Archdiocese of Baltimore

Fallout begins over church sexual abuse report; one official, Monsignor Richard Woy, resigned from the University of Maryland St. Joseph Medical Center’s board of directors.

Reporters matched details in the Maryland attorney general's report into the Archdiocese of Baltimore to court transcripts, archdiocesan letters, church directories, news articles and other public documents.

Sister Marie Francis Yocum is accused of abusing a young woman in the 1950s, according to the Maryland Attorney General grand jury investigation of the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

There were nearly 100 redactions in the report, leaving some survivors calling for more accountability.

We’ll go On the Record with Attorney General Anthony Brown. His office’s investigation of pervasive child abuse by scores of Catholic priests and brothers blames decades of cover-up by the Baltimore Archdiocese. And we’ll talk to David Lorenz, an advocate for survivors.

"Abusers preyed upon the children most devoted to the church: the altar servers and choir members, those who participated in church youth organizations and the Scout troops, and especially those who worked in the rectories answering telephones in the evening and on the weekends," according to the report.

In 2019, the Maryland Office of the Attorney General launched a grand jury investigation into allegations of sexual abuse within the Archdiocese of Baltimore and its response. The report is 456 pages and titled “Clergy Abuse in Maryland.” The document identified 158 priests who are accused of sexual abuse and torture of more than 600 people in the last 80 years.

Initial approval given to allowing child sex abuse victims to file a lawsuit at any age as Maryland awaits public release of report into decades of abuse within the Catholic Archdiocese of Baltimore.

The bill would give more survivors of child sexual abuse the legal right to sue the church and other institutions complicit in the crimes. It would also remove a longstanding legal barrier that has blocked many adults in Maryland from filing lawsuits over abuse they suffered in schools and churches.

Major potential change to state law comes as report into abuse within Archdiocese of Baltimore is to go public.