Priest Admits to Abuse of Second Boy

By Julie Manganis
Salem News
August 10, 2015

http://www.salemnews.com/news/local_news/priest-admits-to-abuse-of-second-boy/article_b59fccf8-a40c-5e08-a653-cf6762737523.html

Priest admits to abuse of second boy

A retired Roman Catholic priest who is already serving eight to 10 years in prison for the rape of a boy back in the early 1980s has received a second state prison term after admitting to molesting another child.

Rev. Richard McCormick, 74, the former provincial of the Salesian Society of North America, pleaded guilty Tuesday in Salem Superior Court to a reduced charge of indecent assault and battery.

The charge was reduced as part of plea negotiations, after McCormick agreed not to challenge whether the statute of limitations had expired in the case. He was originally charged with raping the boy during a period between 1981 and 1983, when the child was between 6 and 8 years old.

The victim, who grew up in Salem, the child of a struggling single mother, was sent to a summer camp in Rowley through the Salem Boys Club, he said.

The camp was sparsely equipped, so once a week campers would be allowed to visit the Sacred Heart/Don Bosco retreat in neighboring Ipswich.

That’s where McCormick was running a summer camp for disadvantaged Catholic boys from the greater Boston area.

“We were told that this was a really nice camp and to be on our best behavior,” the victim wrote in an impact statement read in court.

“It was there, at the pool, were I encountered Richard McCormick, his face etched in my memory forever since.”

Prosecutor Kate MacDougall described how the victim came forward after seeing McCormick’s photo in a Boston newspaper when he was charged with raping the other boy.