CAMBRIDGE (MA)
The Mercury News
Associated Press
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - A judge on Friday barred the media from using photos or televised images of an alleged victim of Paul Shanley during the defrocked priest's upcoming child rape trial.
Superior Court Judge Stephen Neel agreed with prosecutors that allowing the alleged victim to be filmed or photographed may place undue stress on the man, the last remaining accuser in the case. The order also extends to his family.
The man, now in his 20s, says Shanley raped him at St. Jean's parish in Newton while he was a young boy in the 1980s. He said he did not recall the abuse until three years ago, when the clergy sex abuse scandal first erupted in Boston.
"It will be extremely difficult to ask him to testify to those details with a camera right there," prosecutor Lynn Rooney said during a hearing Thursday on the request.
Two other men who accused Shanley of raping them as children were dropped from the case, and prosecutors have said they expect to drop a third accuser.
Posted by kshaw at January 14, 2005 05:21 PM