A man allegedly molested by a priest in the 1970s lured the clergyman to the lobby of his Jesuit retirement home and beat him in front of shocked witnesses, police said today.

William Lynch, 43, was arrested yesterday on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon for the May 10 attack on the Rev Jerold Lindner, said Sgt. Rick Sung, Santa Clara County sheriff's spokesman.

Lynch had fantasised for years about confronting the priest, who also allegedly molested his younger brother.

Sgt Sung said Lynch attacked the 65-year-old priest after he failed to recognise him at the Jesuits' Sacred Heart retirement home in Los Gatos, California. The attack happened in a small room adjoining the lobby.

"They're saying it was pretty close to beating him to death," defence lawyer Pat Harris said. "They're essentially saying that he waited all these years and then took out his revenge. It's sort of the ultimate revenge story."

Lynch and his younger brother settled with the Jesuits of the California Province, a Roman Catholic religious order, for £390,000 in 1998 after claiming that Lindner abused them in 1975 during weekend camping trips in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

The boys, who were seven and five at the time, were raped in the woods and forced to perform sex acts on each other while Lindner watched, Mr Harris said.

Lindner has been accused of abuse by nearly a dozen people, including his own sister and nieces and nephews.

Lynch would be released on 315,600 bail, Mr Harris said. The lawyer negotiated his client's surrender and said Lynch would plead not guilty at his arraignment next month.

Police connected Lynch to the attack using phone records, Sgt Sung said. Half an hour before the beating, a caller identifying himself as Eric called the rest home and said someone would arrive shortly to inform Lindner of a family member's death.

"The Father shows up in the lobby, at which point he was asked by the suspect if he knew who he was. When the Father answered 'No', that's when the suspect started attacking," Sgt Sung said.

"He was punching him in the face and all over the body. After the Father goes down, then the suspect takes off."

Lindner was able to drive himself to the hospital. He did not return a call left on his answering machine last night.

He has previously denied abusing the Lynch boys and has not been criminally charged. The abuse falls outside the statute of limitations.

Lindner was removed from ministry and placed at the Los Gatos retirement home in 2001. He was named in two additional lawsuits for abuse between 1973 and 1985, according to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. The cases were included in the record-breaking £412 million settlement struck between the church and more than 550 plaintiffs in 2007.

The Rev John McGarry, the provincial, said Lindner had fully recovered and resumed his work at the retirement home, where he helps care for 75 retired and invalid priests.

"As you can imagine it's very emotionally distressing to go through something like this. He hasn't spoken a lot about it," Mr McGarry said. "He's living a quiet life of prayer and service within our community."

Lynch declined an interview yesterday but in a 2002 Los Angeles Times article, he said he had had nightmares for years, battled depression and alcoholism and had attempted suicide twice because of the alleged abuse.

"Many times I thought of driving down to LA and confronting Father Jerry. I wanted to exorcise all of the rage and anger and bitterness he put into me," Lynch told the newspaper.

"You can't put into words what this guy did to me. He stole my innocence and destroyed my life."

Most of Lindner's family severed contact with the priest years ago after discovering he had molested his nieces and nephews when they were as young as three.

His brother Larry, a retired Los Angeles policeman, said he last saw him more than two decades ago after he walked in on him molesting his eight-year-old daughter during a visit.

"The last contact I had with him personally was the day after I caught him with my daughter and I told him he best get in his vehicle and leave," he said.

"I said, 'If I go out to the truck and get my off-duty weapon out of the glove box, you're a dead man'."