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	Victims Advocates Protest Priest's Bid for New Trial By Denise Lavoie Boston Globe May 29, 2008 http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2008/05/29/victims_advocates_protest_priests_bid_for_new_trial/ BOSTON—Advocates for clergy sex abuse victims said Thursday that they were outraged that a priest at the center of the Boston clergy sex abuse scandal is seeking a new trial, based on a challenge to the theory of repressed memories. more stories like this Defrocked priest Paul Shanley, 77, is serving a 12- to 15-year sentence for repeatedly raping and fondling a boy at a Newton parish in the 1980s. The victim testified that his repressed memories of the event surfaced in 2002. Shanley was in Suffolk Superior Court on Thursday for a hearing on his motion for a new trial, during which his new lawyer, Robert Shaw Jr., argued that the theory of repressed memories was "junk science." Shaw said Shanley's trial lawyer failed to vigorously challenge the theory during his trial. "Paul Shanley, just like any other citizen, is entitled to a fair trial," he said. Boston attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who represented more than 100 clergy abuse victims who reached civil settlements with the Boston Archdiocese, said he has been flooded with calls about Shanley's motion for a new trial. "The victims outraged that Father Shanley might have any possibility of having a new trial," Garabedian said. "The victims desperately want closure." Robert Costello, a Norwood man who said he was sexually abused by another priest during the late 1960s and early 1970s, said he attended the hearing to remind Shanley about the victims of clergy sex abuse. "He should not get a new trial," Costello said. "There was more evidence than just the doctors talking about repressed memories. There was (the victim's) testimony." Shanley's accuser testified that Shanley repeatedly pulled him out of catechism class and raped and fondled him, beginning when he was 6 years old. He said he recovered memories of the abuse in 2002, when the news media began reporting on the clergy abuse scandal in the Boston Archdiocese. Assistant District Attorney Loretta Lillios said Shanley's defense did call an expert witness during the trial who questioned the reliability of repressed memories and also cross-examined the state's expert on the phenomenon. Judge Stephen Neel did not immediately rule on the motion. Shanley was known in the 1960s and 1970s as a "street priest" who reached out to troubled children and gays. He became a central figure in the abuse scandal after at least two dozen men claimed he molested them.
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