NEW YORK
New York Newsday
BY KAREN FREIFELD
STAFF WRITER
August 11, 2005
A Catholic priest from Pennsylvania was sentenced Wednesday to 10 years probation for taking a 17-year-old former altar boy to a Greenwich Village hotel and groping him.
The Rev. Albert Liberatore, 41, of Lackawanna, apologized in State Supreme Court in Manhattan and accepted responsibility for inappropriate behavior, his attorney, Robert Gottlieb, said Wednesday.
"He admitted he knew he crossed the line," Gottlieb said. "He cared very much for and about the boy and his family."
In June, Liberatore pleaded guilty to attempted sexual abuse and admitted he groped the boy at the Washington Square Park Hotel in May 2002
Liberatore, who has been suspended as a priest, was charged with first-degree sodomy and sexual abuse. He could have received 15 years in prison if convicted at trial.