AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald
September 6, 2015
Eamonn Duff
Sun-Herald senior investigative writer
A Sydney priest who was found guilty of common assault after he allegedly smacked a child in church has been granted an appeal against the legal ruling.
Father Terrence Millard was dismissed from the St John Vianney Catholic Church at Greenacre after a controversial flashpoint in which he “grabbed” a nine year old boy, Peter*, “positioned” him in front of a symbolic image of Jesus Christ and punished him with a “smack” to the upper buttocks for alleged bad behaviour. In June, after the NSW Police Force laid criminal charges, a magistrate delivered a finding of guilt against the priest – with no conviction recorded.
While he has lost the support of the Catholic Church, which stood the priest down and dismissed his actions as “extremely regrettable”, Father Millard will press ahead with an appeal, to be heard at Parramatta District Court on October 1.
News of the appeal has come as a bitter blow to Peter’s distraught family who in the months following the incident, witnessed their son change from “happy-go-lucky” sports fanatic to “anxious” and “troubled.”
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