PHILADELPHIA -- A judge broke down in tears Friday as she gave probation to a priest who sexually molested a student in the late 1970s. "I can't pretend to any one of you that I know what the right thing to do is," Judge Pamela Dembe said. "Where I get stuck is, I don't know how to balance one very terrible violation against the 30 years that followed."

Behan performed oral sex on the teenager dozens of times from 1978 to 1980, when he taught at Northeast Catholic High School for Boys, prosecutors said.

The statute of limitations has prevented prosecutors from pursuing complaints against dozens of priests in Pennsylvania and many more around the country. In Behan's case, prosecutors successfully argued that the clock stopped running in 1980 when he left the state to take a parish job in North Carolina.

Behan pleaded guilty in February to involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and corruption of minors. He was sentenced to 12 years of probation. Prosecutors sought a prison sentence of 11 to 22 years.

This is cache, read story here