UNITED STATES
BishopAccountability.org
Summary of Case: A Josephite priest ordained in 1959, Salisbury was a college chaplain, teacher, and Alderian psychologist in Houston for many years. He served on the Galveston-Houston diocese’s Priests Senate and chaired continuing education for priests. He was transferred in 1979 to Washington D.C., where he was a counselor at St. Joseph’s Seminary, and in 1983 he was moved to a parish in the Mobile AL diocese. After two years he was back in D.C., where he was in residence at two parishes, consecutively.
Along the way, Rev. Salisbury was twice convicted of child sexual abuse and accused at least one other time. In 1978 he was charged with indecency with a child; convicted in June 1979 after pleading ‘no contest,’ he was given three-years’ probation. Per news reports, Salisbury was also accused of child molestation in Alabama. It wasn’t until he molested a boy in his Washington D.C. rectory in 1993 that Salisbury was removed from ministry. In that case, he pleaded guilty and was given a one year prison sentence, suspended, and a year of probation. The Josephites sent him to treatment and prohibited him from presenting himself as a priest.
In approximately the mid-1990s, Salisbury relocated to his native Bar Harbor ME. He served for many years on the town’s housing authority board, but resigned under duress in 2010 after his criminal convictions came to light. He had been listed as “Father” W. Dayton Salisbury on the housing authority’s web page.
Ordained: June 6, 1959
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