New Orleans archbishop: local Catholic institutions must help with cost of clergy abuse claims

The claims are part of the archdiocese’s pending bankruptcy protection case and remain ‘too costly to defend’ outside of that context, Aymond’s letter said. Photograph: Gerald Herbert/AP

Contradicting promises he made when his archdiocese declared bankruptcy in May 2020, New Orleans’s archbishop, Gregory Aymond, told the area’s Catholic churches, schools and other ministries that they will now have to share some of the costs of resolving hundreds of clergy abuse claims.

Aymond’s notice came in a letter on Friday, at the end of a particularly bad news week for his organization. One day earlier, a grand jury in New Orleans indicted the retired archdiocesan priest Lawrence Hecker on charges of aggravated rape, aggravated kidnapping, aggravated crime against nature and theft.