The two reporters countered the claim that Wojtyla covered up the sexual abuse by Surgent, noting that the priest was from the Diocese of Lubaczów rather than the Archdiocese of Krakow. They said Wojtyla made several decisions regarding Surgent “within his competencies” but ultimately left “the final word on possible sanctioning of the priest to his ordinary, the bishop of Lubaczów.”
In the case of Loranc, the two reporters stated that Wojtyla removed the priest from the parish, suspended him, and then forced him to live in a monastery where the civil authorities ultimately arrested him. When he was released from prison, he was again allowed to celebrate Mass but was not allowed to return to the “canonical mission of catechesis of children and youth” or the ministry of the confessional, according to the investigation.
“Two of the cases presented … had already been known to the public for several months thanks to the journalistic work of editors Tomasz Krzyżak and Piotr Litka, which was based mainly on an analysis of the files of state criminal proceedings available in the archives of the Institute of National Remembrance,” Father Adam Zak and Father Piotr Studnicki said in a joint statement on behalf of the Polish Bishops’ Conference. “The findings have already been widely reported.”
Zak is the coordinator of the Polish Bishops’ Conference for the Protection of Minors and Studnicki is the director of the Office of the Delegate of the Polish Bishops’ Conference for the Protection of Children and Youth.
A third allegation, which is an alleged cover-up of sexual abuse allegedly committed by Father Boleslaw Saduś, is a new claim that was not addressed in prior reporting. The documentary alleges that Wojtyla knew Saduś was accused of sexually abusing young boys but recommended him to a diocese in Austria without noting this information.
However, this third case “was presented not on the basis of a prosecutorial or judicial investigation but on the files of the security services of the People’s Republic of Poland,” the Polish Bishops’ Conference statement noted. “On the basis of the sources presented in the film, it is impossible to determine the qualification of the acts attributed to Father Saduś.”