A Polish priest living in Brazil has been arrested on charges of paedophilia after turning his home into an "erotic dungeon" where he organised orgies with teenagers, Brazilian media reported.

The judge overseeing the case says the priest, identified only by his initials MMS, ran a church in the west of Rio de Janeiro state and used his spiritual authority over the youths to prey on them.

"[The priest is] a person compulsively attached to sex with adolescents," Alexandre Abrahao Teixeira said in his decision to issue a preventive detention order.

He said the priest's house was transformed into "a sort of erotic dungeon where these youths were thrown into orgies".

The investigation was opened in 2007 when one teenager told police the priest persuaded him to engage in kissing and sex acts.

If convicted, the priest could be jailed for 10 years.

Church officials in the state declined to comment on the case, which, if confirmed, would add to a growing paedophilia scandal implicating Catholic priests in several countries to the increasing discomfort of the Vatican.

- AFP