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  Timeline of Defrocked Priest Stephen Kiesle

Santa Cruz Sentinel
April 9, 2010

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/nationalbreaking/ci_14855128

A timeline of defrocked priest Stephen Kiesle

# 1972: Ordained at St. Francis De Sales, Oakland.

# 1972-1975: Associate pastor at St. Joseph's Church in Pinole.

# 1975-1978: Assigned to Our Lady of the Rosary in Union City.

# August 1978: Kiesle is arrested and pleads no contest to lewd conduct, a misdemeanor, for tying up and molesting two boys. Sentenced to three years of probation. His record is later expunged.

# 1978-1981: Takes extended leave of absence, attends counseling and reports regularly to probation officer.

# July 1981: Oakland Bishop John Cummins sends Kiesle's file to the Vatican in support of the priest's petition for laicization, or defrocking.

# November 1981: Vatican asks for more information.

# 1982: Kiesle moves to Pinole.

# February 1982: Cummins writes to Joseph Ratzinger, then prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, providing additional information and warning of possible scandal if Kiesle is not defrocked.

# September 1982: Oakland diocese official writes Ratzinger asking for update.

# September 1983: Cummins visits Rome, discusses Kiesle case with Vatican officials.

# December 1983: Vatican official writes Oakland to say Kiesle's file can't be found and they should resubmit materials.

# January 1984: Cummins writes a Vatican official to inquire about status of Kiesle file.

# 1985: Kiesle volunteers as a youth minister at St. Joseph's Church in Pinole.

# September 1985: Cummins writes Ratzinger asking about status of Kiesle case.

# November 1985: Ratzinger writes to Cummins about Kiesle case.

# December 1985: A memo from diocese officials discusses writing to Ratzinger again to stress the risk of scandal if Kiesle's case is delayed.

# 1987: Kiesle is defrocked.

# 2002: Kiesle is arrested and charged with 13 counts of child molestation; all but two are thrown out after U.S. Supreme Court ruling invalidates a California law extending statute of limitations.

# 2004: Kiesle pleads no contest to felony charge of molesting a young girl in 1995 at his Truckee vacation home.

# 2004: He is sentenced to six years in prison for the 1995 molestation.

# 2005: Ratzinger is elected pope and adopts the name Pope Benedict XVI.

# 2009: Kiesle is released on parole in March; he violates parole in October and returns to prison.

# 2010: Kiesle is released again in February. He is now a registered sex offender living in Rossmoor, the gated seniors community in Walnut Creek.

 
 

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