A Canadian Roman Catholic bishop betrayed little emotion during his
sentencing hearing Thursday as a court was told his laptop contained
hundreds of pornographic images of young boys, including photos of
torture.
Bishop Raymond Lahey, 71, sat quietly, his right hand
trembling slightly as he ran his index finger along his lips and chin,
as Detective Andrew Thompson told the court that almost 600 photos,
mostly of young teen boys, were found on Lahey's laptop and hand-held
device when he arrested in 2009.
"Some of them were quite
graphic," said Thompson. "There were images of nude boys, but there were
also (images of) torture and stuff like that."
Lahey pleaded
guilty in May to importing child pornography in a rare case of a
high-ranking Canadian Church official facing charges over sexual
misconduct.
He waived his bail and was taken into custody even
though he had not been formerly sentenced. His lawyer Michael Edelson
had said Lahey wanted to start serving time now to get credit after
sentencing.
Lahey is scheduled to return to court in December. His
lawyer, Michael Edelson, has asked the judge to reschedule that
appearance for an earlier date.
At the time of his guilty plea,
the Vatican said the church would impose its own disciplinary or penal
measures, but it did not elaborate on what punishment Lahey could face.
Prelates who sexually abuse minors can be defrocked; lesser punishments
include being forbidden from celebrating Mass publicly.
Last year,
in the midst of the clerical abuse scandal, the Vatican made acquiring,
possessing or distributing child pornography one of the most serious
canonical crimes that are handled by the powerful Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith.
Lahey was charged in 2009 with possessing
and importing child pornography after border agents examined his laptop
at an Ontario airport on his return home from London, England.
According
to court documents, Lahey became nervous when a border agent asked him
if he had a laptop and ordered a second inspection when they discovered
his passport contained stamps for Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and
Germany — countries that can be sources of child pornography.
Thompson
told the court some content on Lahey's laptop ranked among the worst he
has seen in scores of investigations into child pornography
allegations.
"They're right up there," he said. "I mean, it doesn't depict infants, but the explicit images of torture are disturbing."
Lahey's
lawyers argued that the bishop may not have seen every image stored on
his laptop's hard drive, since some of the pictures may have come from
pop-up windows he never actually looked at.
They also tried to
make the case that the 588 images of child porn were just a small
fraction of the 155,000 or so photos on his computer.
Lahey resigned as head of the Catholic diocese of Antigonish in Nova Scotia just before the charges became public.
The
case was especially shocking to Canadians because Lahey had overseen a
multimillion dollar settlement for clerical sexual abuse victims in his
diocese only a month earlier.
Barbara Dorris, outreach director of
the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, also known as SNAP,
applauded Canadian authorities for apprehending Lahey and for pursuing
criminal charges against him.
"We urge the magistrate presiding
over this sentencing hearing to give Lahey a stiff sentence and send a
message to pedophile clerics in Canada and abroad that child abuse will
not be tolerated," Dorris said Thursday.