Bishop Michael J. Bransfield Denies Testimony Alleging He Abused Youth
A Roman Catholic bishop from West Virginia denied on Thursday that he had ever sexually abused children, as alleged by a witness in the trial of two other priests here who are accused of abusing children or failing to stop the abuse.
Bishop Michael J. Bransfield of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston issued a statement saying that to hear the “horrific” allegations against him was “unbelievable and shocking.”
Bishop Bransfield, 68, a native of Philadelphia, was formerly a priest in the city’s archdiocese, which grand juries in 2005 and 2011 said had failed to stop the widespread abuse of children by its clergy. He was named the bishop for the West Virginia diocese in 2004.
A man alleging sexual abuse by a member of the clergy testified in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas on Wednesday that Stanley Gana, a former priest in the city, once told him that Bishop Bransfield was having sex with a teenage boy. The conversation occurred when the man was in high school.
The man, who is now 48, described Bishop Bransfield as a “personal friend” of Father Gana’s. He said he had been working on Father Gana’s farm in upstate New York when Bishop Bransfield drove up with several teenage boys in his car.
The witness said he asked Father Gana who was in the car, according to a trial transcript. “He said, ‘Oh, they’re his fair-haired boys.’ ”
Asked by the assistant district attorney Patrick Blessington what Father Gana meant by that, the witness replied, “He said the one that was in the front seat he was having sex with,” according to the transcript.