Catholic Priest on Trial over Charges of Sexual Abuse against Boys

Tamworth Herald
January 27, 2012

http://www.thisistamworth.co.uk/Catholic-priest-trial-charges-sexual-abuse-boys/story-15052422-detail/story.html

A CATHOLIC priest perpetrated a catalogue of sexual abuse against young boys – including children from Coleshill – who were in awe of his "revered and trusted" status within the community, a court heard.

Jurors at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court were told that Alexander Bede Walsh abused eight boys while working at Roman Catholic establishments in Warwickshire, Staffordshire and Coventry between 1975 and 1994.

Walsh, of Church Lane, Abbots Bromley, Lichfield, Staffordshire, denies a total of 27 offences of indecency, buggery and indecent assault.

Opening the case against the 58-year-old, prosecutor Robert Price alleged that one of the victims was abused after being plied with alcohol during what purported to be a private communion ceremony.

Mr Price told the court that Walsh was arrested and interviewed in 2006 after two men contacted the police to claim they had been abused in Coventry when they were children.

Further complainants came forward between 2008 and 2011, said Mr Price, who told the jury: "Slowly but surely the picture became clear as the investigation moved forward.

"That picture was a picture of repeated, serial, predatory sexual abuse of eight boys committed over a period of several years.

"The defendant was a Roman Catholic priest who worked in various schools and parishes throughout the Midlands and in our county, Staffordshire.

"The prosecution's case in a nutshell is this – we say that he sexually abused no less than eight young boys and that the

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abuse, we say, took place in the 1970s, the 1980s and in one particular instance in the 1990s.

"He was able to perpetrate that abuse because his respected and indeed revered position with the Roman Catholic Church allowed him to have access to young boys, and to groom them and manipulate them before sexually abusing them."

Some of the complainants, who cannot be named for legal reasons, saw Walsh as "their route to God" and were in awe of him, Mr Price claimed.

The Crown also alleges that one of the boys was given a strong cocktail of alcohol by Walsh, who told the victim that it was the "blood of Christ" before undressing him and abusing him after he was taken ill.

Although Walsh maintains that the complainants are lying, Mr Price told jurors: "We say it's inconceivable that eight individual victims would tell lies about all of this.

"The abuse that each of them suffered had a profound effect upon their lives and upon their ability to cope with life generally."

All eight complainants are due to give evidence during the trial about abuse which is alleged to have taken place at various locations, including a swimming pool in Coventry and a children's home in Coleshill, Warwickshire.

Walsh, who was ordained in 1979 and has a previous conviction for downloading indecent images of children from the internet, is also alleged to have committed sexual offences at other locations while based at churches in Coventry and Cheadle, Staffordshire.

The trial continues.