AUSTRALIA
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NSW enquiry head, Ms. Cunneen, so far has only considered legal action against Detective Chief Inspector Fox (who triggered the enquiry) for tweeting, and victims who have protested outside the court. Action against Mr. Fox was eventually dropped, while the victims are still under threat from Ms. Cunneen.
Something is very wrong here. From the perspective of the enquiry officials’ little pond, it is clearly no big deal. However, those who live in the much larger pond of Australia and the world, may think concerns have been somewhat skewed.
Yesterday, Ms. Cunneen referred to Maitland-Newcastle deputy, Fr. Burston, as “having given his life to the Catholic Church” and having been subjected to “unacceptable behaviour” by victims. Today, after lunch, she further ruled that Fr. Burston was excused from giving evidence until next Friday, “when the stress of the events of the past few days”- pointedly the peaceful demonstration outside the court on Wednesday (see yesterday’s posting’s picture) – “would hopefully be behind him.”
Lawyer for Fr. Burston, Mr. Gyles (see previous posting), submitted that the “unacceptable behaviour” of the victims may have affected Burton’s ability to give evidence, and he should be excused from the enquiry while he stabilized. Counsel Assisting, Mr. Kell objected. However, Ms. Cunneen agreed to Burston’s lawyer’s request.
Prior to Burston being excused from the enquiry, it had heard that he had told another church official that the priest’s alleged victim “had been demonstrating bizarre behaviour for years.” He allegedly also said the victim’s claim to have been sexually abused by convicted serial child sexual abuser, Fr.Fletcher, “was just another sign of his psychological disturbance.” Burston fell back on his usual poor memory defence, saying he did “not remember” saying that.
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