The Salesians had been charged with knowing that the priest, Titian Miani, now 81, had been accused of preying on young people when they assigned him to a high school where he allegedly molested four children.

The jury had been seated for the trial in Los Angeles Wednesday when the settlement was reached.

Court papers showed Miani was accused as a seminarian in the 1940s of molesting a 13-year-old boy at an Italian church retreat and of sexually abusing at least three youngsters at a Salesian boarding school in Edmonton, Canada.