AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald
December 18, 2013
Catherine Armitage
Senior Writer
The 49-year-old father of three spoke angrily, detailing his horrible experiences at the hands of the Marist Brothers.
He said he had put his faith in the Marist Brothers three times, but each time had been betrayed.
The first time was when he was a student at St Augustine’s College Cairns. He was abused by three different Marist brothers from when he was 11 in 1976. He was made to shower naked in front of Brother Leonidas. A brother who was supposed to be tending to his injured foot made him take his pants off and tried to masturbate him.
In 1981, Brother Ross Francis Murrin “put his hand down my pants, fondled my genitals and tried to kiss me”. This hurt the most because he had turned to Brother Murrin “in my time of need and fear” and thought they were good friends.
The witness known as DK told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse he believes other brothers at the school and its principal Brother Gerald Burns knew of the abuse and condoned it.
“After the abuse by Brother Murrin, I received a number of floggings and was treated differently by the brothers. I remember being excluded from events and feeling like they were trying to get me to leave the school”, he testified. His grades suffered.
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