BishopAccountability.org
	Victims Force the Church to Admit That a Prominent Priest Was an Abuser Broken Rites September 10, 2011 http://brokenrites.alphalink.com.au/nletter/page118-pickering.html When Broken Rites established its Australia-wide telephone hotline in late 1993, one of the first calls we received was a tip that Melbourne priest Father Ronald Pickering had suddenly vanished from his parish and had fled to England. We continued receiving occasional calls about Pickering, and we referred these callers to the Sexual Offences and Child Abuse (SOCA) unit of the Victoria Police. The police were frustrated by Pickering's escape to England and they said it would be difficult to nab him. Therefore Broken Rites referred these complainants to the Melbourne Catholic Archdiocese's sex-abuse commissioner, Peter O'Callaghan QC. The complainants eventually scored a victory when Mr O’Callaghan handed down an official ruling in 2002 that Father Pickering had indeed been sexually abusing boys during his 36-year career as a priest in Melbourne. The Melbourne archdiocese then gave these victims a written apology “for the hurt and wrongs you have suffered at the hands of Father Ronald Pickering”. These victims, from various parishes, do not know each other. Victims calculate that Pickering targeted or groomed hundreds of boys during his priestly career. He encouraged boys to engage in furtive, “illicit” behaviour - smoking, drinking, pornography and sex. Some Pickering victims went on to other forms of misbehaviour and rebelliousness, culminating in drug-taking and suicide attempts. This shattered whole families. Father Ronald Dennis Pickering was born in Britain in the late 1920s (possibly 1929). Originally an Anglican, he became ordained as a priest of the Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne in 1957. He ministered at the following Melbourne suburban parishes: St Theresa's in Essendon (1958-65);St Mary's in East St Kilda (1966-68); Sacred Heart in Warburton (1969-72); St Peter's in Clayton (1973-78); St James's in Gardenvale (1978-93). In signed statements made to police, victims say that Father Ron Pickering hovered around altar boys, choir boys and parish-school boys. He lured victims to his bedroom with promises of watching television or videos or receiving pocket money for altar-serving or doing odd jobs. He continually talked about sex. He would often encourage boys to consume alcohol in an attempt to get them drunk before abusing them. He would often have a boy staying with him overnight, even sharing his bed. He also took boys away with him on weekend trips, where he abused them. In a typical scenario, Pickering would wrestle with a boy on the bed, tickle the boy’s stomach and then engage in sexual activity. Pickering prospered financially while in the priesthood. He acquired a number of residential investment properties in various parts of Australia, which brought him rental income as well as capital growth. He was a heavy smoker and drinker and was a big spender on cars and clothes and on gifts for boys. It is believed that some of Pickering’s fortune resulted from him prompting elderly parishioners to remember him in their will. Pickering presented himself as a conservative. He supported advocates of the Latin Mass. He sprouted much in public about "spirituality". Pickering had a degree from Oxford University. In Australia, he took an interest in Catholic teachers’ colleges. He mixed socially with some of Australia’s most prominent clerics. These clerics knew about Pickering’s sex-abuse but Pickering, in turn, knew secrets about certain colleagues. So everyone remained silent. In 1993, one Pickering victim, “Mike”, began making inquiries about Pickering at the archdiocesan office and in Pickering’s parishes. Alarmed that the police might knock on his door, Pickering fled to England. The Melbourne archdiocese knew his forwarding address in England (care of one of Pickering's sisters, living in Margate, Kent), so the archdiocese was able to send his superannuation entitlements to him. Certain prominent Melbourne clerics were relieved to see Pickering escape from Australia -- because of what he knows about them. Negligently, the church did not bother to inform Pickering’s former parishioners why he had fled. It did not bother to find out how many families had been affected. This cover-up prolonged the suffering of Pickering’s victims and their families. The cover-up ended after victims consulted Broken Rites. Mike’s story Mike (born in late 1954) told Broken Rites that he was an 11-year-old altar boy at the East St Kilda parish, when Pickering befriended him in 1966. Mike respected Pickering as a father figure, as the boy’s own father had died three years earlier. Pickering began paying pocket money to Mike to wash the priest's car or assist at weddings, baptisms, funerals and Masses. Pickering would pay the money in his bedroom where sexual abuse would occur. At age 13 or 14, Mike revealed the abuse in confession to a priest at a neighbouring parish – Father Wilfred Baker at St Colman’s, Balaclava. Contrary to myths about the “secrecy of the confessional”, Fr Baker later mentioned to Pickering what Michael said in confession. Baker’s remarks to Pickering were made in a sleazy “nudge-nudge, wink-wink” manner. Later Pickering reprimanded Michael for revealing the sexual abuse (even in confession!). [Father Bill Baker was jailed in June, 1999, after pleading guilty to child-sex offences spanning almost 20 years from 1960. So Mike is lucky that he was not sexually abused also by Billy Baker.] One of Pickering’s colleagues in the East St Kilda parish in 1968 was Father Desmond Gannon, who in 1995 was jailed for a year for indecently assaulting boys at his various parishes in the 1960s and ‘70s. Luckily, Mike escaped being abused by Des Gannon. Mike says Pickering’s abuse damaged his former value system and his trust in authority. He has managed to repair his damaged life – by his own efforts, with no credit due to the Catholic Church. . He is now married, with children, and runs a one-man business. Tom’s story Tom (born 1963) told Broken Rites that he was befriended by Pickering at the Gardenvale parish in 1978-9 while he was a student at Melbourne’s Xavier College, aged 14-15. Tom was one of a group of boys who would visit Pickering at the parish house, climbing a balcony to reach Pickering's bedroom. Pickering gave them wine to drink. On one occasion, Tom became so drunk that he vomited in Pickering's office. After the first sexual assault, Pickering ordered Tom to keep it secret. Tom says that originally he was a top student at school. But, post-Pickering, his schoolwork suffered and he afterwards worked in menial jobs. After Pickering, Tom had 20 years of depression, anxiety, suicidal thoughts, bouts of anger and difficulty in maintaining personal relationships. Finally, in his early 30s, a psychologist helped him see the impact of Pickering’s abuse. Then he phoned Broken Rites and contacted the police Sexual Offences and Child Abuse Unit. Matthew’s story Broken Rites was also contacted by a Melbourne woman, Rosemary. She said her son Mathew became an altar boy and choir boy under Pickering at Gardenvale from 1979, aged nine, and remained associated with Pickering into his mid-teens. When Matthew was 14, his mother learned that boys climbed a ladder to Pickering's bedroom. Matthew told Rosemary that the ladder was so that the boys would not disturb the housekeeper. Rosemary says Matthew’s was originally a lovely boy but, during his association with Pickering, he became rebellious. Matthew died from a heroin overdose in 1992, aged 22, and Rosemary finally realised the impact of the Pickering influence. Rosemary said another Pickering choir boy had died of a drug overdose a year before Matthew and a third had attempted suicide and was receiving psychiatric care. Others led troubled lives. Rosemary believes they may also have been victims of Pickering. Rosemary has learned that other Gardenvale families complained to the church about Pickering while he was there but they were ignored. In a letter to Rosemary, in November 2001, archdiocesan sex-abuse commissioner Peter O'Callaghan, QC, admitted that Pickering "had a proclivity for child abuse" and that Rosemary’s "suspicions that Matthew was a victim of Pickering are well justified". Further developments In 2002, Broken Rites was having discussions with investigative journalists at Melbourne’s Sunday Age about church sexual abuse. Consequently, on 24 March 2002, the paper exposed Pickering and the church’s protection of him. The Sunday Age story forced the church to make admissions. The new archbishop, Denis Hart, issued a statement (dated 25 March 2002), acknowledging that Father Ronald Pickering had left the Gardenvale parish in late May 1993 "without warning or notice" and had gone to England. The statement also said that the church sex-abuse commissioner Peter O'Callaghan, Q.C., had upheld complaints from three victims about being sexually abused by Pickering. A former teacher at the Gardenvale parish primary school, Genevieve, told the Sunday Age (31 March 2002) that in 1989 she complained to one of Melbourne's auxiliary bishops about Father Pickering's general competence and his role in managing the parish school. But Ms Grant said that this auxiliary bishop (who later became one of the most famous professional Catholics in Australia) "brushed me aside" and "didn't want to know". A Gardenvale parishioner told the Sunday Age that, five years after Pickering fled, the church published an appeal for donations to help retired priests, including (the church said) Father Pickering. Another parishioner told the Sunday Age that Pickering gave a sermon in the early 1990s urging people with complaints about the church or members of the clergy to tell a priest, not the police. Melbourne priest Father Michael Shadbolt wrote to the Sunday Age, admitting that the case against Pickering was “powerful”, although Pickering had not been brought before a court of law. After the Sunday Age exposure, Broken Rites received further calls from males telling us of their dealings with Father Ron Pickering in their school days. Father Ron Pickering was a friend and mentor of Father Paul David Ryan, who was jailed in Australia in September 2006 for indecently assaulting boys. For the full story of Ryan (including Pickering), see our article entitled "Church kept an abusive priest - and one victim committed suicide".
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.