AUSTRALIA
The Australian
FEBRUARY 24, 2015
Ean Higgins
Reporter
Sydney
A PEDOPHILE teacher sacked from Knox Grammar because the parents of a boy he abused were coming to the school was later given a glowing reference by the headmaster who dismissed him.
Damien Vance had been reprimanded by headmaster Ian Paterson for physically assaulting two boys before he was asked to leave the exclusive Sydney boys school in 1989.
When he left, Dr Paterson gave Vance a letter of service which he used to get a job in a school in Victoria.
He continued to teach until a court ordered him to stay away from all schools two decades later.
Today, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse was told Vance was given 72 hours to resign by Dr Paterson, who did not mention the name of the boy he abused but just suggested he quit because “the parents were coming down”.
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