Bernie Ward pleaded guilty to a charge of distributing child porn. The plea agreement he signed, quoted in court, contained an admission that he had sent between 15 and 150 pornographic images via e-mail to various people. He was indicted by a grand jury in December and was fired Dec. 31.
A former Catholic priest, Ward initially pleaded not guilty and said he had downloaded a few pornographic images over several weeks as research for a book on hypocrisy among Americans who preach morality in public. Police in Oakdale released transcripts in February of a series of online sex chats between Ward and a dominatrix known online as "Sexfairy" in December 2004 and January 2005. The transcripts quote Ward fantasizing about naked children, most often his own, with no apparent reference to any subject he was researching. Police said he had sent photos to the woman that showed children engaged in sexual activity. The woman turned him in.
Prosecutors are asking for nine years in prison.
Talk about hypocrisy. After the priesthood, Ward worked as a schoolteacher, served as legislative assistant for then-Rep. Barbara Boxer for three years, and was hired by KGO in 1985. As an investigative reporter, he won a national award for a series of stories in the mid-1990s, in partnership with the San Francisco Examiner, that exposed financial and sexual improprieties in the San Francisco Archdiocese.
In December when Bernie pleaded not guilty, his lawyer said, "It's really tragic that the government has decided to prosecute him for a judgment he made as a journalist and to treat him as a child pornographer when he is not." Yeah.
Graphic Police report (from the Smoking Gun). The filthy man speculated about his own children, both male and female, and their friends.
Bernie's unsealed indictment here. As someone commented when Ward was indicted, "There is a God."
Bernie will be sentenced August 28.
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ABC7 reported (May 8, 2008) that complaints about Ward date back to his time in as a priest.
It's the same old story -- Catholic priest gets in trouble for complaints of sexual activity with minors. Only this time, it's Bernie Ward.The I-Team has been able to confirm two sexual misconduct complaints against Ward when he was a priest. [Detailed at the story.]
Ward often discussed his time as a Catholic priest during his weeknight KGO Radio show and his Sunday morning program, "God Talk." However, he never told the complete story of what happened when he was Father Bernie.
Ward's guilty plea brings some comfort to one of his victims. She says it's important for people to know that someone who criticized the Catholic church for so long on the radio had his own complaints of misconduct when he was a priest.
UPDATED September 2 - Ward was sentenced to 7 years in prison. (It's federal sentencing, so no parole.) In addition to being a Catholic priest who was the subject of two sexual misconduct complaints, Ward was a high school teacher and served as legislative assistant for then-Rep. Barbara Boxer for three years.
Ironically, Ward received the Scripps Howard Award for journalism as a result of his ten-part series, Heaven Help Us, which explored allegations of financial and sexual misconduct of the Catholic Church in San Francisco.Ward will be on lifetime supervision after his release.
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