Testimony in Philadelphia Clergy Sex-abuse Trial to Begin Monday

By Joseph A. Slobodzian
Philadelphia Inquirer
January 10, 2013

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/local/20130110_Testimony_in_Philadelphia_clergy_sex-abuse_trial_to_begin_Monday.html

Testimony is to begin Monday in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court in the trial of a priest and a former parochial-school teacher charged with sexually assaulting a 10-year-old altar boy at a Northeast parish in the late 1990s.

Judge Ellen Ceisler confirmed the start of testimony Wednesday after prosecution and defense lawyers completed picking a panel of 12 jurors and six alternates to hear the evidence against the Rev. Charles Engelhardt, 66, and Bernard Shero, 49.

Jury selection began Monday and concluded Wednesday with two final jurors and six alternates. The final panel is composed of eight men and four women, with four male and two female alternates.

Engelhardt and Shero are accused of serially molesting a fifth grader at St. Jerome's parish and school in 1998 and 1999.

The pair are the last two of five people charged as a result of the 2011 county grand jury report outlining a cover-up of clergy sexual abuse of children in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

Last year's landmark three-month trial ended June 22 when the jury found Msgr. William J. Lynn guilty of child endangerment. He became the first church administrator convicted for a priest's sexual abuse of a child.

Lynn, 62, who as secretary for clergy from 1992 to 2004 was responsible for investigating allegations against priests, was sentenced to three to six years. He is in a state prison and has appealed his conviction.

Another priest pleaded guilty before trial, and a priest tried with Lynn is to be retried this year after the jury could not reach a verdict in the charges against him.