Priest searched online for sexual images of children, according to police report

MINNESOTA
Minnesota Public Radio

[with audio]

Madeleine Baran St. Paul, Minn. Feb 25, 2014

Feb 26, 2014

Documents released Tuesday by the St. Paul police department in a closed investigation show that the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis knew in 2004 that a priest had searched online for sexual images of children.

The police file of the investigation into alleged child pornography on the computer of the Rev. Jon Shelley includes a 2004 report from a private forensic examiner who reviewed the images on Shelley’s computer. It found that Shelley had searched the Internet for the terms “free naked boy pictures,” “blond boys sucking pics” and “preteen.” The examiner wrote the report for the archdiocese’s private investigator, who gave it to the chancery in 2004, according to the police file.

The archdiocese kept Shelley in ministry despite the report’s finding.

A spokesman for archdiocese declined to comment on why Shelley remained in ministry after church leaders learned he looked for pornographic images of minors. Shelley’s attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

MPR News reported in October of last year that top church officials debated for months in internal memos whether the images from Shelley’s computer could be considered child pornography and concluded that they didn’t need to call police.

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