AUSTRALIA
lewisblayse.net

In a surprise move, the NSW government enquiry into clerical child sexual abuse in the Newcastle region has reconvened in Sydney to hear more detail on the previous evidence of Paul Lucas, the Secretary of the Australian (Catholic) Bishops’ Conference.

Lucas was the one who, in six years of interviewing suspected paedophile priests, with a view to convincing them to retire discreetly without police being involved, decided to keep no notes of his activities. In the absence of notes, poor Lucas was unable to remember anything about his activities in this regard, which ran from 1990 to 1996.

Suggestions have been raised at earlier hearings of the enquiry that this was so that there would be no “paper trail” which would be available to police and victims lawyers. It was raised again at this new hearing, which suggests it may be a serious focus of the enquiry…