House of horrors orphanage investigated ...

By Louise Cheer
Daily Mail
April 15, 2015

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3040028/The-horrific-orphanage-kids-kids-raped-forced-confess-sin-Horrifying-accounts-child-abuse-Catholic-community-Rockhampton-given-royal-commission.html

The royal commission in Queensland heard from alleged victims who suffered at the hands of nuns and priests who ran the Neerkol orphanage near Rockhampton

About 4000 children passed through what was known as St Joseph's Orphanage between 1885 and 1978

Claims ranged from being raped by a broom handle to being gang raped to being forced to drink their own urine

The commission will be hearing from 13 former residents of the orphanage located in south-east Queensland

The royal commission hearing is expected to run until April 24. Pictured is Justice Jennifer Coate

House of horrors orphanage investigated as alleged victims reveal horrific tales of gang rape, beatings and sexual assault with a broom handle... before being forced to confess the brutal acts as their own sins

Victims at an Australian orphanage have told of the horrific abuse they suffered at the hands of the priests and nuns who ran the institution from claims of being raped by a broom handle to being forced to drink their own urine.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse in Rockhampton has also heard a woman was gang raped by employees and then had a child at 14 years of age.

While a retired nurse, who was sent to Neerkol orphanage near Rockhampton, said she was punched and slapped repeatedly, and a third victim claimed she was raped more than 100 times by parish priest Reginald Durham, who is now dead, from when she was 11.

The Rockhampton hearing in Queensland, which started on Tuesday, is expected to go until April 24.

A victim identified as AYL told the inquiry she had allegedly been routinely raped by a male employee from 1963, and in claims aired publicly for the first time said on one occasion the man and two other employees bound, gagged and raped her at the orphanage.

AYL also recalled an incident where she was allegedly raped with a broom handle by employee Kevin Baker, The Courier Mail reported.

The day before her own assault was carried out she claimed she had witnessed Baker sexually abusing a boy until he bled.

When she informed a nun at the institution, the boy was allegedly slapped in the face.

The next day AYL claims Baker raped her and threatened if she levelled another accusation at him again 'it won’t be a few inches, but a few feet'.

AYL, who was sent to the orphanage in 1961 at the age of 10, assumed he meant this as a reference to the broom.

She also claimed at age 14 she gave birth at a girls' home in Mitchelton, in Brisbane's north, and the child was taken away by a nun who was present at the delivery.

'I do not know what happened to the baby,' AYL told the commission.

'At the time, I was told that I was having the devil taken out of me.'

The woman said she had previously asked for the claims she gave birth to be included in her March statement to the commission but they were not.

She told the inquiry she was made to scrub the floor with a toothbrush when she told a priest about the sexual abuse she suffered at Neerkol.

The commission has heard the nuns who ran the orphanage meted out savage and arbitrary punishments to children, and some residents were molested by priests who are now deceased.

Former residents told of being locked in rooms and cupboards, starved of food and water, being forced to drink their own urine for hydration and to lick their own vomit.

On the first day of hearing, a 67-year-old woman who worked at Neerkol said former Catholic bishop of the Rockhampton Diocese Brian Heenan had been originally dismissive of her claims she was raped more than 100 times by Durham.

'After each time I was sexually abused, I had to go to confession to him and confess my sin of impurity,' the woman, identified as AYB said.

Durham was in 1999 sentenced to 18 months prison for indecently dealing with the woman but many more serious charges involving her and other complainants were discontinued.

The commission also heard from retired nurse Mary Adams, 64, who was at the orphanage between the 1950s and 1960s.

She claimed she suffered repeated emotional, physical and sexual mistreatment at the hands of nuns and priests at Neerkol.

Sobbing uncontrollably at times, Ms Adams told the hearing in Rockhampton she was punched, slapped, pulled by her hair and on one occasion flogged with a skipping rope so forcefully she struggled to walk for days.

Boys who tried to run away from Neerkol were publicly flogged with horse whips and those who wet the bed were forced to stand with the soiled sheets draped over their heads.

Ms Adams recounted how when aged 12 she confided in a visiting priest, and he tried to rape her.

Another priest repeatedly molested her while she was billeted to a foster carer in Mackay, the commission heard.

She later received $20,000 compensation from the Catholic Diocese of Rockhampton and the Sisters of Mercy, who ran the orphanage.

But she said nothing could ever heal the pain she had suffered because of the alleged abuse.

'No amount of money can ever give back my childhood, my loss of confidence, my lack of formal education, my dignity, my self-esteem and self-worth,' Ms Adams said.

She also claimed Bishop Heenan made no real attempt to identify the priest who sexually assaulted her.

A fourth victim, Diane Carpenter, said she was led to believe all five of her siblings, including herself, were abused.

She lived at Neerkol until she was 17 years old on a number of occasions and claimed she was physically abused by the Sister of Mercy nuns, the ABC reported.

On one occasion Ms Carpenter said she was forced to drink her own urine to keep hydrated while she was locked in an 'extremely hot room'.

Many former residents of Neerkol who received payouts and formal apologies from the church said they could not erase the horrible memories.

'I can never be compensated for the abuse I suffered at Neerkol,' AYL said.

'I just wish that I could wind back the clock and be a child.'

The commission is investigating historical allegations of child abuse at the Neerkol St Joseph's Orphanage near Rockhampton, which was operated by the Sisters of Mercy until 1978.

About 4000 children passed through what was known as St Joseph's Orphanage between 1885 and 1978.