'Filthy Little Liar': Nuns Abused Child Sex Victim, Court Hears

By Paul Bibby
The Court Reporter
October 14, 2013

http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/filthy-little-liar-nuns-abused-child-sex-victim-court-hears-20131014-2vicp.html

A former resident of a Catholic Church institution says she was called a "filthy little liar" and forced to take multiple large doses of caster oil as punishment for reporting repeated sexual abuse by a priest.

The woman, who cannot be named, was giving evidence in the trial of Finian Egan, a 78-year-old former priest and youth worker who worked at multiple dioceses across NSW in a career spanning more than 30 years.

Egan is now facing eight counts of indecent assault and one count of rape in relation to a series of alleged attacks on four girls aged 10 to 17 in the 1960s, 1970s and 1990s.

Egan has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Fighting back tears, the woman told the Downing Centre District Court on Monday that she was first assaulted by Egan in March 1961 when she was sent to St Martha's Institution for Disadvantaged Children in Leichhardt at age 10.

She said soon after she arrived at the school, Egan called her into the church's Sacristy and pulled her on to his knee.

"He put his hands up my dress, pulled down my underwear and put his hands into my vagina," she said, crying.

"I could feel he had an erection."

The jury heard that Egan abused the woman on at least three other occasions, including placing his penis in her mouth during preparations for a palm Sunday service at the nearby St Fiacres Church in July 1962.

The woman said Egan had commented that she had "beautiful hair", leading her to ask a nun to cut it off in the hope he would leave her alone.

"I thought if I didn't have nice hair he wouldn't be interested in grabbing hold of me," the woman said.

When asked by the Crown Prosecutor in the case, Trevor Bailey, whether the strategy had worked, she replied 'no'.

The woman said she eventually told a young nun what was happening to her, believing that the woman was going to help.

She said that instead she was abused, ridiculed and humiliated.

"I thought she believed me - she said she was going to go and tell Mother Superior," the woman said.

"[Then] she called me a filthy little liar and gave me a big dose of caster oil. I couldn't keep it down ... threw up.

"She said 'even if it takes two bottles you're going to swallow it. I don't know how many doses I had before I eventually kept it down. I had to clean up my own vomit."

The woman said the nuns also put her in front of her class and told the students she was a liar.

The trial, before Judge Robyn Tupman, continues.