A Roman Catholic priest allegedly smuggled drugs into the Oregon State Correctional Institution and had a sexual relationship with an inmate while working as a prison chaplain.Thomas Ha, 39, testified Thursday that over a period of years, he and the Rev. Michael Sprauer engaged in multiple sex acts in a prison chapel bathroom.
Additionally, Ha said Sprauer smuggled cocaine, marijuana and tobacco into the medium-security prison for him.
"He said he loved me and would take care of me," Ha said, the Statesman Journal of Salem reported.
The allegations surfaced in testimony Ha gave in a civil trial against the priest, stemming from allegations that Sprauer sexually abused three men while they were minors incarcerated in the 1970s at the MacLaren School for Boys at Woodburn.
After settling with the Archdiocese of Portland, Robert Paul Jr., Randy Sloan and Norman Klettke Jr. are all now suing the priest for allegedly luring them into mutual masturbation and oral sex, mostly, they say, while they were in isolation cells.
In all, at least 15 men claim Sprauer sexually abused them at the youth detention center, according to the Statesman Journal.
Marion County Circuit Judge Marshall Amiton said that he would not allow Ha to testify in front of the jury, ruling that allegations of consensual sex are much different from the sex-abuse allegations that Sprauer faces in the civil trial.
Sprauer, listed as the parochial vicar at St. Joseph Parish in Salem, has denied the charges
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