Drug baron Catholic priest sentenced to prison
To whom do you confess when you are already the bishop?
In the case of Monsignor Kevin Wallin, the only option appeared to be the police and then a judge.
Wailin – or Monsignor Meth, as he has become known – will spend the next three years in prison after falling on hard times and becoming the kingpin of a methamphetamine racket which spanned multiple US states.
He also purchased a sex shop, Land of Oz & Dorothy's Place, to launder the profits from his underground operation.
The suspended Catholic priest apologised on Thursday for running the distribution ring and letting down scores of friends and parishioners.
"I have never from the day I was arrested denied my guilt," the 63-year-old said at his sentencing in U.S. District Court in Hartford, Connecticut.
"The day I was arrested was a very good day. It took me out of that situation."
Most drug dealers found guilty of running methamphetamine operations spend about a decade in prison, however, the judge said the public outpouring of support for Wailin had been unlike anything he had ever seen.
"For you, sir, this is an unhappy day," he told Wallin.
"It's a little like attending your own funeral, your own wake.”
Wailin was sentenced to five-and-a-half years in prison but has already served 28 months of his sentece.
Wallin's public defender, Kelly Barrett, said her client "put all his efforts in helping others" while neglecting himself. She called for leniency because Wallin has no criminal history and likely wouldn't return to crime.
Barrett also said Wallin was coping with financially tough times at the parish at the start of the recession in 2008.
"He was floundering and overwhelmed," she said.
"The man who had given help to others was unable to accept help."
Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Caruso told the judge that Wallin "abandoned his priestly life" and became a meth addict, associating with other meth users.
He acknowledged Wallin's service as a priest and his charitable work and said he's "genuinely remorseful."
But Wallin, who worked in Bridgeport and Danbury, was the "most culpable" as head of the meth ring, the prosecutor said.
"He turned his apartment into a meth den for people to buy meth, to use meth," he said.
"The public didn't know how he became a stone-cold drug dealer."
A psychiatrist who works with drug addicts, a church colleague of Wallin's and several others asked Covello for leniency.
"We try to judge wisely and justly," Monsignor Andrew Varga of Westport told the judge.
"His human failings got in the way of his better judgment. We ask you to judge wisely and justly."
News break - May 8
