AUSTRALIA
The Australian
September 20, 2016
DAN BOX
Crime reporter Sydney
@DanBox10
Senior Catholic officials were allegedly told by a pedophile priest that he had been abusing children but made no record of the conversation and did not contact police, a royal commission has heard.
Those involved in the meeting subsequently gave conflicting accounts of what was said, including telling Cardinal George Pell that no such admissions were made, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse heard yesterday. Following the publication of a letter in 2012 detailing the priest’s alleged admissions, the archdiocese of Sydney put out a media release that was also incorrect, the commission heard.
Written eight days after the meeting took place, the letter states that pedophile priest John Farrell met two members of the church’s Special Issues Resource Group, Brian Lucas and John Usher, in September 1992.
Father Lucas, the current director of Catholic Mission, and Father Usher, who recently stepped down as chancellor of the Sydney archdiocese, were “the architects of the church’s response” to child abuse, counsel assisting the commission, Gail Furness SC, has said.
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