JNN 26 Mar 2011 : A US Jesuit order has agreed to pay 166 million dollars to settle more than 500 child sexual abuse cases at religious mission schools in five US states, lawyers say.

The US Northwest chapter of the Rome-based Society of Jesus agreed to pay the money to compensate those abused by members of the Oregon Province from the 1940s through to the 1990s.

According to lawyers, this is one of the largest settlements in the Roman Catholic church’s sweeping sex abuse scandal, AFP reported.

The victims were Native Americans and Alaska Natives who were abused by the priests and missionaries in the states of Oregon, Washington, Alaska, Idaho and Montana.

“This settlement recognizes that the Jesuits betrayed the trust of hundreds of young children in their care, and inflicted terrible atrocities upon them,” said lawyer Blaine Tamaki on Friday.

“These religious figures should have been responsible for protecting children, but instead raped and molested them,” he added.

The Roman Catholic Society of Jesus filed for bankruptcy in 2009 as claims of sexual abuse were mounting. Numerous cases of child sexual abuse by Catholic priests have surfaced across the world since the mid-1980s to date.