Victim reveals his abuse by priest during confession at Newry school

NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

By Stewart Robson

April 28 2018

A man has told how he was sexually abused as a child by a priest under the guise of him conducting confessions.

In an emotional interview, the victim, who used the name Paul, said he was abused by Father Seamus Reid at St Joseph’s Boys’ High School in Newry.

He said the sustained weekly abuse lasted for more than three years.

Paul, now 68, was only 11 when his ordeal began. He described events on Radio Ulster’s Stephen Nolan Show.

“I remember being sent out to confession in a store room and there were older boys there, and they were pushing us in rather than going in themselves, and I remember very vividly the first time I went in,” he said. “There was bright sunlight streaming through the window and he was sitting with his back to the window, but the glare of the sun made him look like a silhouette to me.”

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