ST. LOUIS (MO)
Post-Dispatch
By Robert Patrick and Peter Shinkle
Of the Post-Dispatch
08/31/2005
Jurors who convicted the Rev. Thomas Graham on Wednesday of sodomizing a boy in the Old Cathedral downtown in the 1970s, then heard new accusations against him as the penalty phase of the trial began.
St. Louis prosecutors presented testimony of a man and woman who claimed that Graham molested them years ago as well. Jurors will weigh their stories in deciding proper punishment for Graham, 71. He could face from two years to life in prison. The sentencing hearing continues today.
The defense fought hard to prevent the case from reaching trial, arguing all the way to the Missouri Supreme Court that prosecutors stretched an outdated law to circumvent a statute of limitations. Graham was convicted under a 1969 sodomy statute, significantly modified 10 years later, that had contained no deadline for prosecution.