PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer
By John P. Martin and Joseph A. Slobdzian
INQUIRER STAFF WRITERS
One of the priests on trial in the landmark clergy-sex abuse case acknowledged that he let a 14-year-old boy view online pornography and share his bed but denied touching the teen or exposing himself, according to statements he gave church investigators.
The Rev. James J. Brennan said he later realized his decision to let the boy view porn and sleep next to him that night in 1996 was “borderline” inappropriate. Still, he told interrogators at a canonical trial that he was blindsided when the young man came forward a decade later and accused him of sexual assault.
“I was just devastated,” Brennan testified in 2008.
His statements from that proceeding were introduced Monday as the Common Pleas Court trial against Brennan and Msgr. William J. Lynn opened its sixth week. Brennan is charged with attempting to rape the 14-year-old; Lynn, a former ranking official for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, is accused of endangerment for not removing Brennan from ministry despite signs that he might abuse minors.
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