‘NUMEROUS TIMES’

New Hampshire Bishop Accused of Sexually Abusing Boy in 1980s

The bishop of the Diocese of Manchester allegedly fondled the genitals of an altar boy while the child was preparing for mass.

A civil lawsuit filed this week accuses the head of a New Hampshire Catholic diocese of groping an altar boy “numerous times” in the early 1980s. Peter Anthony Libasci, bishop of the Diocese of Manchester, allegedly fondled the genitals of a boy when he was 12 in 1983, and 13 in 1984. On one occasion, the bishop, who was a priest at St. Cyril and Methodius Roman Catholic Church in Deer Park, New York at the time, allegedly molested the boy as the latter prepared the altar for mass. The lawsuit names the priest, the church, and an organization that operated the boy’s school as defendants, alleging they should have known about the abuse.