How to assess the value of a broken life? An entire existence spent suffering, rehashing an attack with heavy psychological consequences, sometimes identical, often different from one person to another. One year after the submission of the report by the Independent Commission on Sexual Abuse in the Church (Ciase), two structures set up immediately seek to answer this question every day, in an attempt to bring recognition and relieve the victims as much as possible. Set up at the initiative of the Church’s hierarchs, the Recognition and Reparation Commission (CRR) and the Independent National Authority for Recognition and Reparation (Inirr) thus work to receive, listen to, and then estimate compensation for the victims. .
“It’s an impossible exercise. It is an impossible mission to repair and assess the cost of a broken life as accurately as possible. This is where the financial dimension is insufficient”, makes a point of specifying the jurist Marie Derain de Vaucresson, at the head of the Inirr. Because those who contact his organization or the CRR led by Antoine Garapon, honorary magistrate, often need much more than money. Often victims of an aggression which occurred several decades earlier, prescribed by law and therefore escaping any legal framework, many also expect recognition of the harm done to them and of the fault committed by the Church.
In each of the two bodies, colleges made up of psychologists or even lawyers deal with the cases one by one, discuss them, seeking to find the right sum or the right answer according to several criteria. At the Inirr, three axes have been retained: the seriousness of the facts, the response of the Church and the consequences on the person. A rating system, based on the story written by the referent in agreement with the victim who validates it, then makes it possible to establish the sum that will eventually be paid or the support that will be provided. The money comes from the solidarity fund and the fight against sexual assault on minors contributed by the dioceses; the compensation can go up to 60,000 euros.
At the CRR, where the same scale was used, the funds come from the religious congregations from which the aggressors come. Here too we take into account the nature of the facts but also the effect of “devastation” they may have had on the victim.
“I had no idea what to ask”
Clearly, once all the criteria have been met in one instance as in the other, a rape, for example, could be considered as requiring less significant reparation than touching. Thus, those who find themselves more affected in their daily, financial or emotional life will be better compensated.
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