Mr. Leahy, who spoke to the British Insurance Law Association in London last week, told National Underwriter yesterday that at the present time, in addition to church-run mutual carriers, some of the major U.S. insurers with potential liabilities from clerical abuse claims are American International Group Inc., ACE Limited and Employers Re.

For insurers involved in this marketplace, he said, there is a potential for significant exposures. Currently, Mr. Leahy noted, there are some 900 clergy sexual abuse cases against the U.S. Roman Catholic church in the state of California alone.

But Mr. Leahy said that while the insureds believe they are insured for these losses, there are strong disagreements among many of the insurers on that point.

"Nobody knows what the ultimate outcome of these cases will be. There is a great deal of controversy over whether they are covered or not. These are difficult claims and no one has any idea of what the eventual outcome will be," Mr. Leahy said.

He explained that the legal issues in such cases "are the typical ones: Has an occurrence taken place? Is this an intentional act? Those are the two big ones and those are very fact based."

He noted reports that the Boston Archdiocese has sued its insurers and legal actions have been undertaken in California as well. Mr. Leahy said he could not say what the dollar value of the cases were worth, but "they are serious cases."