Rev. Pat Comben resigns from all duties to Anglican Church

www.abc.net.au

According to The Australian on 25 November 2013, former Clarence Valley Shire councillor and former registrar of the Grafton Diocese, Rev. Pat Comben has resigned from the Anglican priesthood:

He said on Monday he was quitting because history is being re-written by some members of the church.

Mr Comben said he had signed the letter of holy orders relinquishment outside the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses into Child Sexual Abuse on Friday. That was just before he took the stand to give evidence into the diocese's handling of allegations by former residents of the home.
"Fifty years in the Church and I do not know if I can even say I am a Christian," said Mr Comben outside the commission on Monday after he had completed two days of evidence.

By 7pm his resignation "minutes before" he was due to give evidence before the Royal Commission was confirmed in an ABC News broadcast.

Caught out in what appears to be a second instance of failure to report, one suspects the Anglican Church may have been grateful for this resignation.

1999

Mr Comben testified that he did not know why he asserted that ‘we’ know something. He said only he knew things and he erred in asserting that Cabinet had knowledge of what he knew….

He said that he had no specific knowledge about any matters involving child abuse.  Over some period of time he had received complaints at his electoral office about things that had allegedly occurred at the Sir Leslie Wilson Youth Centre, he had received complaints from homeless youths who had were detained at the John Oxley Youth Centre and had received ‘low grade scuttlebutt’ from some staff about children being inappropriately treated or inappropriately punished. He said that it was information of this nature which he had in mind when he referred to ‘child abuse’ in the statement broadcast in 1999. [State of Queensland,3(e) Report: Queensland Child Protection Commission of Inquiry, June 2013]

2013

The Royal Commission into child abuse has heard a former Anglican Church official responsible for responding to historic abuse claims did not pass on allegations to police.

The former registrar of the Anglican Diocese of Grafton, Pat Comben, today took the stand for a second day at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Mr Comben, who had previously served as Queensland education minister under premier Wayne Goss, was the first to receive claims about the North Coast Children's Home at Lismore.

He has faced intense scrutiny about the evidence given to the commission by former residents of the home about the physical and sexual abuse they suffered between the 1940s and 1980s.

Witnesses at the commission last week criticised Mr Comben's handling of the allegations and subsequent negotiations for compensation, with his actions described as cruel and inappropriate.

Today counsel assisting the commission Simeon Beckett questioned Mr Comben about his actions.

"You were in possession of serious allegations of child sexual abuse made against a number of people, some named, some unnamed," Mr Beckett said.

"You did not provide that information to police. Why was that?" 
"I have no idea," Mr Comben said....[ABC News,25 November 2013,Anglican Church official Pat Comben quizzed in Royal Commission over response to child sex abuse at North Coast Children's Home]

"I became aware that (a convicted pedophile) Reverend Kitchingman, as he was, was still in the stud book...

 Mr Comben also told the commission that he subsequently took no disciplinary action against Reverend Kitchingman or another alleged pedophile priest at the home, Campbell Brown.
"I did nothing at all (about Kitchingman)," he told the commission. "I think we were too busy to take him on."
[The Australian,25 November 2013,I'm not sure I'm still a Christian, Anglican priest Pat Comben says]

* Day One (22 November 2013) of Mr. Comben’s evidence to the Royal Commission Into Institutional Responses To Child Sexual Abuse,pp 64-115

* Day Two (25 November 2013) of Mr. Comben’s evidence to the Royal Commission Into Institutional Responses To Child Sexual Abuse will be found here when transcribed.

Royal Commission Into Institutional Responses To Child Sexual Abuse: Anglican Rev. Pat Comben former Clarence Valley Councillor

The Northern Star on 22 November 2013, Page 6:

"REMARKABLE and distressing" is how a former Anglican chaplain has described the way she saw members of the Grafton Diocese respond to claims of child sex abuse.

Jennifer Woodhouse told the Royal Commission former Grafton Diocese registrar Pat Comben suggested "Grafton would be better off" if child abuse survivor Richard 'Tommy' Campion was offered up to $50,000 in compensation rather than the opportunity to tell his story to an independent panel of professionals.....

Ms Woodhouse described the first response as "caring and warm" but said she found it remarkable and distressing that by 2006, after Mr Campion had unearthed several other victims, Mr Comben appeared "more concerned about the finances of the dioceses than he did about the many people who had been abused at the North Coast Church of England Children's Home".

Evidence given to the Royal Commission Into Institutional Responses To Child Sexual Abuse, between 18 and 21 November 2013:

** A. .....We walked in to an office, a fairly large office. We had a number of tables put together. The Reverend Comben, as I recall, when I walked into the room, was sitting on a chair with his hands behind his head and with his feet up, which I interpreted as being something of a machismo role that he was trying to play out.

I put my hand across the table and shook hands with him, although the orphanage boy and the Celt in me felt like kicking the chair from underneath him, quite frankly.

He was showing a level of disrespect that I'd not come across in negotiations previously. Certainly I was there representing 41 people who were in various states of decompensation, and to be met with that level of what I perceived as ignorance --

Q. All right. In terms of the negotiations that occurred over the days 19 and 20 December, did Mr Comben's behaviour change from that early episode you've just described?

A. No. Mr Comben's feet remained in a prostrate position throughout most of the conference.....

Q. Sorry, was that inappropriate or an appropriate - I didn't quite hear?

A. Well, the poker playing is a given part of any settlement negotiations, effectively. When it comes to matters like this, I felt that that wasn't necessarily the appropriate way to proceed. But the Reverend Comben came back at one point and said, "Look, I've been back to" - I forget who he had called; I think it was Bishop Slater - "and the maximum we can go for each of these individuals is $10,000", and that if we were not going to settle, then, in Clint Eastwood style, he said, "Bring it on", which again I felt was inappropriate, but was consistent with the previous references to Tommy Campion as being a ringleader and other derogatory remarks that were made throughout the course of the process.

Q. What did he mean by "Bring it on", to your understanding?

A. Oh, again, his macho bravado was taking over and he was effectively telling us to bring these matters before the court, because he knew that we'd have significant

difficulties if they were not going to waive limitation periods to allow us to properly explore these matters and have some real transparency.

** Mr Harrison told me that Reverend Comben had been very rude in that meeting, and said, in reference to the group of victims, that we "should have been happy to have had a roof over our heads".

** Q. What I am interested in is whether that was an issue - that is to say, the association between the Anglican Church and the North Coast Children's Home - prior to the group claims, namely, when [CH]'s litigation was being discussed?

A. Yes, my best recollection was that it was always being said by Grafton that it really wasn't their home, you know, that it was not an Anglican home.

Q. In that period prior to Mr Campion's claim, who was the main proponent, if you like, of that particular view?

A. Oh, Pat Comben.

** The diocese, through its registrar, Reverend Pat Comben, indicated to the media that the claimants had substantial hurdles to overcome. He also questioned the factual basis for some of the claims and said that the home was a great North Coast community facility.

** Q. So just returning to that issue, what were the main concerns of the claimants about that interview?

A.  I wonder if you could refer me to the exhibit itself?

Q.  Yes. Sorry, it's not on the screen. SJH-15.

A.  Well, there were a number of concerns.

Q.  Could we have the whole page, please, on the screen.

A.  It certainly wasn't an appropriate vehicle to be discussing these matters. This wasn't to be a trial by media. It was very much a self-serving article that Reverend Comben was trying to put out there, and he was also, in my view, trying to rally the community behind himself as if he was some knight in shining armour. He'd said in the fifth paragraph towards the bottom:

Increasingly I see these matters as being a challenge to the very community of Lismore.

They weren't. They were a very challenge to the Reverend Comben, not the community itself, in my view.

** 1 October 2006 media release distributed by Rev. Pat Comben:

ANG.9320.01802.0631

The Anglican Diocese of Grafton has been provided with 600 pages of statements and documents containing allegations of abuse to 42 former residents of the North Coast Childrens Home.

It is understood that a number of the claims go back more than fifty years and cover matters including discipline in the home and sexual assaults.

Diocesan Registrar Rev Pat Comben said he was surprised at the amount of personal detail of the material while "substantial threshold legal and responsibility questions remain totally unresolved."

The Church has been asked by the claimant's solicitors to respond before the 20th October, a date Rev Comben says is unrealistic.

"It has taken the solicitors for the claimants almost twelve months to collect and collate this material and we will require time to properly assess it and respond," Rev Comben said.

"Our legal advice is clear that there are substantial hurdles to be overcome by the solicitors for the claimants.

"I would hope that these issues can be resolved before increased costs are borne by the individual claimants supplying further personal and medical information which may not be needed because no claim can be made.

"I am concerned that a number of people mentioned as alleged perpetrators are not and never were staff members of the home or even church workers.

"These individuals, many of whom are still living, named as alleged perpetrators have a right to state their response to the allegations and even have their day in court.

"There are also, I believe, substantial factual errors in the material given to us about the home and its management.

"Increasingly I see these matters as being a challenge to the very community of Lismore.

"We have a wide range of evidence that points to the home being a great North Coast community facility, run and 'owned' by the community, with tremendous support from individuals and service clubs.

"Some of the matters complained of might have been standard practice in Australia some decades ago.

"Some of the complaints being raised are a potential affront to all those individuals who willingly gave their time and money to a home that In their eyes did an essential and great job.

"The Church will do all it can to speed the matter up, but in view of the legal uncertainties will continue to contest the matters as presently put to us In the name of all former staff, the wider community of Lismore and the church itself," Rev Comben said.

Pell and Abbott - two high profile Catholics who remain in denial concerning the extent of institutionalized child abuse and the part each may have played?

Cardinal George Pell and Minister for Health and Ageing Tony Abbott in 2004

This is the reality that is the Catholic Church in Australia in November 2013.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, self-styled Captain Catholic in a Radio 3AW (Melbourne) interview on 14 November 2013: As is pretty well known, I have a lot of time for George Pell... Well, I didn’t see his evidence before the committee and I haven’t read the report. He is, in my judgment, a fine human being and a great churchman.

Three snapshots from the Victorian Parliament Family and Community Development Committee Inquiry into the Handling of Child Abuse by Religious and Other Non-Government Organisations report entitled Betrayal of Trust:

Betrayal of Trust Report:
Volume 1 (PDF 2.2Mb),
Volume 2 (PDF 4.0Mb)

This is an excerpt from the 1997 evidence given by Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, when he was Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs, in support of an alleged paedophile priest, John Gerard Nestor, later forcibly laicized by the Vatican:

Q. You kept up your friendship with the defendant?

A. From time to time, yes.
Q. And you saw him?
A. From time to time, perhaps once or twice every twelve months. 
Q. And you've kept up that friendship until this day?
A. That's correct....
Q. First of all, how would you describe him as a man? 
A. An extremely upright and virtuous man. I guess one of things that I liked very much about John when I first him, was his maturity, intellectual, social, emotional he was, to that extent I guess, a beacon of humanity at the Seminary
Q. How did he appear to get on with his peers at the at Manly?
A. Obviously we have different relations with different people. John got on extremely well with some, less well with others. I guess one of the things that marked John out from his peers at the seminary was he was a man with high expectations of himself and others and I can recall on occasions being more than a little annoyed with him, because, you know, he would want to bring me up to the mark, bring me back to the path of virtue from time to time and this didn't always go over too well with me. And I guess it could annoy others as well.
Q. But as far as his own conduct was concerned, did you ever become aware of anything which would in any way question his beliefs and his dedication as a priest?
A. Never.
Q. And you've come all the way from Sydney today to give this evidence?
A. I have indeed.
Q. You do have other duties to perform? A. I have an electorate to represent and a ministry to assist.

NO CROSS-EXAMINATION

[http://tl.gd/n_1rjd2n5]  

Anglican Children's Home in Lismore subject of third public hearing of national Royal Commission Into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

Royal Commission Into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse Media Release 16 September 2013:

The third public hearing in November is to examine the handling of complaints and civil litigation concerning child sexual abuse in the North Coast Children’s Home by the Anglican Diocese of Grafton in 2006 and 2007.

Brief background included in this ABC News article and NCV post:

Anglican Diocese of Grafton apologies to North Coast Children's Home victims

Another perspective on the Reverend Hon Pat Comben - former Clarence Valley councillor (2008-2010)

UPDATE

Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse INTERIM REPORT VOLUME 1 30 June 2014:

Case Study No 3

The public hearing examined how the Anglican Diocese of Grafton in New South Wales handled claims of abuse from former residents of the North Coast Children’s Home, including whether policies and procedures were applied consistently and fairly.

Forty claimants, half of whom claimed to have suffered sexual abuse, brought a group claim against the Diocese.

It reached a settlement with most claimants in 2007, but later received further claims from new claimants….

Findings have not yet been made in this case study.

Excerpt from North Coast Children's Home Inc. trading as Child & Adolescent Specialist Programs & Accommodation (CASPA) v Martin [2014] NSWDC 125 8 August 2014:

The North Coast Children's Home was first set up in 1919, when two young orphaned and neglected children were given into the care of the Vicar of St Andrews, the Reverend A. R. Ebbs. Those children were given temporary shelter until a local resident, a Mr George Barnard, offered the children the use of a house which he owned in Lismore, free of rent. There was public interest in the establishment of an orphanage in the town of Lismore. The placement of children at the Home continued, but its structure was not formalised until 1951, when a constitution for the home was prepared (Exhibit F to the affidavit of Mr Todd Yourell, 3 July 2014). The Management Committee was not incorporated, until 16 May 1989, when the relevant documents were lodged at the Corporate Affairs Commission registry in accordance with the Associations Incorporations Act 1984 (NSW).

Mr Yourell's affidavit sets out that the Church of England's role in relation to the Home continued, but on a restricted basis. Since 1989, the Bishop of the Diocese of Grafton has held powers enabling him to appoint up to four members of the Board of Governance, which is responsible for the affairs of the first plaintiff (hereafter referred to as "CASPA"). The Board of Governance is responsible for the affairs of CASPA and acts in the interests of CASPA. Prior to incorporation in 1989 the Anglican Diocese of Grafton was responsible for the affairs of North Coast Children's Home.

It was while the Anglican Diocese of Grafton was responsible for the affairs of North Coast Children's Home, prior to 1989, that substantial and serious abuse of children at the home occurred. Orphaned and neglected children in the care of the home were victims of sexual, physical and psychological abuse. As is common in relation to victims of institution-based abuse, there were few complaints at the time, and those which were made were ignored, disbelieved and/or discouraged.

The Anglican Diocese of Grafton received a number of complaints in 2006 about historical acts of physical, sexual and psychological abuse at the North Coast Children's Home in Lismore, all of which occurred between the 1940s and 1980s. Thirty-nine of those claims were settled through negotiated payments. Two of those persons did not participate in the settlement, and instead brought proceedings. Seven others later came forward with similar claims. The Right Reverend Keith Slater, who acknowledged that he did not pass on all the complaints to the Church's Professional Standards Director as was required, resigned as Bishop in May 2013.

While the nature and extent of the abuses which occurred are the subject of current inquiry and evidence, the nature and extent of the inquiry currently being undertaken by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse ("the Royal Commission") relates to periods well before the employment of the second and third plaintiff, and well before the first plaintiff, which is no longer a part of the Anglican Church but a separate organisation. It is neither controlled by, nor answerable to, the Anglican Church. As Mr Yourell points out in paragraphs 20-24 of his affidavit (Exhibit F), the Royal Commission is considering a case study of the home during its operation by the Anglican Church in the 1960s and 1970s, more than 40 years ago, but not into its present operation.

Cardinal Pell's smear claim doesn't stand up to scrutiny

 

 

Cardinal George Pell in The Australian 13 November 2012

 

In November 2012 Cardinal George Pell attacked a ''persistent press campaign'' and ''general smears that we are covering up and moving people around'', and suggested that abuse by Catholic priests had been singled out and exaggerated.

However, his statements do not sit easily with the historical record.

Brisbane Times 16 November 2012:

 

THE Catholic Church has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on legal fees to defend priests and brothers who have already been tried and convicted of serious sexual assaults against children in their care.

A Fairfax Media investigation has revealed that at least two Catholic orders have continued to fund the legal defences of some of their religious members as they went to trial for the second, third and even fourth time for the sexual abuse of children.

This includes the funding of multiple appeals, hiring top barristers who charge thousands of dollars a day, and hiring private investigators.

In some cases the result has been that criminal prosecutions and the victims of abuse are dragged through the courts for many years.

 

This is the opening paragraph of a 1998 appeal judgement in R v Best in which the court directed that a new trial of the applicant be had:

 

CALLAWAY, J.A.: The applicant, who is now aged 57, pleaded not guilty in the County Court at Melbourne to a presentment containing 18 counts of indecent assault on a male person under the age of 16 contrary to s.68(3A) of the Crimes Act 1958 as it stood at the time of the alleged offences. They related to five boys, who were pupils at a Christian Brothers primary school of which the applicant was the principal. I shall call them "M", "K", "D", "W" and "B". After a trial occupying 13 days the jury returned verdicts of guilty on counts 4 to 7, which related to K, and counts 12 and 13, which related to D. The applicant was acquitted on the remaining counts. The verdicts of not guilty on counts 8 (one of several counts relating to M) and 16 to 18 (three of four counts relating to B) were unanimous. All the other verdicts were by majority. On 27th March 1998 the learned trial judge heard a plea for leniency, following which the applicant was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment on each count. His Honour directed that three months of each of the sentences imposed on counts 5 to 7, 12 and 13 be served cumulatively upon each other and upon the sentence imposed on count 4, making a total effective sentence of 24 months' imprisonment. The return of prisoners does not include the words "upon each other and", but the sense is clear from the specification of the total effective sentence. Twelve months of that sentence were suspended for an operational period of three years. The applicant seeks leave to appeal against both conviction and sentence.

Geelong Advertiser June 2011:

The Christian Brothers yesterday also confirmed it had forked out millions of dollars for Best's long and drawn out trials where top barristers, that included Queen's Counsel and Senior Counsel, were hired to get him off dozens of charges.

It can now be revealed Best, who has close links to Cardinal George Pell, pleaded guilty this week to six sex abuse-related charges of three boys aged between 11 and 12.

 

According to The Age in August 2011:

 

Best has admitted 27 indecent assaults on 11 boys who attended schools at which he taught as a Christian Brother in Ballarat, at Box Hill in Melbourne and in Geelong.

He is already in jail serving four separate terms for indecent assaults against boys at his schools….

Detective Sergeant Carson is somewhat constrained in what he can say about the Best case by the law and the rules of his job.

But sometimes his sense of right and wrong combined with the tragedy of what has happened in a church he once respected, make it too difficult to stay within those bounds.

"Best got convicted for earlier crimes last December and the church knew that," he said.

"Yet the Catholic Church spent millions of dollars on this bloke's defence in his latest trials and did nothing for the victims."

 

Excerpt from a 2008 Supreme Court judgment in Tasmania v Ferguson:

79 Although C1 does not claim it, evidence is available from Father Jago that upon an indecent assault by the accused being reported to him by C1, Father Jago reported it to the school principal. However, prosecuting authorities were not informed. C1 says that he has been deeply affected by the sexual assaults he believes were committed on him by two of the teachers at the school and by the caretaker of the nearby oval. I conclude that it is in his interests and in the interests of the public, that his allegations, which are charged in count 1, should go to trial.

80 There is available evidence from C2 and Christopher Bartlett that C2, who was aged 13 at the time, complained to a prefect who in turn reported the matter to the school principal. Although the report, along with all the other similar reports Father Hosie appears to have received, may have resulted in the accused being quickly transferred in his employment to another place, with the protection of the school's reputation seemingly gaining prominence, the alleged conduct was not reported to the police as it should have been at the time. There is no evidence that C2 was permanently and adversely affected by the one indecent assault that he alleges took place. Nevertheless, he reported it at the time to a responsible person and it was in no way his fault that his report was not passed on to the police. It is in the interests of the public that his allegations should go to trial.

81 Although C3 says that he did not report to the school's principal the sexual assaults he says were committed against him by the accused, he reported to the principal on the following morning the incident he witnessed that involved the accused sexually misbehaving in the presence of boys in his room. He says that for his pains the principal accused him of lying. He was deterred from reporting the sexual assaults upon himself. Even his father was reluctant to listen to him. His explanation for not reporting the matters to the police until 2004 was that he had spent 30 years being upset by it but he had not been game enough to do so. It was only as a result of the police contacting him that he eventually told them about what he says occurred. It is in the interests of the public and in his interests that his allegations should go to trial.

82 C5 says that he made no report of the crimes committed by the accused against him, either to the school, his parents or anyone else for over 30 years. He believes that many of his life problems, such as alcohol and drugs, and his offending, stemmed from the accused's sexual assaults upon him. It was not until 2002 that he told anyone about them. Subsequently, the police approached him, it would seem as a result of his opening up to others. It is in the interests of the public and in his own interests that his allegations should be allowed to go to trial.

83 C6's allegations are extremely serious ones. They include oral sex, attempted anal sex and urinating on him. He says that he was also the subject of sexual assaults by another teacher. He says that after the first occasion of being assaulted by the accused he was crying in the dormitory and the teacher-in-charge told him to stop blubbering. He was 12 years old at the time. Thereafter the assaults continued for a time and he felt unable to tell anyone of what had happened. It is an all too typical account of child sexual abuse. It appears that his report to the police only came about following his breaking down earlier this year and telling his wife about what had occurred. It is in the public interest and in his interests that his allegations should be allowed to go to trial.

 

ABC News December 2007:

 

70 year old former priest convicted of maintaining a sexual relationship with a person under the age of 17 has been jailed in the Launceston Criminal Court.

Gregory Laurence Ferguson was sentenced today to three years imprisonment with an 18 month non-parole period.

Ferguson sexually abused a 12 year old boarder at Burnie's Marist College in 1970, when he was a teacher and priest there.

Ferguson was convicted on two other sexual abuse charges earlier this year, and was jailed for two years.

He now has a total of five years imprisonment, with a minimum non-parole period of two and half years.

 

ABC News February 2008:

 

72-year-old Roger Michael Bellemore has been sentenced to four years imprisonment, with a two-year non-parole period.

Bellemore sexually abused three male students when he was a teacher, priest and football coach at Marist.

Justice Ewan Crawford said Bellemore had used his superiority to have his way with the boys.

One of Bellemore's victims was 11 at the time he was assaulted in 1966.

 

The Age July 2004:

 

In his first interview since allegations against the Salesians surfaced worldwide, Father Murdoch revealed that he made two trips to Rome to persuade the Vatican to expel David Rapson, who had been sentenced to two years' jail in 1992 for sex abuse of a 15-year-old student at the Salesian school Rupertswood, near Sunbury.

Father Murdoch also revealed that he had prevented a former head of the order, Father Julian Fox, from returning from Rome to Australia unless he agreed to face his accusers in a case of alleged sexual assault.

The Salesians also paid $35,600 compensation following sex abuse allegations against Father Fox.

The New Zealand Herald April 2006:

With the 21 guilty verdicts in a four-week trial that ended in Christchurch last month, and one guilty plea by McGrath as the trial began, it was now clear that he had not made full admissions in 1993.

McGrath was being sentenced on 13 charges of indecent assault, eight charges of inducing an indecent act, and one charge of doing an indecent act.

The offending related to nine victims at Marylands School where McGrath was a brother, teacher and housemaster. The victims were aged between 7 and 15 at the time.

The New Zealand Herald November 2012:

One was Brother Bernard McGrath, a New Zealander who has been convicted in both countries…….

McGrath was trained in Australia and sexually assaulted boys at the Kendall Grange boarding institution for the intellectually disabled, near Lake Macquarie, south of Newcastle. In 1986 he moved back to Christchurch, working at Marylands and the Hebron trust. In 1993 he was sentenced to three years' jail for abusing children at the two institutions.

Later, in Sydney, he was sentenced to nine months for abusing a pre-teen boy and in 2006 he was sentenced again in Christchurch to five years' jail on eight charges involving indecent assault.

News.com.au  November 2012:

 “There was one priest in Victoria who admitted when caught that he had confessed 200 times and nobody had reported him, because priests are not allowed to report anyone who confesses in a confessional."

Priests are not subject to mandatory reporting laws so they don't have to report child abusers who confess to them.

The Sun Herald November 2012:

 

A FORMER priest charged with sexually abusing seven boys over an 18-year period blamed God for making him do it, a court has been told.

David Rapson, 59, is charged with abusing the boys while teaching at Salesian College Rupertswood, in Sunbury, between 1973 and 1990.

The former college vice-principal is charged with one count each of rape and gross indecency and a string of indecent assault charges.

Professor Parkinson alleges contemporary cover-up of child sexual abuse matters by the Catholic Church in Australia

 

Victorian Parliament Legislative Council

FAMILY AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE

Inquiry into the handling of child abuse by religious and other organisations

Melbourne — 19 October 2012

 

Excerpts from evidence given by Professor Patrick Parkinson, Faculty of Law, University of Sydney:

 

I guess that brings me to the rift I had with the Catholic Church over these issues. When I was asked to review Towards Healing in 2009 and 2010, I came across some cases which worried me deeply with one religious order. They worried me deeply because they were cases which had all arisen since 1996, 1996 being the watershed because Towards Healing was published then, and it contains significant promises to the Australian people about how the church will respond to these things. One of the things it says is that those who have abused their power will not be given back the power that they earlier have abused. Even from what I had read — from the submissions and some documents which were given to me in the course of those submissions — I could see that there were priests who had never had the power taken away. Settlements had been made with victims, and they continued in ministry, in two cases in Samoa and in another case in Rome.

 

In the case of the man who went to Rome, in fairness, he has always denied the offences and the accuser died, but one of the issues, which I deal with at great length in my submission, is that the police wanted to interview him. At that stage Father Murdoch, who was the Provincial of the Salesians, did his best to bring that man back from Rome to face the police and asked him to face his accusers. The no. 2 leader in the worldwide Salesians, one of the largest orders in the world and one of the most powerful Church organisations in the world, said, ‘Why don’t we just move him to another province, another part of the world, where he will be out of reach of the police?’. You will see from Four Corners the letter in which Father Murdoch documents exactly that. That no. 2 man is now the Bishop of Ghent in Belgium.

 

I said, ‘This must be dealt with’. With Towards Healing the Catholic Church relied on my reputation, my independence and the work I have done to say, ‘Yes, we have got people other than Catholics who are involved in this’. A condition of that for me was that they had to deal with this. I recommended strongly that there should be a public inquiry. I recommended that the government of Victoria be invited to establish a public inquiry.

 

They were very, very anxious about that. We agreed that we would first refer those concerns to the Salesians. I wrote a five-page letter, which you are most welcome to have, in May 2009 setting out those concerns and saying, ‘My preference is for a public inquiry, but the first step is at least for the Salesians to give a response’.

 

There were lots of delays, but eventually Father Moloney, who was then the provincial of the Salesians, gave a very long response, an eight-page letter with 12 attachments, revealing all sorts of documents from his files. I said, ‘That satisfies me somewhat’, because I had been concerned that there may have been criminal offences committed by the leaders of the order, ‘but there still needs to be a public accounting for this’. Eventually we agreed that on the basis of the documents they provided I would write a report. It is now attached as an appendix to the submission.

 

The story from then is the story of a contemporary cover-up. The Salesians have been described by one of America’s leading experts as the most unrepentant and defiant order he has ever come across. Indeed on the issue of sexual abuse, I would absolutely endorse that. I would say they are not only unrepentant and defiant,

they are untruthful. The lies which were told, the cover-ups, the attempts made to suppress my report, were breathtaking. And Father Moloney, who is apparently a well-known theologian, was absolutely at the centre of that, telling untruths which were in my view completely slanderous. There was a campaign of vilification and misinformation. Take the journalist who exposed all of this in Samoa many years earlier: the rumours were spread that he had himself been convicted of sexual abuse. I have no idea what has been said about me, nor do I care. But my rift with the church on these issues was because at the end of the day they wanted to protect the Salesians and not protect children.

 

Is this ancient history? I would like to think it is largely so, and I want to say again how many people have made a real effort to cut this cancer out of the church, but I am afraid that the cover-ups go to the highest levels. At the end of the day I wrote to Archbishop Wilson, who was then the chair of the Catholic Bishops Conference, and said, ‘I’m going to go public on this unless you act’. Two months later he had not responded.

 

These are very serious issues. May I just say how we might go from here, how we can rebuild trust and give you at least a few ideas? First of all, I think there has to be a complete account of all offenders and alleged offenders against children. I think that somehow, in some way, we need to have all those names out — all the Father Fs,  all the Father Kleps, whether they are in Samoa, Rome, wherever they are, Father Klep being one of the men in Samoa…..

 

I think that there then needs to be the resignations of everybody responsible for the cover-ups. I think the church cannot recover from this crisis unless there is a clean slate and, for the people who have covered up, even if they thought they were doing the right thing at the time, getting them out of the church. I think they have to go, and some of them are still in positions of highest leadership in the church today. Then there should be independent audits of diocesan and religious institute responses in the future…..

 

Transcript of Professor Parkinson’s 2010 Professional Standards Review report.