If you were a CCD kid, an altar boy or a student of Paul Shanley, we believe you.

Ordained in 1960. Thirty years in the Archdiocese of Boston, St. Patrick's in Stoneham, then the street ministry in Roxbury and Milton in the '70s, then St. Jean's in Newton from 1979 until he left for California in 1990. Indicted in June 2002. Convicted in Middlesex Superior Court on February 7, 2005, of two counts of rape of a child and two counts of indecent assault and battery on a child under 14: a boy in the CCD classes at St. Jean's, six years old when it started in 1983, twelve when it stopped. Twelve to fifteen years. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed in 2010. He died in October 2020, three years out of prison. If you knew him as a kid, in any of those places, in any of those years, this page is about you.

WatchingWatching: a bill to lift the age-53 rule and the $20,000 charitable cap (House Amendment 110 to S.3141) is in a House-Senate conference; it must reach the Governor by January 5, 2027.

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Looking for the page about the Archdiocese, not the man? Archdiocese of Boston survivors: the Attorney General's 2003 findings, the five counties, the bill in conference.

This applies to you no matter what

You weren't the boy at the trial. One person testified in 2005. The AP reported that church records showed Shanley was moved after allegations surfaced, years before that, and none of those allegations came from him.
It was Stoneham in the '60s, or the street ministry in the '70s, not Newton. Same priest, same employer. Your birth year decides more than the parish, and the deadline section says why.
It wasn't rape. Two of the four counts he was convicted of were indecent assault and battery. What it counts as is for a lawyer, not you.
You already took something from the Archdiocese, in 2003 or since. Say so first thing. A release closes what it covers, and what it covers is a lawyer's reading of the paper.
You moved. New Hampshire, Rhode Island, California, wherever; the case sits in Massachusetts whether you do or not.

The indictments, the conviction, the report that names him and the bill: what the public record says, and when

None of what follows is ours. The indictments were returned by a Middlesex County grand jury, the conviction by a Middlesex jury, the findings by the Massachusetts Attorney General, the assignment history by the Archdiocese's own records as compiled by BishopAccountability, and reporters wrote it up. Every line links to where it came from. Where the Attorney General is the source it's a finding of an investigation, not a judgment, and we say so.

June 9, 2002

The conduct charged ran from 1983 to 1989 at St. Jean's Church in Newton, where the boy, six when it began, attended CCD classes. On this day a Middlesex County grand jury handed up the rape-of-a-child indictments against Paul Shanley; the indecent assault and battery ones, child under 14, followed on June 20. The indictment numbers aren't printed here because we haven't pulled them from the clerk yet. Commonwealth v. Shanley, 455 Mass. 752 (Justia).

July 23, 2003

The Massachusetts Attorney General's report on the Archdiocese, the product of a grand-jury investigation, names Shanley among the priests whose complaints the Archdiocese, it found, handled inadequately, in a report that found top officials "decided that they should conceal" their knowledge of individual complaints from the parishes, law enforcement and the public. A finding of an investigation, not a court's judgment; the report says itself that no charge against the Archdiocese was possible under the law of the time. Massachusetts Attorney General, report (PDF).

February 19, 2004

The Vatican laicised him. So when he stood trial a year later he wasn't a priest any more, not on paper. The assignment record, the one BishopAccountability compiled from the Archdiocese's own documents, lays out the thirty years. Stoneham first, St. Patrick's, 1960 to 1967. Braintree, St. Francis of Assisi, 1967 to 1969. Then the street ministry: Warwick House in Roxbury, 1970 to 1976, and after that the Exodus Center and Milton Street in Milton, out to 1979. And Newton. St. John the Evangelist, which everybody called St. Jean's, 1979 to 1990, associate pastor, then administrator, then pastor from 1983 on. BishopAccountability, assignment record.

February 7, 2005

Convicted, by a Middlesex Superior Court jury, on all four counts. Two were rape of a child, chapter 265, section 23; the other two, indecent assault and battery on a child under 14, section 13B. The man who testified was 27 by then. He hadn't remembered any of it, he told the jury, until nearly twenty years after. We don't print his name and never will. Commonwealth v. Shanley, 455 Mass. 752 (Justia).

February 15, 2005

Eight days later, in Cambridge: 12 to 15 years, and ten years' probation on top. The AP wrote up the sentencing, and one line in that story is the line that matters for the Archdiocese, not for him. Church records, the AP said, showed he "was transferred from parish to parish after allegations surfaced". That's a description of documents made public in the civil cases, not a finding of the criminal court. NBC News / Associated Press.

January 15, 2010

The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the convictions and the denial of a new trial. Commonwealth v. Shanley, 455 Mass. 752. The opinion is the citable public record of everything on this page about the trial: the counts, the dates, the parish, the CCD classes, the ages. Commonwealth v. Shanley, 455 Mass. 752 (Justia).

October 28, 2020

He died in Ware, Massachusetts, at 89, of heart failure, CBS Boston reported. He had been released in July 2017 after serving twelve years. There is nothing left of him for a court to reach; that is why every claim on this page runs against the Archdiocese, and why the cap in the next section matters. CBS Boston.

September 16, 2026

The one still moving. A House amendment to a Senate bill would end the civil time limit going forward, open a two-year window for claims the calendar has already closed, and repeal the $20,000 charitable cap for institutions that enabled abuse. The House vote was unanimous. Then a House-Senate conference committee took it up, on September 17, and that's where it sits. January 5, 2027 is the last day the Legislature can send it to the Governor; miss that, and the rules you're reading on this page stay the rules. WCVB, via BishopAccountability.

We checked this on September 22, 2026, and the newest thing in it is from September 16, 2026. When something new gets filed or decided, it goes in here within 72 hours, with the link.

Who can be held responsible in a Paul Shanley sexual abuse lawsuit

Not him. He's dead, he was laicised in 2004, and he had nothing by the end. The claim is against the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, which ordained him, assigned him to Stoneham, to Braintree, to the street ministry and to Newton, and kept him in a parish until 1990. The theory is the ordinary one, negligent supervision, and since 2014 Massachusetts has had a statute written for it: a claim that the defendant "negligently supervised a person who sexually abused a minor". What makes his case different from most is the paper. The Attorney General's 2003 report names him; the AP's account of his sentencing says church records showed he was moved from parish to parish after allegations surfaced. Those are two public documents a lawyer starts with. And, plainly, they're an investigation's findings and a reporter's description of files, not a judgment against the Archdiocese, which has admitted no liability in any pending case.

Then the two Massachusetts facts that make this a watching page and not a case page. One: the state caps what a charity can be made to pay in a tort case at $20,000, chapter 231, section 85K, and the Archdiocese is a charity under it. Whatever it paid the Shanley claimants who were among the 552 in 2003, it paid by choice; a court could not have ordered it. Two: the bill in conference would repeal that cap for institutions that enabled abuse and open a two-year window that ignores the calendar. If it reaches the Governor by January 5, 2027 and is signed, this page is rewritten that day. If it doesn't, the cap and the age-53 rule stay. Nobody can promise you which way. What a lawyer can do now is take your dates and your parish and hold your place.

Your deadline: the Massachusetts statute of limitations for abuse by Paul Shanley

Until you turn 53, or seven years from the day you understood what it did to you, whichever comes later. That's Massachusetts' rule for a claim against the person who did it, chapter 260, section 4C: 35 years from your 18th birthday, or 7 years from discovery. It's why the questions ask your birth year. Born in 1974 or later and you're under 53 on age alone, and most of the St. Jean's kids of the '80s are. Born in 1973 and it comes down to months. Born before that, Stoneham in the '60s, the street ministry in the '70s, and it turns on discovery, which is a conversation with a lawyer about when the harm and its cause connected for you, not a date you look up.

But he's dead, so the claim that matters is the one against the Archdiocese, and that's section 4C½, added in 2014, same two periods on paper. Here's the part nobody puts in an ad. The 2014 act says its 35-year clause for claims against an institution applies to acts that "first occurred after the effective date of this act", and its 7-year discovery clause applies "regardless of when" the claim arose. So for St. Jean's in 1985, whether the age-53 route reaches the Archdiocese at all is contested, and the discovery route is the one being argued, case by case. Unsettled is the honest word. It's exactly what the bill in conference would settle.

Plainly, then. Born in 1974 or later: you have a route today on age against the person, and an argued one against the Archdiocese. Born earlier: you may, on discovery. And if the bill passes, every one of those sentences gets rewritten and the two-year window doesn't care what year you were born. A lawyer reads your dates. Not a calendar, not this page.

Your situation still qualifies even if

You never told a soul; neither had the man who testified in 2005, who said he hadn't remembered it himself for nearly twenty years.
Your parents went to the parish, or to the chancery, and complained, and the next Sunday there he was. The AP reported church records showed he was moved after allegations surfaced; the Attorney General's report found complaints were concealed. Neither is a mark against yours.
It wasn't at church. The street ministry, a car, a cabin, his apartment. The employer is the same.
You loved him, or your family did, and a lot of Newton did too, which changes nothing about what he did.
He's been dead since 2020, which matters less than it sounds, because the claim never ran against him in the first place. It runs against the Archdiocese.
You live in New Hampshire, Rhode Island, California, anywhere else now. The case sits in Massachusetts and you don't need to.

Where he was

St. Patrick's, Stoneham, 1960 to 1967. St. Francis of Assisi, Braintree, 1967 to 1969. Warwick House at St. Philip's in Roxbury, 1970 to 1976, then the Exodus Center and 49 Milton Street in Milton to 1979: the street ministry. St. John the Evangelist in Newton, St. Jean's to everyone who went there, 1979 to 1990. After that Palm Springs and San Diego, which is another diocese and another page nobody has built. For the Archdiocese as a whole, all 250 accused on the Attorney General's count, there's a separate page, /archdiocese-of-boston-survivors.

Questions people are asking

What does it cost?

Here, nothing. Every case is on contingency. There is no charge for the call, the review, or the case. The firm is paid only out of a recovery, and if there is no recovery you owe nothing.

Can I sue if Paul Shanley is dead?

The claim was never really against him. It's against the Archdiocese of Boston, for putting him in front of children and keeping him there, and the Archdiocese is solvent and has never filed for bankruptcy. The catch is Massachusetts law, not his death: a $20,000 cap on what a charity can be made to pay, and a deadline statute for claims against institutions whose reach to the 1980s is contested. Both are in the bill now in conference.

Is there a deadline for a claim about Shanley?

Against him personally it would be your 53rd birthday or seven years from discovery, whichever is later, chapter 260, section 4C. Against the Archdiocese it's section 4C½, the same periods, except the 2014 law limits the 35-year clause to abuse after it took effect and leaves the discovery clause open, so for St. Jean's in the '80s it's argued case by case. Born in 1974 or later and you're under 53 on age alone. A bill in conference would end the limit and open a two-year window; it has until January 5, 2027 to reach the Governor. A lawyer confirms your dates, which is what the call is for.

What's this $20,000 cap people keep mentioning?

Massachusetts caps a charitable organisation's liability in a tort case at $20,000, exclusive of interest and costs, chapter 231, section 85K. The Archdiocese is a charity under it. It's the plain fact that makes the pending bill matter, because the bill would repeal the cap for institutions that enabled abuse. What the Archdiocese has paid above that to anyone, it paid by choice. Nobody should be promising you a figure, and you won't hear one from us.

I was part of the 2003 settlement. Does that close the door?

Say so on the call, first thing. The September 2003 settlement covered 552 people, some of them Shanley's accusers, and everyone in it signed a release. A release closes the claim it covers. Whether it covers everything, and what the bill's two-year window would do to it, is a lawyer's reading of your paper, not ours.

Did the Shanley case actually end in a conviction?

It did. A Middlesex Superior Court jury found him guilty on all four counts on February 7, 2005, and when he took it up to the Supreme Judicial Court he lost there too, in 2010. Every date, count and statute number is in the record section above, with the opinion linked. He served twelve years and died in 2020.

Who sees your form

Kerim Eravci · Survivor Advocate · Not a lawyer

I was a victim, and I waited. Not because I didn't know what happened to me (I knew every day), but because I'd decided it was over, mine to carry, nobody's business. When I finally went looking for a lawyer, the answer came back in two words I'd never thought about: statute of limitations. My time had run out while I was busy getting through it.

What that has cost me since is a long story, and I'll tell you the whole thing in private, if you want it. The short version is the reason my name is on this page: I'm here to help people do what I wish I'd done, which is find out where you stand while the door's still open.

I'm not a lawyer. I read what you send, I call you once, on your terms, and nothing gets filed unless you say so. Ask sooner than I did.

Kerim Eravci is not an attorney. He's a survivor.

What happens next. Three steps, nothing more until you say so.

You answer 5 questions. Nothing is filed. Nothing starts.
A survivor calls you, once. Not a robot, not a call center. Someone who has been where you are.
You decide. You find out your options. If you want to stop there, you stop there.

How this works

ME2 Survivors Alliance protects the heart. Licensed MA attorneys do the legal work. We are not lawyers and we don't pretend to be.

You never pay a dollar

Every case is on contingency. There is no charge for the call, the review, or the case. The firm is paid only out of a recovery, and if there is no recovery you owe nothing.