AUSTRALIA
The Canberra Times
February 16, 2016
Christopher Knaus
Reporter for The Canberra Times.
Former Marist students have urged the school to rename a student house that honours a brother who helped move and protect a known child sex offender in the late 1960s.
Marist College Canberra has faced private calls to change the name of Othmar House, a student house body that honours the former Marist Brother Othmar Weldon, who held the senior position of provincial leader within the organisation in the 1960s and 1970s.
Brother Weldon’s actions came under close scrutiny in the Canberra hearings of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse last year.
Damian De Marco, a victim of Brother Kostka, who was named ACT Local Hero of the Year in 2015 for campaigning to prevent child abuse Photo: Jamila Toderas
The royal commission found Brother Weldon had learnt of complaints that Brother John William Chute, also known as Brother Kostka, sexually abused a boy at a school in Lismore.
Brother Kostka admitted molesting the child, but the provincial council, chaired by Brother Weldon, simply issued him a “canonical warning”. He was then shifted to another school, where, disturbingly, he was promoted to principal.
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