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The Vatican, crime, Australia, the great facilitator


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AUSTRALIA should renounce the Vatican’s diplomatic status, close its embassy to the Holy See and make senior Catholic clergy accountable to the Australian criminal justice system, say supporters of a tougher response to the church after it refused to comply with requests from the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Hunter-based One Nation Senator Brian Burston is planning a private member’s bill to withdraw diplomatic recognition granted the Vatican in 1973, after public controversy about Cardinal George Pell’s failure to return to Australia to give evidence at the royal commission, and the Vatican’s refusal to provide the commission with files of Australian child sex offender priests held by the Holy See.

“It’s disgraceful, absolutely disgraceful. They’re hiding behind the diplomatic status but it’s typical of how the church acts,” Mr Burston said.

A call by NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge - who campaigned for the royal commission - to renounce the Vatican’s diplomatic recognition was backed by human rights lawyer and church critic Geoffrey Robertson, QC, who said “if we have any self-respect we should sever our ties with it”.

 

Full Report Link;

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/4477315/calls-for-vatican-diplomatic-recognition-to-end/?cs=305

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The Catholic Church spent over one million dollars defending a peadophile priest, Australia.

 

A Victorian judge said evidence the Catholic Church continues to fund the legal defence of one of Australia's worst paedophiles, Robert Charles Best, "just blows me away".

On Monday Best, 76, pleaded guilty in the County Court of Victoria to sexually abusing 20 young victims between 1968 and 1988 at schools in Ballarat, Box Hill, Geelong and Moonee Ponds.

County Court Judge Geoffrey Chettle admitted he was struggling to contain his emotion at the gravity and extent of Best's abuse.

"It's hard not to get angry, and I'm trying," he said.

The Church admitted in 2013 to have spent more than $1 million on defending Best, whose victims number in the dozens. Some of the victims took their own lives in the aftermath of Best's abuse.

"I've got to say that just blows me away, on a plea," County Court Judge Geoffrey Chettle said when told the Church continued to fund Best's defence.

"It's ongoing, regular abuse of children over 20 years, from a man who purports to be their pastoral carer".

In 2011 the Christian Brother was jailed for abusing 11 other children under his care. The Church has already spent at least $1 million on defending Best.

With his guilty pleas to 24 charges Best now joins the likes of Gerald Ridsdale as among Australia's worst paedophiles.

Best taught at several Catholic schools including Ballarat's St Alipius primary school in 1971.

Ridsdale, the country's most notorious paedophile priest, was the school's chaplain, while convicted paedophiles Stephen Farrell, Edward Dowlan and Gerald Fitzgerald filled the teaching ranks.

Most of Brother Best's victims were schoolboys aged between eight and 11 who he abused while working as a teacher at St Alipius as well as St Leo's College in Box Hill, St Bernard's in Moonee Ponds and St Joseph's College, Geelong.

Many of the assaults occurred in Best's office, where he took victims for punishment, prosecutor Peter Rose QC told the court.

Others occurred in the school sick bay under the pretext of checking their wellbeing.

One young man was abused while singing during choir practice. Another when he was reading out loud in front of class.

Yet another had his hands bound with rope to a metal grate by Ridsdale while Best assaulted him.

When his victims started to cry, Best whispered that it would "be OK" as he continued to assault them.

Several of those he abused braved the witness box to tell of the harm he had done to their lives.

"As a seven or eight year old, the fear I had was enormous. I would go to school not knowing the next time I would be attacked

"The fear and anxiety was unbearable. He is truly a monster," one of Best's victims said.

Many of Best's other victims have since killed themselves, several victims told the court.

Best will be sentenced on March 2.

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/4480613/judge-stunned-by-churchs-legal-aid-to-paedophile/?cs=2452

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