Questions over Police Role in Church Abuse Handling Process

By Suzanne Smith
Radio Australia
February 28, 2013

http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/international/2013-02-28/questions-over-police-role-in-church-abuse-handling-process/1094878

[with video]

New South Wales police are facing fresh questions over whether they forged an unhealthy relationship with the Catholic Church in dealing with sexual abuse allegations against priests.

Lateline can reveal that for eight years to 2004, a senior police officer was an integral part of Towards Healing, the church's internal process for handling sexual abuse cases.

The state's former director of public prosecutions says that was a serious conflict of interest for police and should never have been approved.

In the mid-1990s, the Wood royal commission into police corruption was highlighting the need for greater child protection measures in the church.

As the level of disquiet grew about the church's handling of complaints, in 1996 it set up an expert panel known as the NSW Professional Standards Resource Group.

On that expert panel was a police officer from the sex crimes squad.

The officer was there to advise on the law and whether church practices constituted a breach of the law.

The senior police officer reviewed the church's own investigations - at the beginning and end of the process only - and then gave advice on what action to take against alleged offenders.

According to NSW Police, all the information provided by the church to that officer had the names of victims and alleged perpetrators removed.

Alarm bells

Photo: Nicholas Cowdery questions why a police officer was involved. (Lateline)

Lateline understands this was because the victims were assured of confidentiality. Now, the role of the police in that process has set off alarm bells.

Nicholas Cowdery, the NSW director of public prosecutions from 1994 to 2011, questions why the church set up the resource group with a police officer involved.

"They have done that presumably so they can say publicly, 'what we have done is appropriate, we have brought in the interests of law enforcement and therefore you shouldn't be inquiring any further'," he said.

"The problem with that is that a police officer doesn't leave behind his or her oath of office until they retire, so when the police officer comes into this body that police officer brings that oath of office with him or her and is obliged to enforce the law and take any action appropriate in that regard.

"Well the church may say, 'we just wanted the police officer as a private individual or citizen but with the experience gained as a police officer'... but that really is no answer.

"It places that police officer in an impossible position and it is clear the police officer was not involved in all the proceedings of this body."

Mr Cowdery says the officer could not have known whether the investigations were being done properly or whether priests kept re-offending.

"So the police officer was given a sample at the beginning of an investigation and information at the end of it.

"All of that information as I understand it was anonymised so the police officer had no way of knowing who it was they were investigating, whether from one investigation to another it was the same person who was maybe re-offending, no way of assessing the requirements of law enforcement and whether or not there should be some further action taken outside that body in relation to these individuals.

'Gagging exercise'

"So it was a sort of a gagging exercise in a way too, gagging law enforcement from exposing what went on in this body by controlling the information that the police officer got and by making his or her deliberations subject to controls by the Catholic Church."

A spokesman for NSW Police said it was not a police force position within that program.

"The officer advised the towards healing program on best practice system and process matters as part of her inter-agency liaison duties with the then Child Protection Enforcement Agency," the spokesman said.

"As a member of the board she was involved in the review of cases to ensure proper processes were being followed.

"The identities of the alleged victims and perpetrators were withheld from the board."

Mr Cowdery says the officer was prevented from exercising her powers and duties by the way in which the information was provided to her.

Lateline has spoken to individuals directly involved in towards healing who say the process was undertaken in good faith, with good intentions.

Michael Salmon, the director of the Catholic Church's NSW professional standards office, said in a statement:

"We have audited all the complaints that have come into the professional standards office pursuant to the Towards Healing protocol, to ensure that all matters involving complaints of sexual abuse of children and minors have been reported to the sex crimes squad of the NSW Police pursuant to our normal practice."

There are many channels for reporting abuse crimes to police, including by the bishop in every diocese.

The resources group was just one level of review the church established to tackle the issue of child protection.

But Mr Cowdery says with hindsight this process could be viewed as the church conscripting the police force into its own agenda.

"The police force is a public instrumentality, it is part of our system of government and social control and serves a very public purpose.

"I think it is quite wrong for a member of that police force to be taken away and put into a private body set up by the institution, the Catholic Church, with the most to lose from an unfavourable outcome and gagged."

NSW Police withdrew the officer's position from the resource group in 2005.

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