AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald
December 7, 2015
Jane Lee
Legal affairs, health and science reporter
A survivor has told a royal commission he overheard George Pell joking about paedophile priest Gerald Ridsdale “rooting boys again” more than a decade before Ridsdale was convicted of multiple counts of child sexual abuse.
Cardinal Pell – who will appear at the child abuse royal commission in Melbourne next week – was widely criticised for supporting Ridsdale at his first court appearance for child sex offences in 1993. Cardinal Pell was also present at at least one meeting of senior priests which decided Ridsdale should be moved to another parish, but maintains he never knew children were being abused while he was in Ballarat.
The survivor, known as BWE, told the commission on Monday he was aged between 10 and 12, and getting ready to serve as an altar boy for a funeral mass, when he overheard Cardinal Pell speaking to parish priest Father Frank Madden in the sacristy at St Patrick’s Cathedral in 1983. Cardinal Pell, he said, was officiating the mass because the deceased woman was either his former parishioner or close friend.
“After they had exchanged pleasantries, Father Madden said ‘How’s everything your way?’ or words to that effect. George Pell responded by saying ‘Haha I think Gerry’s been rooting boys again’.”
BWE said that the door between the alcove and the sacristy was usually open because altar boys did not need to remove their clothes to wear their church robes.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/national/george-pell-accused-of-joking-about-gerald-ridsdales-abuse-of-children-20151207-glhlmd.html#ixzz3tdN0tgFw
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