IRONDALE (AL)
National Catholic Register
December 14, 2018
By Peter Jesserer Smith
Standing at a payphone in Rome, calling his wife in tears, was not how the newly ordained Catholic deacon planned to end a 10-day pilgrimage in Rome.
On a misty night in February 2006, Deacon Mark King called his wife, Susan, to explain he had just escaped a drunken sexual attack from their pastor, who had subjected him to days of sexual harassment and unwanted sexual advances, at a restaurant.
Upon his return to the United States, Deacon King and his wife met with diocesan officials the next morning, where chancery officials prepared his statement, witnessed by the diocesan investigator and notarized by the chancellor of the diocese, documenting the aggressive sexual harassment, sexual advances and propositioning he had received from Father Greg Mullaney, then-pastor of Sacred Heart Church in Groton, Connecticut, during that trip.
Speaking to the Register more than 12 years later, Deacon King said he was very concerned that he might not be the only person targeted by the priest for sex. According to the deacon’s statement, the priest had made many immoral, suggestive and sexually disparaging comments about fellow clergy and laity, including parish employees.
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