PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Newsworks
BY AARON MOSELLE
The Philadelphia Courts website still lists Tuesday as the start of Monsignor William Lynn’s retrial, but an unresolved defense appeal means the former church official won’t face another jury for months, perhaps not until 2018.
Lynn, currently a free man, was convicted in 2012 of recommending the Archdiocese of Philadelphia transfer a known pedophile priest.
Much of Lynn’s three-month trial focused on clergy sex abuse allegedly committed by 21 priests over several decades. Some examples dated back to the 1940s — well before Lynn was a supervisor with the archdiocese.
Common Pleas Court Judge Gwendolyn Bright, who is presiding over the case, has ruled that Lynn’s next trial will spend far less time on these “prior bad acts.”
In late April, Bright ruled that prosecutors could detail allegations against three priests, according to court documents. Lynn’s lawyer then filed an appeal to the Superior Court of Pennsylvania.
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