POLAND
The News
Loyal parishioners turned out in force yesterday as a Polish priest was sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in prison for molesting five boys from 2002 to 2009.
Father Slawomir S. (full name withheld under Polish privacy laws) had pleaded not guilty and he was not present in court yesterday. The clergyman had led a parish in Rawa Mazowiecka, central Poland.
The five victims had served as altar-boys for the priest, and all of them had been under fifteen at the time of the abuse.
The priest has been banned for life from working with minors, and he is also forbidden from making any contact with the victims in future.
One of the abused, now an adult, told the TVN24 news station that he finally stepped forward as he “would have been furious if the priest abused someone else.”
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