Wanted Priest Arrested in India

Praetoria News
March 19, 2012

http://www.pretorianews.co.za/wanted-priest-arrested-in-india-1.1259633

Indian police say they have arrested a Catholic priest wanted in the United States on charges of sexually assaulting a teenage parishioner in Minnesota.

The Rev Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul appeared on Monday in a New Delhi court and will be held in custody pending an official US request for his extradition.

Police Sub-inspector Pugal Maran says Jeyapaul was detained Friday near the southern Indian town of Erode after Interpol issued an alert.

Jeyapaul, an Indian citizen, has denied molesting a 14-year-old girl in 2004 when he was working at the Blessed Sacrament Church in Greenbush near the Canadian border.

He returned to India in 2005 to see his ailing mother, but was asked not to return to the Minnesota church. - Sapa-AP