Disgraced priest David Rapson seeks sentencing discount because of illness

By Shannon Deery
Herald Sun
April 1, 2015

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/law-order/disgraced-priest-david-rapson-seeks-sentencing-discount-because-of-illness/story-fni0fee2-1227287740037

David Rapson allegedly abused boys at a boarding school.

A DISGRACED priest who plied young boys with cigarettes and alcohol before raping them deserves a sentencing discount because he is unwell, a court has heard.

David Edwin Rapson is one of the most notorious paedophiles in Victorian history with a string of victims from his offending that spanned three decades.

In 2013 he was jailed for 13 years for sickening crimes on kids, but was released on appeal after serving just 11 months of that sentence.

His convictions were quashed by the Court of Appeal after a concession by the Office of Public Prosecutions that Rapson should have faced several trials.

They admitted that because of the varying nature of his offending it was unfair for all the matters to be determined by a single jury, as they had been.

Today the evil paedophile is back behind bars after being again found guilty of a string of charges.

After four secret County Court trials, which were unable to be reported because of suppression orders that were lifted today, he was found guilty of five charges of rape and six indecent assault charges.

The offending was against six boys between the 1970s and 1990s at a Victorian Catholic boys’ boarding school.

His lawyer, Shaun Ginsbourg, told a plea hearing Rapson’s physical and mental health had deteriorated since his original trial.

Mr Ginsbourg said Rapson had abused alcohol in the lead-up to his 2013 trial to cope with anxiety, but could no longer self-medicate when jailed.

He said this led to the former priest and principal suffering a breakdown in prison.

He urged Judge James Parrish to take Rapson’s diminished health into account when sentencing him.

But prosecutor David Cordy said little weight should be given to the anxiety and depression Rapson was now battling.

“Very few people are going to travel better in prison than in the community,” Mr Cordy said.

In a first for the disgraced priest, who is serving his third prison term for sexual offending, he gave evidence in each of his fresh trials.

But he was unable to convince jurors of his innocence.

Rapson’s crimes were so repulsive and so widespread he was defrocked by Pope John Paul II in 2004.

More than $80,000 has already been paid to his victims.

One student, who was 15 when he was molested by Rapson, told an earlier County Court trial that he was ordered not to come back to the school after accusing Rapson of assaulting him.

Another claimed that another priest witnessed Rapson molest him in the 1970s but did not move to stop the abuse.

He told police after the priest walked in on Rapson abusing him, Rapson told the priest: “You know what we do here. God made us this way and it’s his fault.”

The victim said the other priest told Rapson he had been “trying to resist it” and urged Rapson to do the same.

Another victim told police Rapson attacked him in his office in 1988.

He said he was boarding at the college when Rapson invited him to his office after “lights out” to play computer games.

He said he was given a drink that made him a “little bit dizzy” and later woke up in pain.

“I must have passed out or fallen asleep. When I woke up I was on the floor in the foetal position right next to the computer desk and felt a large amount of pain,” he said.

“Father Rapson was on his hands and knees lying over me.

“I tried to move but I couldn’t because he was on top of me and he was a big man.”

The man said Rapson raped him before he got up and fled the office.

“He yelled at me in a voice like the devil and said, ‘Come back’. I was too scared and just ran all the way back to my dormitory.”

Rapson did not deny giving some children cigarettes and alcohol but denied all of the abuse allegations.

He will be sentenced on May 4.