CALIFORNIA
Appeal-Democrat
Appeal-Democrat and wire service reports
Yuba County District Attorney Pat McGrath said he will seek the extradition of a priest convicted of sexually molesting a minor in 1989, now that the Rev. Jose Luis Urbina has been discovered serving as a priest in Mexico.
Urbina fled the country after his 1989 conviction in a Yuba County court and later served for about a decade at his hometown parish in Navojoa, Mexico, the Dallas Morning News reported in its ongoing series on accused Roman Catholic priests who are now working in other countries.
"We will start exploring extradition for Mr. Urbina immediately," McGrath said.
Urbina, now 51, left Yuba County before then-Municipal Judge James F. Dawson could sentence him. He had been released on $2,500 bail.
Urbina served in the Yuba-Sutter area from about 1979 until 1984, living in the rectory at St. Isidore Catholic Church in Yuba City and working at St. Joseph's Catholic Church in Marysville.
In 2003, a then-33-year-old Yuba City man sued Urbina and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sacramento, alleging that Urbina molested him from 1980 to 1986, when he turned 17. The suit is pending in Sacramento County Superior Court.
Posted by kshaw at March 19, 2005 07:13 AM