NEW YORK
27 East
By Alexa Gorman Oct 1, 2014
A former priest wanted by police after he was accused of sexually abusing a 6-year-old Hampton Bays girl has been on the lam since the end of June, when he was questioned by Southampton Town Police and released from their custody.
The family of the victim, who is not being identified by authorities, contacted Town Police on June 28 after they suspected that longtime family friend Augusto Cortez—whose last known address was on Staten Island, although he also owns the Norbury Road home where the victim and her family have been staying in Hampton Bays—had sexually abused the girl, possibly on more than one occasion.
On June 28, a member of the victim’s family told authorities that she observed Mr. Cortez, a former Catholic priest of the Vincentian Congregation, adjusting his pants after being left alone in the room with the child during a family party at her Hampton Bays home, according to Southampton Town Detective Sergeant Lisa Costa.
He was brought in the next day, questioned by detectives and later released because they did not have enough evidence to charge him with a crime, even though they were aware that he was already on probation for inappropriately touching a 12-year-old girl at a Catholic school in Bushwick, Brooklyn, in 2008. He was kicked out of the priesthood at that time.
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