Sex Claims 'Met with Violence'
By Joanne McCarthy
DEFROCKED Catholic priest John Sidney Denham violently sexually assaulted a 12-year-old schoolboy over a number of months in 1977, police have alleged. But another priest's violent response at news of the alleged assaults stopped the boy speaking about it until decades later. Police who have charged Mr Denham, 70, with 47 child sex offences involving 14 boys, allege a priest, who cannot be named, repeatedly hit the boy and yelled: "How dare you make up these lies? How dare you come into my office and make up lies about a man of his stature?" The boy, who came from a violent home and had seen his Catholic school as an "outlet from this family abuse", "believed from that time that he could not tell anyone", police allege. Mr Denham declined to appear in Newcastle Local Court on an audio visual link yesterday after Strikeforce Georgiana Detective Sergeant Kristi Faber charged him with 10 new child sex offences involving two boys. This is in addition to 37 charges previously laid involving 12 boys at St Pius X School, Adamstown, in the 1970s. He has not entered pleas to any of the charges including indecent assault and buggery. Police allege Mr Denham violently sexually assaulted one boy, 12, in his bedroom in the priests' quarters at the school in early 1977, when the boy was in year 7. While the boy was crying in pain, Mr Denham is alleged to have told him that if he told anyone about it, Mr Denham "would tell his dad that he came to him and that he wanted it". The boy was "extremely fearful of his father due to physical abuse at home", police allege. After another incident allegedly involving oral sex, Mr Denham is alleged to have told the boy: "Don't forget you're the one who comes to me. If you tell anyone I'll tell your family and friends. No one will believe you." It is alleged that after another incident that left the boy bleeding heavily, Mr Denham threatened to tell the boy's father. Police charged Mr Denham with four indecent assault offences involving a second boy, also 12, in 1978 when Mr Denham was the boy's religion teacher. They allege the boy was repeatedly indecently assaulted in a music room at the school until Mr Denham allegedly became more "forceful" and the boy decided to report the alleged offences to another priest. He alleges that priest said "I'll look into it". Police allege the boy returned to the second priest another three times when the assaults allegedly continued. The boy pleaded with his mother to leave the Catholic school and he completed his education at a Newcastle public school. Newcastle Local Court magistrate Ian Cheetham adjourned the charges to August.
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