AUSTRALIA
The Age
EDITORIAL
The presumption of innocence is fundamental to our legal system and to natural justice.
Cardinal George Pell, the third highest-ranking leader of the Catholic Church, is accused by a number of people of child sexual abuse, for which he has been under investigation for more than a year by Victoria Police’s Taskforce Sano, established following the state parliamentary inquiry that was a precursor to the federal Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.
Cardinal Pell, who lives in the Vatican and was previously the Archbishop of Sydney and, before that, of Melbourne, must be presumed innocent unless and until he is proved guilty. The accusations against him are receiving heightened attention following a report on the ABC’s 7.30 program on Wednesday evening, in which fresh allegations were aired, including by two men who claim he serially sexually abused them in Ballarat decades ago.
Cardinal Pell has consistently maintained his innocence and following the 7.30 program has released not only a robust rebuttal, but an accusation, which he wants officially investigated, that Victoria Police and the ABC are guilty of conspiring to pervert the course of justice. The ABC says its sources are witnesses and survivors of abuse, not the police, a claim backed by the police. Whatever the case, the allegations are consequential and Cardinal Pell’s guilt or innocence must be established. The statement from his office said “there has [sic] been no requests made by the [Sano] Taskforce to interview the Cardinal”.
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