Deposed Priest Receives Probable Life Sentence, by Staci Wilson, Times-Tribune, March 25, 2011

Deposed Priest Receives Probable "Life Sentence"

By Staci Wilson
Times-Tribune
March 25, 2011

http://thetimes-tribune.com/news/deposed-priest-receives-probable-life-sentence-1.1123588#axzz1HbFAerY7

Former Episcopal priest Ralph Johnson, 84, is led out of the Susquehanna County Courthouse in handcuffs on Thursday. Mr. Johnson was sentenced to serve four and one-half years in prison for sexually assaulting two teenage boys more than a decade ago.

MONTROSE - An 84-year-old deposed Episcopal priest will spend 4? years behind bars for sexually assaulting two teenage boys more than a decade ago in his Susquehanna County home.

The sentence delivered Thursday to Ralph Johnson of Gibson Twp. is likely a "death sentence," said his attorney, John Petorak, after the hearing.

In November, Mr. Johnson pleaded guilty in Susquehanna County Court to two felony counts of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a minor. Mr. Johnson will serve two concurrent 4?-to-18-year sentences in a state prison.

District Attorney Jason Legg agreed to waive the five-year mandatory minimum sentences in each case but asked the court to fashion a jail term in the aggravated range. Given the fact that there were multiple victims, an aggravated sentence would "still be lenient," he said.

The Times-Tribune does not identify victims of sexual assault.

One victim provided testimony that Mr. Legg read during the proceeding. In the statement, the victim called Mr. Johnson a "despicable man."

"His use of religion as a means to harvest young men is more blasphemous than those who are not true believers," the victim wrote. Now about 30, he requested no leniency for the aged man, "as he gave his victims no leniency."

"And to my childhood (which) he stole from me, may he understand the pain, confusion and abandonment that I felt," the victim added.

The counts against Mr. Johnson stem from separate incidents that occurred more than a decade ago in the former priest's Gibson Twp. home.

The victim who provided the written testimony was between the ages of 11 and 15 at the time of the abuse. The other boy - now in his twenties - was 14 at the time of the assault and has a mental disability.

Mr. Petorak told the court that the acts committed by his client in the past were "heinous" but said the man was now in "the waning years of life" and was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2009. He asked the court to deliver a sentence with his age in mind and give "Mr. Johnson some hope of coming out while he's still alive."

"He is probably going to serve out the remainder of his life in prison," said the defense attorney.

After the sentence was delivered, Mr. Petorak spoke with reporters outside the Susquehanna County Courthouse in Montrose. Mr. Johnson regrets the acts he committed but was not regretting having to go to prison, Mr. Petorak said.

"He may be thinking about having to answer to a higher power," Mr. Petorak said.

Mr. Johnson was deposed in 2006 by Bishop Gladstone "Skip" Adams of the Central New York Episcopal Diocese after similar allegations of inappropriate conduct surfaced while Mr. Johnson was serving at a parish in Owego, N.Y.

Bishop Adams said in March 2010 that no victim ever came forward at that time to verify the allegations, but he felt the information was credible enough to merit Mr. Johnson's discipline.

While ordained, Mr. Johnson served in parishes in Buckingham, part of a Philadelphia area diocese; as well as at the New York churches of St. Paul's, Owego; Zion Church, Windsor; and St. Ann's, Afton.

He never served a parish in Susquehanna County.

He has lived in the Gibson area since 1987. Prior to that, he owned property on Stanton Road in Thompson Twp.

Contact the writer: swilson@independent weekender.com