AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald
By JOANNE McCARTHY Sept. 7, 2014
A CATHOLIC priest has admitted to having sex with a woman at places including a beach, a camping ground, in a grandstand, a church-owned building and in the Italian city of Florence, despite his vow of celibacy.
But Father Tom Knowles, of the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament Fathers, has denied the woman suffered embarrassment, humiliation or damage because of their lengthy and secret sexual relationship, or that he sexually groomed and abused her.
Central Coast woman Jennifer Herrick, 60, has filed a landmark breach of trust case against the priest and the trustees of his order.
Ms Herrick alleges the Blessed Sacrament Fathers failed to act on disclosures made by the priest to senior members of the church about his sexual misconduct.
In his defence, filed in the NSW Supreme Court in August, Father Knowles admitted the two ‘‘often shared a bed at night’’ in the mid-north coast village of Harrington and ‘‘maintained a sexual relationship’’.
But he denied that it constituted a breach of duty of care, or that such a duty of care existed.
He admitted they had sex on a beach at Harrington, at a Blackheath camping ground, at a church-owned building in Chatswood, in the grandstand at Beauchamp Park at Chatswood and in Florence while on separate holidays.
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