Prosecutors wrap up case against priest
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (AP) – Prosecutors wrapped up their case against defrocked priest Paul Shanley on Monday after a psychologist testified that it is not uncommon for adults who suffer trauma as children to repress memories of the experience. Shanley’s accuser, now a 27-year-old firefighter, says he remembered in early 2002 that he had been repeatedly raped and molested by the former priest from 1983 to 1989 at a parish outside Boston. Shanley’s lawyer has questioned the science behind repressed memory.
The condition is “not common, but it’s not at all rare,” said prosecution witness Dr. James Chu, an associate professor at Harvard Medical School.
He said repressed memory is more common among people who suffered repeated trauma as children than in those who suffered a single traumatic event.
Under cross-examination by Shanley’s lawyer, Frank Mondano, Chu acknowledged that there is an intense debate within the psychiatric community about the validity of repressed memories. He also conceded that false memories can be implanted in a person’s mind through repeated suggestions by someone they trust.
Four former classmates of Shanley’s accuser also testified Monday that the boy was frequently absent from religious education classes. Prosecutors have said Shanley would pull boys from Sunday morning catechism class in order to rape them in the church confessional, pews, rectory and bathroom.
After prosecutors called their final witness, Judge Stephen Neel threw out one of the three child rape charges at the request of Shanley’s attorney, who said testimony did not support it. Prosecutors did not object.
That leaves him facing two counts of child rape and two counts of indecent assault and battery on a child. The maximum sentence would still be life in prison.
Mondano is expected to begin presenting evidence later this week. The judge said the defense plans to call only one witness, a well-known psychologist who has challenged the reliability of recovered memory.
Shanley’s case became one of the most notorious of the clergy sex abuse scandal in the Boston Archdiocese after personnel records showed that church officials knew he publicly advocated sex between men and boys, yet continued to transfer him from parish to parish. His is also one of the few cases in which prosecutors have been able to bring charges against priests accused of molesting boys decades ago.