Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul, facing charges of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl in Minnesota, was asked by the archbishop of Madras to return to the US for investigations.
Roman Catholic priest Rev Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul, facing charges of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl in Minnesota, was today asked by the archbishop of Madras to return to the US for further investigations.
Even as the diocese of Udhagamandalam, Jeyapaul's home diocese, said it is probing the matter, archbishop of Madras Rev Fr M Chinnappa said he had spoken to the bishop of Ootacamund
to take action against the priest.
Jeyapaul is currently staying in the hill station in Tamil Nadu.
"I have asked the bishop of Ooty to comply with the demands of the case. Jeyapaul must return to the US if necessary for further investigations. He has to oblige. There is no way out," Chinnappa said in Chennai.
Prosecutors in Minnesota yesterday said they were trying to get the 55-year-old Jeyapaul extradited.
Jeyapaul has denied the allegations of sexual abuse and is reported to have said that he has no plans to return to the US to face the courts there.
In a statement handed over to reporters, who had gone to meet Jeyapaul in Ooty, bishop Fr Amulraj of the diocese said the matter had been referred to the Catholic Bishops Conference of India (CBCI), the highest Catholic organistaion in India, for necessary direction.
Amulraj earlier said Jeyapaul had gone to meet his advocate in Chennai regarding the cases, which were highlighted by the press.
In the statement, Amulraj said it was true that Jeyapaul was working in the diocese of Crookstone in Minnesota in the US from September 2004 to August 2005.
"Suddenly he had to rush back to India to see his ailing mother and he never returned to the US since then," Amulraj said.
"In the meantime some sexual abuse cases connected to Fr Jeyapaul emerged and we conducted an inquiry into the matter. As the above allegations could not be proved beyond doubt, he was placed under the direct supervision of the bishop.
"Now the same allegations have come to limelight through the press, we are studying the matter in detail," he said.
People in and around Ooty are tightlipped about the presence of Jeyapaul either in the bishop's house or in the Nilgiris, since he was instrumental in providing jobs, including temporary ones, to the poor and needy in 12 schools run by the diocese, a worker in one of the schools, on the condition of anonymity, said.
Father Babu Joseph of the CBCI said, "He [Jeyapaul] will certainly cooperate with the civil authorities [in the US] inquiring into the matter in case there is further need for him to go to the US.
"We are taking the allegations against him [Jeyapaul] seriously," Joseph said. "Already some administrative action has been taken against him.
"He has not been assigned any parish or pastor work. On the contrary he has been asked to stay in the bishop's house and help out in his office work... He has been kept away from children and people."
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