AUSTRALIA
Bendigo Advertiser
By Barney Zwartz
Dec. 17, 2012
Boys from Victorian orphanages who later ended in up prison said that was not nearly as bad as the boys’ homes, the state inquiry into how the churches handled sex abuse heard on Monday.
It was another litany of horror at the inquiry as the Care Leavers Australia Network (CLAN) gave evidence of repeated and systematic rapes over years, physical and psychological abuse amounting to torture, and a callous indifference by police and authorities, whether church or state.
Leonie Sheedy, chief executive of CLAN – which represents people raised in homes run by the state, churches and charities – told the inquiry that in a sample she took of 18 years 1352 children absconded from religious and non-government homes and 1877 fled state institutions. …
Right up to the present, institutions were unco-operative or even, as with the Salvation Army in Victoria, overtly hostile, usually telling victims records had been lost, Mr Golding said. This not only reduced the chances of legal action but also finding and reuniting people with lost family members.
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