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Former Priest Admits to Molesting but Goes Free

By Matthew Young
This is Kent
August 16, 2013

http://www.thisiskent.co.uk/priest-admits-molesting-goes-free/story-19667215-detail/story.html#axzz2c8ZebKtv

A FORMER Tunbridge Wells catholic priest who preyed on boys in the 1980s has avoided jail after being found guilty of molesting an altar boy at another church.

Malcolm McLennan, 69, committed sex crimes against church boys in 1985 and 1986, when he was priest at St Augustine's Roman Catholic Church in Crescent Road.

In 2009 the pervert was jailed for the offences for 18 months – but has now avoided a further sentence after admitting he molested another boy in a church in Chatham, also in the 1980s.

He was handed a three-year community order at Maidstone Crown Court on Friday.

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After the sentence, the victim, now in his 30s, said: "I am devastated. Justice has not been served."

After reporting the incident to police in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal, the victim learned McLennan had indecently assaulted three boys – the youngest believed to be five – while working in Tunbridge Wells in the 1980s.

The court heard how in 2009 he was jailed for 18 months and placed on the sex offenders' register for ten years for these offences.

McLennan admitted indecent assault over the acts he committed while an assistant priest at St Simon Stock Church, in Walderslade, Kent, in 1989.

The court heard McLennan would rub himself up against the victim or cuddle him when the boy was changing into his robes at services.

One day, he put his hands down the youngster's underpants.

The boy reported the matter and was visited by a bishop the following week, who dismissed his allegations by saying: "We'll have no more of your silly talk."

The court also heard McLennan had convictions for gross indecency dating back to 1973, 1977 and 1989 involving offences in public toilets with men, but had since turned his life around.

The former alcoholic began to change when he started attending Alcohol Anonymous meetings, the court heard.

Andrew Espley, defending, said McLennan now works as an infirmary assistant looking after ill monks in Gloucestershire, where he has no contact with children.

But the abuse has left a mark on his victim.

He is said to have lost his faith and refuses to let his children play outdoors.

Speaking last month, the victim said he wanted the "predatory sex offender jailed".

McLennan was instead sentenced to a 36-month community order, with supervision, and a requirement of attending a sex offender programme.

Judge Jeremy Carey said the sentence was a "constructive alternative" to a prison sentence as McLennan had already served a minimum of nine months in 2009 for "strikingly similar sexual offences" and could therefore only be sentenced to a few more months in prison.

He told McLennan: "You have been punished as a sex offender.

"You have not committed further sexual offences for many years and I accept you have been leading a non-criminal life of a positive kind."

 

 

 

 

 




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