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Background Article: Father David O'hearn Is in Jail but Officially He Is Still a Priest

Broken Rites
August 19, 2016

http://www.brokenrites.org.au/drupal/node/119

Catholic priest David Anthony O’Hearn, 55, has been in jail in New South Wales for the past four years, and now he is about to learn how many more years he must remain behind bars. In jury trials during the past four years, he has been found guilty of 44 child-sex offences against six victims. For legal reasons, those trials could not be reported in the media until the final jury completed its work in May 2016. He is scheduled to be sentenced on Monday 22 August 2016 at 10.30am by Judge Richard Cogswell in Sydney's Downing Centre District Court (the court list still refers to David O'Hearn by his initials, "DO"). This article includes some Broken Rites research about O'Hearn.

A series of separate juries (in the Sydney District Court) from 2012 to 2016 found O'Hearn guilty of offences against six young boys, including sexual intercourse, indecent assault and inciting a minor to commit an indecent act.

The offences occurred in the Maitland-Newcastle diocese, north of Sydney, while O'Hearn ministered in various parishes in the 1980s and 1990s. Victims ranged from nine to 13.

During the series of jury trials, the NSW District Court imposed an order prohibiting the media from publishing O'Hearn's name until the final jury would finish its work. The trials were delayed somewhat when O'Hearn launched appeal proceedings.

On 20 May 2016, after the final jury trial was finished, Judge Richard Cogswell lifted the name-suppression order.

In the eyes of the Vatican, Father David Anthony O'Hearn is still officially a Catholic priest while in jail, although a priest without a parish. On 20 May 2016, after O'Hearn's final jury trial, Bishop Bill Wright of Maitland-Newcastle Diocese said in a public statement that he is asking the church authorities in Rome to officially remove O'Hearn from the Catholic priesthood. [The Vatican is usually reluctant, to do this.]

Background research by Broken Rites

Father David Anthony O'Hearn was born on 28 April 1961.

Broken Rites has researched Father O'Hearn in the annual editions of the Australian Catholic directories. His annual entries all list him as a priest of the Maitland-Newcastle diocese.

Before being ordained, David O'Hearn was a deacon at Waratah parish in 1985 and at Singleton parish in 1986.

He was ordained in late 1986. He then became an assistant priest at Muswellbrook in 1987.

In the 1990 directory Fr David O'Hearn was listed as an assistant priest at St Joseph's parish in Cessnock, where the priest in charge was another child-sex criminal, Father Vincent Gerard Ryan.

In the early 1990s, Father O'Hearn was listed as the priest in charge firstly at the Windale parish (St Pius X) and later at the Toronto parish (St Joseph's).

In the directories from 1995 to 1999, he was listed as being in charge of the Rutherford parish (St Paul's).

In the 2000 edition of the annual Directory of Australian Catholic Clergy, he was "a priest in residence" at St Columban's/Christ the King, 58 Church Street, Mayfield West. Also listed at that address was Father William (Bill) Burston, who was the Vicar-General of the Maitland-Newcastle Diocese.

In the directories for 2001 and 2003, David O'Hearn was listed as the acting parish priest at St Patrick's, Swansea.

In the 2004 directory, he was listed as the Parish Priest of St Michael's, Nelson Bay.

Police began investigating O'Hearn in 2008 and they laid the first charges against him in court in 2009. When Broken Rites checked the Nelson Bay parish website on 19 March 2012, O'Hearn was still listed officially as the Parish Priest there (but with another priest acting as the parish administrator).

Meanwhile, O'Hearn was facing proceedings in the Newcastle Magistrates Court, where a preliminary ("committal") hearing in June 2010 resulted in him being ordered to stand trial in the NSW District Court.

The July 2011 edition of the annual Australian Catholic Directory stated that Fr O'Hearn is "on Leave" and it gave his postal address in 2011 as care of the Maitland-Newcastle diocesan office.

O'Hearn fights the charges

At the District Court, O’Hearn slowed down the court procedures. He sought leave to appeal to the High Court in 2011 before his trials started. He argued for separate trials for each of six victims, rather than combined trials.

In May 2012, a jury found O'Hearn guilty of the first batch of charges. and he was jailed for this batch, with the court imposing a media-suppression order because of the subsequent juries.

After this trial, O'Hearn appealed against the conviction. There was a retrial with a different jury. He was again found guilty.

Later, fresh juries heard the charges relating to the remaining victims.

In jail since 2012

David Anthony O'Hearn has been in jail since May 2012, when a jury (comprising seven men and five women) found him guilty of 23 incidents of indecent or sexual assault against four boys (aged between 8 and 14) in the 1980s and early 1990s.

The four alleged victims were from different parishes and did not know each other before making statements to police, the court was told.

O'Hearn befriended these victims, who were each having family problems or difficulties at school, the court was told. The families repeatedly trusted Father O'Hearn (because of his status as a Catholic priest) to counsel their boys and take them away on trips and camp for up to 10 days.

"Their families looked up to him. He was their priest, mentor and friend and he betrayed them," the prosecution said.

The jury heard evidence of how O'Hearn told an eight-year-old victim to look at a Sacred Heart image on the wall and "Just look up at Jesus" while he committed oral sex on the boy.

The boy, who had a physical disability and was teased at his Catholic school, was proud to be an altar boy because it was "something important" and a chance for him to "belong" to a group, the jury heard.

"He wanted his parents and relatives to see him up on the altar, being important. That was his dream," barrister Kate Traill, for the Crown, told the jury.

Instead, he was repeatedly abused by O'Hearn in a church.

When the boy told his devout mother that he did not want to be an altar boy any more, without revealing what had been happening at the church, she told him she wanted him to continue.

Another boy had been referred to Father O'Hearn by a Catholic primary school teacher because there were problems at the boy's home. O'Hearn took the boy to a park and molested him before asking: "How's that, do you feel better now?", then warning him not to tell anyone because "No one will believe you anyway".

Family members of the victims were called to give evidence, and they detailed the changes they noticed in the boys' behaviour as they grew older. The four boys experienced difficulties in their lives after the abuse, including problems with drugs and alcohol. Some became violent, withdrawn and made attempts at suicide, the court was told.

After the jury's verdict, O'Hearn was led from the court for his first night in jail to await his sentencing. In December 2012, he was sentenced to 13 years jail as a result of this jury trial. A media-suppression order remained on O'Hearn's name until all of O'Hearn's juries were finished — and this turned out to be four years later, on 20 May 2016.

 

 

 

 

 




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