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Priest admits abusing Foley
19/10/2006 17:33 - (SA)
Miami - A Roman Catholic priest has admitted he once had an intimate relationship with Mark Foley when the now disgraced Republican lawmaker was a teenage altar boy, a Florida daily reported on Thursday.
The revelation came amid an explosive scandal over revelations that Foley had sent sexually suggestive messages to teenage congressional aides. Foley resigned last month, and his lawyer said the prominent Republican was an alcoholic, gay and had been molested as a boy by a priest.
Roman Catholic priest Anthony Mercieca, 72, admitted he had a series of encounters with Foley that might be perceived as sexually inappropriate, according to the Sarasota Herald Tribune.
Mercieca told the newspaper he taught Foley "some wrong things" related to sex, though he wouldn't specify what he meant.
He said he had massaged Foley while the boy was naked, skinny-dipping with him at a secluded lake and being naked in the same room on overnight trips.
He mentioned one incident he said he couldn't clearly remember, which might have gone too far.
"I have to confess, I was going through a nervous breakdown," he said. "I was taking pills - tranquilisers. "I used to take them all the time. They affected my mind a little bit."
The daily said sources close to the former lawmaker's family confirmed Mercieca was the priest who allegedly abused Foley at the Sacred Heart Church in Lake Worth, Florida when Foley was 12 or 13. 'Loved each other like brothers'
Mercieca told the Herald-Tribune that after he moved from Brazil to Florida in 1966, he and Foley became fast friends and "loved each other like brothers".
He said he didn't understand why Foley had decided to come forward after almost 40 years, wondering if he was looking for a scapegoat.
"Why does he want to destroy me in my old age?" Mercieca said. Foley's lawyer had said he would soon name the priest who had abused the former lawmaker.
Mercieca, who now lives on the Maltese island of Gozo, said that, at the time, he considered his relationship with Foley innocent but now realised his actions could be labelled inappropriate, the paper said.
Republican leaders of congress have been accused of not taking appropriate action or even hiding what they knew of the scandal, which has dominated US politics since it broke in late September.
The widening scandal has increased pressure on the Republicans as they risk losing control of the house of representatives for the first time since 1994 heading into mid-term elections on November 7.
Probes have been launched by the US justice department, a congressional ethics committee and Florida state authorities.
- AFP
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