SEATTLE (WA)
King County Journal
2005-11-30
by Noel S. Brady
Journal Reporter
One of two young men wanted by police for allegedly molesting a young boy while living with an Eastside group known to many as a cult has surrendered to authorities.
Justin Kirkland, 20, a member of the Tridentine Latin Rite Church, was being held Tuesday night held in lieu of $75,000 bail after being booked at the King County Jail in Seattle on Monday morning, nearly a year after he was charged with two counts of first-degree rape of a child.
Police are still looking for Michael W. Muratore, 21, a third member of the church who was charged Nov. 18 with first-degree child molestation for crimes against the same victim.
The mother of the now-13-year-old boy, whom Kirkland and two other young men are accused of molesting over three years beginning when the boy was 8, said she believes recent media converge about the church pressured its leaders to send Kirkland to authorities. She is not being named to protect the privacy of her son.