Former Philly Catholic Priest Sentenced For Lying to FBI In Child Sex Case

PHILADELPHIA — A former Philadelphia Catholic priest was given a term of probation by a federal judge this week after he admitted that he lied to FBI agents who questioned him in connection with a child sexual abuse investigation nearly three years ago.

Robert Brennan, 83, who currently resides in Perryville, Maryland, was sentenced to five years of probation, the first two years of which will be served on home confinement with location monitoring, in connection with his guilty plea of lying to the feds during an interview conducted at his home in April 2019.

The sentence was handed down this week by U.S. District Judge Anita B. Brody at the federal courthouse in Philadelphia.

Background can be found here in Patch's previous coverage of the case.

Brennan served in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia from 1993 to 2004 as a priest at Resurrection of Our Lord parish in the Rhawnhurst section of Northeast Philadelphia.

The Philadelphia District Attorney's Office had filed criminal charges against Brennan back in September 2013 alleging that he had sexually abused a minor boy, Sean McIlmail, while Brennan was parish priest at Resurrection, but the case was subsequently dropped after McIlmail died from a drug overdose a month later.

The McIlmail family sued the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and Brennan in November of that year, and the case settled for an undisclosed amount in May 2018, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, which announced sentencing in the federal case this week.

In the spring of 2019, FBI agents descended upon Brennan's Maryland home to question him about McIlmail, during which Brennan made several false statements, according to prosecutors.

It was the perjury during that interview that led to the federal criminal charges of making materially false statements.

"Holding people accountable for their actions, within the confines of the criminal justice process, is a priority for the U.S. Attorney's Office," U.S. Attorney Jennifer Arbittier Williams said in a statement. "With this sentence handed down today, we hope it brings a sense of justice and closure to this case."

Jacqueline Maguire, special agent in charge of the FBI's Philadelphia Division, called lying to the FBI "more than a mistake and beyond a bad choice.

"Doing so poses a direct threat to investigations, prosecutions — our entire system of justice," she said in a statement. "Such ramifications make it a crime for which there have to be some consequences, with violators held appropriately accountable."