PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island – The sound of the school nurse’s office door opening. Light reflected from a stained glass window. Crying spells and fear of riding the school bus.
For many survivors of clergy abuse, memories like these linger for decades.
A report released this week by Rhode Island’s attorney general uncovered decades of abuse within the state’s Catholic Diocese of Providence, identifying 75 clergy who sexually abused more than 300 children since 1950. The investigation relied on thousands of church records and years of interviews with victims and witnesses. Officials said the real number of victims was likely much higher.
But survivors say the numbers only tell part of the story. Behind each case, they say, there are parts of childhood that resurface years later, along with the long struggle to understand what happened.
Many survivors have spent decades searching for answers and pressing authorities to investigate. Now some are speaking out about what they experienced and what they hope will come next: broader support for survivors, help from the church to pay for treatment and counseling, and accountability from Catholic leaders.
“I can still hear the clicking of the machines in that metal door opening to this day,” said Dr. Herbert “Hub” Brennan, an internal medicine physician who lives and works in his hometown of East Greenwich, Rhode Island, where he grew up in a devout Catholic family.
Brennan was sexually abused in elementary school by Reverend Brendan Smith, an Irish priest who arrived in the community in the 1960s. Brennan was an altar server at Our Lady of Mercy Parish when the abuse began in the church sacristy.
Brennan says a nun would pull him out of class, send him to wait in the principal’s office until Smith arrived, and lead him to the nurse’s room.
“They say rape is one of the few crimes where the victim feels shame,” Brennan said. “But the shame is enormous. Then the secrecy that goes into hiding that shame gets in the way of healing.”
Brennan faced the matter years later when a newspaper arrived on his doorstep in 1995. The headline about Smith’s arrest in Ireland read: “Diocese has no complaints against jailed priest.”
Smith was later convicted of assaulting children at least 100 times over four decades.
When Brennan later tried to discuss the abuse with the parish priest, he said he made sure there were no complaints, but later learned that the priest was Smith’s roommate.
This revelation prompted Brennan to demand accountability. He later worked for attorney Mitchell Garabedian and settled for the Massachusetts Supreme Court.
“I needed to make sure others knew exactly what was going on in this diocese — if it had happened to others, who was responsible and how they were covering it up,” Brennan said.
He said the report released this week felt like the culmination of those efforts: “It allowed me to go from victim-survivor to advocate.”
For Claude Leboeuf, the amber light streaming through the stained-glass windows still evokes painful memories.
LeBoeuf, who was abused by a priest as a child in neighboring Massachusetts and now advocates for victims in Rhode Island, called the report an important step toward dismantling what he calls the church’s “wall of secrecy.”
LeBoeuf said his memories resurfaced just a few years ago, prompting him to file a lawsuit and speak out about what happened to him.
“Something real needs to be done for these people: money, tuition, treatment,” he said. “The effects are real; they last a very long time.”
In a video statement, Providence Bishop Bruce Lewandowski said the report describes a “tragic history” of abuse that has caused lasting harm to victims and their families. He said he felt “deeply sad” and “deeply ashamed” while reading it and apologized to survivors for the failure of church leaders in the past to protect children. Lewandowski said the diocese has since implemented safeguards aimed at quickly responding to allegations and preventing abuse.
LeBoeuf rejects this framework.
“This is not ancient history. It is the denial of justice for over 60 years for some people,” he said. “These are people who brought their complaints to the diocese when they were children in the 1960s, and were ignored, ridiculed, and even punished.”
Anne Hagan Webb remembers the terror she felt before the school bus arrived each morning. Webb was just a kindergartner when her parish priest began sexually abusing her at school in Rhode Island.
The abuse occurred between 1957 and 1965, with Webb – who was abused from ages 5 to 12 – recalling crying spells before going to school, sometimes needing to be dragged onto the bus.
Webb did not turn to therapy until decades later, when he was 40, to help process the memories. But when she was ready to report the abuse, Webb was met with hostility.
Initially, she only requested compensation to cover her medical bills. However, she was met with skepticism, as leaders in the Diocese of Providence demanded her medical records and questioned the veracity of her claims.
Webb turned to advocacy, becoming known as a force for survivors of clergy abuse. In 2019, she helped persuade the Rhode Island Legislature to enact legislation called “Annie’s Law,” which would allow child sex offenders to be held civilly accountable to victims.
Webb said the advocacy was exhausting, and she still faces stigma when speaking out. She says her abuse is often overlooked, because many assume clergy abuse only affects boys.
“For 32 years, the diocese has described me as untrustworthy. I can’t tell you how I feel,” Webb said.
The issuance of the Public Prosecutor’s investigation renewed her hope that change and justice were still on the horizon.
“It feels like a vindication,” she said.
“I hope the public will demand that their church be different,” she added.
The investigation in Rhode Island comes at a time when studying possible clergy abuse is no longer unusual.
The shift is a far cry from what happened in 2002, when the Boston Globe exposed the Boston Archdiocese’s practice of transferring abusive priests between parishes without warning parents or police, prompting investigations around the world.
This calculation took decades longer in Rhode Island. With one of the highest per capita Catholic populations in the country — nearly 40% — the Diocese of Providence has maintained secrecy about clergy abuse even as accusations and lawsuits have surfaced over the years.
Attorney Tim Conlon, who has long represented sex abuse victims in Rhode Island, said that when he first filed claims against the Diocese of Providence, many people were not willing to believe such allegations could be true in their parishes. At one point in the late 1990s, even his mother wondered if he was doing the right thing, he said.
State law has also made it harder for victims to seek justice, Conlon said, pointing to strict limits on civil lawsuits against institutions like the Catholic Church and narrow statutes of limitations for second-degree sexual assault.
“There is clearly a call for reform,” Conlon said. “The extent of the need is well documented.”
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