AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun
December 15, 2015
Lucie Morris-Marr
Herald Sun
A LEADING Catholic bishop stands accused of lying to the child abuse royal commission about crimes committed by Australia’s worst paedophile.
Brisbane’s auxiliary bishop, Brian Finnigan, the former adviser and secretary to former Ballarat bishop Ronald Mulkearns, insisted in the past few days he only learned of Gerald Ridsdale’s horrific crimes against children after 1993, when Ridsdale was charged.
However, examination by the Herald Sun of the evidence, given in a private hearing by Bishop Finnigan in July, shows he admitted he knew of abuse complaints against Ridsdale more than 10 years earlier.
On Monday, counsel assisting the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse Angus Stewart, SC, accused Bishop Finnigan of distancing himself from any knowledge of child sexual abuse in his two days on the stand.
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