Breaking News: A Vatican report on the disgraced U.S. cardinal Theodore McCarrick found that Pope John Paul II and others had believed his denials of sexual abuse.

The report, which, given Mr. McCarrick’s long career in the church, had the potential to engulf three separate papacies in scandal, did not directly cast blame on Pope Francis or his predecessors for knowingly abetting or protecting him.

But a 14-page summary of the report, which included a Who’s Who of Vatican power players and American church officials, seemed to put it at the apostolic doorstep of Pope John Paul II, who personally made the decision to appoint him.