LOUISIANA
KATC
By Tina Macias
A retired priest is being investigated over decades-old allegations of sexual abuse during his time in Lafayette Parish, according to the Youngsville Police Department.
Roy Lee Touchet, 65, of New Jersey is accusing Gerard Smit, 91, of Newark, Delaware, of abusing him in the 1960s when Touchet was an alter boy. The Youngsville Police Department is in the beginning stages of the investigation, said Chief Rickey Boudreaux.
Smit worked for St. Anne in Youngsville and St. Joseph in Milton in the early 1960s. He’s listed as a former assistant pastor of St. Anne on the St. Joseph website.
In 2006, he was among several priests named by the Diocese of Wilmington as a priest with “substantiated allegations of sexual abuse, molestation and rape of minors” on the Diocese of Wilmington website. It’s noted that his allegations came while working in another diocese.
Smit served in Wilmington from 1987-1996, but spent the majority of his career in South Louisiana, working for the Diocese of Lafayette and a new Diocese that was carved out of the Diocese of Lafayette in 1980 — the Diocese of Lake Charles.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.