CANON LAW & THE NOLAN REPORT

Responding to allegations of clerical child abuse
(Recommendations for harmonising the

Nolan Report and the Code of Canon Law)

Working Party of the Canon Law Society of Great Britain and Ireland, 2004
 

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Contents

Introduction

Chapter I: The Preliminary Investigation

1. To whom should an allegation be referred?
2. Disclosures and suspicions: the Nolan Recommendations
3. The Child Protection Co-ordinator and Team
4. The role of the diocesan Bishop or Ordinary
5. The purpose of the preliminary investigation
6. Do the facts alleged constitute a canonical offence?
7. Do the circumstances suggest that penal action is possible?
8. Do the circumstances suggest that a penal action is appropriate?
9. Is the alleged offence imputable?
10. The question of damages
11. The form of the preliminary investigation
12. The need for a preliminary investigation
13. The conclusion of the preliminary investigation
14. What should the decree cover?
15. Recourse
16. Temporary provisions


Chapter II: The Judicial Penal Process

1. The role of the Ordinary
2. Appointment of the promoter of justice
3. Appointment of judges and other personnel
4. The right of the accused to an advocate
5. When does the process begin?
6. The petition
7. The summons or citation
8. The joinder of the issue
9. Temporary safeguards
10. The instruction of the penal process
11. Damages or compensation
12. Exceptional circumstances: abandoning or reopening a case
13. Exceptional circumstances: manifest innocence
14. Discussion of the case
15. The sentence
16. Challenging the decision
17. Records and confidentiality


Chapter III: Administrative Measures

A. The administrative penal process

1. The main stages of the administrative penal process
2. Must the Ordinary carry out personally the extra-judicial process?

B. Other administrative actions

1. Transfer of ecclesiastical office
2. Transfer of parish priests
3. Removal from ecclesiastical office
4. Removal of a parish priest
5. Removal of faculties
6. Declaration of an impediment to the exercise of orders

Appendix I: Decree establishing preliminary investigation
 

Appendix II: Decree concluding the preliminary investigation in more serious cases
reserved to Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith
 

Appendix III: Decree concluding the preliminary investigation in non-reserved cases
 

Appendix IV: Summary of information to be submitted to the Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith

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The Canon Law Society of Great Britain & Ireland was formally invited to give evidence to the Cumberlege Commission, which reviewed the Nolan Report. Its final report "Safeguarding with Confidence" was published on the 16th July, 2007.