AUSTRALIA
Maitland Mercury
By ELLE WATSON July 26, 2013
One of the Australian Catholic Church’s most senior priests has spent a second day defending his decision not to report paedophile priests, including Denis McAlinden, to police on the basis it would betray victims’ trust.
Father Brian Lucas, a non-practicing barrister and the general secretary of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, said he faced a constant dilemma when victims refused to go to police.
He told the special commission of inquiry, which is investigating how the Catholic Maitland-Newcastle Diocese dealt with paedophile priests Denis McAlinden and James Fletcher, it was his role to encourage offending priests to resign from ministry.
Father Lucas, who was also part of a committee that designed a protocol for bishops in dealing with allegations of criminal behaviour in the 1980s and 1990s, said he was “mostly successful” at persuading paedophiles to resign.
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