Retired priest gets prison for sex abuse

• Tweet

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla., Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Retired Catholic priest Neil Doherty, an accused serial child rapist who pleaded no contest in one case, was sentenced in Florida Monday to 15 years in prison.

Doherty, 69, pleaded no contest Jan. 14 to six charges of lewd and lascivious acts upon a child for alleged assaults committed in the 1990s on a man now 26 years old, The Miami Herald reported.

The sentence came under terms of a plea bargain reached with Broward County prosecutors. Circuit Court Judge Kenneth Gillespie accepted the plea deal.

In pleading no contest, Doherty maintains his innocence and avoids a trial but assumes the penalty of a conviction. He must also register as a sex offender, the newspaper noted.