MELBOURNE (AUSTRALIA)
The Associated Press
February 14, 2018
Lawyers for Cardinal George Pell, the most senior Catholic cleric to face sex charges, told an Australian court on Wednesday that the allegations stemmed from publicity surrounding a national inquiry into child abuse three years ago.
Pope Francis’s finance minister was charged last year with offenses involving multiple complainants in his native Australia. The exact details and nature of the charges have not been disclosed to the public, though police have described them as “historical” sexual assaults, meaning they are alleged to have occurred decades ago.
Pell’s lawyers failed in his application in the Melbourne Magistrates Court on Wednesday to gain access to his alleged victims’ medical records.
The court will hold a preliminary hearing next month to determine whether prosecutors have sufficient evidence to warrant a jury trial. The charges and potential penalties have not been made public.
Pell has vowed through his layers to fight the charges. He returned to Sydney to face the allegations but was not required to attend court on Wednesday.
His lawyer, Ruth Shann, told Magistrate Belinda Wallington that the first complainant approached police in 2015, 40 years after the alleged crimes, in response to media reports about Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.
“We will be saying that that complaint and the basis for it lacks reliability and credibility,” Shann told the court.
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