AUSTRALIA
Broken Rites
By a Broken Rites researcher (article posted 3 October 2014)
New South Wales detectives have charged Marist Brother Peter Pemble (aged 66) with child-sex offences allegedly committed when he worked at a Catholic boys’ school early in his career, more than 40 years ago. The detectives allege that the incidents occurred at Maitland (in the Hunter region, north of Sydney) in 1971-1972, when Brother Pemble was in his twenties. Later in his career, Brother Peter Pemble became the principal of several Catholic schools in New South Wales before retiring in 2009.
In recent decades, Brother Pemble’s appointments as a principal have included:
* St Patrick’s Marist college Dundas, western Sydney;
* Marist College in North Sydney:
* Trinity Catholic College Lismore, northern NSW; and
*St Gregory’s College Campbelltown, south-western Sydney.
After retiring from teaching in 2009, Brother Peter Pemble began doing some study in Australia and overseas.
In mid-2014, while Brother Pemble was studying in Belgium, he made a visit to Australia. Detectives contacted him in Australia and interviewed him on 22 July 2014 at a Sydney police station about a complaint from a male who was a boy at Maitland in 1971-72.
Brother Pemble was then charged with three incidents of indecent assault of a male and was granted bail pending the court proceedings.
Detectives filed the charges at a hearing in the Newcastle Local Court on 14 August 2014. This was a brief administrative procedure. The court has scheduled the case to come up for further mention in the same court on a future date, for the next steps in the prosecution process.
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