ND Attorney General Reviewing Clergy Sexual Abuse Cases In Bismarck & Fargo

There are four investigators that are going through the files.

NORTH DAKOTA – In January, the Catholic Dioceses of Fargo and Bismarck published a list of priests and clergy they determined by their standards have abused children.

The law firm says the information was missing the assignment list.

“We sent them a letter telling them to do that, that they should do that, cause it’s really easy for them. It’s in the front of every file, so it’s something that they could’ve easily copied and put out, they still chose not to do that,” says Attorney Mike Bryant.

They had staff work for weeks to compile the information taken from the official catholic directory, media articles and obituaries found online.

They still want the church to turn in the files.

“We want the church to honor the request to turn over the files. The files contain a lot of information, information in addition to what we’re able to gleam from the things that are out there already and I think that’s really important for our victims to know, but it’s also important for the public to know where these priests were located at different times,” says Attorney Tim O’Keeffe.

They’ve contacted the Attorney General to fully investigate how much knowledge the dioceses had of the crimes.

“He is very cooperative and supportive of an effort to have the catholic church provide full transparency to release these files, in fact attorney general Stenehjem said it’s fine with him for us to disclose that they do have the files. And four investigators that are going through the files and the possibility of criminal charges,” says Bryant.

The Catholic Dioceses of Fargo and Bismarck released a statement in response to the news conference held by the law firm.

           ” The Diocese of Bismarck and the Diocese of Fargo follow comprehensive safe environment policies.  These policies include criminal background checks of all Church personnel who work with or around children, and training of clergy, employees, volunteers, and parents regarding safe environment practices.  The dioceses also cooperate with outside auditors to annually conduct an audit to assess whether the dioceses comply with the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People adopted by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in 2002.  The results of these audits are published every year. 

            Early in January 2020, the dioceses published the results of their separate internal reviews of all of their clergy files and named each cleric (priest or deacon) who was the subject of a substantiated allegation of sexual abuse of a minor.   These reviews included at least all those clerics serving back to 1950.

          Beginning in the summer of 2019, the Dioceses of Fargo and Bismarck entered into discussions with the Office of the North Dakota Attorney General.  Based on those discussions it was agreed that the dioceses and the Attorney General’s office had common goals of taking all reasonable measures to protect minors from sexual abuse; ensuring that no cleric with substantiated allegations of sexual abuse of a minor remains in ministry; protecting the identity of alleged victims; and bringing sexual perpetrators to justice by prosecuting them when possible. 

The Dioceses permitted the Attorney General’s trained investigators from the ND Bureau of Criminal Investigation to review the files for their deacons, priests, and bishops.  This external civil review is almost complete.  The dioceses are confident that this external review will confirm that they have no clergy with substantiated allegations of sexual abuse of a minor remaining in ministry, and that they have had no substantiated allegations of any cleric’s sexual abuse of a minor for almost 20 years.  The dioceses also invited the Attorney General’s office to review their safe environment policies and practices and suggest improvements.

             As always, if any person believes that he or she is a victim of sexual abuse by any priest, deacon, bishop, employee, or volunteer working for either Diocese, a Catholic parish, or a Catholic school, the person should promptly report to law enforcement and to the Diocese of Bismarck (701-204-7216) or the Diocese of Fargo (701-356-7965).”