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Inquiry Alleges Senior Clergy Knew of Paedophile Priest

ABC News
July 24, 2013

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-07-24/inquiry-alleges-senior-clergy-knew-of-paedophile/4841744

[with video]

Transcript

LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: More damning evidence of the Catholic Church's failure to report serial child sex abusers has emerged at an inquiry in New South Wales.

The focus of today's hearing was Father Denis McAlinden, a veteran paedophile who abused dozens of children.

In the witness box was one of the Church's most senior office holders, Father Brian Lucas, currently the general secretary of the Australian Catholic Bishops' Conference. He's played an integral role in the Church's handling of paedophile priests and survivors have slammed him for failing to report offenders like McAlinden to the police.

Adam Harvey reports, and a warning: this story contains explicit language and sexual references.

ADAM HARVEY, REPORTER: For 30 years, Father Brian Lucas was the Catholic Church's go-to man.

In public, he was the Church's spokesman, advocating its position on issues ranging from new popes to euthanasia.

BRIAN LUCAS, PRIEST (archive footage, 1986): The concern really is that someone made a choice about death that was a denial of the gift of their life.

(1988): And under no circumstances will a priest breach the confidentiality of the confessional.

(2005): But conserving that which is good and true goes to the very basis of Christian leadership.

ADAM HARVEY: In private, he was Mr Fix-It, brought in to deal with paedophile priests.

It's this role that's brought him today before a special inquiry in Newcastle that's looking into whether the Church hindered police investigations into two notorious child abusers.

In the dark days of the early 1990s, when the Church finally began to confront the abusers within, one of Brian Lucas' jobs was to convince paedophile priests to resign.

ANDREW MORRISON, AUSTRALIAN LAWYERS ALLIANCE: That's nice for the Church, it's nice for the priest, it doesn't help the victims or the potential future victims, and that's where his emphasis should have been.

ADAM HARVEY: In 1992, Father Lucas was part of a panel of three senior clergy that convened at Sydney's St Mary's Cathedral to confront a paedophile priest from regional NSW. He's currently before the courts, so we can't name him.

Father Lucas maintains the priest made no meaningful admissions.

BRIAN LUCAS (6th July, 2012): He was certainly very, very cautious not to incriminate himself and very, very careful not to name any names.

ADAM HARVEY: But his account differs from that of another priest on the panel, Father Wayne Peters, who wrote this letter just a week after the meeting.

After opening remarks from Reverend Brian Lucas, the priest indicated he wished to make certain admissions. He did admit that he, "... fondled the boy's genitals ... "during a car trip from Moree to Narrabri and he fondled the genitals of each of these boys, and to quote, "... sucked off their d***s ...". This was done on a monthly basis over a period of 12 months.

ADAM HARVEY: Claims against Lucas were aired at the Wood Royal Commission into NSW Police corruption.

In 1993, Brian Lucas had been brought in over another scandal. He spoke to victims of Father Peter Lewis Comensoli, who'd been abusing boys in his care.

One of Comensoli's young victims said Lucas wanted to keep the scandal in-house. He, "... stated he would prefer if we didn't go to the police and he would deal with it."

Father Lucas denies the allegation and told Justice Wood that the victim misinterpreted his remarks.

In 1993 in the NSW Hunter Valley, Father Lucas was once again enlisted to help deal with a notorious child abuser, this time Father Denis McAlinden.

BERNARD BARRETT, BROKEN RITES: He was touching girls from day one when he started work in the Maitland-Newcastle Diocese in about 1949.

From the 1950s on, parents had been complained that McAlinden was interfering with their children.

BERNARD BARRATT: Back in those days Catholics went right to the top, to the bishop. Bishops don't arrest or charge or jail anybody and that's how he got away with it.

ADAM HARVEY: Instead of sacking McAlinden, the Church shifted him to parishes a long way from the Hunter Valley - Kerema in Papua New Guinea, Hamilton in New Zealand, Wickham in Western Australia's arid north-west and Kojonup in that state's south.

PETER GOGARTY, ABUSE VICTIM: There was a systematic approach to moving these people on, protecting them, hiding the truth and putting more children in harm's way.

ADAM HARVEY: But in the early 1990s, after pressure from a new victim, the Church finally creaked into action against McAlinden.

Brian Lucas was brought in to help force his resignation.

According to the bishop at the time, in 1993, Father Lucas extracted a confession from McAlinden.

Bishop Leo Clarke wrote to McAlinden.

LEO CLARKE, BISHOP (letter to McAlinden, male voiceover): "In the light of your admission to Father Brian Lucas and other evidence, I have begun the process to declare that you have an impediment to the exercise of orders."

ADAM HARVEY: But McAlinden fought back.

DENIS MCALINDEN (reply to Leo Clarke, male voiceover): "Brian Lucas convinced me against my better judgement to accept that the information would be held in strict confidence by the bishop."

ADAM HARVEY: Last week, another priest, Allan Hart, has told the NSW inquiry that Brian Lucas helped negotiate a deal with McAlinden. The Church bought the self-confessed paedophile a one-way ticket to England.

Brian Lucas says he can't remember anything about this crucial meeting with Denis McAlinden; where it was, what was said or even what Denis McAlinden looked like. Counsel Assisting, Julia Lonergan, even handed up a photograph of Denis McAlinden to try and jog his memory. It didn't help. There are no notes of the meeting because Brian Lucas never took. This informal approach was part of a tactic, he says, to try and seduce the paedophile into resigning.

Father Lucas, it's quite extraordinary that you don't remember any of your dealings with McAlinden ...

BRIAN LUCAS: I think it's best that we talk about this when it's all over, rather than talk about it now.

ADAM HARVEY: Brian Lucas denies his role was to protect the Church's reputation. At the time, he was dealing with about 35 separate abuse cases and he was trying to obtain the resignation of priests who were still a threat to children.

BRIAN LUCAS (male voiceover): "I'd be more concerned about a priest who abused one child yesterday than by a very, very elderly priest who hasn't abused a child for 20 years, but may have abuse 40 children before that."

ADAM HARVEY: McAlinden died in 2006. Police were never told of his alleged admissions to Brian Lucas.

ANDREW MORRISON: That's the fundamental problem with what's gone on in the Church. All the concern has been for the good name of the Church and for protecting the abuse. There has been a total absence of concern, it appears, on the face of it, for the victims.

LEIGH SALES: Adam Harvey with that report.

 

 

 

 

 




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