Former Catholic Bishop Tells Inquiry He Failed to Adequately Protect Children

The Guardian
April 16, 2015

http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/apr/17/former-catholic-bishop-tells-inquiry-he-failed-to-adequately-protect-children

A public hearing for the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse in Rockhampton. Photograph: Royal commission/AAP

A retired Catholic bishop has admitted that he failed to protect Queensland children from a priest who was later convicted of child sexual offences.

The former bishop of the Rockhampton diocese, Brian Heenan, conceded at the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse that his response to multiple allegations of historical child sexual offences against members of his clergy was inappropriate and inadequate.

Heenan was head of the Rockhampton diocese when former residents of the notorious Neerkol orphanage came forward in the 1990s with claims they had been sexually abused by priests.

One of those at the centre of the allegations, Reginald Durham, was allowed to continue working in an administrative role in church, including alongside primary school students.

Durham was later convicted of indecently dealing with a child resident of the Neerkol orphanage.

Heenan said he had wrongly assumed children would not be placed at risk due to Durham’s age.

“I didn’t see the inappropriateness of it. I do so now,” he told the royal commission on Friday.