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  Women Accuse Priest of Sex Abuse

By Michael Amon
Newsday [Rockville Centre NY]
February 27, 2007

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/ny-lida0228,0,5837391.story?coll=ny-linews-headlines

Two women have asked the Suffolk district attorney's office to investigate charges of sexual abuse against an embattled Diocese of Rockville Centre priest who was suspended last year during a church probe.

Terri Baumbach, of Center Moriches, and Mary Quigley, formerly of Sayville and now a Virginia resident, said they filed criminal complaints on Friday and Monday, respectively, against the Rev. William Logan, whom they accuse of inappropriate touching in the early 1970s.

The complaints were partly symbolic, the women said. The 5-year statute of limitations for sex crimes expired long ago.

"This is a protest," said Quigley, 49, who asked that her maiden name be used to protect her identity.

The district attorney's office declined to comment.

The diocese suspended Logan in March after Quigley and Janique Polimine went public with accusations that he touched them inappropriately when he was a young priest at St. Lawrence Parish in Sayville. Logan was reinstated after an internal review could not substantiate the charges.

The diocese declined to make Logan available for comment or say where he works now. Diocese spokesman Sean Dolan said the diocese has already investigated Logan's behavior and exonerated him.

"We take allegations of abuse seriously, but you have to question somebody's motives for making allegations about something that happened 37 years ago," Dolan said.

Baumbach, 52, whose allegations have not been made public until now, said Logan went out of his way to nurture her teenage crush on him while she was a student at St. John the Baptist High School in West Islip from 1970 to 1972.

"At times he would hold me and [become physically aroused] and not let go," said Baumbach. Polimine, 40, who has filed a lawsuit against the diocese, said Logan pulled her out of confirmation class and had her sit on his lap in a stairwell in the early 1980s.

E-mail: michael.amon@newsday.com

 
 

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