MASSACHUSETTS/ARIZONA
The Republican
By Conor Berry, The Republican
With just one week until Arizona’s Republican presidential primary, a Western Massachusetts native and U.S. congressional candidate has resigned as co-chairman of Mitt Romney’s Arizona campaign.
The resignation of Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu came following allegations he was romantically linked to a Mexican immigrant who claims Babeu threatened him with deportation if he ever publicly revealed their relationship.
Babeu, a former Berkshire County commissioner and North Adams city councilor, parted ways with Romney’s campaign after an alternative weekly magazine reported he allegedly threatened to have his former lover deported if the man refused to sign a non-disclosure agreement to keep their past romance private. …
Known for his hardline stance on illegal immigration and other conservative causes, Babeu was among the Western Massachusetts men who claimed they were sexually assaulted as children by Richard R. Lavigne, a former priest in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield. Babeu also claimed he was sexually assaulted in Vermont by George Paulin, a former Catholic priest from Montague who worked in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington.
Lavigne pleaded guilty in 1992 to molesting two former altar boys. Several years later, the diocese settled lawsuits with 17 alleged sexual abuse victims for $1.4 million. Lavigne was defrocked in 2004 and remains the only publicly identified suspect in the unsolved 1972 murder of Springfield altar boy Daniel Croteau, though Lavigne was never charged with a crime.
In 2003, Babeu agreed to drop his lawsuit against the Burlington diocese after a settlement was reached. The terms of that settlement, including the precise sum of money awarded to Babeu, were not publicly disclosed.
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