NEW YORK
Oneida Dispatch
By Diane Pineiro-Zucker, dpzucker@freemanonline.com DianeAtFreeman on Twitter
POSTED: 01/29/15
RHINEBECK >> A “credible” sexual abuse allegation dating back 30 years has led to the suspension of the parish priest at Good Shepherd and St. Joseph churches in Northern Dutchess, according to the New York Archdiocese.
Rev. Peter Kihm, 59, was removed by church officials, according to archdiocese spokesman Joseph Zwilling, who said the alleged victim was male and “certainly a minor.”
Kihm, who could not be reached for comment, has denied the allegation, according to the archdiocese.
Zwilling said the archdiocese’s concerns “go back a couple of months” and were being discussed with the Dutchess County District Attorney’s Office, but it was “only in the past couple of weeks that a person came forward, that we were able to take action.”
Dutchess County District Attorney William Grady said he has been assisting state police in investigating the allegation for “a number of months.”
Kihm taught at the Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic High School in Poughkeepsie from 1987 to 1992, but “the incidents alleged did not occur at Our Lady of Lourdes,” Zwilling said. He said, though, that the school has notified its graduates of the allegation.
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