A New Orleans judge has sentenced a 93-year-old former Catholic priest to spend the rest of his life behind bars for raping a teenage boy in the 1970s.

Authorities are expanding their investigation of clergy sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church in New Orleans to include church leaders suspected of shielding predatory priests and failing to report crimes to law enforcement.

A Louisiana grand jury has charged a now-91-year-old disgraced priest with sexually assaulting a teenage boy in 1975.