Priest pleads guilty to abusing 47 girls

From the Windsor Star Aug. 3

A retired Roman Catholic priest, who lives in Belle River, Ontario, has pleaded guilty to sexually abusing 47 girls over a span of 34 years during his service in parishes from Windsor to London.

Many of the victims, now all women, were in a packed Chatham courtroom Thursday morning when Charles Henry Sylvestre, 83, entered his guilty pleas to 47 charges of indecent assault.

Several observers in the courtroom, including family members of the victims, wept as the court clerk read out the charges and Sylvestre responded in a calm, quiet voice.

The women ranged in age from nine to 14 years old at the time the assaults took place in parishes in Windsor, Chatham, Pain Court, Sarnia and London between 1952 and 1986.