Police commissioner yet to weigh in on Fox, by Jason Gordon And Michelle Harris, Newcastle Herald (June 2, 2014)

AMID all the rage, vindication and soul-searching that has followed the Special Commission of Inquiry’s report into child sexual abuse cover-ups, police commissioner Andrew Scipione still had the plight of victims foremost in his mind during a visit to Newcastle yesterday.

But while he ‘‘took comfort’’ from the commission’s findings that no ‘‘Catholic mafia’’ existed within Newcastle’s police ranks and was ‘‘proud’’ of his officers involved in the investigations, he refused to be drawn on questions about Detective Chief Inspector Peter Fox.

Mr Fox, while on extended sick leave, is still a police officer – one who was heavily battered by the commission’s findings, and one who the commission found had ‘‘exaggerated’’ evidence and at times been ‘‘deliberately untruthful’’.

Almost ironically, victims of sexual abuse by Catholic clergy have rushed to support Mr Fox despite the commission’s adverse findings against him.

Yesterday, Mr Scipione said he was still analysing the commission’s four-volume report and it was ‘‘still too early’’ to comment on the findings against Mr Fox.

‘‘We’ll do the analysis,’’ he said.

‘‘It’s not appropriate that I comment on [Mr Fox] now.

‘‘My main focus right now is that people know they can come forward and talk to us and anything that takes away from that is a distraction, which we’ll look at in the fullness of time.’’

The police commissioner was in Newcastle to unveil a memorial garden dedicated to highly regarded police officer, the late Tony Tamplin.

In a statement by Mr Scipione’s office, the commissioner spoke highly of Margaret Cunneen who had ‘‘probed forensically into the role police played’’ throughout the investigation into Church cover-ups.

‘‘As the commission found, there was no credible evidence of any wrongdoing by those officers undertaking their investigations or their commanders,’’ Mr Scipione said.

‘‘The issue of child abuse is one the NSW Police Force takes extremely seriously and has devoted significant resources to.’’

Mr Scipione said officers involved in Strike Force Lantle could ‘‘hold their heads up high’’.

‘‘We are proud of them,’’ he said. ‘‘Their motivation was to seek justice for victims – they had no other motivation.

‘‘They can now get back on with their lives and do what they do best – protecting the community.’’

Mr Scipione said police continued to encourage any victim of sexual abuse to report the matter to police in the first instance or, further, tell their story to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Meanwhile, Premier Mike Baird said he had spoken to commissioner Margaret Cunneen, SC, to thank her for her work.

‘‘[It’s] an incredibly difficult issue that I think she has done superbly well,’’ he said.

The government was considering the report in detail before responding. Asked of his reaction to the findings that Church officials had known of offending by priests, in Denis McAlinden’s case for more than 40 years, and not alerted police, Mr Baird said: ‘‘There are many details in there that disturb me very much, but again, we will consider the report in detail.

‘‘At this point, what I want to do is just to pay tribute to Margaret.’’