US bishop arrested after fatal hit-and-run

The Catholic Bishop of Phoenix has been arrested in connection with a hit-and-run death crash after police traced a numberplate to his car and found the windshield smashed.

Bishop Thomas O’Brien, 67, was driven away in an unmarked detective’s car. Police said he would be charged with leaving the scene of a fatal accident.

O’Brien’s lawyer, Jordan Green, said the bishop was taken to hospital, but would not say why. He declined to comment on the arrest.

Diocese spokesman Jose Robles would say only that the bishop “was very exhausted”.

Earlier this month, it was announced that O’Brien had relinquished some of his authority in an unprecedented agreement with prosecutors that spared him from indictment on obstruction charges for protecting child-molesting priests.

In the hit-and-run case, Jim Reed, 43, died after he was struck by two cars while he was crossing a street. Both cars drove off.

Witnesses gave police a partial licence plate number from the first car, which led investigators to the bishop’s car.

In a statement, Monsignor Richard Moyer, the diocese’s chief of staff, said the diocese would cooperate with the investigation.

“I sincerely regret reports I have received about Bishop O’Brien being involved in a fatal accident,” Moyer said. ”The sympathy of all of us in the Diocese of Phoenix as well as our prayerful support goes out to the victim’s family.”

O’Brien has been the spiritual leader of 430,000 Catholics in Arizona since 1981.

In the agreement with prosecutors earlier this month, he admitted that he allowed priests to work with minors after he knew of sexual misconduct allegations against them and he transferred them to ministries without telling their new supervisers.

Under the deal, O’Brien agreed to appoint the church equivalent of a chief of staff to supervise the enforcement of the church’s sexual misconduct policies.