PENNSYLVANIA
WCNC
12/09/2005
By JOANN LOVIGLIO / Associated Press
A judge broke down in tears Friday as she gave probation to a priest who had a sexual relationship with a student in the late 1970s.
"I've worried about this case for months now and I can't pretend to any one of you that I know what the right thing to do is," Judge Pamela Dembe tearfully said. "Where I get stuck is I don't know how to balance one very terrible violation against the 30 years that followed."
The Rev. James J. Behan is the only priest charged in Philadelphia since the church abuse scandal broke in 2002.
Behan, an Oblate priest, performed oral sex on the teenager dozens of times from 1978 to 1980 when he taught at Northeast Catholic High School for Boys, prosecutors said.