Ballarat Christian Brothers 'misled police' over abuse, royal commission lawyers say

By Charlotte King
ABC News
October 31, 2016

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-31/christian-brothers-misled-police-royal-commission-lawyers-say/7981578

Brother Paul Nangle gave inconsistent evidence to the royal commission, according to lawyers.

Convicted paedophile Edward Dowlan has changed his name to Ted Bales.

A senior member of the Christian Brothers religious order failed to tell police the truth about the nature of historic child sexual abuse complaints in Ballarat, lawyers assisting the sex abuse royal commission have submitted.

The Christian Brothers operated four schools in Ballarat in the 1970s and much of the 437-page submission from the counsel assisting the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse detailed the religious order's handling of abuse complaints.

The submission, now made public, singles out Brother Paul Nangle, one of Ballarat's most senior Christian Brothers in the 1970s, for providing inconsistent testimony in relation to a complaint from the father of a student at the St Alipius boys school.

In his February evidence to the royal commission, the 84-year-old accepted that the 1974 complaint, made against a St Alipius primary school teacher, Brother Stephen Farrell, had a "sexual element" to it.

Counsel assisting submitted that evidence contradicted a 2012 police statement, in which Brother Nangle told detectives he had "no recollection" of the nature of the father's complaint.

The counsel assisting's submission concluded Brother Nangle provided "misleading information" to the police that was "intentionally vague and non-committal" in order "to protect the Christian Brothers' reputation".

Brother Nangle had previously told the hearing he believed he did not lie to the police.

Counsel assisting also argued other evidence given by the 84-year-old should be dismissed as "implausible".

In Brother Nangle's statement to the royal commission, he claimed he had no knowledge of "any rumours, allegations or complaints of child sexual abuse" in relation to Brother Edward Dowlan, a teacher at another Ballarat school run by the religious order, St Patricks College, until criminal charges surfaced in the 1990s.

Brother Paul Nangle was the school's headmaster from 1974 to 1979.

Edward Dowlan, who has since changed his name to Ted Bales, has since been convicted of a total of 52 charges of child sexual abuse against 20 boys between 1971 and 1985.

Counsel assisting submitted Brother Nangle "in fact" received at least three complaints about Dowlan abusing boys.

It submitted Brother Nangle's evidence represented "a desire to protect his own reputation and or the reputation of the Christian Brothers by suggesting a lack of prior knowledge about sexual misconduct by Dowlan", and should be "rejected".