"Stay over there and live your life,"

[Gob]

US / Canadian residents may not want him....

A Marist Brothers school teacher who repeatedly sexually abused children was tipped off to a police investigation by the head of the order in Australia, who then sent him overseas and, when a warrant for his arrest was issued, told him to "stay over there and live your new life".

The allegations came from the convicted paedophile himself - Gregory Sutton - who has taken the highly unusual step of giving evidence at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Sydney.

Sutton was jailed for 67 child-sex offences against 15 children. Most of the offences occurred while he worked at various Marist Brothers primary schools in NSW and Canberra.

He is one of two brothers whose actions are the focus of the commission's hearings.

Sutton told the commission on Tuesday that, in August 1989, he was called in for a meeting with the then head (or provincial) of the Marist Brothers in Australia, Brother Alexis Turton, and told that he was being investigated over his abuse of children at a school in Campbelltown.

Within four days of that meeting, Sutton said, he was put on a plane to the US. He then travelled to Canada for an "assessment" and "treatment" for his behaviour, at a Catholic Church institution known as Southdown.

"He informed me that there was a police investigation into my offending at Campbelltown," Sutton said of the meeting.

"Was this the first time you had heard that such an investigation was under way?" counsel assisting the commission, Gail Furness, SC, asked Sutton.

"Yes," he replied.

Sutton said Brother Turton arranged for his plane ticket to fly to Chicago from where he travelled to Ontario, where the "assessment" took place.

"Did it seem sudden to you?" Ms Furness asked Sutton of the hastily arranged trip.

"It seemed extremely sudden," Sutton replied.

The commission heard that Sutton continued to live in the US after his "treatment" in Canada, taking up a job as an administrative officer at a grade school in the city of St Louis.

Sutton said that, in 1992, Brother Turton rang him in St Louis and informed him that a warrant had been issued for his arrest by a court in Lismore.

"I asked him what I should do," Sutton told the commission.

"And do you remember what he told you?" Ms Furness asked.

"Yes, he said 'stay over there and live your life'," Sutton replied.

Sutton was arrested in the US in August 1995 and extradited to Australia in April 1996.

He pleaded guilty to 67 child-sex charges and was sentenced to a maximum of 15 years in jail with a minimum of 12 years. He was released in April 2008.

He is due to continue giving evidence this afternoon.



Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/marist-brothe ... z36BqgtuaT

[Lord Jim]

He pleaded guilty to 67 child-sex charges and was sentenced to a maximum of 15 years in jail with a minimum of 12 years. He was released in April 2008.

This guy admits to 67 child-sex charges, and he does 12 years?

[MajGenl.Meade]

He had nothing to lose but his wains

[rubato]

"Stay over there and live your life,"

Now that's the kind of amoral clarity I've come to expect from the Roman Catholic leadership.

"If you get away with it, it isn't sin!"



yrs,
rubato

[dgs49]

This is strikingly similar to a story reported recently in Pittsburgh.

http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/ ... 1403220087

I wonder if there are any others lurking out there.

[Lord Jim]

A Melbourne court this week found sufficient evidence to order Brother Bernard Joseph Hartman to stand trial in April 2015 on 18 charges of abuse.

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/ ... z3707RpPLP

Well, if the other guy got a big 12 years for 67 counts of child abuse, what will this guy get for a mere 18? Three years?

[rubato]

This is strikingly similar to a story reported recently in Pittsburgh.

http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/ ... 1403220087

I wonder if there are any others lurking out there.

Others? You don't recall all of the other accounts? The accounts of rapist priests sent from Ireland to the US to escape punishment (and enable them to continue in a fresh flock of unwitting victims). The accounts of priests moved from parish to parish in the US just one step ahead of exposure and arrest

Others?

Where have they proven sexual abuse by roman clergy and the church leadership protecting and helping them continue; everywhere they've looked in the entire world.

For how long; we can prove it for as long as memory exists. All of the evidence suggests that this has been going on in this way for centuries. For all we can tell one of the reason's people become priests is to have sexual access to children and someone to protect them from punishment.


yrs,
rubato