CNA Staff, Jan 3, 2024 / 14:40 pm
The Franciscan Friars of California announced this week that they have filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy over dozens of sexual abuse allegations filed against the religious order.
The Franciscans of the Province of St. Barbara, founded in 1915 in Oakland, California, said on their website on Tuesday that they had filed a Chapter 11 petition “to address 94 child sexual abuse claims” leveled against the friars.
Friars from the Province of St. Barbara, one of seven such OFM Franciscan entities in the United States, serve in California, Arizona, Oregon, and Washington, and in a number of Native American nations in the Southwest as well on mission to Mexico, Russia, and the Holy Land.
The order said the dozens of claims came about due to California “state laws that allowed abuse survivors to file decades-old complaints that were otherwise time-barred or expired under the state’s statute of limitations.”