Former Catholic School Teacher John Skehan Sentenced for Historical Sexual Assault of Student in Victoria

By Tammy Mills
The Age
October 30, 2014

http://www.theage.com.au/national/former-catholic-school-teacher-john-skehan-sentenced-for-historical-sexual-assault-of-student-in-victoria-20141030-11e6t0.html

Victim Greg Barclay. Photo: Eddie Jim

A former Catholic school teacher in country Victoria avoided jail on Thursday for a historical sex assault on a student in 1970.

John Skehan, 75, was given an eight-month sentence suspended for two years and was placed on the sex offenders register after he pleaded guilty to the indecent assault of his 13-year-old student at a boys school in Shepparton.

That student was Greg Barclay, now aged 58 and a vice-president with the Australian Education Union.

Mr Barclay said outside court on Thursday that he was "gutted" with the sentence. Skehan had already been convicted and placed on a suspended sentence in 2010 for the indecent assault of a young child in Broken Hill in the 1970s.

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In his sentencing on Thursday, Magistrate Ian Watkins took into account Skehan's age, his ill health and that he was unlikely to reoffend.

Mr Barclay said despite the sentence, he felt vindicated that the abuse that he held secret for 44 years had been proven.

"Our justice system has come a long way, but there's still a way to go," he said.

"If nothing else, it has been to court today. It's been proven that he's guilty of it. It is vindication, it allows me to never visit that perhaps it was something that never happened, that I imagined it and it's out there for all and sundry to read and accept and believe."

Mr Barclay chose to go public with his identity in the hope it would help other victims of abuse to come forward.

"If we keep things secret, nothing ever gets done. It's got to be out there, we've got to talk. If we don't talk, we don't acknowledge it and we don't deal with it," he said.

Mr Barclay was 13 and a student at St Colman's in Shepparton in the state's north-east when he was abused by the Marist brother. The school later merged with a girl's high school to become what is now Notre Dame College.

Skehan called Mr Barclay out of class and took him to the brothers' dormitory where the assault took place.

"I remember going up the stairs, I remember going into his room, I remember the assault. I don't remember the end of the assault, I don't remember leaving his room, I don't remember getting back to class," Mr Barclay said.

"But I will never be rid of the effects of his deliberate actions and sexual abuse of me. He forced me, a child, to carry a secret that I couldn't share."

Mr Barclay went to police after his mother died in November.

"I know that she would have felt responsible for not being able to protect me. She did not deserve to blame herself," Mr Barclay said.

Shortly after the sentencing of his attacker, Mr Barclay visited his mother's grave in Shepparton.

"One of the gifts Mum gave me was the concept of social justice. I haven't been a retiring violet in terms of grabbing a cause and putting the head down and going head-long into it," he said.

"I think she would be proud. I know she would."

- with Jenna Bishop, The Shepparton News.