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	Australian Senator Names Sex-claim Priest Hibernia Times September 13, 2011 http://thehiberniatimes.com/2011/09/13/australian-senator-names-sex-claim-priest/9274 An Australian lawmaker has named a Catholic priest as having allegedly raped an Anglican archbishop in violent attacks dating back about 50 years. Independent senator Nick Xenophon used parliamentary privilege to identify the man as Monsignor Ian Dempsey after the Church declined to stand him down in connection with the alleged sexual abuse of Archbishop John Hepworth. Hepworth, who was trained and ordained as a Catholic but shifted to the Anglican church in the 1970s, says he was violently raped and sexually abused over 12 years from age 15 by two priests and a seminary student. Two of the men are now dead but the third, Dempsey, runs a parish in South Australia state, where Xenophon said he was being allowed to practise despite Hepworth’s allegations, which he first raised with the Church in 2007. “The allegations are serious; they are made by a man with credibility,” Xenophon told the Senate late on Tuesday. “The people of the Brighton parish have a right to know that for four years allegations have been outstanding that priest Ian Dempsey raped John Hepworth and church leadership has failed to make appropriate inquiries into this matter.” Xenophon had earlier threatened to out the accused man if Adelaide’s Catholic diocese did not stand him down. Lawyers for the diocese countered with a strongly worded letter urging him to desist from his threat while defending their decision not to suspend the priest as consistent with both religious law and their own procedures. “You may be aware that the allegations made by Archbishop Hepworth relate to a period dating back almost 50 years,” the lawyers said. “The priest concerned has categorically denied the allegations and, objectively speaking, it is not irrelevant that he has been a priest of good standing in the archdiocese for almost 50 years.” Hepworth said the priest should be forced to step down. “In the Catholic Church generally in Australia, bishops do stand priests aside or request they stand aside while allegations are investigated,” he said. “I can’t see how there can be any sort of law that would in fact prevent that request being made.” Xenophon earlier warned that the case had grave implications for the besieged Labor government, which appointed top South Australian Catholic official Monsignor David Cappo as chief of its new Mental Health Commission. “Monsignor Cappo, for reasons not fully explained, has failed to act in a timely and decisive manner on this important issue,” he said on Monday, adding that the matter had been given a “seemingly low priority” by the Church. “I question whether it is appropriate for a senior religious figure like David Cappo, who has responded this way to allegations of serious sexual and psychological abuse, to be given the role of chairman of the federal government’s mental health taskforce,” he said. Hepworth, head of a breakaway Anglican group seeking reconciliation with the Vatican, added he was “saddened” by the “very crude way” the issue was now playing out. He raised the matter in public for the first time after decades of silence with a media interview on Saturday. The interview followed an apology and offer of A$75,000 (ˆ56,690) compensation from the Archdiocese of Melbourne in relation to the two men he accused of abuse who are now dead. Hepworth, 67, has not sought to bring criminal charges over the case.
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