Ex-priest/ serial molester to testify from jail

As far as I know the sex abuse trial of serial clerical molester Father Charles Picot will continue tomorrow in Bathurst, New Brunswick:

27 May 2015:  09:30 am, TRIAL, Bathurst New Brunswick courthouse (254 St. Patrick Street)

Please send along links to media coverage which should be available this evening.

As always, please keep the complainant and Picot’s many victims in your prayers.

*****

The Australian Royal Commission continues its hearings today/this evening (depending where in the world you live).  The next witness to testify is   thrice convicted serial molester  Gerald Francis Ridsdale.  Ridsdale will be testifying from the jail where he will without doubt be spending the rest of his days on this earth.

I have posted quite a slew of documents related to Ridsdale.  There are many more – I  have tried to select those which will give you a bit of an idea what has been going on since this man was ordained to the priesthood in July of 1961 and those which show the abhorrence of his crimes.  I think when you read through the sentencing reports you will wonder how “Adrian” could testify as to the ‘good character’ of this ‘priest’ at trial number one.  And, a reminder that Cardinal Pell drew outrage when it was learned that he had accompanied Ridsdale to court for one of his trials.  Further to that, Ridsdale’s nephew has testified that when he told Pell, a family friend, that Father Ridsdale had molested him Pell’s response was to ask what it would take to keep him, the victim, quiet.  And, an addendum, in 1973 Father Ridsdale the then Father Pell served in the same parish, with both living in the rectory at St. Alipius in Ballarat East.

So, bearing all of that in mind, the hearings should be interesting.

The hearings start Tuesday 26 May at 8 pm EST, which is Wednesday 27 May 10 am AEST.  Click here to access the commission website

And here is the raft of documents posted.  They can be accessed manually by clicking on “Documents” on the horizontal menu under the picture  above, then click “Church-related Documents”, then scroll down to “Australia” and on down to “Ridsdale:  Father Gerald Ridsdale”.(you may prefer to read from the bottom up ?):

08 April 2014:   Reasons for Sentence DPP v Ridsdale (references all charges, including abuse of young girls, also reference rape, digital penetration and sodomy)

11 August 2006:  Reasons for Sentence R v Gerald Francis Ridsdale (reference all charges including buggery and instance where victim was tied to pool table and sodomized with lubricated pool cue)

14 October 1994:   Sentencing remarks of the Supreme Court of Melbourne Gerald Ridsdale (reference all the crimes, including buggery)

06 June 1994:   Transcript of Interview between Catholic Church Insurance Limited and Gerald Risdale (‘latched on to boy aged 10 or 11 at Charismatic prayer group; talks of counselling sessions, time and scandal  at Servants of the Paraclete in New Mexico, and had molested after New Mexico)  (4)

06 June 1994:   Extracts of transcript of interview between Catholic Church Limited and Gerald Ridsdale (3)

06 June 1994:  Transcript of Interview between Catholic Church Insurance Limited and Gerald Risdale (reference to abuse of policeman’s son in 1975, and introducing new Rites of Reconciliation in diocese in ’75 and ’76) (2)

06 June 1994:  Australia Transcript of Interview between Catholic Church Insurance Limited and Gerald Risdale (was molested by family members, molested in England in ’59 or ’60, first complaint to Bishop after ordination was early 60s, flatly denies allegations of buggery, 06 June 1994 (1)

06 June 1994:   Extracts of transcript of interview between Catholic Church Limited and Gerald Ridsdale

06 June 1994:  Transcript of Interview between Catholic Church Insurance Limited and Gerald Risdale (reference to abuse of policeman’s son in 1975, and introducing new Rites of Reconciliation in diocese in ’75 and ’76)

07 April 1994:  Transcript of Interview between Catholic Church Insurance Limited and Bishop Mulkearns

28 April 1993:   Extracts of Transcript of Interview between Father Eugene McKinnon and Catholic Church Limited (discusses angry parents confronted priest who replaced Ridsdale and belief that Ridsdale probably molested every boy at the school)

10 April 1993:   J.E.  O’Con to Mssrs Dunhill Madden Butler re Father Ridsdale (believe he has admitted to sex abuse of eleven boys)

19 August 1989:  Father Watson ofm to Bishop Mulkearns (Re Father Ridsadle going to Servants of Paraclete, and re opening similar treatment facility in Victoria)

27 June 1989:  Father Augustine Watson ofm to Bishop Mulkearns (re seriousness of decision bishop must take “to protect community & the Church – suggests putting Ridsdale in chaplaincy, preferably  at convent of elderly nuns)

27 November 1988:   Bishop Mulkearns to Father Gerald Mulkearns9suggest not good idea to hear confessions or baptise.  No suggestion he cease his “apostolic work” with families in the area)

30 June 1988:  Bishop Mulkearns to Father Gerald Risdale revoking faculties for one year

11 April 1988:  Father Gerald Ridsdale to Bishop Mulkearns (confirms he will step down from parish work which “has proved to be a temptation and a difficulty for me.”

There as bit of reading there, but I think you can get through them enough to familiarize yourself with the magnitude and abhorrence of the scandal, and get a sense for who did or might have known what and when in conjunction with the recycling of this serial molester

(Sorry, – I’m not sure if Ridsdale is or is not still a priest. )

Enough for now,

Sylvia