Leominster priest abuse trial may be delayed
WORCESTER -- The trial of a former Leominster priest charged with child rape may be delayed again while lawyers review one of the victim's psychiatric records.
The documents include the medical and "psychiatric/psychological" counseling records of alleged sex-abuse victim Heather Mackey of Tewksbury, whose name is being released because she filed a lawsuit against the Rev. Robert Kelley, a priest at St. Cecilia's Parish in Leominster during the 1980s.
"It may cause a further delay," said Kelley's lawyer, Anthony Salerno of Worcester, after a Tuesday hearing to address the documents was continued to Thursday. "I don't know."
"These haven't even been reviewed yet," Salerno said about some of the documents, the specific contents of which he would not reveal but has said may help his client. "I have to see if there's anything in there that's going to lead us to another document. It's almost like a domino effect."
The documents were in the possession of Worcester Diocese attorney James Gavin Reardon Jr., who represented the diocese in a lawsuit brought forward by Mackey and two women from Fitchburg and Leominster in May 2000.
As the wait for the Wednesday pretrial hearing in Worcester Superior Court extended for hours, Kelley, who declined comment, sat quietly in the back seat of a courtroom while two alleged victims sat with their families on the other side.
Superior Court Judge John McCann, who was new to the case this week, conferenced Wednesday with Salerno and prosecutors so he could be updated on the case, Salerno said.
Though the diocese has not defrocked Kelley, the Worcester man has not worked as a priest since child sex-abuse allegations arose in 1985.
In a separate case, Kelley stood trial in 1990 for sexually abusing a young girl at the Sacred Heart Parish in Gardner. He was released in 1996 after serving a sentence of five to seven years in state prison.
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