HAYWARD - A former Wisconsin priest will be sentenced on Thursday, nine years after victims first told police he molested them.

Thomas Ericksen, 72, will face Ashland County Circuit Court Judge Kelly McKnight at 1 p.m. Thursday at the Sawyer County Courthouse in Hayward. Ericksen faces up to 30 years in prison for two charges of sexual assault from incidents dating to the early 1980s, when he was stationed at St. Peter's Catholic Church in Winter.

Ericksen was originally due to be sentenced Aug. 30, but the hearing was delayed when court authorities discovered a pre-sentencing review of his case was incomplete.

Two other charges were brought against Ericksen after his arrest in November 2018, but were dismissed as part of a plea deal. In addition, two allegations of sexual misconduct surfaced in Lincoln County, stemming from his time as a chaplain at the former Holy Cross Hospital in Merrill, and those will also be considered in the sentencing.

Victims went to investigators in 2010 and 2011, but the Sawyer County District Attorney's Office didn't file charges until late 2018, two weeks after USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin requested investigative documents in Ericksen's case from the district attorney.

The statute of limitations hadn't expired on the sexual assault cases in Wisconsin because Ericksen moved out of state after he was removed from the priesthood in the 1980s.

The Sawyer County Sheriff's Department investigated Ericksen as far back as 1983, when he was accused of molesting a boy and then admitted to investigators he "had a problem," according to a department report from that year. Instead of seeking criminal charges, the sheriff's office allowed then-Superior Bishop George Albert Hammes to handle the priest.

Seven potential victims are known to have spoken to law enforcement, according to court documents and interviews with the Sawyer County Sheriff's Department and the Merrill Police Department. USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin has conducted on-the-record interviews with several victims of Ericksen and has been contacted by others who shared their stories and corroborating details but were unwilling to share their names. Those people have not spoken to police. In all, at least 11 men claim they were abused by Ericksen during his time in the clergy.

Laura Schulte is a reporter based at the Wausau Daily Herald. If you have any information about this case or other cases involving clergy abuse in Wisconsin that have not been reported, you may reach her at leschulte@gannett.com, by phone at 715-496-4088 or on Twitter @schultelaura.

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