23.10.09
A New Jersey priest was found murdered in the rectory when he didn’t show up to morning Mass on Friday – and investigators said he may have been too generous for his own good.
Authorities in Chatham did not release any details about how the Rev. Ed Hinds was killed but said the 61-year-old clergyman had wounds “consistent with a homicide.”
A deacon and a maintenance man found the pastor’s body shortly after 8 a.m. in the kitchen of St. Patrick’s Church rectory, about 10 miles west of Newark .
“He had his black clerical outfit on. He was supposed to say mass at 8 o’clock. That alerted one member who went looking and found him in the rectory,” said Morris County Prosecutor Robert Bianchi.
The prosecutor offered a possible motive for the crime.
“The fact is that this was a community leader whose arms were wide open to downtrodden. Maybe one of those individuals was involved,” he said.
“That kind of generosity is preyed upon.”
Hinds was last seen alive at 11 p.m. Thursday, the same night a community public safety meeting was held at the rectory. “He was fine,” Bianchi said.
Relatives of the priest left the rectory in tears Friday afternoon.
“Why? Why?” one older woman sobbed as she was escorted out.
Father Owen Moran , who will be replacing Hinds at Mass this weekend, said the parish is devastated by the loss of the pastor, who had been at St. Patrick’s for seven years.
“Everyone who knew Father Ed loved him,” Moran said.
A little boy came up to Moran with tears in his eyes.
“Father, who will be our priest now?” he asked. “God will decide, my dear child,” he replied.
Lonnie Atkinson