PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Newsworks
BY AARON MOSELLE
Monsignor William Lynn, the first American Catholic Church official to be convicted of covering up clergy sex abuse of children, will be in court Thursday morning with hopes of avoiding a new trial that is currently scheduled for May.
Lynn, 65, was released from prison in August after the Pennsylvania Supreme Court vacated his 2012 conviction. The high court affirmed that jurors were “prejudiced” by hearing hours of evidence about abuse unrelated to Lynn’s actions as a supervisor with the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.
During Lynn’s three-month trial, prosecutors presented 21 examples of the Philadelphia archdiocese covering up child sex abuse, some dating back to the 1940s, long before Lynn was in charge of assigning priests.
At the time of his release, Lynn had served nearly three years of a 3-6 year sentence and was slated for parole.
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