Priest Arrested After Overdose At ‘Gay Sex Party’

A Polish priest has received an 18-month jail term for offences relating to sex and drugs, the New York Post reports. Father Tomasz Zmarzły of Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary of the Angels was prosecuted after a man overdosed during a gay sex party at the priest’s parish residence. 

According to Reuters, a man collapsed unconscious at the party after taking too many erectile dysfunction pills. One of the attendees insisted on calling an ambulance for the man, but Father Zmarzły refused to let the paramedics into the house. The ambulance crew were only able to gain entry after police arrived on the scene. The man was taken to hospital and later discharged.

Initially identified as a sex worker, the victim’s status was later corrected by prosecutors, according to Reuters. While some reports say the man was “severely mutilated in the lower body”, other reports do not mention any injury and the priest was not prosecuted for assault.

Last Tuesday, Tomasz Zmarzły was sentenced for sexual offences, the supply of drugs and failing to provide assistance to a person in danger of loss of life or serious bodily harm.

He was also ordered to pay the victim 15,000 złoty (AUD $5750) in damages to the victim, and several thousand zlotys to a fund for victims of crime.

Arrest is “attack on the church” says Zmarzly

The Guardian and LGBTQNation report that Father Zmarzły denied preventing paramedics attending to the unconscious man, and that he perceived the charges “as an obvious attack on the church, including the clergy and the faithful, in order to humiliate its position, tasks and mission.

“If something similar had happened to a little-known person, with a different profession, not media or clergy, there would be no issue at all,” he said.

More sexual crimes in diocese

This is not the first sexual crime to be reported in the diocese.

In March 2023, the corpse of a 26-year-old deacon was found with injuries suggesting homicide. Local prosecutors said he had been killed by a 40-year-old priest who then committed suicide. Prosecutors said the two had been in a conflictual relationship for some time and that the priest had sent the deacon threatening messages, PAP reported. 

In March 2023, a 26-year-old deacon was discovered dead, with injuries suggesting murder. The Guardian reports he was killed by a 40-year-old priest, with whom he had a troubled relationship. The priest later committed suicide.

In 2010, the then-acting rector of the Sosnowiec seminary was involved in an altercation at a gay club. Despite media coverage, he retained his position for over a year until the Holy See intervened, closing down the seminary.The bishop responsible for the diocese, Grzegorz Kaszak, resigned in October last year. He did not give a reason for his sudden resignation, but asked “everyone to forgive my human limitations.”