An Iowa man is in custody in the stabbing death of a Catholic priest in the rectory of his northeast Nebraska church shortly before dawn Sunday.
43-year-old Kierre Williams of Sioux City was arrested inside the church. He faces homicide and felony weapons counts.
     The Washington County Sheriff’s Office says a 911 call reporting an attempted break-in at St John the Baptist Catholic Church in Fort Calhoun came just after 5:00 am.
When deputies arrived, they found The Rev Stephen Gutgsell with multiple stab wounds. Fort Calhoun medics transported Father Gutgsell to Nebraska Medicine in Omaha, where he died.Â
Gutgsell was an associate pastor with the Omaha Archdiocese, most recently splitting his time between the Fort Calhoun parish and St. Francis Borgia in Blair.
He was at the center of a scandal in 2007 when he pled guilty to theft by deception for embezzling $127,000 from a church he served. He was sentenced to probation and ordered to pay restitution.
Gutgsell was later reassigned to another church with leaders of the Archdiocese saying he’d learned his lesson, admitted wrongdoing and sought forgiveness.
His brother, the Rev Michael Gutgsell, served as chancellor of the Omaha archdiocese from 1994 until 2003, but eventually had legal problems of his own and pled guilty earlier this year to theft charges..