Louisville Priest Sentenced in Sex Abuse Summer Camp Case

U.S. News
June 29, 2017

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/kentucky/articles/2017-06-29/louisville-priest-sentenced-in-sex-abuse-summer-camp-case

A Catholic priest has been sentenced to serve two years in prison after pleading guilty to sexual abuse charges brought by a victim who says he was abused in the 1970s at a church summer camp.

R. Joseph Hemmerle was sentenced on Thursday in Meade County. The two-year sentence will be served in addition to a seven-year sentence Hemmerle received in February on another abuse case. Both victims say they were abused by Hemmerle at Camp Tall Trees, a now-closed Catholic summer camp about an hour west of Louisville.

The 74-year-old Hemmerle has been on administrative leave from the church since 2014.

In November, the priest testified at a trial that he would sometimes apply calamine lotion to the genitals of child campers, but denied abusing anyone.