Researchers conducting a national survey on sex abuse by Roman Catholic clergy said Tuesday that a draft report viewed by CNN was a month old and did not contain all the data submitted by dioceses.
John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York said in a statement that the statistics CNN reported Monday about the abuse of minors "were apparently taken from a preliminary report completed in January 2004."
The college also said it has received new data since then, with some submitted as recently as last Friday, and that the latest information included corrections to earlier drafts of the survey.
CNN reported that 4,450 of the 110,000 U.S. clergy who served since 1950 have been accused of molesting minors. The draft report also said 11,000 abuse claims have been filed against the churchmen during that period, according to CNN.
Those figures already are higher than previously estimated by some victims' groups, the media and church officials.
The final report is due to be released Feb. 27 by the National Review Board, the lay watchdog panel the bishops formed in response to the molestation crisis. The board commissioned John Jay to collect data from the nation's 195 dioceses on the number of accused priests, the number of abuse claims and the legal and counseling costs associated with clergy sexual misconduct over five decades.
Board members contacted by The Associated Press wouldn't say whether or not the latest statistics were accurate. They stressed the report is not finished, and that any numbers tallied so far could change before the study is made public.
The bishops authorized the unprecedented survey as part of a series of reforms meant to restore trust in their leadership after more than two years of scandal over how they responded to allegations of abuse.
Jerry Capeci, a John Jay spokesman, said Tuesday that no one at the college leaked the information to the media. He declined to comment further.