Police investigating Tri-Cities priest who served ‘dessert wine’ before alleged rape
A woman and a Tri-City priest were drinking in his Kennewick home when he went into the kitchen and returned with what he called a “dessert wine.”
The 30-year-old woman drank only a portion of it before she couldn’t keep her head up.
Then Rev. Tomás Vázquez Téllez allegedly carried the woman to his bedroom and raped her, she told Kennewick police.
For days after the attack, he sent her text messages apologizing and asking for her forgiveness.
The 49-year-old priest made his first appearance in Benton County Superior Court last week after he was arrested on suspicion of third-degree rape. He has yet to be charged and has been released from the Benton County jail after a $30,000 bond was posted.
He was also ordered to turn over his passport to Kennewick police, surrender any firearms and not have any contact with the victim.
Vázquez Téllez has served at St. Patrick Catholic Church in Pasco since Sept. 2021.
Before that he was the pastor at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Kennewick before stepping down in April 2020 to begin a sabbatical to study biblical languages. However, his studies were delayed by the COVID pandemic, according to the Diocese of Yakima.
He’ll be paid by the diocese while the case is pending. However, the church isn’t paying for his attorney, Bishop Joseph J. Tyson said in a diocese release.
Sexual assault report
The woman went to Vázquez Téllez’s Quincy Place home for lunch on Aug. 19, according to a Kennewick police report. As they were eating, he served her several drinks and felt she was “intoxicated but still alert and awake, though not safe to drive.”
Then the priest stepped out of sight into the kitchen and returned with two glasses he called “dessert wine.” She said hers was colored and had a sweet licorice flavor, while his drink was clear.
“After only partially drinking this small drink she became very impaired and couldn’t hold her head up, which was not a way her body had felt in the past while intoxicated,” court records say.
He picked her up and carried her to his bedroom. She believed he was just going to let her sleep. Instead, he took off her clothes and allegedly sexually assaulted her, according to Kennewick police.
“(She) reported apart from telling Father Vazquez ‘no’ multiple times, she struggled and pushed him, and was crying during the incident,” according to the arrest affidavit filed in court. She said he would stop when she cried, but would then continue, saying everything would be OK.
When she felt safe to drive in the morning, she went to another priest’s home and told him what happened. He took her to a local hospital. Hospital officials called police.
Vázquez Téllez allegedly sent her a series of texts over several days apologizing and asking for forgiveness, police said.
In an interview with police Aug. 29, he said he blacked out from the alcohol and didn’t remember having sex, but remembered waking up naked with the woman in bed.
However, when asked if she should be worried about getting pregnant, he said no because he remembered certain actions he took during sex.
In a later interview with police, he said the woman was an “honest and good person with a very good memory” and he didn’t question her allegations, according to court records.