AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald
October 13, 2014
The handling of abuse allegations by NSW Police and Catholic Church is set to be probed at a police corruption watchdog hearing starting on Monday.
The Police and Integrity Commission (PIC) is investigating the conduct of a police officer in a Catholic Church professional standards group between 1998 and 2005.
The watchdog will also examine any agreement between the police and the church about how complaints of abuse at the hands of the church were dealt with.
The hearing comes after freedom of information (FoI) documents revealed the Catholic Church believed it had an understanding with the NSW police in 2003 that allowed them to conceal evidence against pedophile priests.
The file, accessed through FoI laws by NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge and obtained by ABC’s Lateline, documents the Catholic Church’s attempt to co-opt NSW police to strike into the illegal agreement.
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.