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	Judge: Fushek Entitled to 5 Separate Trials By Lawn Griffiths East Valley Tribune September 20, 2008 http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/126234 A judge has ordered five separate trials for Monsignor Dale Fushek, former pastor of St. Timothy's Catholic Community, accused by five men of sexual misconduct in the 1980s and early 1990s while they were teens at the Mesa parish. San Tan Justice of the Peace Samuel Goodman ruled Tuesday that the priest, who founded the international Catholic youth program, LifeTeen, is entitled to face his accusers in separate trials with separate juries, with the first trial to begin Nov. 17 in the Chandler court. Fushek faces seven misdemeanor counts, pared down from 10 counts first filed in November 2005 after a Maricopa County Attorney's Office investigation. Three counts were dismissed. One of the victims has died. In his order, Goodman said criminal procedure rules require the cases to be "severed." Fushek's attorney, Thomas Hoidal, had argued at a hearing Aug. 21 that a single jury would be ill-equipped to hear testimony on separate incidents from five complainants without one case prejudicing their thinking in other cases. The judge noted that originally he had intended to try Fushek on all counts in a single trial from the bench, with him determining Fushek's fate. But the priest got the Arizona Supreme Court to rule that he was entitled to a jury trial.
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