Survivors of clergy sexual abuse in Illinois have something many other survivors do not: an official record. In 2023, the Illinois Attorney General published a report naming 451 Catholic clerics and religious brothers as substantiated child sex abusers across all six Illinois dioceses. Those men abused at least 1,997 children.
You do not need to have reported the abuse, and nobody needs to have been charged. A civil claim asks a different question from a criminal case. It asks what a diocese or religious order knew, what it should have known, and what it did.
Ervin Nevitt, a partner at Coplan + Crane, reviews these claims. He holds Illinois bar registration 6319808 and was admitted in 2014.
What sets clergy claims apart
Clergy claims in Illinois rest on an unusual base of evidence. The state's own Attorney General documented the scope of abuse, and the report's data analysis tracks the abusers year by year from 1950 through 2019.
One pattern comes up again and again: transfer rather than removal. A priest was moved to another parish after a complaint. The complaint itself was recorded in an assignment history that still exists.
Who the claim is brought against
These claims are usually brought against a diocese or religious order, not only against the individual. The theory that most often carries them is negligent retention. In practice, several theories run together, and which one fits depends on your facts rather than on a category.
The responsible body is usually a private organization. That means the Tort Immunity rules that govern claims against Illinois public bodies do not apply in the same way. The liability questions are the ordinary institutional ones.
The Attorney General's report, diocese by diocese
The Attorney General's investigation began in the second half of 2018. It covered the Archdiocese of Chicago and the Dioceses of Belleville, Joliet, Peoria, Rockford, and Springfield. Investigators reviewed more than 100,000 pages of diocesan documents. When the investigation opened, only Chicago and Joliet posted any list of substantiated abusers, and those lists named 103 men between them.
The final report counts substantiated abusers by the diocese where they ministered. The Archdiocese of Chicago, which covers Cook and Lake counties, had 275 named in the report, compared with 150 on the archdiocese's own list at the close of the investigation. The Diocese of Joliet had 69 in the report and 52 on its own list. Peoria had 51 and 43. Belleville had 43 and 42. Springfield had 32 and 23. Rockford had 24 and 24.
Those diocese totals add up to 494, which is more than the statewide figure of 451. The difference exists because some men ministered in more than one diocese. The report also names 160 clerics and religious brothers who had been substantiated as abusers by Catholic sources but whom the dioceses still had not disclosed. If a diocese's own list does not include the man who abused you, the Attorney General's list is the next place to look.
Each entry lists the man's Illinois assignments, the number of reported survivors, the dates and places of reported abuse, and the date the diocese says it first received a claim about him. That last date is often the most important line. If it falls before your abuse, the diocese had a complaint on file while he still had access to you.
Religious orders and the "not our men" problem
Not every Catholic priest or brother answers to a bishop. Members of religious orders, such as Jesuits or Oblates, often work in schools, hospitals, and orphanages run by their orders, as well as in parishes. The Attorney General identified more than 250 religious order clerics and brothers as substantiated child sex abusers, from more than 30 orders ministering in Illinois.
Diocesan representatives told investigators that order members are not their men. Dioceses generally refer an allegation against an order member to the order, so a complaint made directly to the order may never reach the diocese. The Archdiocese of Chicago acknowledged nearly 60 order members with substantiated allegations who served within it. It still left them off its public list, because they had no diocesan ministry or were non-ordained brothers.
If you were abused at a Catholic school run by an order, the order kept the man's file and decided where he went next. The diocese may hold records too. The report notes that survivors of order members often report to the diocese where the abuse happened, and church law gives the bishop authority to watch over Catholic schools in his territory, including those run by orders. A claim can involve the order, the diocese, or both.
Abuse in other faiths and denominations
The Attorney General's report covers only the six Catholic dioceses. A survivor abused in a Protestant or Orthodox church, a synagogue, a mosque, a Jehovah's Witness congregation, or another faith community will not find the abuser there. The records still exist. They sit with the congregation, its regional or national body, and any youth program, camp, or school the faith runs.
Illinois law treats clergy of every faith alike on one point. Any member of the clergy is a mandated reporter under Section 4 of the Abused and Neglected Child Reporting Act (325 ILCS 5/4). Clergy must report immediately to the Department of Children and Family Services when they have reasonable cause to believe a child known to them in that role may be abused. Whether that happened, and what the congregation's leaders did instead, is often central to a case against a non-Catholic institution.
Who can be named depends on how the faith is structured. In a self-governing congregation, the local church or its board may be the only institution involved. Where a regional body ordains, places, or disciplines clergy, that body may hold the personnel history.
How church records come out in a civil case
Once a lawsuit is filed, Illinois Supreme Court Rule 214 lets one party serve written requests on another to produce specified documents. The responding party must identify everything responsive in its possession. It must produce the documents as they are kept in the usual course of business, or organized by the categories requested, and sign an affidavit stating whether the production is complete.
In a clergy case, those requests usually reach four kinds of records:
- Assignment histories: every parish, school, and residence the man was sent to, with dates and the letters announcing each transfer.
- Personnel files: complaints, correspondence with the bishop or provincial, leaves of absence, and treatment referrals.
- Personnel board and review board records: minutes about where the man could serve, and any finding on an allegation.
- Parish and school records: rosters, server schedules, and trip records that place the abuser and the child together.
The report's chapter on Belleville shows why these records matter. Personnel board minutes from 1985 read, "In making assignments, must not forget about Fr. Kownacki." By then, the diocese had known about his abuse of children for more than a decade. At the trial of a survivor's lawsuit, the diocese's vice-chancellor testified that when the priest was transferred to a new parish in 1982, it was common knowledge among diocesan leaders that he abused children.
Churches have resisted producing files. The report describes the Diocese of Rockford refusing to give a priest's personnel file to Kane County prosecutors. The Illinois appellate court held that internal church rules did not allow evidence of child sexual abuse by priests to be shielded from discovery. Illinois does keep a clergy privilege (735 ILCS 5/8-803), but it is written around confessions and admissions made to a cleric acting as a spiritual advisor. The court decides whether a given document falls within it.
You do not need these records before you speak with a lawyer. Your memory of names, places, and dates is enough to start, and many survivors file a sexual abuse lawsuit anonymously in Illinois. Timing depends on the facts and should be checked with a lawyer.
Common Questions Around Illinois Clergy Abuse Claims
Do I need to have reported it? No. A civil claim requires no police report, no charge, and no conviction. Most people we speak with never reported.
Does someone have to have been convicted? No. A civil case uses a lower standard of proof than a criminal one and is usually brought against the institution rather than the individual.
It was a long time ago. That is the norm in this work rather than the exception. What governs it is your age at the time, who was responsible, and the particular facts.
How do I find out whether the priest who abused me is in the Attorney General's report? The report is at clergyreport.illinoisattorneygeneral.gov, with a search function and a section for each diocese. If he is not there, that does not mean you will not be believed. The report counts only men substantiated by the time it was published.
He was a religious brother at a Catholic high school, not a parish priest. Who is responsible? Often the religious order that ran the school and assigned him, and sometimes the diocese as well. Dioceses frequently left order members off their public lists, so his absence from a diocese's list tells you little.
The abuse happened in a non-Catholic church. Does any of this apply to me? The Attorney General's report does not, because it covered only the Catholic dioceses. The rest does. Clergy of every faith are mandated reporters in Illinois, and a congregation that is a party to a civil case has to produce relevant records under the same court rules as a diocese.
What happens when you contact us
Asking a question does not set anything in motion. You speak with a person, not a form or an intake script, and you do not have to describe what happened to have the conversation.
We look into which institution was responsible, what it knew, what records exist, and whether a claim can still be brought. That work costs you nothing. Then we tell you plainly what is possible. If you decide not to go ahead, that is the end of it, and what you told us stays confidential.
If you go ahead, we carry it: the filings, the deadlines, the records, and the institution's insurers. Steps can be taken to protect your identity in the court record.
Call (708) 671-6858 for a free, confidential case review.
