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Michigan’s top state prosecutor on Monday issued a report outlining allegations against nearly 60 people at the Roman Catholic diocese of Lansing accused of sexually abusing children and vulnerable adults over the last seven decades.
The state attorney general Dana Nessel’s office published the report as part of a years-long investigation into clergy sexual abuse within Michigan’s Catholic dioceses.
The investigation, which began in September 2018, found that 48 priests, three religious brothers, one apparent former religious brother and four deacons were suspected of engaging in sexual misconduct in the Lansing diocese since 1950. The report includes victim interviews, tips, police investigations and documents seized from the diocese amid the decades-old global and US reckoning with clergy sexual misconduct.
Of the 56 total accused, 42 were ordained or incardinated by the diocese of Lansing. The number of offenders identified in Lansing is a fewer number than that reported in other dioceses elsewhere in the US – but the diocese is also not among the largest organizations of its kind in the country.
Nessel’s office said Monday that it had filed charges in 11 Catholic clergy abuse cases across Michigan during its statewide investigation. Nine led to convictions.
Two of those cases involved priests in the diocese of Lansing, and one involved an apparent former religious brother, as the Detroit News noted.
A priest named Vincent DeLorenzo was sentenced to one year in jail and five years of probation in June 2023 for one count of attempted first-degree criminal sexual assault of a five-year-old boy. DeLorenzo died in January while serving his sentence.
DeLorenzo’s fellow priest Timothy Crowley received a one-year jail sentence and five years of probation in November 2023 on two counts of second-degree criminal sexual conduct. The Detroit News reported that he pleaded guilty to sexually abusing a minor three decades ago.
And Joseph Comperchio, a church organist and Catholic school drama and music teacher who presented himself as a religious brother, was sentenced in August 2021 to between 10 and 30 years in prison for sexually abusing four children. Comperchio died in 2022 while serving his sentence, according to the Detroit News.
Nessel has promised to publish reports for all seven Catholic dioceses of Michigan. Reports for the diocese of Marquette, Gaylord, and Kalamazoo have already been released.
Since taking office, Nessel has repeatedly said that she would use her department to assure cases of sexual abuse and assault are properly reviewed.
“By publishing these reports, we are sharing their stories and validating their experiences,” Nessel said during a Monday afternoon press conference. “We hope this report provides a voice to those who have suffered in silence for so long.”
Diocese of the Lansing bishop Earl Boyea also released a statement apologizing for any sexual abuse that took place within the diocese.
“Having read this long and detailed report, my heart breaks for all those who have suffered due to the evil of clerical sexual abuse which is a great betrayal of Jesus Christ, His Holy Church, the priesthood, and, most gravely, those victims – and their families – who were harmed physically, emotionally, but above all spiritually when they were so young,” said the statement from Boyea, who has led the Lansing diocese since 2008.
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“To all those injured by such criminal and immoral actions I say clearly and without hesitation: these terrible things should never have happened to you.”
Nessel said the diocese cooperated with the inquiry and, in some cases, shared information on misconduct uncovered in its own investigations.
“And we feel like things are going to really change, I hope, moving forward,” she said, “and I think that’s reflected by the significant cooperation that we’ve received, especially from the Lansing diocese”.
A report on the archdiocese of Detroit is among the three ones that are pending from Nessel’s office’s investigation into Michigan’s Catholic dioceses. The reports are expected to be completed by 2026.
