MAINE
Portland Press Herald
By JOHN RICHARDSON, Portland Press Herald Writer
Maureen Bickford was part of the Sodality at St. Peter's Catholic Church, an after-school program for kids held in the parish hall.
And, she says, she became one of the girls the Rev. Lawrence Sabatino chose to play hide-and-seek with him or go with him on outings to the woods or the beach.
Sabatino sexually abused her repeatedly when she was between the ages of 8 and 11, Bickford said. About 20 years later, as she was walking home from work in the same Munjoy Hill neighborhood, images of those incidents flooded her mind and stopped her in her tracks.
"I just started bawling. I was miserable," she recalled.
Bickford, now 52, would later remember more details, such as how dark it was behind the heavy velvet curtains on the wooden stage in the parish hall.
"We used to do this hide-and-seek game," she said. "That's the first place he ever touched me - behind the curtain."
He would put his hands on her, and inside her, and would grind himself against her, she said. "He would press against you so you could not get away," she said.