‘Shame on them’: anger and dismay from survivors over Saints clergy-abuse emails

Members of Snap, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, hold signs during a conference in front of the New Orleans Saints training facility in Metairie, Louisiana, on 29 January 2020. Photograph: Matthew Hinton/AP

Clergy abuse survivors and their supporters expressed disgust, pain and disbelief after the Guardian and WWL Louisiana’s investigation on Monday into hundreds of emails showing officials with the NFL’s Saints and NBA’s Pelicans aided New Orleans’ Roman Catholic archdiocese efforts to soften critical media coverage about the church’s management of a clerical molestation scandal in their city.

Richard Windmann said it was “disturbing” to see the emails mention his decision to go public about his abuse as a child at the hands of a priest and janitor at Jesuit high school in New Orleans in the 1970s.