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Connecticut court orders release of sealed documents on clergy abuse
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BRIDGEPORT, Conn. (CNS) -- Bridgeport diocesan officials said they were reviewing their options after a May 22 ruling by the Connecticut Supreme Court to make public sealed documents from settled sexual abuse lawsuits filed against priests in the Bridgeport Diocese. The 4-1 ruling involves the release of documents from 23 lawsuits against six priests settled in 2001. In 2006, a Superior Court ruled that the files should be released but the diocese appealed the decision. The Supreme Court's decision to release the files would not take effect until it was published in the Connecticut Law Journal June 2. According to a May 22 statement from the Bridgeport Diocese, church officials were "deeply disappointed" in the ruling. The battle over the sealed documents began in 2002 when The New York Times filed suit to obtain the documents that it said were a key par of the church's record of handling charges of clergy sex abuse. Three other newspapers joined in the suit: The Hartford Courant, The Boston Globe and The Washington Post. About a dozen people, including members of the Survivors' Network of those Abused by Priests, delivered a letter to Bridgeport Bishop William E. Lori May 26 urging the diocese not to appeal the release of the more than 12,600 pages of documents.
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