AUSTRALIA
news.com.au
Senior Catholic priest Monsignor David Cappo gives evidence at Father John Fleming defamation trial in South Australia Supreme Court
FATHER John Fleming “definitely” raised allegations he had been involved in a ménage-a-trois when he was interviewed by a senior Catholic priest, a court has heard.
Monsignor David Cappo has provided the Supreme Court with handwritten notes of his 1995 interview with Fr Fleming, prompted by allegations of sexual misconduct towards a teenage girl.
He said that, almost 20 years after the interview, he still recalled Fr Fleming saying there were false rumours he had been “running a ménage-a-trois in my flat”.
“In fact, it’s one of the few terms I remember clearly for the reason that, as I was writing it, I didn’t really known how to spell it,” he said.
“So I was writing away, thinking ‘I’ve not got time to think about how to spell it’ because we were moving on to the next topic.
“(Afterwards) I needed to look it up in the dictionary to see exactly how it was spelled … I don’t think I had used the term before in a written way.”
Fr Fleming’s lawsuit concerns 2008 Sunday Mail articles reporting allegations he was sexually involved with two women, “Jane” and “Jenny”, and a man, “Richard”.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.