Miscellaneous
-4
PRIEST IN SEX CASE MUST HAVE CHAPERONE
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-- JUDGE IMPOSES RULE AS PART OF
PROBATION
By MARY JO LAYTON, Staff Writer
Date: 05-14-1994,
Saturday
Section: NEWS
Edition: All Editions -- Two Star B, Two Star P,
One Star
Biographical: PETER WALSH
A Superior Court judge sentenced a
Franciscan priest to five
years' probation Friday and ordered him to be
chaperoned whenever he
drives a car to prevent the priest from masturbating
and exposing
himself in public.
Citing psychiatric reports, Judge
George Parsons said the Rev.
Peter Walsh's compulsive sexual disorder was
caused by "extreme tension
with no available outlet."
The Roman
Catholic priest, who says he prays for God's forgiveness,
was sentenced for
masturbating in front of five Lyndhurst boys last
summer.
"I don't
know if there are words strong enough to express the pain
and scandal I've
caused," Walsh said at a brief hearing in Hackensack.
"I pray to God that
someday I can feel that forgiveness."
Walsh, who was a pastor of an
upstate New York church, was visiting
his mother in Lyndhurst when the
incident occurred in August.
Authorities charged that on two separate days,
he drove to a playground
and parked his car in full view of the boys, then
masturbated in his
vehicle.
Assistant Prosecutor Ike Gavzy, who said
the priest was among "the
most remorseful" defendants investigators had ever
seen, accepted that
the priest was "in the throes" of his disorder when the
crimes were
committed.
"He was in the throes of that disorder when he
committed this
offense. The remorse spews out of the defendant," Gavzy
said.
Walsh, who pleaded guilty in March to five counts of
child
endangerment, has been undergoing psychological counseling since
the
incidents.
The priest was ordered to have a chaperone whenever he
drives
because the court believed he is most likely to engage in such
behavior
when he has access to a car.
In addition to the chaperone,
conditions of probation include
having no contact with juveniles or the
victims. Walsh also must pay for
psychiatric counseling for the victims as
needed. One of the boys is in
counseling, Gavzy said.
Walsh, a priest
since 1982, was reassigned to the Franciscan
order's Manhattan office after
his arrest and is living in a monastery
there.
The first incident
occurred when Walsh parked his car in front of
the Washington School and
exposed himself to a group of four boys, ages
7, 9, 10, and 11, authorities
said.
There was no conversation between the priest and the boys,
but
Walsh positioned his car in a way that he could not be
avoided,
authorities said at the time of his arrest.
The next day,
Walsh parked at Stuyvesant and Post avenues and
tapped on the car window to
get the attention of a 13-year-old boy. He
then exposed himself to the
boy.
"Peter is very remorseful," his attorney Mark L. Groothuis
advised
the judge. "He deeply regrets the circumstances that brought him to
you.
. . . He has dedicated his life to helping people, not hurting
them."
Parsons ordered that Walsh be permitted to perform
"limited"
priestly duties. But Groothuis said the priest is concentrating on
his
therapy.
"He's doing everything possible to address the situation.
We'll
worry about the other things later," Groothuis
said.
Illustrations/Photos: COLOR PHOTO - WALSH.
Keywords: NEW
JERSEY. COURT. RELIGION. OFFICIAL. SEX. CRIME
Copyright © 1994 Bergen
Record Corp. All rights reserved.
MARY JO LAYTON, Staff Writer, PRIEST
IN SEX CASE MUST HAVE CHAPERONE. , The
Record (Bergen County, NJ),
05-14-1994, pp a01.
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Copyright
© 1999 Infonautics Corporation.
