BishopAccountability.org
 
  Inmate Accused in Priest's Killing Alleges He Was Beaten

Associated Press, carried in Boston Herald [Worcester MA]
April 26, 2005

WORCESTER, Mass. - The convicted murderer accused in the jailhouse killing of John Geoghan said Tuesday that he was beaten by prison guards after he was pulled from the former priest's cell.

Joseph Druce, who is already serving a life sentence for another murder, is asking a judge to dismiss the charges that he killed Geoghan, a convicted pedophile, in his cell at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center.

He testified during a hearing in Worcester Superior Court that he has been abused and harassed by officials at the maximum-security prison in Shirley and barred from meeting privately with his lawyers there and at MCI-Cedar Junction, the prison where Druce was transferred in October 2003.

Druce said guards handcuffed and shackled him after he was taken from Geoghan's cell following the Aug. 23, 2003 killing. "They walked me out and around the corner," he said, "and that's when my head was pummeled."

He said the beating resulted in a cracked or broken rib.

Later, prison officials threatened him and wouldn't let him see his lawyer, Druce said. To escape the harassment, he swallowed two pencils, Druce said.

"I knew I could swallow them and that I would be taken to the hospital and I could call my lawyer (from the hospital)," Druce said in one of several rambling responses to questioning by his lawyer, John LaChance.

Department of Correction spokeswoman Diane Wiffin declined to discuss Druce's allegations, saying it was agency policy not to comment on pending cases. On Monday, a prison official testified that Druce wasn't allowed a private visit with his lawyer because that's the prison's policy.

Druce also said that he was being bullied by Capt. William Grossi, a supervisor at Cedar Junction, to admit to killing Geoghan.

"I took it as an immediate threat," Druce said. "I freaked out."

Grossi testified Monday that he never pressured Druce.

The hearing on Druce's motion to dismiss the murder charge was expected to continue on Wednesday. If Judge Timothy Hillman denies the request, LaChance has said his client will likely mount an insanity defense. The trial is tentatively set to begin this fall.

Geoghan was a key figure in the clergy sex abuse scandal that erupted in the Boston Archdiocese in early 2002. The 68-year-old defrocked priest was serving a 10-year sentence for molesting a 10-year-old boy when he was killed.

Druce is already serving a life sentence for the 1988 killing of a man he thought was gay.

Investigators say he jammed shut the door of Geoghan's cell so no one could enter, then beat and strangled him.

Druce allegedly told investigators afterward that he killed Geoghan "to save the children." He now claims that statement was coerced from him by state police in violation of his constitutional rights.