Abuse Victims Want Royal Commission into Church

ABC News
March 1, 2012

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-03-01/minister-under-fire-for-paedophile-comments/3863604?section=vic

[with video]

TONY JONES, PRESENTER: Victims of sex abuse by Catholic clergy in Victoria are calling for a Royal Commission into the church.

Victims' support groups say they've traced dozens of suicides among people molested by Catholic clergymen in the Ballarat area.

And in the wake of an inquiry into child protection, the Victorian Government is scrambling for the right response.

Hamish Fitzsimmons reports

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS, REPORTER: Victoria's Community Services Minister is under pressure over comments comparing the rights of paedophiles to the rights of victims.

MARY WOOLDRIDGE, VICTORIAN MINISTER FOR COMMUNITY SERVICES (Fairfax Radio): We have to balance the rights of children and families...

NEIL MITCHELL, RADIO HOST: Against the rights of paedophiles.

MARY WOOLDRIDGE: ...with the rights of paedophiles.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Mary Wooldridge was responding to a recommendation in a landmark report into child welfare that parents have a right to know if a convicted paedophile moves into their community.

Supporters of abuse victims went to Parliament today to ask the minister to explain her comments.

HELEN LAST: The offenders have lost their equal rights by perpetrating crimes on vulnerable little children, adolescents and vulnerable adults.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: The victims of paedophiles want more than an explanation from the minister; they want a Royal Commission into the Catholic Church following years of sexual abuse in places like Victoria's Ballarat region.

STEPHEN WOODS, ABUSE VICTIM: I went to St Pat's Cathedral in Ballarat and I was sent to Father Ridsdale - so, out of the frying pan, into the fire. And he took me up around the lake and he raped me. He was doing that within about half an hour of me seeing him.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Stephen Woods and two of his brothers are among the many victims of two convicted paedophiles, Father Gerald Francis Ridsdale and Brother Robert Charles Best.

STEPHEN WOODS: At that school we know that there were three to four paedophiles in activity over a number of years. And they all bashed and molested and bashed and molested, so, kids - you copped it, whether in grade three, grade four, grade five, grade six. You just fell victim to them.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Father Ridsdale was jailed in 1994 for a minimum of 19 years and last August Brother Best received a 14-year jail term for his crimes.

While people like Stephen Woods now live with what has happened to them, others haven't been able to bear the pain. It's now thought as many as 35 people molested in Ballarat have committed suicide.

JUDY COURTIN, LEGAL RESEARCHER: These suicides stem from two offenders only: Robert Best, Christian Brother and Gerald Ridsdale, priest.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: The report into child protection in Victoria by retired judge Philip Cummins has called for more scrutiny of religious organisations.

Two recommendations of the Protecting Victoria's Vulnerable Children report include:

PHILIP CUMMINS, RETIRED JUDGE (male voiceover): "A formal investigation into the processes by which religious organisations respond to the criminal abuse of children by religious personnel within their organisations. Such an investigation should possess the powers to compel witnesses to give evidence and be able to demand documentary and electronic evidence."

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: The Catholic Church says it wants to consider the inquiry's report before commenting.

The Victorian Government says it will consider its next step.

MARY WOOLDRIDGE: Well what we'll be doing is meeting with the religious organisations, meeting with the community, who feel very strongly about it obviously, and we will have a response in time in relation to that.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Some, like Judy Courtin, say only a Royal Commission would make the Catholic Church's own investigations transparent.

JUDY COURTIN: Crimes are a matter for the state. They are not a private matter. They're a public matter. They are a matter for the police. And to date, all of these crimes have been dealt with within the church.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: When cases are pursued in the legal system giving evidence can be traumatic for victims.

STEPHEN WOODS: We're talking an obscene amount of money, we're talking multiples of millions over the years defending these people. Well that's telling the victims they can go stuff themselves. In court and in trying to get some compensation out of them, they would deny that they even existed legally. So, you know, the victims were on their own. You know, we really were just - it was like being molested all over again.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: And there are other barriers. In a 2007 case in New South Wales, the church successfully argued it was, in legal terms, a property trust and therefore not responsible for the behaviour of its priests.

JUDY COURTIN: There is no legal entity for the Catholic Church in Australia that can be sued for particularly historical sex offences.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Some are still trying. A class action against the Christian Brothers order is about to be played out in the Victorian Supreme Court.

Barrister Vivian Waller says that her 45 male clients claim they were abused by both Father Ridsdale and Brother Best. And Ms Waller believes that number is only the tip of the iceberg.

VIVIAN WALLER, BARRISTER: The Law Reform Commission tells us that the estimate is that only 10 per cent of child sexual assault cases are ever reported to the authorities.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: One of those was Colleen's husband Peter, who struggled with alcoholism and anger over what had happened to him. She says before he died in 2004 he tried several times to tell the church what had happened.

COLLEEN, FORMER WIFE OF ABUSE VICTIM: Basically shut the door in his face and, yeah, wouldn't acknowledge, you know, that anything did happen.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Colleen doesn't want to be identified for family reasons. She says the abuse Peter suffered also hurt her and their four children.

COLLEEN: They are angry, of course they are; they haven't got a father anymore. And, you know, they've lost a lot of years there with him, you know, growing up as well with him, like, you know when he was in his moods and that sort of thing.

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: For many victims the road to justice and recovery is never-ending.

Hamish Fitzsimmons, Lateline.