A Sydney Priest Abused Eight Children, Police Allege

Broken Rites
May 13, 2015

http://brokenrites.org.au/drupal/node/359

A retired Catholic priest (now aged 70) is listed for Sydney's Parramatta Local Court on Thursday 14 May 2915, where he is to be charged with 19 offences relating to the sexual and indecent assault of children while he was ministering (in parish work or, at one stage, as a full-time chaplain for some disadvantaged people) in the Sydney archdiocese during the 1970s and 1980s and 1990s. The case number is 2015/00126145.

According to an announcement by the New South Wales police on 28 April 2015, the investigation began in 2014 when police from the Blue Mountains Local Area Command and the New South Wales Sex Crimes Squad received information relating to the alleged assault of a young girl by this Sydney priest during a visit to the Blue Mountains region in 1986.

Detectives made inquiries into the 1986 matter and identified seven more children who had allegedly been sexually or indecently assaulted by this priest in Sydney, or during visits elsewhere in New South Wales, between 1975 and 1992.

Throughout the time of the offences, the man was practising as a Catholic priest.

On 28 April 2015, following their inquiries, detectives arrested the 70-year-old man at a private house in Granville (in Sydney).

He was taken to Parramatta Police Station, where he was charged with:

*Two counts of sexual assault; and,

*17 counts of indecent assault.

He was granted conditional bail until the case is filed in the Parramatta Local Court on Thursday 14 May 2015.