Convicted Pedophile Priest Paul Shanley to Be Released from Prison

By Tim Caputo
WHDH
July 26, 2017

http://whdh.com/news/convicted-pedophile-priest-paul-shanley-to-be-released-from-prison/

After more than a decade behind bars, convicted pedophile priest Paul Shanley will be released from prison this week, according attorney Mitchell Garabedian’s office.

Garabedian, who represented Shanley’s victims, told 7News that he will be released on Friday. A press conference announcing the news will be held Wednesday at 11:30 a.m.

Shanley, who was one of the central figures in Boston’s clergy sex abuse scandal, was convicted in 2005 of two counts of rape of a child and two counts of indecent assault and battery on a child. The Middlesex District Attorney’s Office originally pushed for life in prison, but Shanley was sentenced to 12-15 years in prison.

Shanley, now 86, repeatedly raped and fondled a boy at a Newton parish in the 1980s. Shanley was known in the 1960s and ’70s as a priest who helped troubled children.

District Attorney Marian Ryan confirmed Tuesday that Shanley would be released. Ryan said her office hired psychiatric experts to evaluate Shanley to see if he could continue to be held after completing his sentence. Both experts said he doesn’t meet the legal criteria for civil confinement as a sexually dangerous person.

Shanley will be monitored by the probation department for the next 10 years and has been ordered to have no contact with children under 16 years of age, Ryan’s office said.