AUSTRALIA
Coastal Times
JOANNE MCCARTHY
31 Aug, 2012 03
HE was the ”right-hand man” of a bishop, and a one-time acting bishop himself, but priest Tom Brennan has become the first Australian Catholic priest charged with concealing the alleged child sex crimes of another.
Father Brennan, 74, was arrested and charged yesterday with two counts of misprision of a felony – failing to disclose a serious crime – relating to alleged child sex offences by defrocked priest John Denham against two boys in the late 1970s.
The offences allegedly occurred at St Pius X, in the Newcastle suburb of Adamstown, where Father Denham was a teacher and Father Brennan was school principal.
Strike Force Georgiana’s Detective Sergeant Kristi Faber also charged Father Brennan with eight counts of sexually assaulting a boy, 8, at a Waratah church in 1984 and 1985, and two counts of assault.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.