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	Tate's Apology at Sentencing Prompts Questions By Martin B. Cassidy The Advocate February 24, 2008 http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/local/scn-sa-tate6feb24,0,4050578.story Jack Bausman heard Robert Tate, former Christ Church Greenwich choir director, confess Thursday to viewing child pornography and committing decades of sexual abuse of minors. But Bausman said he still has questions about Tate's admission that he had hired two pedophiles who preyed on choir boys. At his sentencing Thursday, Tate, 66, apologized for knowingly hiring the two unidentified men and called himself "a coward" for firing the men but not turning them into police when they molested boys in the choir. Bausman, a Christ Church parishioner who has known Tate for 34 years, said he had hoped for the benefit of parishioners that authorities would identify the men and say when they had worked at the church. "The specifics I don't know and I don't believe they were part of the court record," said Bausman, one of the parishioners who helped put up Tate's $500,000 bond in January 2007. It is difficult to know what to think of Tate's admission without more information, Bausman said. Tate was sentenced to 51Ú2 years in prison Thursday for possession of child pornography, while acknowledging a history spanning 40 years of collecting illicit pictures of children and sexually abusing minors. Eugene Riccio, an attorney for Christ Church, on Friday said the current leadership of the church was unaware of the two pedophiles hired by Tate until prosecutors disclosed it last week and were reviewing whatever records and statements. "The church will examine these very serious allegations keeping in mind that these events occurred decades ago and that the rectors of the church at that time are no longer alive," Riccio said. "It will take time." Assistant U.S. Attorney Peter Jongbloed, the prosecutor in the case, declined to identify the men after Tate's sentencing or say whether they could face charges. Francis O'Reilly, a Fairfield-based attorney representing Tate, said the men's employment at the church was from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s. At the sentencing, U.S. District Court Judge Alan Nevas said that he had received many letters of support for Tate from Christ Church choir parents asking him to show leniency, citing Tate's role in their children's lives while leading the acclaimed choir program at the church since 1973. During the sentencing, Jongbloed said Tate's supporters accurately praised Tate's distinguished career as a choir leader, but erred in asking for leniency, overlooking other acts Tate had committed, including overseas sex trips and hiring child prostitutes from Manhattan. In addition to hiring the two child predators, Tate admitted to having sex with boys in Thailand, the Philippines, and Costa Rica, and collecting child pornography since the 1960s. Riccio and Chris Caldwell, an attorney who attended Tate's sentencing, said they believe the prison term was surprisingly light in the face of Tate's admitted sexual abuse of minors. Tate faced up to 10 years in prison on the child pornography possession charge. "His lawyer gets a 10 out of 10 on that one," Caldwell said of Tate's sentence. "I felt a longer sentence was in the offing," Riccio said. Jongbloed and former Christ Church attorney Philip Russell subpoenaed Caldwell, a former associate of Russell's, to testify about Russell's destruction of a computer containing Tate's child pornography. In December, Russell, a Stamford resident, was sentenced to 12 months of probation for destroying the computer, admitting he demolished it to prevent federal investigators from finding the pornography. Caldwell said Tate's actions had changed many lives including his own, playing a role in his leaving Russell's firm, though the former legal associates are still friends. "Until yesterday, I don't think anybody knew the extent of what Mr. Tate was doing," Caldwell said Friday. "This guy dropped a neutron bomb on a community of people and changed their lives. What was said today, it certainly had a shocking effect on the parishioners."
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