Philadelphia trial of priest, ex-teacher postponed

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - September 4, 2012 (WPVI) -- The Philadelphia rape trial of a Roman Catholic priest and a former Catholic school teacher has been postponed after a lawyer in the case had a death in the family.

The Rev. Charles Engelhardt and Bernard Shero are due back in court Friday to get a new trial date.

Their case has been severed from the high-profile trial earlier this year of a church official charged over his handling of abuse complaints. The Rev. William Lynn is appealing his landmark child-endangerment conviction while starting a three- to six-year prison term.

Engelhardt and Shero have pleaded not guilty to sexually assaulting a former altar boy at a Northeast Philadelphia parish in the 1990s.

Their accuser, a troubled 24-year-old policeman's son, is expected to be the key trial witness.

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