Abuse victim decries accused priest's Missouri treatment

ST. LOUIS (AP) -- A former Nevada priest who abused teenage boys is being treated at a Missouri center close to the home of one of his victims, prompting that man's call Friday for the one-time clergyman to be relocated.

"Why do I have to pay again and again and again?" the 21-year-old man said, requesting that he not be publicly identified. Mark Roberts "can go somewhere else.

"I've made a home now and I'm starting to get my life back together."

The victim's father called Roberts' Missouri presence "mentally cruel to my son."

Roberts, 53, was removed from his position as pastor at St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Church in Henderson, Nev., in February 2002 and pleaded guilty in January 2003 to lewdness and child abuse involving five teens. He was sentenced four months later to three years of probation.

Authorities said Roberts subjected the boys to strange sexual rituals.

Last month, Clark County (Nev.) District Judge Donald Mosley took Roberts off formal probation and allowed him to move to a treatment center for priests about 40 miles southwest of St. Louis.

Mosley tried to place Roberts there last year, but Missouri probation-and-parole officials refused that after groups protested that Roberts would be living too close to the victim who spoke out Friday. That victim has moved to the St. Louis area.

Since then, Mosley said officials with the Nevada Division of Parole and Probation have been unable to find a treatment center in a state willing to supervise Roberts while he served three years' probation for abusing five southern Nevada boys.

Mosley said he would monitor Roberts' progress with updates from the Missouri center, and that if Roberts behaves inappropriately "it is understood I can extradite him immediately."

Raymond Burke, St. Louis' archbishop, said Friday "the whole question revolves around the security of the (center) and the monitoring that takes place there."

When it comes to those being treated there, Burke said, "the whole point is are they so monitored and is the situation sufficiently protective that they can't go out to commit these crimes."

Burke declined further comment about the Roberts case, saying he needed to know more details.