Royal Commission: Hutchins School employee told to hang up on callers asking about alleged abuse

AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Tyson Shine

An employee at the private Hobart boys’ school at the centre of a sexual abuse inquiry was told to hang up on some people calling about alleged abuse.

A royal commission is investigating the way the Hutchins School handled sexual abuse claims relating to a paedophile ring that operated at the school in the 1960s.

Documents released to the commission outline an instruction for a member of the Hutchins staff to “hang up” on some people calling for information.

A victim, known only as AOA, first approached the school in 1993 to get an apology for abuse he had allegedly suffered under paedophile headmaster David Lawrence in the 1960s.

After almost a decade of fighting for an apology, AOA took his complaint public in February 2002 by publishing an open letter about his sexual assault in The Australian newspaper.

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