AUSTRALIA
ABC News
By ABC’s Suzanne Smith
The abuse of children by Catholic clergymen has exposed a major failure of society, writes Suzanne Smith. But there were those who refused to accept the status quo.
I have met many honourable people in my career as a journalist, but none so inspiring as Detective Chief Inspector Peter Fox and Joanne McCarthy, the courageous journalist from the Newcastle Herald.
But it hasn’t been an easy road for either of them. They have stood beside many victims when everyone else failed to take responsibility and left those victims to deal individually with the Catholic Church. This has been a major failure of our society. We all left these traumatised and shattered families to deal directly with a powerful institution.
Many gasped in horror last Thursday night on ABC’s Lateline when Detective Chief Inspector Peter Fox described the anal rape of a teenage boy by the notorious paedophile priest James Fletcher.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.