Ex-Priest At Woodbridge Church Admits To Sexually Assaulting Teen

WOODBRIDGE, NJ — The first Catholic priest to be charged in a case filed by the state's newly created Clergy Abuse Task Force, which only formed last September, has now admitted to his crimes.

And the abuse occurred when Father Thomas P. Ganley was a priest at Saint Cecelia Church in Iselin. It happened in the 1990s; his victim was a teenage girl he instructed in the youth ministry at the church.

Ganley, 63, who currently lives in Phillipsburg in western New Jersey, pleaded guilty Monday, April 7 to sexually assaulting a teenage girl in the early 1990s.

Ganley was a priest at Saint Cecelia Church in the Iselin section of Woodbridge when he sexually assaulted the girl, and he had supervisory authority over the victim in his role as head of the Youth Ministry for the parish, according to the state attorney general's office.

The priest admitted that he engaged in sexual acts with the victim when she was 16 or 17 years old.

Ganley was arrested in January of this year, and at the time of his arrest, he was still working as a priest, assigned to Saint Philip & Saint James Church in Phillipsburg. New Jersey’s statute of limitations has been amended for certain sex crimes, and it applied in this case, which allowed Ganley to be prosecuted.

The Clergy Abuse Task Force was formed in September, 2018 and his victim, now an adult woman, called the hotline's number just two days it was published, to allege that Ganley had sexually assaulted her as a teen. That hotline number is 855-363-6548, and it is staffed by trained professionals and operated on a 24/7 basis. More than 480 calls have been received through the hotline to date, according to the attorney general's office.

New Jersey lawmakers are being being aggressive when it comes to helping victims of sexual assault by members of the clergy. Just this spring, the state legislature passed a bill that would extend the statute of limitations to prosecute sex crimes to when the victim is 55, or seven years after they realize their abuse. Many incidents of sex abuse, particularly in a religious setting, occur when the victim is a child, so they may not be able to articulate the crime, or even fully understand what happened. Gov. Murphy indicated he would sign the bill into law.

Officially, Ganley pleaded guilty to second-degree sexual assault. Prosecutors are seeking he be sentenced to four years in prison, and he will be required to register as a sex offender under Megan’s Law. He also will be prohibited from having any contact with the victim and prohibited from having unsupervised contact with children under the age of 18.

He will be sentenced in June. We reported on Ganley when he was first arrested this past January: Woodbridge Priest Charged With Sexually Assaulting Teen In '90s

“Our message today is that we will move swiftly and decisively to secure justice for survivors,” said Attorney General Gurbir Grewal. “Two days after this victim called our hotline, Ganley was arrested. Three months later, he pleaded guilty and faces prison."

Attorney General Grewal formed the New Jersey Clergy Abuse Task Force in response to publication of a report by a Pennsylvania grand jury outlining allegations of sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests against more than 1,000 victims in that state. Those allegations were uncovered in a multi-year investigation led by Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro.

The task force is led by former Acting Essex County Prosecutor Robert D. Laurino, an experienced sex crimes prosecutor.

The New Jersey task force was specifically formed to investigate allegations of sexual abuse by members of the clergy within the Catholic dioceses of New Jersey, as well as any efforts to cover up such abuse. They operate in all 21 counties in New Jersey.