Investigative reporters Jason Dearen and Mike Rezendes joined forces to reveal how religious lobbying across the U.S. has protected a loophole that exempts clergy from reporting child abuse to civil authorities if the abuse is revealed in a spiritual setting. The subject had surfaced in Rezendes’ August investigation into the mishandling and coverup of child sex abuse cases by the Mormon church.
The pair began by looking at political efforts to close the loophole in Arizona and Utah,two heavily Mormon states. In each case, powerful Mormon lawmakers and the Catholic Church had successfully quashed the bills.
Dearen then reached out to AP’s statehouse reporters in all 33 states that have the loophole,finding similar dynamics: The Catholic and Mormon churches,and the Jehovah’s Witnesses successfully defeated more than 130 bills seeking to create or amend child sex abuse reporting laws. In Maryland, a Catholic cardinal who would later be defrocked for sexually abusing children and adult seminarians had led the campaign to preserve the loophole.
So grateful to the breath-taking number of talented colleagues who contributed to this story — more than 30! — about the role clergy play in covering up child sex abuse. This could only happen at the @AP! https://t.co/CsfJrndzC2
— Michael Rezendes (@MikeRezendes) September 28, 2022
The story had an impact before it was even published. After learning of the loophole from AP reporter Wilson Ring,Vermont state Sen. Richard Sears,a Democrat,said he would introduce a bill in the next legislative session to try to close it. “I wasn’t even aware it existed,” Sears told AP.
New legislative efforts are also expected in both Utah and Arizona,where the story played widely online and was tweeted out by major newspapers and political reporters. And despite the story publishing just as Hurricane Ian was bearing down on Florida, readers responded to Rezendes and Dearen with notes of thanks.