Abominations

Convicted Gay Priest Goes on Trial Again

FLEMINGTON -- A man claiming he was sexually abused as a child by a priest in Hunterdon County was silent for almost a decade before he came forward, a prosecutor told a jury Tuesday. "He felt he couldn't face it. He couldn't talk about it," Assistant Prosecutor Dawn Solari said in her opening statement at the latest trial of John M. Banko, the now-former pastor of a Milford parish. Banko, 62, who is serving a 15-year sentence on a 2002 child sex abuse conviction, is now being tried for allegedly abusing another person. Solari opened her statement Tuesday by describing how the man, now 23 years old and living outside New Jersey, buried the abuse he allegedly suffered at ages 9 and 10 while attending religious instruction at St. Edward's Roman Catholic Church. He accused Banko of secretly molesting him on numerous occasions in a church bathroom between September 1994 and May 1995, Solari said.
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Posted by Editor at May 8, 2008 12:14 PM