The Vatican Refuses to Release Files of Australian Priests Accused of Abusing Children

news.com.au
August 22, 2014

http://www.news.com.au/national/the-vatican-refuses-to-release-files-of-australian-priests-accused-of-abusing-children/story-fncynjr2-1227032540685

Refuses to release files on paedophile priests ... Cardinal George Pell appears via video link from the Vatican at the Commission into child abuse Source: Supplied

THE Vatican has refused to hand over the files of Australian priests accused of sex crimes to the child abuse royal commission.

Claiming the internal documents were the property of the Holy See, the Vatican argued the commission’s request was “neither possible nor appropriate”.

Reasons included ongoing church investigations, and that internal working documents were the sovereign property of the Holy See.

[CHURCH SEX ABUSE: Cardinal George Pell heavily criticised]

[ROYAL COMMISSION: Catholic priests ‘encouraged victims to go to police’]

Cardinal George Pell, now working in Rome, was asked if he sought an assurance from the Vatican that any document the royal commission needed would be provided.

“That is correct,” Cardinal Pell told the commission via video-link today.

“I suppose in retrospect there would be some discussion over what ‘any document’ meant.” Cardinal Pell said specific requests about cases would be more likely to succeed than what he described as an “ambit claim” for large numbers of documents.

A letter from the royal commission to the Vatican said it needed access to documents if it was to fulfil its terms of references. “It is essential that the royal commission understand the nature and extent of the communications between those congregations and the Holy See in relation to child sexual abuse complaints about Australian clerics,” the letter said.

Cardinal Pell said the Vatican had provided 5000 pages of documents in relation to specific requests.

“But in following international convention they will not provide internal working documents of another sovereign state,” he said. Cardinal Pell said he thought the royal commission’s request for documents relating to each case was “unreasonable”.

“Overwhelmingly every document that is held in Rome exists here ... I am not aware of exceptions — overwhelmingly they are available in Australia,” he said.

A letter from the Vatican’s Secretariat of State said finding every file on accused Australian priests would be a substantial burden, “inconsistent with international practice”.

“The Catholic Church is no more legally responsible for priests who abuse children than a trucking company which employs a driver who molests women,” a defiant Cardinal Pell said.

The Vatican refuses to answer the plea ... Vlad Selakovic with the Care Leavers Australia Network protest outside the Royal Commission into institutional child sex abuse. Source: Supplied

Victims’ families were outraged at his comments, branding it as “a ludicrous comparison.”

Even the chair of the child abuse royal commission thinks the situation is quite different when it comes to a priest getting access to a child.

Cardinal Pell accepts the church has a moral obligation to victims, but when it comes to its legal responsibility, the actions of its priests are not necessarily its fault.

“If the truck driver picks up some lady and then molests her, I don’t think it’s appropriate, because it is contrary to the policy, for the ownership, the leadership of that company to be held responsible,” Cardinal Pell told the commission via video link from Rome on Thursday.

But Cardinal Pell said if the church had been warned about a priest or had bad policies or procedures in place, “then certainly the church official would be responsible”.

Anthony Foster, the father of two girls raped by a paedophile priest, said the comparison was clearly wrong.

“The truck driver analogy was just absurd, ludicrous, and it was nowhere near a proper analogy to the Catholic Church,” Mr Foster told reporters.

Commission chair Justice Peter McClellan said priests got access to children with the parents’ consent, unlike truck drivers. “The relationship between the priest and a child is quite different to that between the truck driver and the casual passenger, isn’t it?” he asked Cardinal Pell.

“Yes, I would certainly concede that,” Cardinal Pell responded. Cardinal Pell said the Melbourne archdiocese strove to meet its moral obligations to abuse victims by setting up the Melbourne Response in 1996, the first comprehensive scheme in Australia to deal with clergy abuse allegations which included determining compensation payments.

“We did not admit that there was a legal obligation but that, in practice, in the compensation panel we fully accepted our moral responsibility towards those who had suffered,” he said.