by wozza 23 Replies latest watchtower child-abuse
About time the ruling headship of this religious organization made some strong changes to protect innocent children !
I wish the JWS would do the same, but they seem to be complacent set in denial. NOT ARE ORGANIZATION .
Are elders have never committed such debauchery of sexual victimization of the children within are congregations
I,m not a Catholic and many priests in the church I believe are guilty of the most heinous crimes against children.
I spoke to a lawyer today who does,t believe pell in guilty and believes he will appeal the conviction and will be successful.
There is a witch hunt to get the most senior Catholic in Australia and in the trial there were many discrepancies
George Pell also became very high up at the Vatican ,the pressure is now on Pope Francis to excommunicate him from the Church.
Unlike wtbts, I dont believe the Catholic church can ex-communicate for "sin", since they believe we all do, the exception being abortion. I think things like breaking confessional confidence and ordaining someone bishop without papal authority. Oh, and attacking the pope!
He can be suspended, though.
Punishments which are handed out for offences can often seem to be either disproportionate or not severe enough.
How many named paedophile priests have actually escaped being jailed for their terrible acts?
Compare what they've done with what an Orangeman did to a Catholic priest.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-47387094
As the poster Barry has pointed out, Pell legal team is appealing his conviction. A matter that two of his supporters, former Prime Ministers, John Howard (who wrote a character reference for Pell's use in court) and Tone Abbott ( a Catholic) both believe. apparently, that the appeal will quash the conviction, So we shall have to wait and see whether the conviction will stick.
But there are other things that inform us as to the character of George Pell. A Sydney lawyer, John Ellis. who was himself sexually abused by a priest, and who was denigrated by George Pell, writes in a Fairfax newspaper:
" George Pell has been a controversial figure for decades and has been a staunch defender of the church. He has repeatedly touted his credentials as a person to whom sexual abuse of minors is an abhorrent scourge on the church. He has done so as a cover to seek to divert attention away from his record as a man who has waged a covert war on victims and survivors of abuse and who orchestrated the church’s defence to my claim – the "Ellis defence", by which I was figuratively hung, drawn and quartered and displayed as a warning to any other survivor who may have the temerity to seek to sue the church. It claimed there was "no legal entity responsible for sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.""
Whether or not Pell's conviction stands, Pell is guilty of something worse than the sexual abuse of a child, he is guilty of attempting to pervert justice. Particularly so, since the injustice is based on a certain perception of sex and its function in humans, that has been taught and advocated throughout the areas we call 'the West.'
Ellis further wrote of Pell,
"George Pell apologised to me for the legal abuse perpetrated by the church under his watch as Archbishop of Sydney. Before he departed for Rome in 2014, he famously recited a public apology not to me but to the assembled audience at the conclusion of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse public hearing. I had a cup of tea with him. While that was a private meeting and will remain so, I can say that I have never felt any warmth from the man. I was not left with a sense of any acceptance of personal responsibility for how he sought to crush me or any appreciation of the impacts of his own actions."
Pell's view of the world parallels that of the Watchtower Society's -- whose only motivation is the protection and perpetuation of a grimy unneccessary organisation that has no place in a rational world.
Link to the Canberra Time article: https://www.canberratimes.com.au/national/history-will-judge-george-pell-the-cardinal-who-sought-to-crush-me-20190227-p510ma.html
I don't think they will over turn the conviction and I don't think he is innocent, he has been molesting boys since the 60's before he was a priest I really feel he is guilty.
Gerald Ridsdale
Pell served as an assistant priest at St Alipius' Church in Ballarat East and, in 1973, shared a house with Gerald Ridsdale, a priest who was later defrocked and jailed for child sex crimes.[153][162] Ridsdale was convicted between 1993 and 2017 of a very large number of child sexual abuse and indecent assault charges against children aged as young as four years during the 1970s and 1980s, the total number of known victims standing at 79, but that is thought to be a small proportion of his victims.[163][164][165][166] Pell was part of a leadership group of Catholic priests in the Diocese of Ballarat that met during 1982 and discussed moving Ridsdale from the parish at Mortlake and sending him to Sydney.[167] Pell denied knowing about any of Ridsdale's actions.[168] Journalist and former priest Paul Bongiorno, who also lived in a presbytery with Ridsdale told ABC radio that Ridsdale concealed his activities: "They hide it. It was certainly hidden from me. And when it came out, after I’d left the priesthood, I was shocked and I was ashamed."
In March 2016, when asked by the Royal Commission why he had agreed to walk Ridsdale into the courthouse in Melbourne during his 1993 criminal trial, Pell responded, "I had some status as an auxiliary bishop and I was asked to appear with the ambition that this would lessen the term of punishment, lessen his time in jail." Peter Saunders, the victims' advocate and a former Catholic priest, said that this Pell response "demonstrates once again the callousness, the coldheartedness and the contempt that George Pell appears to display for this whole issue and particularly for the victims of these dreadful crimes."[170]
In 2002 on 60 Minutes, Pell was accused by David Ridsdale, a victim of child sex abuse in Ballarat and the nephew of Gerald Ridsdale, of attempting to bribe him in 1993 in order to prevent the abuse being made public.[22] Minchin's anti-Pell song "Come Home (Cardinal Pell)" repeated the allegation.[171] The allegation was examined at the royal commission and received further wide publicity.[172][173] However, Counsel-Assisting Gail Furness conceded in her final submission to the royal commission that, given it was already known to Pell that Gerald Ridsdale was subject to police investigation, and David Ridsdale had requested a "private" rather than police process "it is not likely that Bishop Pell would then have thought it necessary to offer Mr Ridsdale an inducement to prevent him from going to the police or public with his allegations", and Ridsdale could have "misinterpreted Bishop Pell's offer of assistance".[22]
2002 allegation
In June 2002, Pell was accused by a Melbourne man of having sexually abused a 12-year-old boy at a Catholic youth camp in 1961, whilst he was a young seminarian. Pell denied the accusations and stood aside while the inquiry continued.[174] The complainant agreed to pursue his allegations through the church's own process for dealing with allegations of sexual misconduct, the National Committee for Professional Standards. Retired Victorian Supreme Court Justice Alec Southwell, appointed Commissioner by the church to investigate the matter, found that the complainant, despite his long criminal record, had mostly given the impression of "speaking honestly from actual recollection" but concluded as follows: "bearing in mind the forensic difficulties of the defence occasioned by the very long delay, some valid criticism of the complainant's credibility, the lack of corroborative evidence and the sworn denial of the respondent, I find I am not 'satisfied that the complaint has been established'".[175][176] Pell said he had been exonerated, while the complainant's solicitor said his client had been vindicated.[176]
Victoria Police investigations
In March 2013, Victoria Police launched "Operation Tethering", to investigate whether Pell had committed unreported crimes.[177] On 20 February 2016, the Herald Sun newspaper reported that Pell had been under investigation for the past year by detectives from the Victoria Police SANO Taskforce over sexual abuse allegations involving between five and ten boys that occurred between 1978 and 2001 when he was a priest in Ballarat and when archbishop of Melbourne.[178] His office issued a public statement denying the allegations calling them "utterly false" and asked for an inquiry into the leaking of information by Victoria Police officers to the media.[178] Victoria Police remained silent on whether Pell was being investigated.[178] The SANO Taskforce was established in 2012 to investigate allegations arising from the Victorian Government Inquiry into the Handling of Child Abuse by Religious and other Organisations and the subsequent Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.[178][179]
On 28 July 2016, the Chief Commissioner of Victoria Police, Graham Ashton, confirmed that there was an investigation into alleged child sexual abuse by Pell following a report by the ABC's 7.30 program the previous day and stated that he was awaiting advice from the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).[180][181][182] On 17 August 2016, Victoria Police confirmed a response had been received from the DPP, but would not disclose the DPP's recommendations.[183]
In October 2016, three Victoria Police officers from the SANO Task Force flew to Rome to interview Pell, who voluntarily participated, regarding allegations of sexual assault.[184] In February 2017, Victoria Police advised that the brief of evidence against Pell for sexual assault allegations had been returned to the Office of Public Prosecutions for review with advice subsequently provided to Victoria Police in May 2017.[185][186]
Having been a victim myself from a different source I feel disgusted at the world's way is with these things.
I brought this topic up because of the abuse of power of some people and how appalng it is and always has been.
There are more victims than what is known in this case and others and they have a life sentence and when you go to court you feel like a victim all over again ,having had to go thru this myself as a witness for my ex-wife ,the judge had to clear the court as someone yelled at me "mother f****r".
The world has become a better place for victims in sense ,for things are'nt so easily hidden and those in authority are more so being called to justice.
I did not start this topic to throw mud at the catholic church specifically but to all filth in organisations who break with decency and respect I say would love to see a world where you are put to death.
As regards the Ballarat area of Victoria and the sex abuses carried out there over time I know little of the history but when I lived in Queensland I knew a family of JW's who came from there ,and one of the family confided to me why they left the Ballarat area and moved to Queensland as they were catholic at one time and became witnesses. They faced horrors in Ballarat and it adversely affected all their lives . I kept in touch for a time till it was obvious they would not talk to me any more because I was telling them the truth about the truth.I was trying to tell them the facts about the WTS and it's problem with molestors So I have been affected by losing dear freinds.
So we do get a life sentence yet the perpetrators often get away free. Is it any wonder that a young man years ago in new south wales took the life of his perpetrator? I personally felt a sense of justice from that .
Wozza, you have my sympathy life is not fair period.... Are you getting any help in how to process these feeling? No need to answer if you feel uncomfortable, finding a good therapy is important to acknowledge your feelings and placing them in a productive space in the psyche wish you the best my friend.
Thanks BW
My personal history as child is of incest and then rape from someone else .This stuff does stick like shit to blanket.
You can imagine what it was like trying to have girlfriend when I was a teenager. After a year she told me the time had come to have sex and I should read two sex manuals she gave me ,she was switched on for 16. I finally started to learn what a proper relationship was and how it works . This is one way your affected in life.
I've done the therapy ,hospital treatment etc all my life but I think think fighting the WTS for years over my ex wifes abuse by her elder father is what did me in for a while and helped me find better help.
I feel I am more real about the world ,have learned to avoid the bullshit people in life more but I am sorry molestors deserve to die ,no time for any new age bs ,there is no god I can see now ,evolution is probably right and so the molestors don't have any moral platform to live on.
Again thank you for your concern and I hope that Pell gets justice to whatever degree society sees fit.
