March 26, 2015
The Pennsylvania Superior Court on Wednesday affirmed Charles Engelhardt’s convictions of endangering the welfare of a child, corruption of a minor, and indecent assault, according to the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office.
Englehardt, a Catholic priest who had been in residence at St. Jerome’s Church in Northeast Philadelphia, plied a 10-year-old altar boy with communion wine, forced the child to disrobe, and then sexually assaulted him in the church sacristy in the late 1990s.
This week, the Pennsylvania Superior Court also affirmed Engelhardt’s co-defendant, Bernard Shero.
Shero was convicted of rape of a child, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child, endangering the welfare of a child, corruption of a minor, and indecent assault.
Shero, a lay teacher at St. Jerome’s, offered the same victim a ride home after school but instead took the boy to a secluded parking lot where he was raped in 2000.
Engelhardt was sentenced to six to 12 years in prison. He died of natural causes while his appeal was pending but, as Pennsylvania Supreme Court case law requires, the appeal continued.
Shero was sentenced to eight to 16 years in prison.
