Witness Asked Why No-one Intervened over Abuse at Salvation Army Boys Home

By Thomas Oriti
ABC News
February 5, 2014

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-02-05/evidence-of-paedophile-network-near-qld-salvation-army-boys-hom/5240292

An inquiry into physical and sexual abuse at a Salvation Army boys home in Queensland has been told child welfare officers were aware of the concerns, but the home continued to operate.

A former social worker Roy Short has been asked why more was not done to address reports of severe abuse at the boys home.

Salvation Army officers are accused of beating and raping boys at the Alkira boys home in the Brisbane suburb of Indooroopilly in the 1970s.

Lawyers at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse have been attempting to gather further information in light of revelations that boys were also being flown to Sydney as part of a prostitution network.

Mr Short worked at the Department of Children's Services, and says he was aware of concerns about the home.

In June 1975, Mr Short was asked write a memorandum reflecting on his time observing behaviour at the Alkira boys home.

"As the childcare officer for Alkira since late February 1975, I am of the opinion that the institution is presently incapable of providing a satisfactory standard of care for the boys already there, and for any who may be considered for placement there in the near future," the memorandum, dated 18 June 1975, reads.

Counsel Assisting the Commission, Simeon Beckett, has asked why he simply described the behaviour as unsatisfactory.

"It seems a fairly mild response, given the nature of the conduct you set out there in the memorandum," he said.

Mr Beckett told the hearing Mr Short had clearly made up his mind about the facility.

"I presume that, by that stage - and really we're talking a matter of four months after you had started work there - you had formed a very strong opinion about the nature and conditions at Alkira boys home?" he asked.

"That's correct," Mr Short responded.

"Those opinions are both my own, those expressed by other colleagues and those expressed in written records that the Department had at the time."

The Chair of the Royal Commission, Justice Peter McClellan has called the action a "passive response".

"It's a very poor picture. It would be surprising that there wasn't some capacity for active intervention," he said.

He says he is surprised no-one questioned whether the Salvation Army was equipped to run the home.

Concerns were expressed to the Salvation Army in writing, but the home remained open for five years.

The response was to ensure that boys would not be replaced once they left.

Numbers dropped, and Alkira closed its doors on 15 August 1980.

Paedophile network operated near Salvation Army boys home

A former Assistant Police Commissioner from Queensland has revealed information about a paedophile network operating near a Salvation Army boys home in the 1970s.

Retired Major Cliff Randall says a boy approached him at the Alkira Salvation Army Home for Boys in the Brisbane suburb of Indooroopilly in 1975, saying he was flown from Brisbane to Sydney by a millionaire hardware store owner.

The boy says he was sexually abused by a Sydney chef and forced to hitchhike home.

Retired Queensland Assistant Police Commissioner David Jefferies has made an unexpected appearance at the Royal Commission, revealing information about his work with the Juvenile Aid Bureau in 1974 and 1975.

Mr Jefferies says at the time, four people were implicated in a paedophile network involving boys selling newspapers adjacent to the Alkira home.

He says he believed one of the men involved in the network was a millionaire businessman and another was a teacher living nearby. He could not recall the identities of the other two men.

The hearing was told the boys would leave a brick on the road upright if they were available and it would be left horizontal if they were not.

David Jefferies says it is possible the Alkira residents were involved.

"I couldn't say categorically that these boys came from there, but we were aware that boys that were in state care and from institutions had in fact been flown to Sydney," he said.

"The newspaper sellers may have been Alkira residents, but I can't be sure of that."

Counsel Assisting the Commission, Simeon Beckett, has asked the retired officer to clarify why the boys were flown across the border.

"You said that part of the allegation was that boys had been taken from Brisbane down to Sydney for the purposes of sex with adults, is that correct?" he asked.

"Yes, that was the information that we had gleaned," Mr Jefferies responded.

Counsel Representing the Salvation Army, Kate Eastman, asked why police never questioned the manager of the Alkira home, Captain John McIver.

"I've never had any information that, for want of a better word, was a complaint or a piece of credible information," Mr Jefferies said.

"We would have certainly endeavoured to try to get as much information as we possibly could, and if we felt that interviewing the Salvation Army institution would have assisted that, we certainly would've done that."

David Jefferies told the hearing four people were arrested over the network, resulting in two convictions.

The Commission has also been told that boys from the Salvation Army's Bexley Boys Home in Sydney were "rented out" to adults for sex.

The hearing continues.