Anonymous ID: 8e4986 Aug. 13, 2018, 6:32 p.m. No.2589591   🗄️.is 🔗kun

Illinois megachurch paid $3.25M to settle lawsuits over child sex abuse by church volunteer

 

CHICAGO - Willow Creek Community Church agreed to pay more than $3 million to settle lawsuits over the sexual abuse of two developmentally disabled boys by a church volunteer, court records show.

 

The second and largest of the settlements, for $1.75 million, was made in February, before the Chicago Tribune revealed unrelated claims that the evangelical megachurch's founder, the Rev. Bill Hybels, engaged in inappropriate conduct with women, eventually leading to his early retirement and, this month, the 'resignation of the church's two leading pastors and its entire board of elders.

 

Sobczak, now 24, is serving a seven-year prison sentence after pleading guilty in 2014 to sexually abusing an 8-year-old boy with special needs at the church and an older boy who was not connected to Willow Creek. In 2013, Sobczak pleaded guilty to sexually abusing another disabled boy, around age 9, at the church, and initially received probation in that case.

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/illinois-megachurch-paid-dollar325m-to-settle-lawsuits-over-child-sex-abuse-by-church-volunteer/ar-BBLT3hY?ocid=spartanntp#image=BBLT3hY_1|1