Priest who sparked calls for Vatican probe hit with new charges over threesome on altar

Higher charges were filed by a district attorney almost a year after the alleged act

Travis Clark, a former priest at Saints Peter and Paul Catholic Church in Pearl River, Louisiana (St. Tammany Parish Sheriff’s Office )

A former Catholic priest accused of performing sexual acts on an altar in Pearl River, Louisiana, has been charged with a higher offence of obscenity for the September 2020 encounter, according to a report.

Travis John Clark, aged 38, was a pastor at Saints Peter and Paul Catholic Church when he allegedly had a threesome on the altar with Mindy Lynn Dixon, 42, and Melissa Kamon Cheng, 29, who were wearing corsets and high heels.

Mr Clark, Ms Dixon and Ms Cheng were charged with obscenity by St Tammy Parish Sheriffs Office in Pearl River, before a district attorney dropped the charges in favour of institutional vandalism, a lesser charge, in March 2021.

All three pleaded not guilty to charges of "knowingly vandalising, defacing, or otherwise damaging property and causing damage valued at over $500 and under $50,000” in court. The scandal, at the same time, led to calls for an investigation at the Vatican.

As The New Orleans Advocate reported on Thursday, a district attorney filed a superseding bill of information against the former priest, Ms Dixon and Ms Cheng for obscenity — the charged originally filed by Pearl River police — on 27 August.

A re-arraignment is scheduled for 13 October in front of 22nd Judicial District Judge Ellen Creel, according to The Advocate, with the trio facing a three-year jail sentence if found guilty.

All three were allegedly witnessed by a passerby who recorded the sexual encounter and police later found stage lights, sex toys and a phone mounted on a tripod at the altar. All the items were removed as evidence.

Police also claimed in court filings that the altar was visible through the church’s windows and glass doors — which has been been disputed by an attorney for Mr Clark. In Louisiana, a charge of obscenity refers to a sexual act in any “place open to the public view”.

Attorney Bradley Phillips told The Advocate after arrests were made last year a vandalism charge was a "thinly-veiled attempt to regulate the morality of private individuals”, and that the sexual encounter was legal because it was private, and not in public.

The Independent has approached Mr Philips for comment. The district attorney, meanwhile, refused to comment.