‘Wounds of child abuse won’t heal’

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

JUNE 06, 2015

Rebecca Puddy
Reporter
Adelaide

The Catholic Church in Adelaide has conceded that the damage caused to disabled children and their families by a convicted sex offender can never be ­repaired.

The child sex abuse royal commission this week handed down its findings on the church’s handling of offences against disabled children at St Ann’s school in the late 1980s and early 90s by pedophile Brian Perkins.

Adelaide Archdiocese Vicar General Philip Marshall said the church would do all it could to stop child abuse. “I don’t think you can ever repair the damage that those children went through,” he said.

Father Marshall declined to comment on compensation claims for three of the victims, which were still being negotiated with the church.

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