The 62-year-old former priest arrested Monday on decades-old sex abuse allegations can be released from jail as he awaits trial, a Baltimore County judge ruled Tuesday.

In her ruling, District Judge Krystin D. Richardson noted that she was “concerned about the nature of the allegations” against William Mannion Jr., who is accused of sexually abusing a student at St. Agnes School while working as a priest for the Catonsville parish.

But Richardson said her main concern — the Sparrows Point resident having contact with minors — had been alleviated during Tuesday’s bail review.

The former priest, now a psychiatric nurse at Johns Hopkins Bayview, has “zero” patients who are children, and there are no minors who frequent his home, Mannion’s defense attorney, Charles Waechter, said at Tuesday’s hearing.

The judge ordered him to be held without bail, but allowed him to be released on home detention through the Baltimore County Detention Center. Mannion is barred from having any contact with minors as he awaits trial.

Mannion is accused of sexually abusing a young altar server at the school in the early 1990s, around the same time he assisted in bringing one of the Baltimore Catholic community’s most infamous child abusers to justice.

The man told detectives that Mannion, known at the parish as “Father Bill,” performed sex acts on him in the monastery, according to charging papers. The former priest is accused of abusing the boy for several years, starting in the second grade.

Mannion played Christian rock music and integrated puppets from his religious education classes into the abuse, the man told investigators. Mannion told the boy that he had to perform the sex acts or God would condemn his family to Hell, the records say. And after abusing the boy, the priest made the boy pray with a towel over his head, the man, now in his 40s, told detectives.

Baltimore County Police arrested Mannion on Monday. Police began investigating the man’s allegations after he disclosed the abuse to a therapist in 2023. The former St. Agnes student’s name is redacted, and The Baltimore Sun does not generally name victims of alleged sexual abuse.

Mannion is facing four felony child abuse and sex offense charges as well as a count of performing an “unnatural or perverted practice,” a type of misdemeanor offense that was repealed in Maryland in 2023 but still applies to Mannion because the alleged crime took place before that repeal.

Waechter said during Tuesday’s hearing that he had been involved in the case since its inception and that he arranged for Mannion to turn himself in to authorities on Monday. Without commenting on the allegations at length, Waechter told Richardson that the case “certainly is defensible.”

Charging papers say that the man first disclosed the abuse allegations in October of 2023, months after the Maryland Attorney General’s Office released a damning report of its probe into 80 years of sexual abuse within the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

Mannion’s name appears in that report, though not as an alleged abuser — he had reported allegations of sexual abuse against John Joseph Merzbacher to the archdiocese in the 1990s. Merzbacher, who the report describes as “the most obvious example of systemic abuse” within the archdiocese, was eventually convicted of rape and ordered to serve four life sentences. He died in 2023 while incarcerated.

Investigators with the Attorney General’s Office interviewed Mannion in 2018 and 2019, according to the report. He described Merzbacher’s “outrageous and inappropriate behavior” and recalled making the report.

Elizabeth Ann Murphy, who had been raped by Merzbacher while attending Catholic Community Middle School in South Baltimore, had spoken with Mannion at a 1993 wake and disclosed her abuse. Mannion then brought Murphy’s allegations to the archdiocese, and Murphy contacted an attorney, ultimately resulting in criminal charges against Merzbacher. Dozens of the teacher’s other victims came forward, as well.

The charges against Mannion allege that he was abusing the boy during that same early 1990s time period. The alleged victim told detectives that the abuse became more frequent during his third- and fourth-grade years, from 1992 to 1994. He recalled fifth grade “being a great year for him” because the abuse had stopped, the charging documents say.

The documents say the man felt that Mannion would “single him out” during religious education classes, making him wait in the hallway when he would answer a question incorrectly. Then, he would take the boy to the monastery and abuse him, the records say.

Murphy, who continued to advocate for victims of sexual abuse, died last month. Her wife, Courtney Henderson, told a reporter on Tuesday that she had not heard about the new sexual abuse charges against Mannion but said that it was “sad” to hear about the allegations.

Mannion, a classmate of Murphy’s at the South Baltimore school, also continued to signal support for Merzbacher’s victims in the following decades, occasionally appearing for the disgraced teacher’s court hearings.

“All I can do is give it up to prayer,” Mannion told a Sun reporter at a 2012 hearing on Merzbacher’s appeal.

Assistant State’s Attorney Emily Abell said during Tuesday’s hearing that Mannion’s alleged victim’s parents confirmed details about his demeanor during elementary school, and they noted a change in the fifth grade, when the abuse had stopped.

“This is someone who was put in a position of power, and used that religious power … to take advantage” of a young student, Abell said.

Mannion, a Loyola University graduate, left the priesthood around 1998, a spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Baltimore confirmed. Mannion asked to stop being a member of the clergy, a request later granted by the Vatican.

The former priest has been married for several decades and has two children, who are adults, Waechter said on Tuesday. Mannion’s wife attended the hearing in Towson.

The St. Mary’s Seminary graduate was charged with drunken driving in 1998 in Harford County and second-degree assault in 2000 in Anne Arundel County. He was granted probation before judgment for both the DUI and the assault cases.

Lawyers had few details on those cases during Tuesday’s hearing when pressed by Richardson. A clerk at the Glen Burnie courthouse where the assault charge was filed could not find the charging documents, though a case summary notes that Mannion pleaded guilty and was ordered to pay a $100 fine. An Anne Arundel County Police spokesperson said the case was a “spousal” assault.

Police said Monday that investigators “believe there may be more victims of Mannion’s abuse and urge them to come forward.” Anyone with information can contact the Crimes Against Children Unit at 410-887-7720 or Child Protective Services at 410-887-8463.

Mannion’s next court hearing is scheduled for April 11.

The National Sexual Assault Hotline can be reached by phone 24/7 at 800-656-HOPE or online at hotline .rainn.org. The hotline, operated by the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, or RAINN, offers free services.

Capital Gazette reporter Luke Parker contributed to this report.

Have a news tip? Contact Dan Belson at dbelson @baltsun.com, on X as @DanBelson_ or on Signal as @danbels.62.