New York Archdiocese Agrees to $800 Million Settlement Over Sex Abuse Allegations: NPR

St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan, seat of the Archdiocese of New York, celebrates mass on April 21, 2025 in New York.

Yuki Iwamura/AP

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Yuki Iwamura/AP

The Archdiocese of New York has agreed to pay $800 million to settle claims filed against the Church by some 1,300 people who say they were victims of sexual abuse by clergy and lay workers.

Jeff Anderson, an attorney whose firm represents more than 250 plaintiffs, said the settlement has been finalized, pending signed documents, and all plaintiffs have agreed to the settlement.

In an email sent to priests of the archdiocese Saturday afternoon and shared with NPR, Archbishop Ronald Hicks also said the agreement had not yet been signed but that an agreement had been reached with the plaintiffs and their attorneys.

“We are on the verge of being able, please God, to bring some measure of healing and reconciliation to all victim-survivors,” Hicks wrote in the email. “This agreement will also allow the archdiocese to once again devote its full attention to its mission of preaching the Gospel, healing the sick, caring for the poor and needy, welcoming the stranger and educating our children.”

Anderson says that following the settlement, his clients expressed mixed feelings, both sadness over the abuse they suffered and relief that the legal battle was over.

“The first is a real sense of relief and accomplishment,” Anderson said, and “the belief that having stood up, they at least now have a chance to move forward and have done something to protect others in the future and clean up the Archdiocese of New York.”

The deal was first reported by The New York Times.

It is one of the Catholic Church’s largest settlements related to sexual abuse claims. In 2024, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles agreed to an $880 million settlement for victims of sexual abuse by its clergy.

In December 2025, the Archdiocese of New York agreed to mediation to settle the 1,300 sex abuse complaints and said it had laid off staff and planned to sell some of its Manhattan properties in an effort to raise $300 million to pay survivors.