SYDNEY, 8 April 2020:
Victims should not be discouraged after an Australian court yesterday quashed the child sexual abuse conviction against cardinal George Pell, said the man who took him to court.
Australia’s top court had overturned Pell’s sentence of six years in prison on five counts of sexual abuse of minors – including one of oral penetration – finding there was “a significant possibility that an innocent person has been convicted because the evidence did not establish guilt to the requisite standard of proof”.
Witness J – whose testimony was the basis of the legal process against the 78-year-old cardinal – while respecting the court decision, said “it is difficult in child sexual abuse matters to satisfy a criminal court that the offending has occurred beyond the shadow of a doubt”.
“I understand why criminal cases must be proven beyond all reasonable doubt. No-one wants to live in a society where people can be imprisoned without due and proper process,” Witness J said in a statement released by lawyer Vivian Waller.
“This is a basic civil liberty. But the price we pay for weighting the system in favour of the accused is that many sexual offences against children go unpunished.”
Witness J, who denounced the former Vatican treasurer on charges of sexual abuse against him and another 13-year-old minor in 1996 and 1997 at St Patrick’s Cathedral – when he was archbishop of Melbourne – said “I would hate to think that one outcome of this case is that people are discouraged from reporting to the police”.
“I would like to reassure child sexual abuse survivors that most people recognise the truth when they hear it. They know the truth when they look it in the face. I am content with that.”
Cardinal Pell, who was freed from prison yesterday after the High Court of Australia overturned his 2018 convictions in the second trial – after the jury was unable to reach a verdict in the first one and later sentenced him to six years in jail.
During his trial in August 2019, two of the three justices of the Supreme Court of the state of Victoria ratified the sentence.
During the second trial, the judges considered there was “a significant possibility that an innocent person has been convicted because the evidence did not establish guilt to the requisite standard of proof.” according to the ruling.
Pell argued before the Supreme Court that the appeals court failed to take proper account of evidence casting doubt on his guilt. According to an article published in The Conversation magazine, the cardinal won the case due to a legal technicality.
– EFE