ADELAIDE (AUSTRALIA)
Australian Associated Press
December 6, 2017
– Adelaide Archbishop Philip Wilson is accused of covering up child sex abuse
– Wilson allegedly tried to prevent abuse claims from being reported to police
– He’s accused of covering up abuse by now-dead pedophile priest James Fletcher
Adelaide Archbishop Philip Wilson has been accused of covering up child sex abuse by the Catholic clergy for nearly three decades.
Crown prosecutor Gareth Harrison told the Newcastle Local Court on Wednesday that Wilson had allegedly been involved in a number of cases where he had tried to prevent abuse claims being reported to police between 1976 and 2004 to protect the Catholic Church.
In his opening address on the first day of Wilson’s trial where he is accused of concealing information about the abuse of an altar boy by now-dead pedophile priest James Fletcher in the NSW Hunter region, Mr Harrison said the evidence would show Wilson had failed to report widespread child abuse by the Catholic clergy and a teacher.
The prosecutor said Wilson had been a priest at a parish in 1976 when an altar boy came to him in the presbytery to reveal he had been sexually abused by Fletcher when he was 10 years old.
The altar boy claimed Wilson was shocked by the abuse claims and promised to look into it but nothing happened.
Mr Harrison said another altar boy, aged between eight and nine years old, went to see Wilson in the confessional box in late 1976 to complain about being abused by Fletcher but Wilson told the boy he was lying.
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