Inquiry Probes Salvos" Abuse Claim Process

Illawarra Mercury
April 3, 2014

http://www.illawarramercury.com.au/story/2196640/inquiry-probes-salvos-abuse-claim-process/?cs=12

A man who spent 10 years in a Salvation Army-run boys home wanted the army to pay him $1 million for every year he suffered abuse.

Ralph Doughty, who was in the Gill Memorial Home for Boys in Goulburn, NSW, from 1940, when he was seven, to 1950, said he calculated the amount based on cases overseas.

"I will guarantee that not one judge ... would be prepared to accept a million dollars a year to [be sexually abused]," said Mr Doughty, now in his 80s.

Mr Doughty, who qualified as a barrister in the past decade, told a royal commission hearing in Sydney on Thursday he first reported the abuse in 1951.

While at Gill he was sexually, emotionally and physically abused.

He said officers used a cane to penetrate him and another, who had raped another boy, tried to [force him to perform oral sex].

He told the commission since his time at Gill he often felt suicidal, suffered nightmares and feared losing his family.

The commission in this hearing - the second concerning the Salvation Army - is examining what processes the army had in place to deal with abuse complaints.

This hearing has heard from 10 witnesses who went through that process and all said it was never explained and settlement offers appeared ad hoc.

The hearing resumes on Friday.

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