Gary M. Melanson faces the unpleasant prospect of crossing paths with the Rev. Joseph A. Fredette for the first time in more than 20 years.

It could happen, strangely enough, at the Worcester County House of Correction in West Boylston.

Fredette could be there awaiting trial on charges that he raped Melanson and a number of other boys. Melanson could be there on charges pending from a car chase with police that he insists would never have happened if not for the fact that he is an emotional wreck thanks to alleged rapes by Fredette.

"It's incredible. It's absolutely incredible," Melanson said in a telephone interview from his home in Pawtucket, R.I., yesterday.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police arrested Fredette, 60, on Friday in the Canadian province of New Brunswick, at his retreat in rural Jailletville, on warrants that were issued two years ago following indictments by a Worcester County grand jury. Fredette has been released pending an extradition hearing that could happen at the end of this month or in early February.

Upon his eventual return to Worcester, the way Melanson figures it, Fredette could be held at the county jail awaiting trial. Melanson fears he is looking at a sentence of several years there, on charges that he regards as small potatoes compared to what he claims Fredette did.

Melanson, 36, is facing charges in connection with the chase two months ago. He says he was in possession of illegal drugs at the time police say he led them on a wild ride from Sutton to Lincoln. But police in Sutton and Shrewsbury, who brought the charges, did not file any drug-related charges.

Melanson is scheduled for a jury trial at Central District Court in Worcester on March 15, according to his attorney, Jane A. Fraier of Northboro.

EMOTIONAL RECOVERY

He thinks of the possibility of being in a visiting room at the jail seeing his wife and soon-to-be-born child, while Fredette sits a few feet away with friends or relatives.

And he gets sick to his stomach.

Melanson feels that his emotional recovery rests with Fredette's conviction and imprisonment.

"That's going to close a chapter," he said. "That's a process of growing up that I have to go through."

He feels a solidarity of sorts with the victims of former Catholic priest James R. Porter, recently sentenced to prison on charges similar to those facing Fredette.

He recalls watching with horror as Porter's victims got up one by one and assailed the former priest for raping them when they were young.

"I sat through that with my wife. I laid in bed and watched that. I sat here and I cried. I made so many connections just listening to that," he said.

Melanson is one of several people who have accused Fredette of sexually molesting them.

He is in his second marriage and works on an assembly line for Hasbro Inc. in Pawtucket. He has spent more than seven years behind bars, most recently at Concord State Prison on an armed robbery conviction. He was released nearly two years ago.

Melanson was sent to the group home Come Alive Inc. 22 years ago after running away from home.

At the same time, Fredette, a priest with the Augustinians of the Assumption, was in the midst of a four-year stint running the home.

Melanson was in and out of Come Alive for about two years. He had also been sent to the Lyman School, a reform school in Westboro, while in the custody of the state Department of Youth Services.

KEPT QUIET

He says the first sexual assault happened about two weeks after he was sent to Come Alive. He was high on LSD, which had been provided to him by some other boys at the home, when Fredette discovered him and took him to his office in his bedroom.

Melanson said Fredette carried him to his bed, where he stripped him and raped him.

It was the first of several assaults, Melanson said. But he said he kept quiet because he didn't want to go back to reform school.

In 1974, Worcester police filed sexual assault charges against Fredette on behalf of two boys. Fredette fled that year to New York, then Quebec, and eventually landed in New Brunswick.

He served at St. Timothy's Church in Adamsville, New Brunswick, in the Diocese of Moncton. In 1984 he was removed as pastor after the parish council complained of financial irregularities. He had been housing 20 teen-age boys in the rectory without parish approval.

HERMITAGE

He established Les Ermites de la Misericorde - the Hermits of the Broken Heart - at a 240-acre retreat in Jailletville. The telephone at the hermitage went unanswered last night. A spokesman for the Royal Mounted Police said yesterday no one would be available to comment on Fredette's release until tomorrow.

Melanson first related his experiences only to his second wife, the former Patricia Sadowski. But as the Porter case became more prominent, he began to talk about it more and eventually told his mother, Beverly Melanson of Charlton.

"He's had problems since he was young because of this. I blame a lot of this on Father Fredette," his mother said. She recalled having several run-ins with Fredette, but never suspected that he was raping her child.

The prospect of Fredette receiving a long prison sentence is "fabulous, fabulous," she said.

"I think that he belongs there. This man here has been running around loose for years. He has to be punished for this," she said. "I want to see him in court."

WORCESTER -- A Rhode Island man has been indicted on charges of abducting and raping a 9-year-old girl in Bellingham more than 10 years ago.

A Worcester County grand jury handed up indictments last week charging Gary M. Melanson, 45, formerly of Pawtucket, R.I., with kidnapping, five counts of aggravated rape, four counts of unnatural rape of a child, one count of child rape and two counts of indecent assault and battery on a child. The crimes are alleged to have occurred May 16, 1992, in Bellingham.

Mr. Melanson was arrested Jan. 15 in Lincoln, R.I., on a fugitive from justice charge relating to a warrant issued by of Milford District Court charging him with the abduction and sexual assault. Last Wednesday's indictments will move the case to Worcester Superior Court.

District Attorney John J. Conte said DNA and other forensic testing led to the charges against Mr. Melanson in the decade-old case. He said Mr. Melanson appeared in court Friday in Rhode Island and waived a rendition hearing.

The district attorney said he expected Mr. Melanson to be returned to Massachusetts this week for arraignment in Worcester Superior Court.

In 1995, the Rev. Joseph A. Fredette was convicted in Worcester Superior Court of sexually molesting Mr. Melanson, when the accused was 13 years old and the Assumptionist priest was overseeing a home for troubled teens in Worcester.

Rev. Fredette, who fled to Canada in 1974 after Worcester police issued warrants for his arrest, has been returned to Massachusetts to face trial. He was acquitted on charges of molesting another 13-year-old boy.

Last October, the state Appeals Court overturned the 1995 convictions, for which Rev. Fredette was sentenced to 4 to 5 years in state prison. A special prosecutor will be assigned to review Rev. Fredette's case, which has been continued to March 13 in Worcester Superior Court.