Pressure mounts on Pell as royal commission submits damning report, by Shannon Deery, Daily Telegraph (October 31, 2016)

AUSTRALIA’S most senior Catholic Cardinal, George Pell, was involved in knowingly shuffling paedophile priests between parishes, according to the counsel assisting the child sex abuse inquiry.

And there was strong evidence implicating Cardinal Pell in a church cover-up, the counsel said in submissions to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse published yesterday.

Cardinal Pell strongly denied the claims in his 71-page submission, which was also published yesterday.

Counsel assisting Gail Furness SC, Angus Steward SC and Stephen Free, said Cardinal Pell knew paedophile Gerald Ridsdale was being moved between parishes because of his crimes against children

Cardinal Pell served as a consulter to former Ballarat bishop Ronald Mulkearns, who oversaw the movement of several paedophile priests. At a consultors meeting in 1982 it was decided to move Ridsdale from the parish of Mortlake, where he committed some of his worst offences.

“It is submitted it was the common understanding of the meeting that complaints that Ridsdale had sexually abused children was the reason it had become necessary to move him,” counsel assisting said. “It follows that the conduct of any consulter who agreed to move Ridsdale, or indeed any priest, with knowledge of allegations of child sexual abuse made against them, is unacceptable,” they said.

Of his time as an auxiliary bishop in Melbourne, before being appointed archbishop, the commission has been told Cardinal Pell failed to act on allegations of violent and sexual misconduct by child abuser Peter Searson.

In his testimony to the commission in March, Cardinal Pell said he was the victim of a widespread deception that kept him in the dark about child abuse.

But submissions by counsel assisting say there is no evidence anyone intentionally concealed anything from the Archdiocese.

While the submissions accuse the Cardinal of misconduct, they also urge the commission to reject some of the more serious allegations levelled at him, saying there is no supporting evidence.

The submission argued he should be believed over denials he tried to bribe Ridsdale, who was a victim of his uncle Gerald.

The claim has plagued the Cardinal since Ridsdale’s nephew told the story to 60 Minutes in 2002.