Former Las Vegas priest Bede Parry dies at 71

A former Las Vegas priest who faced sexual assault charges in Missouri during the 1980s died Nov. 27 at the age of 71.

In 2011, the Rev. Bede Parry resigned as organist and choir director at All Saints’ Episcopal Church in Las Vegas after a former choirboy filed a lawsuit in Missouri alleging the Roman Catholic monastery Conception Abbey kept secret the boy’s 1987 sexual assault by Parry, then a Catholic priest who directed the choir.

Parry had served at All Saints’ Episcopal Church since 2000. He resigned when his name surfaced in the lawsuit. Parry said he also asked the diocese to relieve him of his priest duties.

Parry did not deny the 1987 incident in Missouri and said the abbey sent him to New Mexico afterward for several months of treatment.

But Parry insisted that he had no other sexual incidents with minors since then, including during his time in Las Vegas. should the Federal Aviation Administration select Nevada as one of six testing sites.

The federal agency has requested additional information from Nevada and is expected to announce its selections for the unmanned aerial vehicle testing by Dec. 31. There are 25 finalists.

The funding will be used by the Governor’s Office of Economic Development to work with the FAA to get the testing program up and running.

The FAA said recently that it wants to integrate the commercial use of drones into U.S. airspace by September 2015.

The Legislature’s Interim Finance Committee approved the request. The Legislature earlier this year set aside $4 million to pursue a drone testing program. The committee required that the nonprofit group that will manage the program, the Nevada Institute for Autonomous Systems, will have to operate under the rules of the state Open Meeting Law.

The four sites in Nevada where the FAA testing would occur are the Fallon Naval Air Station, the Stead Airport north of Reno, the Boulder City Airport and Desert Rock near the Nevada National Security Site.