Maitland-newcastle Diocese Should Have Known the Risks When It Employed a Paedophile

Newcastle Herald
July 10, 2017

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/4782265/catholic-insurer-applies-harsh-judgment/

IT would be hard to imagine a more damning statement from an insurance company to a church – we refuse to cover you because you allowed a paedophile teacher into your schools.

But that’s what Maitland-Newcastle diocese did in 1974 when it employed a teacher who can only be referred to as GKI. And when parents complained about him in the 1980s the principal and the Catholic Education Office failed to act.

And when one of the teacher’s victims tried to sue the diocese in 2005 he was “fiercely resisted” in court, despite the diocese 15 years earlier conceding – to itself – that victims would have a “pretty good case” against it.

Once again the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has exposed the ugly reality behind the Catholic Church’s global tragedy of abuse. In a series of documents released on Monday, communities around Australia can see how much the church knew.

It makes dismal reading. The commission released more than 400 documents, including how Catholic Church Insurance responded when victims made claims.

In many cases, like that of the Maitland-Newcastle diocese teacher, the insurer walked away because the church knew of risks and either failed to act, or failed to let the insurance company know.

The Hunter documents include letters from parents to the diocese, and the affidavits of parents to the 2005 case about how the teacher was finally reported to police. The report did not come from the church. It was children who told mothers what their teacher did with boys in the classroom, and it was a parent who ultimately phoned police.

The teacher was arrested, his criminal history was checked, he pleaded guilty and was convicted in short order.

The facts of this teacher’s case make ugly reading. He was a serial, serious child sex offender with strong ties to senior people within the Catholic Church. Two monsignors employed him, knowing that he was a convicted child sex offender. A Catholic priest wrote a sickening letter of reference in which he conceded problems in the teacher’s past.

And while we can be confident children are much safer in schools today, that confidence does not extend to how the church continues to treat survivors seeking support and compensation.