MALTA
Malta Today
Daniel Mizzi 20 August 2014
Clarificaton: this article erroneously referred to the defendant’s previous employment as having been inside a Church school.
The police intend to file an appeal against bail, after a a young priest was yesterday allowed out against a €5,000 personal guarantee and €1,000 deposit after pleading not guilty to charges of child molestation, in what is understood to have been criminal acts taking place over several months and involving a number of minors.
The priest has been prohibited from approaching the victims and their homes, the court said in its bail conditions.
Sources told MaltaToday that the accused has been a priest for around 10 to 12 years and he was recently employed as a religion teacher at a boys’ secondary state school in Hamrun.
Victims were said to be aged close to 15, but one of the girls is said to be aged eight years old.
Standing before Magistrate Paul Coppini at the Gozo courts, the priest, whose name cannot be published by court order, appeared wearing casual clothes and a pair of flip flops after he was summonsed to court by arrest.
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