Vatican arrests ex-archbishop, will hold first ever child sex abuse criminal trial

(Image credit: ACI Prensa/Twitter)

last updated 8 January 2015

The Vatican said Tuesday that it has arrested defrocked Polish ex-Archbishop Jozef Wesolowski and will try him on charges of child sexual abuse. Wesolowski, a former Holy See ambassador, is accused of paying street boys for sex acts while serving as papal nuncio in the Dominican Republic. A Vatican cannon law tribunal laicized him in June after finding him guilty of child abuse. This will be the Vatican's first criminal trial for sex abuse.

Wesolowski, 66 and reportedly in poor health, was placed under house arrest rather than in the Vatican's small jail to await his trial. If convicted, he faces up to 12 years in jail — though it's not clear where, since Vatican City doesn't have any long-term holding facility. Both Poland and the Dominican Republic want to put Wesolowski on trial, too. Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi called the arrest and trial "a result of the express desire of the pope, so that a case so serious and delicate would be addressed without delay, with just and necessary rigor."

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.