Los Angeles, USA - The Franciscan friars have reached a preliminary settlement of more than $28 million with about two dozen people who claimed they were sexually abused at a now-defunct Santa Barbara seminary and mission, officials said Monday.
Attorney Raymond Boucher, who represents eight of the plaintiffs, said the average payment would be about $1.27 million. The figure was confirmed by the Franciscans, who ran the seminary until 1987, when it closed for financial reasons.
"In making this settlement, we friars are trying to do the right thing and help bring about healing," the Rev. Melvin A. Jurisich, provincial minister for the Franciscan Friars, Province of Saint Barbara, said in a statement.
Boucher said that "under the circumstances, I think this was a very fair settlement. Some (plaintiffs) will get significantly more, some will get significantly less, depending on their facts and circumstances."
The exact number of people involved in the settlement remains in flux, between 22 and 25, apparently because of unsettled legal issues.
The plaintiffs also sued the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles, which oversees religious orders and Catholic churches in Santa Barbara County.
A lawyer for the archdiocese did not immediately respond to a message left at his office.
The case centers on allegations that nine priests and brothers sexually abused men and women from 1964 through 1991 while assigned to St. Anthony's Seminary and Old Mission Santa Barbara.