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  I Asked Father Gerry Whether Angelika Was an Escort Girl
Murder Jury Hear of Church Aide's Suspicions

By Gordon Mcilwraith
Daily Record
May 2, 2007

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/tm_headline=i-asked-father-gerry- whether-angelika-was-an-escort-girl--&method=full&objectid=19030847&siteid=66633-name_page.html

Father Gerry Nugent was asked if murdered Angelika Kluk worked as an escort - just hours after she disappeared, a court heard yesterday.

But the priest dismissed the suggestion, made by a senior Catholic Church aide.

The court also heard that the Polish student had been "flirty" with the man accused of her murder, handyman Peter Tobin, in the hours before she vanished.

Tobin, 60, denies raping and murdering Angelika in September last year at St Patrick's Church, Glasgow.

Yesterday, church press officer Simon Dames told the High Court in Edinburgh that Father Nugent called him hours after Angelika, 23, was reported missing.

Defence witness Dames said the priest was "anxious, maybe tipping towards nervous" as he asked him to come to the chapel house.

But when he arrived, the priest seemed calmer. Their chat got around to Angelika and that was when he heard she was missing.

Donald Findlay QC, defending, asked the church aide: "Why were you there?"

Mr Dames replied: "Eventually, that was the question I asked myself. Maybe one day I will find out."

He learned from the priest that Angelika was having an affair with married Martin McAskill, 40.

The priest said his own relationship with Angelika was more like father and daughter but in the past six weeks, it had changed.

Father Nugent allegedly said he "no longer gave a damn" about Angelika and had found a contraceptive pill in her room.

Mr Findlay asked Mr Dames: "Given what was being said, did you make some off-the-wall suggestion to Father Nugent in what he was trying to tell you?"

Mr Dames replied: "I would call it a gut and intellectual stab in the dark. The stab in the dark - which I apologised for - was maybe, just maybe, Angelika was involved in escorting."

The witness said Father Nugent dismissed the idea.

Cross-examining Mr Dames, Dorothy Bain, prosecuting, said: "She is not the first young woman in the world to be involved with a married man or the last. But that doesn't make her promiscuous or someone who might be involved in an escort agency, does it?"

Mr Dames replied: "In itself, no, of course not."

Later, Russian student Rebecca Dordi, 30, told the court she lived at the chapel house while Angelika stayed there but was not afriend of the Polish student.

Asked if there was any illfeeling between them, she said:

"I certainly didn't approve of some of the things that were happening... going around with hardly anything on - just a robe.

"I didn't approve of the priest going to the swimming pool in the morning with the girl."

On the night before Angelika vanished, Miss Dordi said she saw her in the garage helping Tobin to paint a shed.

She said: "They were just talking, laughing, giggling, whatever you call it.

"It looked as if Angelika was being flirty - not flirting but being flirty. There is a difference."

She then recalled being taken from the church by police on Friday, September 29, to a friend's house.

Miss Dordi insisted that officers didn't tell her that Angelika's body had been found in a void outside the church confession box.

But when she got to the house, Father Nugent, who had been drinking, said Angelika's body had been discovered at the church and mentioned a trapdoor and the confession box.

Mr Findlay asked her: "Are you able to say that on Friday night, Father Nugent knew where the body was?"

Miss Dordi replied: "He certainly did. Absolutely. I thought somebody from the police had phoned him up and had told him."

Mr Findlay continued: "You have sworn by almighty God. Do you take this seriously?"

The Russian student replied: "Very, very seriously. I owe Angelika to help justice is done."

Advocate depute Dorothy Bain, prosecuting, pointed out that in a statement given to police last October 10, Miss Dordi had described the priest as "very drunk" when they talked.

But in court, Miss Dordi had insisted the priest was not drunk.

She said: "His face was not red, it was not shiny, it was not puffy.

He was not drunk but he was very upset that night."

The police statement also read: "Father Gerry said the body had been found inside the confession box and I said that could not be the case because I always check the confession box."

Told this was different to her evidence in court, Miss Dordi said she was "confused" and had signed her statement without reading it. The case continues.

'Angelika was being flirty - not flirting but flirty. There is a difference'

 
 

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