AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald
By IAN KIRKWOOD July 24, 2013
A SENIOR priest at the heart of the Catholic Church’s efforts to deal with paedophile priests has admitted to not taking notes of his investigations so as not to leave a paper trail.
Father Brian Lucas, general secretary of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, yesterday gave evidence to the Special Commission of Inquiry in Newcastle.
Father Lucas has been identified in earlier evidence as being involved in attempts to discipline paedophile priest Denis McAlinden, who died in a church-run facility in Western Australia in 2005.
Although he acknowledged evidence at the inquiry that McAlinden had confessed to him personally during an interview in the 1990s, Father Lucas said he had no recollection of that meeting.
Father Lucas said repeatedly that he did not report McAlinden to the police because the victims who had come forward did not want this to happen.
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