Associated Press WriterSAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- A judge threw out all 224 child-molestation charges against a defrocked Roman Catholic priest Thursday in a dispute over whether the statute of limitations had run out.

The ruling, unless overturned on appeal, means prosecutors cannot try former Monsignor Patrick O'Shea, 67, on charges of molesting nine boys in the 1960s and '70s.

"It's a terrible thing," said prosecutor Linda Klee.

The case has zigzagged though the courts since its filing in 1995, a year after the Legislature passed a law allowing prosecutors to file molestation charges even after the six-year statute of limitations expired.

The case was thrown out in 1997 by a state appeals court that said the law did not apply retroactively. Legislators later reworked the law to try to get around the problem.

But on Thursday, Superior Court Judge David Garcia said prosecutors could not refile the charges once an appeals court had dismissed them.

Wayne Presley, one of the men O'Shea was accused of molesting when he was an altar boy, was shaken by the judge's ruling.

"I'm upset. He's an evil man," said Presley, now 43, of Foster City. "I don't know whether I'll ever recover from it emotionally, financially and physically."

Defense attorneys said they would immediately seek O'Shea's release from San Francisco jail, where he is being held on $5 million bail.