Priest fondled boy in pool, testimony says

Associated Press

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — In one of the country’s most prominent cases involving clergy charged with child molestation, a defrocked Roman Catholic priest facing a list of molestation accusations went on trial Wednesday for allegedly abusing a 10-year-old boy.

John Geoghan is charged with indecent assault and battery on a person under the age of 14 for allegedly touching the boy in fall 1991.

The boy, now 20 and a college student, took the stand Wednesday. He testified that he had been teaching himself to dive at a Boys and Girls Club swimming pool in Waltham when Geoghan, whom he recognized as a priest he had seen at his housing project, asked if he needed help.

The boy said Geoghan coached him only with words — at first. Then, he said, Geoghan reached into his swimming trunks and grabbed his buttocks.

"I felt a hand go up the back of my leg. … It was kind of like bells went off. I got really nervous," the man testified.

"I got away as fast as possible," he said.

The defense maintains Geoghan, 66, was helping the boy hoist himself out of the pool. The young man maintained on cross-examination that he was not trying to hoist himself out of the pool at the time.

"The offense for which the defendant stands charged took but a few seconds, but those few seconds are forever emblazoned on the memory of (the young man)," prosecutor Lynn Rooney said in her opening statement.

Defense attorney Geoffrey Packard suggested that the young man was motivated by money, noting he did not consult an attorney until 1999.

The testimony began after brief opening statements Wednesday in the first of three criminal cases against Geoghan.

In addition to the criminal cases, 84 civil lawsuits have been filed and more than 130 people have claimed Geoghan fondled or raped them during the three decades he served in Boston-area parishes.

Last week, Cardinal Bernard Law publicly apologized to Geoghan’s victims and ordered clergy and volunteers to report allegations of abuse against minors. The Archdiocese of Boston will have "zero tolerance" for sexual abuse by priests, he said.

Copyright ©2002 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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