CANBERRA (AUSTRALIA)
Sydney Morning Herald
March 11, 2020
By Chip Le Grand
The case of George Pell, now before Australia’s highest court, has returned to the problem that has plagued this extraordinary legal saga in the five years since a former choirboy first told his story to police – when exactly, could the alleged abuse have taken place?
In putting forward Cardinal Pell’s arguments to have his conviction for historic child sex offences overturned, Bret Walker SC led the High Court through the needle the prosecution was required to thread to show Pell had an opportunity to commit these appalling crimes.
To anyone who has followed this case through its protracted judicial course, Mr Walker’s recounting of select evidence to the full bench will be familiar:
How could the then Archbishop of Melbourne have sexually assaulted two boys in in the priests’ sacristy of St Patrick’s Cathedral in 1996 when, according to Monsignor Charles Portelli, the congregation’s master of ceremonies, Pell would have been on the front steps, greeting parishioners after Sunday Mass at the time of the offence?
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