Former Argentine archbishop gets jail term for sexual abuse

BUENOS AIRES - A former Argentine Roman Catholic archbishop was sentenced to eight years in jail for aggravated sexual abuse of a seminarian, the former prelate’s lawyer said Wednesday.

The former seminarian had filed suit against Edgardo Storni, former archbishop of the Argentine city of Santa Fe, in 1993.

Judge Maria Amalia Mascheroni ruled against Storni Dec 23, but the ruling was only made public a week later. The former archbishop was likely to serve the sentence under house arrest, since he was soon to turn 70 and Argentine law allows the benefit of house arrest to convicts above that age.

Storni’s lawyer Eduardo Jauchen was quoted by the Argentine news agency DyN as saying that Storni was considered to have been in charge of the seminarian, which led to aggravated charges.

However, he denounced lack of sufficient evidence to convict his client.

“It cannot be that a person is convicted based on suspicions, rumours or unilateral versions,” the lawyer said.

Jauchen noted that the defendant had appealed the ruling.

The allegations of sexual abuse against then-archbishop Storni became public in 1994, when the Vatican ordered an investigation into the matter. He denied the accusations but stepped down from the position in 2002. A year later, he was formally charged with sexual abuse against a former seminarian.