Ballarat priests involved in child sex abuse sent on 'treatment' trips, inquiry told

The Guardian
May 19, 2015

http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/may/19/ballarat-priests-involved-in-child-sex-abuse-sent-on-treatment-trips-inquiry-told

Former Catholic priest Gerald Ridsdale abused children at parishes or church locations throughout Victoria from the 1960s to 1980s.

Catholic priests involved in the sexual abuse of young children were repeatedly moved to different parishes in Victoria and sent on “treatment” trips to the US and Italy before eventually being convicted of their crimes, the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse has heard.

The opening day of hearings in the Victorian town of Ballarat featured the start of evidence from 17 men who said they were abused at five Catholic institutions in the area.

The widespread abuse, over the course of three decades from the 1960s onwards, has been linked to at least a dozen suicides in the Ballarat area due to the trauma endured by abuse victims.

The prolific offending of Gerald Ridsdale, who has been found guilty on four occasions of more than 100 separate offences against children as young as four, was laid out in confronting detail.

Gail Furness, counsel assisting the royal commission, said Ridsdale abused children “at parishes or church locations throughout Victoria” from the 1960s to 1980s, including in Mildura, Swan Hill, Warrnambool, Apollo Bay, Ballarat and Mortlake.

Furness said Ronald Mulkearns, who was made bishop of Ballarat in 1971, moved Ridsdale due to complaints over “inappropriate behaviour” including reports from two parents that a boy was living at the Mortlake presbytery with him.

Ridsdale was sent for counselling with a member of the clergy and later attended a “psychological and spiritual” program in New Mexico which involved sessions with a “spiritual director, art therapist and psych dramatist”.

Furness said: “Thirteen years had passed since Bishop Mulkearns first knew that Ridsdale was sexually abusing boys he met during his work as a priest.

“Ridsdale had been at some nine parishes and other church locations during his time and abused more than 50 children.”

Ridsdale, who will be eligible for parole in 2019 when he will be 85, will appear at the hearing from prison via video link. Mulkearns, who retired in 1997, was questioned by Victoria police in 1995 over whether he had committed a felony. They found there was no evidence he had concealed a crime.

Another Catholic cleric, Paul Ryan, told Bishop Mulkearns that he thought of “acting out” his attraction to adolescent boys. He was sent to Rome to attend a retreat and then the Saint Luke’s Institute in Washington for treatment.

Furness said a written statement from Ryan said he thought “Bishop Mulkearns buried his head in the sand about the sexual abuse issues on the diocese. Ryan said Bishop Mulkearns knew about him in 1977 but did not revoke his faculties until 1993”.

Ryan was sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment in 2006 after pleading guilty to three charges of indecent assault between 1990 and 1991.

The hearing also heard from Philip Nagle, 50, who told the royal commission he was abused by Brother Stephen Farrell after he moved to Catholic school to St Alipius in Ballarat in 1973.

Nagle said Farrell took him to the school first aid bay and took his pants off and sexually assaulted him. He said he was abused by Farrell on a camping trip in the Grampians, prompting Nagle to consider taking his own life.

“It was a scary time, I couldn’t work out what I was doing to make the abuse happen because the physical pain made it feel like I was being punished,” he said.

Nagle said Farrell was an “evil predator” who would visit the family home, where the paedophile priest sexually assaulted Nagle’s brother in his bedroom. Farrell later received a two-year suspended sentence for these attacks.

Nagle said of the 33 boys in his school year “I know 12 are dead, I believe they committed suicide”.

A further abuse survivor, known in court as BAC to protect his identity, said he was also sexually assaulted by Farrell and felt abandoned by the Catholic church.

“I think the church needs to tell the full story and be honest,” he said. “I want to see the church work to stop the suicides. I want the dying to stop.”

BAC added the Catholic church should “forfeit its privileged position in society” and that victims and their families have been ostracised by the Catholic community.

Timothy Green, another survivor of abuse, said it was inconceivable the Catholic hierarchy, teachers and even some parents didn’t know of the crimes committed by Brother Edward Dowlan, who was jailed in March this year for 34 acts of indecent assault and gross indecency between1971 and 1985.

“It was just so blatantly obvious and every boy in the class knew that their turn was going to come up at some stage,” Green said.