Police in Northeastern Pennsylvania arrested an 85-year-old school crossing guard April 6 and charged him with sexually abusing a 16-year-old boy.
Joseph Gyuriska, a crossing guard in the Dunmore School District in Scranton for more than 10 years, faces numerous charges, including endangering the welfare of a child and unlawful contact with a minor. He is being held in Lackawanna State Prison on $200,000 bail.
Scranton police allege that the teen is a runaway who was staying with 28-year-old Joseph Burns, a resident of Throop, just outside of Scranton. Police say Burns invited Gyuriska to his apartment and videotaped the teen performing oral sex on Gyuriska.
In exchange for the sex act, Gyuriska allegedly bought the teen sneakers and clothing, and the boy also told police that Gyuriska gave Burns $50.
Burns was arrested last week on nine charges, including making and possessing child pornography and corruption of minors.
Police began to investigate the relationship between Burns and the teen after he accompanied the boy to a court appearance in Lackawanna County and allegedly lied to police about his age. Police seized a computer from Burns’ apartment and found the video footage.
It was unclear why the teen was staying with Burns.
Gyuriska will be arraigned April 15.
Also this week, a judge in Bucks County upped the sentence for a prosecutor convicted of having a sexual relationship with an underage boy.
Last month, Judge C. Theodore Fritsch sentenced Anthony Cappuccio to three-23 months of house arrest, but on April 6 toughened that sentence to six-23 months in prison.
Police in Richland Township found Cappuccio, 32, then a chief deputy district attorney in Bucks County, and a 17-year-old boy partially clothed in a parked car near Quakertown. The police investigation found that Cappuccio, a youth leader at a church in Perkasie, provided alcohol and marijuana to several of the teens and had a three-month sexual relationship with the one boy.
Cappuccio was charged in late October with three counts of endangering the welfare of a child and one count of criminal use of a communication facility, both felonies, and misdemeanor charges of corruption of minors and furnishing minors with alcohol.
Cappuccio pleaded guilty to all charges.
The judge’s original ruling was within state guidelines but caused outrage among the boys’ families.
Fritsch said his granting of the tougher sentence was not the result of the public outcry, but rather was based on “calm reflection.”
The judge said he also took into consideration that Cappuccio had not been wearing his electronic monitoring cuff and was, according to Fritsch, underestimating the gravity of the county’s house-arrest program, which allowed Cappuccio to be free for 50-60 hours a week, working at a restaurant, attending therapy sessions and working on his own divorce case.
Jen Colletta can be reached at [email protected].