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	Priest Indicted for Child Abuse of Altar Boy Gazette September 23, 2008 http://www.gazette.net/stories/09242008/poolnew200056_32552.shtml The Rev. Aaron Joseph Cote, who once served as a pastor at Mother Seton Parish in Germantown, has been indicted on one count of child abuse in a case that alleges he sexually touched a teenage altar boy, according to court records. Cote, 56, of New York City, was indicted on Sept. 11 in Montgomery County Circuit Court. He was charged in Montgomery County with one count of custodian child abuse against altar boy Brandon Rains in July. Cote and the Catholic religious order to which he belongs reached a $1.2 million settlement in August 2007 with the altar boy. The settlement included no admission of wrongdoing. Rains accused Cote of sexually abusing him from 2001 to 2002, when he was 14 and 15 years old, at locations in Germantown and Washington, D.C. Cote is only charged with abuse that occurred in Germantown, according to the charging documents. Rains and his family reported the alleged abuse to county police in 2003 and filed their lawsuit in 2005 after they were dissatisfied with the police investigation. Although The Gazette rarely names alleged victims of sex crimes, Rains and his family went public with the case. Cote was assigned as an associate pastor and youth minister at Mother Seton from 1999 to 2002. After Rains' allegations were made in 2003, the Order of Dominican Fathers and Brothers sent Cote for psychological evaluation, conducted an investigation and cleared him of any wrongdoing, church officials have said. Cote then was assigned a position as youth minister and associate pastor at a Providence, R.I., church. When Rains went public and filed the lawsuit, Cote was placed on administrative leave from the church, church officials have said. Cote also served at St. Jane Frances de Chantal Catholic Church in Bethesda from 1997 to 1999. Earlier this year, a Massachusetts family filed a lawsuit against Cote and the Dominican Order alleging that he abused their two young sons in 2003.
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