Dutch insurance giant Aegon pays 1 million to child abuse victim(s) of the catholic church

Dutch news link : right here (it’s one of many!)

English links will follow.

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Official information so far;

Dutch insurance company and major financial player Aegon has agreed to pay a maximum of 1 million Euro’s in damages to people who have been sexually abused by catholic clergymen prior to the year 2000. If the damages turn out to be higher, the church will have to pay the amount above 1 million Euro’s.

The insurance company and the Archdioceses of the city of Utrecht have come this arrangement in 2006 after a conflict about the sexual abuse of a girl by a catholic priest. This has now been officially confirmed by Aegon.

The church wanted to use their general liability insurance to cover the girl’s claim but Aegon originally refused to honor the request because the insurance does not cover damages bmo criminal acts. In 2006 a compromize was agreed upon.

The policy has since been officially terminated says an AEGON spokesperson.

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Excuse me?

As said, more news will follow, but be sure that coming monday I personally will be in touch with Aegon to get some answers about this. I am sure i’ll have more questions but here are some that spring to mind right now.

1. A girl? Really? Prove it!

2. 1 girl (person)? 1 priest? 1 million Euro’s. I’m not an expert but i think this comes to the highest payed amount for any 1 claim for 1 victim by 1 rapist in the Netherlands. Conclusion; There are more sexually abused girls (persons) and more abusers. And let’s be honest, these girls were probably boys. I’m thinking that it is not entirely unlikely that the marketing boys of the vatican or archdiocese demanded in the ‘compromize’ with AEGON that the word boy(s) would be replaced by girl(s).

3. Is Aegon planning to pay this out of their own management bonus system :-) or will the policy holders / customers pay for it :-(. And before you ask; Yup! i am one of them!

4. If insurance does not cover damages from criminal acts (as we all know and is quite logical), why the hell was there a ‘compromize’. How on earth CAN there be a compromize!!

5. Will i be able to insure myself for armed robbery, DUI and fraude from now on?

6. Why does Aegon pay damages when the perpetrators are part of the richest organization in the entire world. See Avro Manhattan’s book ; The Vatican Billions —– free download right here!

Obviously AEGON and the catholic church will have enough to answer to and i will be back to blog about this in the near future!!

Believe me; This is probably going all the way to the pope and the Dutch government! If not other governments.

Yuch!