AUSTRALIA
The Australian
DAN BOX From: The Australian July 03, 2013
A PEDOPHILE Catholic priest groomed at least one of his victims during confession, using deliberately suggestive questions to encourage the schoolgirl to talk about sex.
Witness statements tendered to a NSW government inquiry into church child abuse, as well as the text of a letter sent by Father Denis McAlinden, reveal how he systematically groomed girls as young as four.
In one statement, a victim told police she was 11 years old when McAlinden befriended her through her school choir and started taking her in his car for drives in the NSW Hunter Valley.
“When we were stopped, Father McAlinden took my underpants off from under my dress, which I think was my school uniform as I had been at school,” her statement said. The priest then raped the girl.
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