PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer
Allison Steele, Inquirer Staff Writer
Posted: Tuesday, January 15, 2013
The trial of a priest and a former teacher charged with sexually assaulting a 10-year-old altar boy at a Northeast Philadelphia parish opened Monday with prosecutors portraying the men as predators who turned a happy-go-lucky honors student into a despondent teenager who was expelled from school, attempted suicide, and turned to drugs.
Defense attorneys questioned the credibility of the accuser, saying he had told many different versions of the abuse since reporting it in 2009. They described him as a “damaged” man whose personality shift was the result of drug addiction.
Defense attorney Michael McGovern, who represents the Rev. Charles Engelhardt, also spoke of a “presumption of guilt” that now exists in regard to Catholic priests.
“People look at a Roman collar and they see a bull’s-eye,” McGovern said Monday in his opening statement before Common Pleas Court Judge Ellen Ceisler.
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