criminal Trial Division, released a report finding
that over the previous 35 years more than 120 priests serving
the Archdiocese of Philadelphia had been accused of sexually
abusing hundreds of adolescents and younger children; and
WHEREAS, The report also found that, with rare exceptions,
the Archdiocese of Philadelphia did not report these accusations
to public authorities, and the archdiocesan managers as a whole
did not prevent the sexual abuse of children by priests and kept
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the discovery of the abuse from occurring; and
WHEREAS, The Investigating Grand Jury of September 17, 2003,
in the Court of Common Pleas, First Judicial District of
Pennsylvania, Criminal Trial Division, released a report
documenting child sexual abuse by at least 63 different priests
in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia victimizing hundreds of
children and that archdiocese officials at the highest levels
received reports of abuse and chose not to conduct any
meaningful investigation of those reports; and
WHEREAS, The report further found that archdiocese officials
left dangerous priests in place or transferred them to different
parishes as a means of concealment, that they never alerted
parents of the dangers posed by these offenders, that they
intimidated and retaliated against victims and witnesses who
came forward about abuse, that they manipulated "treatment"
efforts in order to create a false impression of action and that
they did many of these things in a conscious effort to simply
avoid civil liability; and
WHEREAS, The Investigating Grand Jury XXIII in the Court of
Common Pleas of Philadelphia County, Trial Division, released a
report on January 21, 2011, urging the criminal prosecution of
five additional priests and church employees for sexually
abusing children and found that the procedures implemented by
the archdiocese in response to prior abuses purportedly to help
victims were in fact designed to help the abusers and the
archdiocese; and
WHEREAS, The 37th Statewide Investigating Grand Jury released
a report on March 1, 2016, which documented child sexual abuse
by at least 50 different priests or religious leaders within the
Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown victimizing hundreds of children
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and the subsequent efforts by the diocese to cover up the abuses
and avoid public scandal rather than protect the well-being of
innocent children; and
WHEREAS, This resolution is not an indictment of the Roman
Catholic religion or the Roman Catholic Church, but an effort to
deliver justice to abused children and to rid the Roman Catholic
Church of the men who hijacked it for their own grotesque
desires; therefore be it
RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives urge the district
attorneys of the respective counties to request that the Office
of Attorney General investigate the Roman Catholic dioceses of
Pennsylvania for evidence of the sexual abuse of children; and
be it further
RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives request that the
Office of Attorney General recommend any legislative remedies
the office deems appropriate in order to ensure that child
victims of sexual abuse find justice.
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