October 26, 2008
Winnebago County jury to decide fate
by Jennifer K. Woldt • of The Northwestern
A Winnebago County jury will decide next month whether a Catholic priest who sexually assaulted two boys in the 1980s meets the criteria to be classified as a sexually violent person and remain in custody indefinitely.
Father Norbert Maday, 70, the former associate pastor of Our Lady of the Ridge parish in Chicago Ridge, Ill., was convicted of sexually assaulting two altar boys while on a church outing to The Place 2B in 1986. Maday was sentenced to 20 years in prison on two second-degree sexual assault convictions in 1994.
Prosecutors filed a petition to classify Maday as a sexually violent person on Oct. 6, 2007, less than one month before Maday was scheduled to be released from Stanley Correctional Institution.
"He was evaluated by an expert and deemed to meet the criteria for a sexually violent person," said special prosecutor Kevin Greene, who is an assistant district attorney with the Brown County District Attorney's Office. "They must have a mental disorder that predisposes them to acts of sexual violence and they have to be more likely than not to reoffend in the future."
A psychologist performed a psychological evaluation on Maday in September 2007 and determined Maday suffered from several mental disorders, including pedophilia, paraphila and a personality disorder with antisocial and narcissistic features. The evaluation also determined Maday was sexually attracted to adolescent males. These mental disorders "form the underpinnings for his sexual assault in the past and would be predisposing factors in future assaults," according to the petition filed in Winnebago County Circuit Court.
Pedophilia is a disorder where a person has fantasies, urges or behaviors that involve sexual activity with a pre-pubescent child and paraphilia is an impulse disorder that is characterized by recurrent and intense sexual fantasies, urges and behaviors, often involving unusual objects, activities or situations that are not considered sexually arousing to others, according to WebMD.
The diagnosed disorders also cause Maday "serious difficulty" in controlling his behavior, the petition states.
Because Maday declined to be interviewed for the psychological evaluation, the psychologist based his diagnosis on the pre-sentence report prepared in 1994 and institutional social service files complied by the Department of Corrections, the petition states.
A jury is expected to hear expert testimony during the three-day trial that is scheduled to begin Nov. 17. Greene said it is not unusual for these types of cases to go before juries and he said he has asked for a large jury pool to be brought in because of the attention the case has garnered.
If a jury determines Maday should be classified as a sexually violent person, he will be committed to the custody of the state for control, care and treatment in an institution until he is no longer a sexually violent person, according to state statutes.
This article was found at:
http://www.thenorthwestern.com/article/20081026/OSH0101/810260583/1987/OSHopinion
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