AUSTRALIA
The Age
August 7, 2014
Adam Cooper
Court reporter for The Age
An 88-year-old retired priest will spend at least one year in prison for sexually assaulting a boy in his care more than 40 years ago.
James Henry Scannell, who has worked as a priest across Melbourne for half a century and was a chaplain at Kew Cottages, was on Thursday jailed for two years, to serve a minimum of 12 months, for sexually assaulting a boy in Kew between 1970 and 1972.
Scannell, who is of poor health, had trouble getting to his feet and used a walking stick when led out of the County Court dock by security, as some of his large group of supporters cried.
Outside court, Bernard Barrett, from the victims’ support group Broken Rites, said Scannell was still working up until early last year, when he was suspended by the church pending the result of the trial. Dr Barrett called on the church to explain why Scannell’s offending was covered up for so long.
“Questions need to be asked of the Melbourne archdiocese about why and how this sort of thing could have happened and how it’s taken all these years for it to come out,” he said.
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