Diocese of Richmond makes arrangements

About 15 months ago, a lay minister at St. Nicholas Catholic Church was arrested and accused of trying to solicit sex from an undercover police officer – an adult male – in Red Wing Park.

Terrell L. Mailhiot, 56, minister of justice and peace at St. Nicholas, pleaded not guilty, but in May, he was found guilty of criminal solicitation, a felony.

Before Mailhiot’s sentencing, the Catholic Diocese of Richmond sent a letter to the judge presiding over his case. In that letter, the diocese said Mailhiot could keep his job if he were convicted of a misdemeanor and if the case did not become “public knowledge.”

Last month, Mailhiot received a suspended one-year prison sentence and a $785 fine. The church suspended Mailhiot from his job, according to the diocese’s attorney. Mailhiot appealed the conviction Monday.

A Richmond attorney who represents the diocese said the letter to Circuit Judge Patricia L. West expressed a standard business practice.

In the letter, the diocese’s human resources director, Dorothy G. Mahanes, said the question of whether Mailhiot kept his job depended, in part, on how much the public learned about the case.

“Mr. Mailhiot’s continued employment will contain strict terms relating to any future violations, and also will include language relating to any increase in public knowledge of the incident,” the letter said.