Ex-Coventry and Cheadle priest faces sex abuse charges

A Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing four boys has appeared before magistrates.



Alexander Bede Walsh, 57, is charged with 17 counts of indecent assault and two counts of serious sexual offences against boys in the 1980s and 1990s.

During that period he was serving as a priest in Coventry and the Cheadle area of north Staffordshire.

Fenton magistrates bailed Mr Walsh, of Abbotts Bromley, to appear at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court on Monday.

Walsh has a previous conviction for viewing child porn which cannot be mentioned in court.

Monday, 17 January, 2005

Alexander Bede Walsh, 51, who served in Oxfordshire, was spotted on a train by a fellow passenger looking at indecent images on his laptop in March 2003.

Walsh, of Cheadle, Staffordshire, later resigned from his post at St John the Evangelist Church in Banbury.

He received a two-year community rehabilitation order at Oxford Crown Court on Monday.

Sentencing Walsh, Judge Julian Hall credited him as an "intelligent" and "thoughtful" man, adding: "Your offending lies right at the bottom end of the scale.

"It is the more shocking because of your position, but that is not a reason for a more severe punishment."