BishopAccountability.org
 
  Retired Cleveland Priest Pleads Guilty to Soliciting Sex

Chicago Sun-Times [Cleveland OH]
May 16, 2003

CLEVELAND--A retired Cleveland-area priest, accused of soliciting sex from a 17-year-old runaway, pleaded guilty Thursday to promoting prostitution.

The charges against the Rev. Daniel McBride, 76, represent the only criminal case involving a priest to come out of an investigation of sex abuse allegations in the Cleveland Diocese of the Roman Catholic Church.

The plea came as McBride's trial was to begin. He could be sentenced to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine June 26. He had no comment after leaving the courtroom.

"He has pleaded guilty to a felony, but not as a Catholic priest," said defense attorney Niki Schwartz. "He was a one-time customer of an almost-18-year-old prostitute."

McBride retired from the priesthood in 1987, but served as senior associate pastor at a church in Northfield Township, about 30 miles from Cleveland. He was accused of soliciting sex with a minor in April 2002. Prosecutors said McBride went to a bar in Cleveland to meet the boy and arranged to pay him to travel to a condominium McBride kept in Chautauqua, N.Y., for sex. Prosecutors shut the bar down in June, saying it housed a prostitution ring of boys.

 
 

Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.