Here’s the problem: people were willing to talk about what they knew, but nobody was willing to go on the record, or provide documents to back up their claims. Even though I heard the same kinds of stories repeatedly from reputable sources — most of them priests — not a soul dared to put his name to the accusations. This man was too powerful. At least two prominent laymen who knew about this, but who weren’t under his authority (they did not work for him), would not go on the record about it. One of the men gave no reason; the other said it was to protect the church. This was 2002, if that tells you anything.
.. Unless people were willing to make their accusations public, or disclose court documents, my hands were tied. From a journalistic point of view, until and unless that happened, the stories were just gossip. This story burned me up, especially when I would see this old lecher on television pretending to be so heartbroken about the abuse of children. He was a fraud. Lots of people had personal knowledge of the kind of fraud he was. But nobody said a word publicly. The story was never told.