February 14, 2005

Blackwell Trial Resumes

BALTIMORE (MD)
WJZ

Feb 14, 2005 7:40 am US/Eastern
Baltimore, MD (WJZ) Testimony resumes this morning in the trial of a defrocked priest facing up to 60 years in prison on charges he
sexually molested a young parishioner who shot the cleric years later.

The prosecution's star witness, 29-year-old Dontee Stokes, testified for most of the first day of testimony on Friday, vividly describing the abuse he says he suffered at the hands of Maurice Blackwell, the priest he looked up to as a father figure in his boyhood.

Stokes also faced intense cross-examination by defense attorney Kenneth Ravenell, who argued that the Baltimore barber was a deeply disturbed young man who has trouble distinguishing fantasy from reality.

Ravenell also suggested that Stokes made up the allegations as a way of dealing with his own sexual identity
crisis.

Posted by kshaw at February 14, 2005 07:03 AM