By Eithne Donnellan
Irish Times
November 27, 2009
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/1127/1224259547110.html
OUR LADY'S HOSPITAL: TWO FORMER chaplains to Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children in Crumlin, Dublin, abused patients while working at the facility but when this came to light the archdiocese did not inform the hospital, the report states.
It says the first issues in relation to a chaplain at the hospital – referred to in the report by the pseudonym Fr Edmondus – came to light in 1960 when photos he took of the private parts of children were sent to the UK to be developed and the processing company reported the matter to Scotland Yard.
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| Our Lady's hospital in Crumlin, Dublin. The first issues in relation to a chaplain at the hospital came to light as long ago as 1960. Photo by Frank Miller |
Archbishop John Charles McQuaid was informed and interviewed the priest, who admitted taking the photos. Dr McQuaid noted afterwards that the priest clearly understood this was a "sinful act", but he felt that to send him on retreat would be to defame him. The report says Dr McQuaid made no effort to establish who the photographed children were, nor did he put in place protocols for future chaplains to children at the hospital.
"This failure to contact the hospital or put any protocol in place meant that when Fr Ivan Payne became chaplain to the same hospital later, the hospital had no knowledge of previous wrongdoing by a chaplain."
The report found the archbishop had acted to avoid scandal and without regard to the protection of children in the hospital.
Fr Edmondus was chaplain there from 1958 to 1960 and the report says he committed a number of sexual assaults on patients aged between eight and 11 years during that time.
Then, some 16 years later, when based in Co Wicklow, he committed a sexual assault on a nine- year-old child.
However, the hospital only became aware of his abuse of former patients when one of those former patients, Marie Collins, contacted it in 1995.
She had been sexually abused and photographed by him in 1960, when she was aged 13. In 1985, she approached her local curate to report the matter but didn't get far. She decided in 1995 to write letters of complaint to Archbishop Desmond Connell and the hospital.
"The hospital authorities responded immediately and arranged to meet her. She found them very sympathetic. They offered counselling and told her that they would be reporting the matter to the Gardaí, which they did," the commission reports.
The archdiocese also said it would report the matter to gardaí.
Ultimately, the priest was convicted of indecent assault in 1997 against two girls, including Mrs Collins, and served nine months in jail. He remains a priest but is prohibited from exercising ministry. He lives in Dublin.
Fr Payne, described in the report as a convicted serial child sexual abuser, was chaplain at the hospital for a number of years between 1968 and 1974.
The commission was aware of a total of 31 complaints against him and 16 of these were made by people who alleged they were abused during his time as chaplain in Crumlin hospital, the majority of these victims being male.
The first complaint about him to the Dublin archdiocese was made in 1981 in respect of Andrew Madden. After Mr Madden went public in 1995 another complainant who said he was abused in Crumlin hospital came forward.
He spoke to a bishop about the abuse but again the hospital was not told, even though the Archbishop of Dublin – who was then Dr Desmond Connell – was chairman of the hospital's board of directors. There followed in 1996 and 1997 several further complaints from other former Crumlin patients about Fr Payne.
One former patient who made a statement to gardaí said he told nurses he did not want Fr Payne coming near him but they had paid no attention. Fr Payne was later convicted of abusing this man.
The DPP decided to prosecute in respect of some of the complaints but "there was no prosecution in respect of several of the cases from Crumlin because the complainants were unable to provide a clear description of Fr Payne".
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