Priest admits naked encounters with politician

AN ELDERLY priest yesterday acknowledged he was naked in saunas with former US congressman Mark Foley decades ago when the latter was a boy in Florida, but denied the two had sex.

The Rev Anthony Mercieca, 72, speaking by phone from his home on the Maltese island of Gozo, said a report in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune about their encounters was “exaggerated.”

“We were friends and trusted each other as brothers and loved each other as brothers,” Mercieca said. Asked if their relationship was sexual in nature, the priest replied: “It wasn’t.”