Police charge another religious Brother with offences against a child, Broken Rites (July 23, 2014)

Police charge another religious Brother with offences against a child

Broken Rites
July 23, 2014

http://brokenrites.org.au/drupal/node/300

New South Wales Police announced on 23 July 2014 that they have charged a 66-year-old religious Brother regarding indecent assaults of a child, committed 40 years ago. Broken Rites understands that the alleged victim was a pupil at a Marist Brothers boys' school which then existed at Maitland, north of Sydney in the Newcastle region.

The police announcement said that, in March 2013, detectives from Strike Force Georgiana received information about an alleged indecent-assault matter involving a child and they then commenced an investigation. (Strike Force Georgiana is a special unit of investigators located at Charlestown.)

On 22 July 2014, detectives from Central Hunter Local Command and Lake Macquarie Local Command attended Surry Hills Police Station in Sydney and spoke with a 66-year-old man about the alleged offences against a boy.

The police allege that the offences occurred between 1971 and 1972.

The religious Brother was charged with three incidents of indecent assault on a male. He was given strict conditional bail to appear at Newcastle Local Court on a specific date later in 2014.

The NSW Police announcement about the Maitland case says:

"Police are urging anyone with information about this incident to call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or use the Crime Stoppers online reporting page: https://www1.police.nsw.gov.au/

"Information you provide will be treated in the strictest of confidence. We remind people they should not report crime information via our Facebook and Twitter pages."

Broken Rites found a Catholic Church website which says that the Marist Brothers religious order began teaching in Maitland in 1898. The Marists continued there through the 1970s until 1984, when Maitland Marist Brothers High School was replaced by a Catholic co-educational school with lay teaching staff. This school is now known as All Saints College.

Broken Rites understands that the charged Brother (born in 1948) has also worked at other schools in New South Wales including:

Marist College in North Sydney;
St Patrick's Marist college, Dundas, in western Sydney;
Trinity Catholic College, Lismore; in northern NSW; and
St Gregory’s College, Campbelltown, in western Sydney.