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Archbishop Philip Wilson becomes world’s most senior Catholic charged with concealing child abuse
Former Hunter priest Adelaide Archbishop Philip Wilson has become the most senior Catholic clergyman in the world to be charged with concealing a child sex abuse allegation against another priest on what a Hunter paedophile priest victim has described as “a Saint Patrick’s Day we’ll never forget”.
The Adelaide archbishop was charged on Tuesday with one count of concealing a child sex allegation made against the late Hunter priest Jim Fletcher in the 1970s, nearly nine months after the NSW Special Commission of Inquiry recommended the charge.
He is one of only a handful of Catholic clergymen in the world to be charged with concealing a child sex allegation against another priest, and only the third in Australia after the late Toronto priest Tom Brennan became the first to face such a charge in 2012.
Archbishop Wilson, the vice-president of the Australian Bishops Conference, denied the allegation in a statement on Tuesday and said he would vigorously defend the matter.
“The suggestion appears to be that I failed to bring to the attention of police a conversation I am alleged to have had in 1976, when I was a junior priest, that a now deceased priest had abused a child,” he said.
“From the time this was first brought to my attention last year, I have completely denied the allegation.”
The archbishop has taken indefinite leave while he defends the matter.
News of the charge meant tears for some Hunter child sex abuse victims and survivors, and relief that police from Newcastle strike force Lantle had finally been able to lay a charge after concerns about the length of time Commissioner Margaret Cunneen’s recommendation had been with the NSW Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions.
“I’m stunned. When I first heard about it I cried and cried,” said Fletcher victim and longtime advocate for victims Peter Gogarty.
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