A 93-year-old former Catholic priest sentenced to life in prison earlier this month for raping a teenage boy has died, Louisiana authorities and his lawyer confirmed Friday.
Less than two weeks after being sentenced to spend the remaining of his life behind bars, Lawrence Hecker died of natural causes at 3 a.m. Thursday on the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center, in accordance with Ken Pastorick, Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections communications director.
Hecker had pleaded guilty to charges including first-degree rape and aggravated kidnapping shortly before jury selection for his long-delayed trial had been scheduled to start earlier this month, with other victims prepared to testify against him.
The survivor of the assault to which Hecker pleaded guilty had said that Hecker raped him after offering to instruct him in wrestling moves ahead of tryouts for a faculty team within the mid-Seventies.
“The only prayer I can give you I hope he spends eternity in hell after God’s judgment of him,” the survivor said in a written statement provided by his attorney, Richard Trahant.
“Now after his death I feel vindicated and free,” he said.
The Associated Press doesn’t discover those that say they’ve been sexually assaulted.
Hecker’s trial had been delayed for months partly due to questions around his mental competency. Hecker had suffered from dementia, his lawyer Bobby Hjortsberg said.
Hecker had been ordained as an archdiocesan priest in 1958 and remained on this position even after facing an undisputed grievance of kid molestation within the late Eighties, in accordance with court records. Hecker left the ministry in 2002.
Hecker’s conviction occurred amid a wave of sexual abuse allegations against the Catholic church in New Orleans, many resurfacing from many years ago. The fallout has left the Archdiocese of New Orleans embroiled in bankruptcy negotiations.
