WORCESTER (MA)
MetroWest Daily News
By Sara Withee / Daily News Staff
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
WORCESTER -- The Rev. Paul Desilets made his long-awaited court appearance via video conference yesterday as Worcester District Attorney John Conte announced his office is working on a plea deal that likely will include time behind bars.
"We're going to be asking for jail time," Conte told reporters outside the Worcester Superior courtroom where the ailing 81-year-old Catholic priest was ordered held on $100,000 cash bail.
After three years of fighting extradition in Canada, the retired priest returned to the United States Friday to face charges he allegedly abused 18 former altar boys at the now-closed Our Lady of Assumption parish in Bellingham during the 1970s and '80s.
Desilets had been scheduled to attend his arraignment in person, but Conte and Worcester County sheriff officials said court officials kept him at the Worcester House of Correction due to safety concerns.
Joseph Druce, the inmate charged with killing defrocked priest John Geoghan at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center in 2003, was in court yesterday for motion hearings.