AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald
By MICHELLE HARRIS Sept. 24, 2013
FORMER state MP John Hatton wrote more than 25 years ago to the then Archbishop of Sydney, Edward Clancy, to bluntly raise allegations of Father Denis McAlinden’s ‘‘sexual misbehaviour’’ with children and urge they be independently assessed.
Mr Hatton, then the independent MP for South Coast, wrote to the archbishop in May 1987 about the ‘‘extremely delicate matter which has come my way and which I believe should be handled within the church’’ .
The letter was among documents recently released by the Special Commission of Inquiry, which is examining the conduct of police and Catholic Church in response to the offending by two priests.
James Fletcher, who died in jail in 2006, was convicted of abusing an altar boy, although other victims came forward.
McAlinden, who died in late 2005, is suspected of abusing possibly hundreds of young girls.
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