Shine the Light: Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse hears victim was moved by advisory group including Cardinal George Pell

By Fiona Henderson
Newcastle Herald
May 20, 2015

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/3091250/george-pell-involved-in-advisory-group/

Proceedings: Commissioner Andrew Murray, Justice Peter McClellan and Justice Jennifer Coate sitting in Ballarat, while Counsel Assisting Gail Furness SC makes her opening address.

St Joseph's Home in Sebastopol.

DISGRACED priest Gerald Ridsdale was continually moved around the Ballarat diocese due to abuse complaints, according to the counsel assisting the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

In her opening address on Tuesday, Gail Furness said Ridsdale was relocated several times by the College of Consultors – a group of priests advising former bishop Ronald Mulkearns and which included now Cardinal George Pell.

“Several of the consultors had been present at meetings of, or were members of the College of Consultors on each occasion in the past when Ridsdale had been moved,” Ms Furness said.

Minutes show Pell was present at a meeting when Ridsdale was moved from Mortlake after several complaints of inappropriate behaviour with young boys.

“The minutes do not disclose what the bishop said about why it became necessary (to move Ridsdale),” Ms Furness said.

“However ... it is expected that there will be evidence that Bishop Mulkearns knew it was because Ridsdale had abused boys in Mortlake and that he had offended in this manner in 1975.

“The principal (of the school) told the Catholic Church Insurances investigator that she was forbidden by the bishop to speak to the rest of the staff about what had happened.

“She said she told the bishop something should be done for the children and he said there would be nothing done because that would admit guilt.”

Ms Furness also said Catholic Church Insurances did not indemnify the diocese for any claims after December 31, 1975 because of the knowledge Bishop Mulkearns had of Ridsdale’s offending.

The commission will also hear evidence from convicted priest Paul Ryan, who said Bishop Mulkearns had “buried his head in the sand about the sexual abuse issues in the diocese”.

A SURVIVOR of St Joseph's orphanage in Ballarat has given an emotional testimony to the second day of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Gordon Hill told about being raped by a priest at the age of five and waking up bleeding down to his shins and with bite marks on his genitals.

"My genitals and bottom were the worst, they hurt like they were on fire," he said.

He was also forced to masturbate priests while they were in the confession box hearing parishioners' confessions.

It eventually escalated to "dungeon type" assaults.

"I used to be stripped down, tied up and sexually abused," he said.

Hill was hospitalised after an accident and tried to report the abuse but wasn't believed.

He was taken back to the orphanage and given a type of electric shock therapy to find out what he had told the doctors.

In his early working life at a pub, Hill lived in a flat behind the hotel where he was repeatedly raped by a priest and the priest's relative.

"One of them would hold me down and the other tied my legs up and blindfolded me," he said.

"The priest and the relative took turns to abuse me.

"Sometimes the priest's dad came in and sat on me while this was happening."

These stories first appeared in the The Courier.