Brick Priest Trial: Jury Wants to See the Tape

By Kathleen Hopkins
Asbury Park Press
October 14, 2014

http://www.app.com/story/news/crime/jersey-mayhem/2014/10/14/brick-priest-trial/17252185/

Jurors weighing the fate of a popular Brick priest on trial on molestation charges on Wednesday will get a second look at what the prosecution says is among the strongest evidence against him – a videotape of what he said to detectives.

An assistant prosecutor reminded the jury on Tuesday that Marukudiyil Velan, better known to parishioners at Church of the Visitation in Brick as "Father Chris," admitted on the videotape that he improperly touched a mother and her two children in 2012.

Velan's defense attorney, however, maintains the detectives badgered, cursed at and manipulated Velan until he told them what they wanted to hear.

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After deliberating late into the afternoon on Tuesday, the jurors sent a note to Superior Court Judge James M. Blaney saying they wanted to view the videotape again. Blaney sent the panel home without reaching a verdict, saying they would have a chance to see the videotape in the morning.

The panel of six men and six women, after listening to summations from the prosecuting and defense attorneys, could be mulling the following questions:

Why would a mother let a man accused of molesting her child near her family again? And, why would the priest admit to such accusations?

The defense attorney would answer the first question by saying the molestation never happened, and the mother viewed the priest as a cash cow and concocted the story so she could file a civil suit that would yield her money to buy a home.

A prosecuting attorney would answer the second question by saying the accusations are true.

And that is essentially what Toms River defense attorney S. Karl Mohel and Assistant Ocean County Prosecutor Terry Ann Linardakis told jurors in their summations on Tuesday.

Velan, 66, who first came to the Brick church in 2001 and is now barred from it while charges against him are pending, has been on trial since Oct. 8. He is accused of molesting a Brick boy in April of 2012, when he was 13, and later molesting the boy, his sister, then 5, and his mother in their home on July 13, 2012.

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Taped questioning

During the trial, jurors heard testimony from the mother and the boy, but not the girl. They also listened to a recording of a telephone call in which the mother discussed the allegations with the priest, and they saw the tape of detectives questioning Velan about the accusations.

One thing the jurors didn't hear was the young girl's version of events, Mohel reminded the jury in his summation.

"Why didn't she come into court and tell you what happened?" Mohel asked. "She's the third person in that room, and we haven't heard from her."

Linardakis countered that there was no need to put such a young girl on the witness stand when her older brother and mother witnessed her being molested and told the jurors about it.

But Mohel insisted the boy's and mother's stories didn't make any sense.

The boy testified that Velan molested him in April of 2012 while stopped at a red traffic light, when he was alone in a car with the priest on the way to pick up food from McDonald's.

The mother testified that after learning of the allegations, she distanced her family from Velan until July of 2012.

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When Velan showed up at the family's house on July 13, 2012 to take them out to eat, he touched the girl inappropriately as she sat on his lap, then he molested the boy and grabbed the mother's breast, the boy and mother testified last week. Afterward, the family went in Velan's car with him to pick up a pizza to bring back to the house, according to the testimony. Velan again molested the mother as she brought the pizza into the house, and then he came inside and ate with them, the witnesses testified.

Velan did not testify.

"You're now inviting the man who abused all three of you, according to your testimony, into the house?" Mohel said in his summation, questioning the mother's story.

"Are you going to invite the fox back into the henhouse" when it involves your children?" he said. "Does that makes sense, or is something else working here?"

'Source of funds'

Mohel suggested there was something else. He said that in the two years the family was acquainted with Velan, he went from being a friendly priest who brought over day-old baked goods to "a source of funds."

The mother already had borrowed thousands of dollars from Velan to purchase a car, Mohel said. Now, the mother and her boyfriend wanted to buy a house, he said. Money from a civil lawsuit filed by the family against the priest, church and Archdiocese of Trenton would help toward that end, the defense attorney said.

"I suggest to you, when the lawsuit went through, in their eyes, they'd be able to buy a much bigger house," he said to the jury.

"This is a case about misplaced trust," Linardakis told the jurors.

"This is a case of that person, Mr. Velan, shattering that trust, violating that trust, when he touched (the mother) and her children," Linardakis said, gesturing to defendant, who sat at the defense table, clad in a checkered, button-down shirt.

Linardakis said the mother and her son displayed courage by coming into court and revealing their accusations to the jury.

"You saw this 15-year-old boy," she said to the panel. "You heard his voice. You heard his courage and you saw his demeanor. He was embarrassed to have to point out what this man did to him."

Linardakis reminded the jurors of Velan's own words on the recordings, acknowledging touching the boy, his sister and the children's mother.

"He knows what he's saying; his words are his words," Linardakis said.

Velan is charged with sexual assault and three counts of child endangerment.

Kathleen Hopkins: 732-643-4202; Khopkins@app.com