That may be, but it doesn’t follow from that that Catholic lay people working in the judicial system who help prosecute Catholic priests should be excommunicated. Priests are not infallible even in the view of the Church and not exempt from secular prosecution if they break secular laws.
ETA: do you think that the Vatican would excommunicate a judge who sent a priest to for robbing a bank? (I’m sure there have been Catholic priests who robbed banks)
Sorry, missing word, too late to edit: should read “…a judge who sent a priest to prison for robbing a bank.”
No. The whole “Give to Caesar what is due Caesar, and give to God what is due God” thing. You are a priest and you break the law and there is enough evidence to throw you in jail, you go to jail.
Bhwahahahahah!
Since this is FQ, do you have a cite that Priests who are convicted of crimes DON’T go to prison?
This isn’t the Catholic church’s view at all - officially. And, because it isn’t the official view, canon law prescribes no penalties for those involved in subjecting priests to civil justice. So, no, no excommunications.
Unofficially? Seriously, it’s not the unofficial view either. The church’s reluctance to hand offending priests over to civil justice doesn’t arise so much from a sense that priests are entitled to exemption from civil justice as from (a) a desire to protect the church from public scandal - an old-fashioned cover-up to protect reputation, assets or both and (b) a feeling akin to “I can’t be an informer against my own brother/father/insert family member of choice”.
Back in the pre-modern era, the clergy did have substantial exemptions from the jurisdiction of the ordinary courts. But this wasn’t a unique privilege of the church. Medieval society was highly stratified and segmented, and full of various affinity groups with special jurisdictions, special privileges, etc. Clerics might come within the jurisdiction of special courts rather than the general courts but so might, e.g, members of various merchant guilds, freemen of cities, people who lived in areas where some particular lord or noble had the right to run his own courts, etc, etc.
You have to be convicted first, and if you are safely moved out of the jurisdiction by a powerful worldwide organization, you will not be.
Cardinal Bernard Law is 1000X times more guilty than Roman Polanski. He could never be tried in a U.S. court because he had the protection of the Church.
One odd thing about Law’s career was that he was known early on for his tolerance towards those of other races, nationalities, and religions. In some cases he received death threats for such tolerance. And yet later he became known for moving around priests who had been charged with child sexual abuse so that they wouldn’t be charged with those crimes. Sometimes someone who does the right thing at first does the wrong thing later:
Polanski pleaded guilty to “unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor”.
Cardinal Law wasn’t even charged with a crime.
The church pretty much gave up on ecclesiastical courts for civil offenses by clergy (and church-related personnel) centuries ago, along with any claim its members were exempt from civil jurisdiction. Assorted reformations and revolutions basically removed any local recognition of its authority. The USA specifically does not (never has) recognize church courts as anything meaningful. Nowadays, think of it more as a disciplinary tribunal, like the way a league disciplines sports professionals, or a university disciplines faculty and students - over and above civil law. The ecclesiastical courts sure as heck can’t burn people at the stake any more, like they did with Joan of Arc.
The only real gotcha is that the Vatican is a separate country which might complicate issues with extradition.
Should also note the link says Cardinal Law visited the USA in 2015, so presumably there was no criminal warrant out for him. I assume the cases he covered up occurred before the laws required mandatory reporting?
According to Wikipedia, the State Attorney’s investigation into child sex abuse in the Boston Archdiocese was severely critical of Law, but concluded that he had broken no laws. He was never charged with any offences, so the question of whether the Church could or would have shielded him from prosecution did not arise.
It might be suggested that the Church exerted its influence to prevent him from being charged, but I see no evidence for this. Other clergy of the Archdiocese were charged (and tried, and convicted). The parsimonious explanation for why Law was never charged is that his behaviour, although reprehensible, was not criminal.
I guess I’ve been schooled in Circular Reasoning.
Show me a Catholic offender who wasn’t prosecuted despite there being evidence
Shows egregious example
If there was evidence he would have been prosecuted and convicted.
Killers of Emmett Till are redeemed at last!
There was evidence that Law did plenty of terrible things. But no one even accused him of anything that violated the law at the time and there wasn’t any evidence of him violating the law at the time. It wasn’t illegal at the time to ignore reports of abuse , it wasn’t illegal for him not to report the abuse to the police and it wasn’t illegal for him to transfer priests from parish to parish where they would still have contact with children without even informing the pastor. Maybe all of those things are crimes now- but they weren’t then.
You know, there’s an ancient SDMB legend that if you say “Bernard Law” and “criminal” three times in a thread, Bricker will appear with arguments and cites.
But sadly, it was pretty much established that Law didn’t actually break any laws that existed at the time (an oversight which has been rectified by the Massachusetts legislature), and the Attorney General said he wouldn’t be prosecuted. Once he resigned/was removed from being archbishop of Boston, JP2 transferred him to a sinecure in Rome, essentially to keep him out of the Spotlight.
Yes, it was only in that last decade or three that the law was changed in most jurisdictions that people in authority aware of child abuse must report it - or else they face charges. I assume this includes clergy, but it does include school officials, doctors, teachers, police, etc. (And not just sexual abuse, it extends to physical abuse.)
So I’m not sure where this comment comes from. The basic point is - Law did nothing that was illegal at the time, hence not prosecuted. Immoral, unethical, reprehensible, damaging to many - yes. Illegal - no. Oddly enough, the law cannot prosecute people who committed no crime. that’s what lynchings do.
Apologies for the hijack: wouldn’t a high-ranking church official refraining from reporting sexual abuse of a child be considered misprision? IANAL but I assume that misprision laws have been on the books for more than a few decades.
ISWYDT and I 
According to what I’ve read , most states do not define “misprision of a felony” as a crime. Massachusetts has a statute regarding misprision of treason but nothing about felonies.
Laws regarding mandatory reporting of child abuse generally did not apply to clergy in the past and they still may not
From this: Mandated Reporter Brochure – Plymouth County District Attorney's Office
WHO IS A MANDATED REPORTER?
A mandated reporter is a professional, who because of his or her particular employment, is likely to have regular contact with children.
The legislature has outlined a number of health care professionals, including doctors, dentists and nurses, as mandated reporters. The list also includes teachers, guidance counselors, school administrators, psychiatrists, psychologists, family counselors or therapists. Social workers, police, fire fighters and even court personnel are required to report cases of suspected abuse, as are a number of specialized fields.
In 2002, the language was changed to include: priests, rabbis ordained or licensed minister of any church or religious body, an accredited Christian Science practioner, a person performing one or more of the official duties of a priest, rabbi, ordained or licensed minister of any church or religious body or an accredited Christian Science practitioner, a person or layperson in any church or religious body acting in the capacity as a leader, official, teacher, delegate or other designated function on behalf of any such church or religious body to supervise, educate, coach, train or counsel a child on a regular basis, are now designated as mandated reporters.
Bolding mine.
Note the law was not changed until 2002. Also note that a separate thing I found suggests that there are exemptions - conversations with clergy in confidentiality (i.e. confessional), lawyer-client privilege obviously, some doctor-patient and psychiatric counselling.
Also note that this is for Plymouth County, MA. Rules on mandated reporters vary by state for sure; may vary by county or municipality. Certainly not disagreeing with your point; adding some additional insight to it.