BALTIMORE (MD)
Baltimore Sun
By Julie Bykowicz
Sun Staff
Originally published February 11, 2005
With 16 men and women selected yesterday as jurors and alternates, opening statements in the trial of a defrocked Baltimore priest accused of molesting a young parishioner who later shot him are expected to begin this morning.
Maurice Blackwell, 58, is charged with four counts of sexual child abuse in the alleged molestation of Dontee Stokes, 29, between 1989 and 1992.
At the time, Blackwell was the powerful and popular minister of St. Edward Catholic Church in West Baltimore, and Stokes was a youth group leader who says he considered Blackwell a mentor and father figure.
Blackwell said Tuesday that he is innocent.