AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald
March 2, 2015
Rachel Browne
A senior Uniting Church figure denied destroying crucial documents relating to sexual abuse at Knox Grammar School, instead blaming pedophile teacher Adrian John Nisbett, a royal commission has heard.
James Mein, former moderator of the Uniting Church in Australia, synod of NSW and ACT, and an unnamed solicitor were implicated in the disappearance of documents in a series of emails sent by the church’s insurance manager in 2009.
“The solicitor who drafted this is the one who has been advising the school to destroy documents, with Jim’s assistance,” Dwane Freehely wrote in an email tendered in evidence to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.
Mr Mein told the commission he did not destroy the documents and nor did anyone involved in a series of meetings held by the church, school council and lawyers after sex abuse allegations were reported to police in 2009.
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