New York archdiocese reaches $800 million settlement over sexual abuse claims

The Archdiocese of New York has reached an $800 million settlement to resolve about 1,300 sexual abuse lawsuits filed under New York state laws that reopened the window for old abuse claims. The suits involve clergy and other personnel connected to the archdiocese. Archbishop Ronald A. Hicks of New York confirmed the agreement on October 24 in an email to priests of the archdiocese, and lawyers for the plaintiffs confirmed it the following day. The signing is expected during the week of November 6, 2026.

It is the second largest settlement of its kind by a US Catholic diocese, behind the $880 million the Archdiocese of Los Angeles paid in 2024 to settle claims from about 1,000 victims. The same outside mediator handled both cases: retired judge Daniel J. Buckley of Signature Resolution.

Survivors accept the plan

Lawyers for the plaintiffs told their clients about the settlement in an email sent the night of October 23. Jeff Anderson of Anderson & Associates, which represents 300 survivors, said "all survivors who filed claims against the Archdiocese of New York have accepted the settlement plan." Attorney Trusha Goffe told her clients: "Tonight we were able to finalize the settlement with the Archdiocese. All survivors accepted the revised settlement."

Hicks wrote in his email to priests: "We are about to be able, thank God, to bring some measure of healing and reconciliation to all survivors." He added that the resolution will also allow the archdiocese to "turn its full attention back to its mission" of evangelization and works of mercy.

Compensation and transparency

A neutral allocator will review each claim individually and set compensation "based on the nature of the abuse and the harm caused." The settlement also offers a quick-payment option of $250,000 for those who prefer to be paid immediately rather than go through the individual review.

Beyond the money, the settlement requires transparency measures. The archdiocese must publish and keep updated a list of priests with credible accusations of abuse, and make the files of the clergy involved, which until now have been kept confidential, accessible in a database. A number of US dioceses have already adopted the practice of publishing names.

Five years of litigation

The settlement ends five years of litigation that forced the archdiocese to sell property and to take legal action against the insurer Chubb over coverage of the claims. The case against Chubb remains open, and Anderson said that under the terms of the settlement "survivors will have a beneficial interest in the insurance litigation and in the resolution of those claims in the future."

The settlement follows a long effort to shore up the archdiocese's finances. In December 2025, Hicks's predecessor, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, announced that the archdiocese would enter mediation and work to raise more than $300 million for abuse settlements, an effort that brought staff layoffs and budget cuts. It included the 2024 sale of the archdiocese's Manhattan headquarters, bought by Vanbarton Group for $100 million.

A national crisis

In 2018, accusations that sexual abuse by priests had been covered up led the New York attorney general at the time, Barbara Underwood, to open an investigation into the Archdiocese of New York and the state's seven other dioceses. That same year, credible accusations surfaced that then Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, who has since died, had sexually abused a minor in the 1970s, which led to his removal. In 2024, the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors published its first annual report on the handling of the crisis, acknowledging several "current shortcomings" in the Church's procedures for preventing and responding to allegations.

With the New York settlement, the total paid out by US dioceses to resolve abuse claims since 2004 approaches $6 billion, and may exceed it. In June 2026, the Archdiocese of San Francisco announced a $395 million settlement with about 530 people who say priests abused them as children. In December 2025, a federal judge approved a $230 million settlement between hundreds of victims and the Archdiocese of New Orleans.