Pell admits cash offer for silence: [2 Edition]
John Stapleton, Nicole Strahan. The Australian [Canberra, A.C.T] 03 June 2002: 3.
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Abstract
CATHOLIC Archbishop of Sydney George Pell has admitted offering the family of two child sex abuse victims $50,000 if they kept silent about the assaults by a cleric.
Supporters of Dr Pell rallied outside Nine's Sydney studios yesterday prior to the airing of the allegations. They waved placards such as "Say no to trial by media" and "Viva Archbishop Pell".
Also on the program David Ridsdale claimed his uncle, convicted pedophile priest Gerald, had sex with him repeatedly between the ages of 11 and 15, sometimes in a car on the way to mass. Mr Ridsdale several times repeated the accusation that when he approached Dr Pell for assistance, the priest went into immediate damage control, saying: "I want to know what it will take to keep you quiet." Mr Ridsdale claimed that Dr Pell made him feel "that I was at fault". As calls for a royal commission into the Catholic Church's handling of sex abuse allegations intensified, John Howard dismissed the idea, saying the problem was an internal church matter.
CATHOLIC Archbishop of Sydney George Pell has admitted offering the family of two child sex abuse victims $50,000 if they kept silent about the assaults by a cleric.
According to the Nine Network's 60Minutes, the offer was made to the family of two girls abused by their local priest over six years from 1987, when they were just five years old.
The girls' parents, who did not want to be identified, told the program they met with Dr Pell, who was an auxiliary bishop in their area at the time.
They were later sent a letter from lawyers on behalf of Dr Pell saying they could either take $50,000 in compensation for the abuse of their oldest daughter, or take the matter to court where it would be "strenuously defended" by the church.
Dr Pell initially told 60 Minutes he had offered the family nothing but, on being presented with the letter, admitted he had. "I offered them nothing," he said at first. "They were free to go into a process."
He then corrected himself.
"I offered them 50 grand in compensation according to the publicly acknowledged procedure," he said.
"They chose not to accept that."
Dr Pell admitted that had the family accepted the compensation, they would have been bound not to publicly disclose the abuse.
"There is a requirement that they don't talk about it and most of them are happy not to," he said.
Supporters of Dr Pell rallied outside Nine's Sydney studios yesterday prior to the airing of the allegations. They waved placards such as "Say no to trial by media" and "Viva Archbishop Pell".
Also on the program David Ridsdale claimed his uncle, convicted pedophile priest Gerald, had sex with him repeatedly between the ages of 11 and 15, sometimes in a car on the way to mass. Mr Ridsdale several times repeated the accusation that when he approached Dr Pell for assistance, the priest went into immediate damage control, saying: "I want to know what it will take to keep you quiet." Mr Ridsdale claimed that Dr Pell made him feel "that I was at fault". As calls for a royal commission into the Catholic Church's handling of sex abuse allegations intensified, John Howard dismissed the idea, saying the problem was an internal church matter.
The Prime Minister said he had great respect for the clergyman.
"It's too early for somebody in my position, without being in possession of all of the facts, to start giving public advice to individual churches," he told the ABC.
But he said: "The laws must always be fully upheld and every effort must always be made by every institution to root out and punish, according to the rigour of the law, people who are involved in such practices."
The calls for a royal commission were led by victims of alleged assault, who say they believe compensation payouts from the Catholic Church amounted to "hush money".
Ridsdale, a long-time Dr Pell associate and a former school chaplain in the Victorian town of Ballarat, was jailed in 1994 for 18 years after pleading guilty to 46 charges involving 21 children.
A Melbourne victim, who did not wish to be identified, told ABC radio that he was awarded $30,000 under a compensation scheme established in 1996 by Dr Pell.
"It gave me the impression I had to keep quiet about the whole process and the money being offered to me," he said. Dr Pell set up the compensation scheme ahead of, and independently of, a national program that deals with assault allegations.
Under the Melbourne scheme, 126 people have received compensation of up to $55,000 each.
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Caption: Archbishop Pell; Photo: Photo
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