The 83-year-old faces a murder charge for the killing of 25-year-old Irene Garza, authorities said.
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Feit, now an 81-year-old grandfather, has been living in a Scottsdale retirement community.
In this April 24, 2003, photo, Herlinda de la Vina holds a portrait of her niece, Irene Garza, the 25-year-old Texas schoolteacher and beauty queen in Edinburg, Texas, who was murdered in McAllen, Texas in 1960. The first person in her family to go to college, Irene taught disadvantaged children in second grade at Thigpen Elementary in McAllen, Texas. Her body was found days later in an irrigation canal.
The former Miss All South Texas Sweetheart died from a head injury, an autopsy showed.
A former Catholic priest has been arrested in connection with the 1960 killing of a Texas schoolteacher. The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office confirmed the arrest of Father John Feit, reports CBS affiliate KPHO.
Mr. Feit left McAllen shortly after Ms. Garza’s death – on orders from his church superiors – and later left the priesthood. Feit was the last person to see Garza alive when she came into the church he served for confession. Feit heard Garza’s confession on April 16, 1960, the day she went missing. Less than a month before Garza was killed, Feit had also been arrested for attacking a woman at a church 10 miles from McAllen; he pleaded no contest to aggravated assault and paid a $500 fine. “It was presented last week, and they came back with a true bill”, said Ricardo Rodriguez, the district attorney of Hidalgo County. “Everything will be OK, Irene”, Dale Tacheny, Feit’s ex-spiritual counselor, told CNN in 2013.
Garza’s cousin Lynda De La Vina, who was nine years old at the time, told CNN: ‘We were accusing a priest that – in those days priests were infallible’.
Suspicion lived on mostly in disbelieving whispers: How could a priest commit such an act, after all?
It comes 12 years after the case was reopened, but a grand jury failed to indict in 2004.
Feit was expected to be extradicted to Texas.
Another cousin, Noemi Sigler, agreed: “It was impossible for a priest to do such a deed”.
Feit was also accused of attacking a college student in a nearby town, but his trial for assault with intent to rape ended in a deadlocked jury, according to the Washington Post.
No one had been arrested in Garza’s murder prior to Tuesday.
“I’m a Catholic. That doesn’t mean I’m going to dishonor my oath of office”, Mr. Guerra said.
In an interview previous year with The Dallas Morning News, Mr. Feit said he had nothing to do with the woman’s death.
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But then-District Attorney Rene Guerra delayed bringing the case before a grand jury for years, saying their testimony wasn’t credible.
