By Carl Hessler Jr.
Times Herald
November 22, 2011
http://www.timesherald.com/article/20111122/NEWS01/111129882
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| A still frame pulled from video of former athletic director Francis Murphy as he left court after pleading guilty to charges involving sexual contact with a minor. |
COURTHOUSE – A former Archbishop Carroll High School athletic director has admitted to having improper contact with a teenage boy who was an ex-student.
Francis Murphy, 40, of the 1000 block of East Lancaster Avenue, Radnor, stood stone-faced in Montgomery County Court on Tuesday as he pleaded guilty to charges of unlawful contact or communication with a minor and corruption of a minor in connection with incidents that occurred in April with a teenage boy.
Judge William J. Furber Jr. deferred sentencing so that court officials can complete a background investigative report about Murphy, who faces a possible maximum sentence of seven-to-14 years in prison on the charges.
Assistant District Attorney Samantha Cauffman, who leads the district attorney’s sex crimes unit, vowed to seek a state prison sentence against Murphy.
“This defendant was trusted by the parents and the community as a whole to protect and guide their children and instead he violated that trust,” Cauffman said.
“He used his position to try to further his own sexual needs and his own sexual desires and in turn hurt a child emotionally, hurt that child’s ability to trust adults and that’s one thing we can’t afford in this community. We need children to trust adults who want to help them and guide them to a better life,” Cauffman added.
Before taking the job at Archbishop Carroll in 1999, Murphy coached football and baseball at Kennedy Kenrick Catholic High School between 1996 and 1998.
Murphy, who remains free on $250,000 bail pending sentencing, did not respond to a reporter’s questions as he left the courtroom in the company of his lawyers, William Winning and Timothy Woodward.
In a prepared statement, Winning and Woodward characterized Murphy’s conduct as “a non-contact, electronic communication matter” involving an on-line exchange with a former player.
“At the time of the exchange, Mr. Murphy was not acting in his capacity as a coach or administrator of the former player. This is an isolated incident in the context of an impeccable record of service and contribution to his community,” Winning and Woodward wrote in the prepared statement.
Murphy, his lawyers wrote, has expressed “deep remorse” and has accepted full responsibility for his conduct.
“He is truly sorry for what happened here. At the sentencing hearing, we will demonstrate to the court that Mr. Murphy is a good person, a revered coach and athletic director, who made a tragic mistake,” Winning and Woodward said.
During Tuesday’s brief hearing, Murphy agreed with the facts contained in the affidavit of probable cause filed at the time of his arrest.
According to that criminal complaint, Murphy was apprehended in April after he allegedly arrived to pick up the former student at Frosty Falls, an ice cream shop in Bridgeport, for a sexual tryst. Murphy, who had been one of the teen’s football coaches, was met by several Montgomery County detectives who arrested him on the spot.
The student, who was leaving Archbishop Carroll to attend Upper Merion High School, met Murphy when he was in football camp in ninth grade, according to authorities. Murphy, who was the offensive coordinator for Carroll’s football team, had recruited the youth to play ball for the Catholic high school.
When the 11th grade student, who had recently left the high school for financial reasons, sent a Facebook request to Murphy asking for the coach’s help in retrieving a pair of cleats left behind in the boy’s old locker, Murphy readily agreed and allegedly offered to become the teen’s “Sugar Daddy,” a term the high school athlete didn’t quite understand, according to court papers.
During Facebook conversations, Murphy allegedly made sexually explicit suggestions and offered to buy the teenager gifts in exchange for sexual favors, according to prosecutors. The student, unfamiliar with the term, “sugar daddy,” looked it up and became angry. The teenager told Murphy he was not a female and asked how Murphy could think of him that way, the affidavit alleged.
“We should try it out. See how you like it. I will hook you up. Must stay between us,” the athletic director allegedly responded.
The boy subsequently told his mother, who reported the alleged conversations to police. A county detective, who created a new Facebook identity, posed as the boy and continued the communications with Murphy. Prosecutors have described the alleged online communications as “extremely graphic.”
After the detective’s first Facebook contact posing as the 11th grader on April 12, Murphy allegedly wasted little time trying to meet the boy in person. Eventually, Murphy set a date to meet and drove to meet the juvenile at 10:30 a.m. April 15 at the ice cream shop. But when he pulled up in the parking lot in his black Saturn expecting to rendezvous with the student, he was met by police and taken into custody.
The day of Murphy’s arrest, school administrators sent a letter via email to school families informing them of the arrest and reaffirmed the school’s pledge to protect and prevent students from sexual abuse, according to the Philadelphia Archdiocese’s website.
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