What a new report reveals about the Belleville Diocese child-sex-abuse cases

The public has been hearing about child sex abuse in the Catholic Diocese of Belleville since the early 1990s, when church officials acknowledged that some of its priests had been “credibly accused.”

A report released last week by Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul’s office is peeling back a few more layers.

The report examines problems in all six Catholic dioceses in the state. The section on the Belleville Diocese contains disturbing narratives on six former clergy, describing sexual encounters between children and priests in graphic detail, as well as cover-ups by past church leaders.

“Diocese leadership, including multiple bishops, knew of, and participated in, the transfer of a known child sex abuser from parish to parish, over a course of decades,” according to a history on the Rev. Raymond Kownacki.

The late priest was removed from ministry in 1995, nearly 23 years after the first allegation against him, the report states.