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FAIRBANKS -- Representatives of nearly 300 alleged sexual abuse victims claim the Fairbanks Catholic Diocese has attempted to hide assets and divest properties to lessen available funds and property to pay the claims of sexual abuse survivors.
Two lawsuits involving the diocese were filed in Anchorage Federal Bankruptcy Court on Thursday by the seven-member Unsecured Creditors Committee that represents 292 clerical sexual abuse victims. The diocese declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy March 1, 2008. In one complaint, citing fraudulent transfer of funds, UCC attorney, James Stang of Los Angeles, wrote, "The Diocese, its Bishop, and its Director of Finance took a lesson from bankruptcy cases of other dioceses to divest, shield, and lessen the availability of resources for these Survivors." According to the complaint, the diocese amended its articles of incorporation April 4, 2007, less than one year before it declared bankruptcy, to assert that the diocese held the property only for the benefit of its 46 parishes, missions, schools and other groups. In September 2007, the diocese created the Catholic Trust of Northern Alaska, and transferred $3 million from its accounts into the trust for parishes and schools. "If money and property is transferred before a bankruptcy, it is considered a fraudulent transfer," Stang said. "We don't think the parishes owned that money. The diocese made a gift of it and got nothing back in return." Listed in the lawsuit are the bishop, CTNA trustees, Monroe Foundation, Immaculate Conception Elementary School, Monroe Catholic Junior-Senior High School and 46 parishes throughout the sprawling diocese, which encompasses more than 400,000 square miles north of the Alaska Range. The lawsuit also disputes the diocese's claim that some of its real properties are not part of its estate. In addition to the CTNA trust, the list includes the diocese's operating account, the Catholic Schools of Fairbanks bank account, a $12 million endowment initiated in 1980 and the Monroe Foundation's estimated $1.3 million in assets. Ford Elsaesser, attorney for the Northern Alaska parishes, calls the lawsuits an attempt to wipe the parishes of northern Alaska off the map. "In my view, this is an attack on the people in the Bush, an attempt to intimidate and scare the parishioners in the villages which are subsidized by donations from all over the world," Elsaesser said. "It's one of the poorest dioceses in the United States. The Bush churches are the few islands of social stability in a sea of other problems."