Iowa Priest Facing Invasion of Privacy Charges

KETV
August 27, 2016

http://www.ketv.com/news/iowa-priest-facing-invasion-of-privacy-charges/41424986

[with video]

We're learning new details about an Iowa priest suspended after being charged with five counts of invasion of privacy.

Father Paul Monahan was the senior chaplain at St. Albert Schools when the alleged incident happened at a track meet last spring.

Fr. Monahan has worked at parishes and schools throughout southwest and central Iowa.

He was the principal at St. Albert from 1975 to 1979.

Now, he's suspended, accused of inappropriately looking at five boys using a bathroom.

The incident allegedly happened back in April during a track meet at the Treynor athletic complex in Treynor, Iowa.

“A male, an older male, had come in and was observing them use the urinals,” said Pottawattamie County Sheriff Jeff Danker.

Danker says the five boys identified that man as Fr. Monahan.

The boys were students at Logan Magnolia at the time.

In an affidavit, one student told officers that "Monahan walked to the urinal right next to him.”

He then described Monahan as "stepping back with his right foot and looking at him."

That's when the sheriff says the boys confronted Monahan.

“One of them made a comment to him, saying, 'you should be looking at the wall and not at me,' or something like that,” Danker recalled.

That's when investigators say the boys told them that Monahan bolted from the bathroom -- but not before they got a good look at him.

“They observed him, they got a license plate number from the car…and positively identified him as the individual they said was observing them,” Danker said.

Monahan is now being charged with five counts of invasion of privacy -- one for each victim.

The boys also tell investigators they spotted Monahan using the restroom at the track meet 10 or 12 times.

But Monahan says he only used the restroom two or three times and never interacted with the teenagers.