The Rev. Stephen Valenta, a Franciscan friar indicted last April on a sexual assault charge and scheduled to go on trial Monday before 20th District Judge Ed Magre, pleaded no contest and will serve five years unadjudicated probation cloistered in a friary.
Valenta, 86, had pleaded innocent and was scheduled to go on trial before the judge, but proceedings were delayed as his attorneys met with prosecutor Kerry Spears to work out details of a plea agreement.
Valenta was indicted April 16, 2009, by a Milam County grand jury on third-degree felony sexual assault in connection with an incident May 21, 2008, in which a visiting priest at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Rockdale forced a Rockdale woman to perform oral sex in the church rectory.