Patrick Joseph McCabe,
77, who fought his extradition from the Bay Area, pleaded guilty and was
sentenced Friday at the Central Criminal Court in Dublin.
McCabe also received an 18-month sentence at the court last year for abusing boys.
The
former priest was working as an administrator at an Alameda nursing
home when Interpol located him in 2007. He was extradited in 2011.
One
of his victims, James Moran, now 50, said McCabe "changed the path of
my life forever" in a statement he prepared for Irish authorities as
part of the prosecution.
"For
me, it was a turning point; initially I was shocked, confused and
nervous," said Moran, who waived his right to anonymity following
Friday's sentencing. "I didn't know who to trust. I couldn't concentrate
on anything."
McCabe
targeted Moran in 1976 at an Irish boarding school after he saw his
photo while visiting Moran's family and thought the youth attractive.
Another boy was abused in the parochial house of the Pro-Cathedral in Dublin, according to investigators.
"We
are glad that Fr. Patrick McCabe has received prison time for abusing
two 13-year-old boys in the 1970s," said Barbara Dorris of the Survivors
Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP. "We are especially
grateful that McCabe was not let off the hook because of his advanced
age. Children are always safer when predators are behind bars, whether
that predator is 20 or 80."
According to a 2009 Irish
government report on sexual abuse within the Catholic Church, officials
in the Dublin Archdiocese moved priests such as McCabe to the United
States and other locations after they became aware of complaints against
them.
Four former
parishioners sued the Santa Rosa Catholic diocese in 2010, accusing it
of fraud and negligence for failing to disclose sex-abuse claims against
McCabe dating from 1973 to 1981 in the Dublin archdiocese.
The
men allege they were molested by McCabe at St. Bernard Parish in Eureka
from 1983 to 1985. Three settled their lawsuit against church officials
last year for $550,000.
A fourth man rewrote his lawsuit in an attempt
to avoid being timed out by the statute of limitations.
McCabe
came to the Santa Rosa Diocese in 1983, months after he had been
designated as a pedophile and placed on a drug to curb his sexual
impulses at a church treatment facility in New Mexico.
His transfer was
arranged by former Dublin Archbishop Dermot Ryan and former Santa Rosa
Bishop Mark Hurley, according to an official report by the Dublin
Archdiocese on more than 40 priests involved in sexual misconduct in
Ireland.
McCabe was initially sent to Eureka, but transferred to a
Guerneville parish in 1985 after parents complained he put children on
his knee during first confessions.
The Dublin report says McCabe returned to Ireland in 1986 and three months later was accused of abusing a 9-year-old boy.