LONDON (England)
Express
February 8, 2019
By Joe Duggan
The Abbot of a Benedictine abbey withheld an allegation of abuse from police about a priest who was later jailed for child sex offences committed while teaching at a leading Catholic school, an inquiry heard this week.
Abbot Shipperlee admitted to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) he failed to report a claim of abuse against Soper to the police when informed of it in 2001.
He said: “Because I simply did not believe that this was possible.
“I was outraged that such an accusation could be made against someone of whom I – well, it did not occur to me that it was possible that this sort of thing could happen.”
In October 2009, Pearce, a former junior school head master at St Benedict’s, was jailed for eight years for abuse at the school from 1972 to 1992, as well as one offence in 2007.
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