Cardinal Pell welcomes court’s dismissal of abuse conviction – By Rod McGuirk (Associated Press) / April 7 2020
Cardinal George Pell is welcoming Australia’s highest court clearing him of child sex crimes and says his trial had not been a referendum on the Catholic Church’s handling of the clergy abuse crisis
CANBERRA, Australia — Cardinal George Pell welcomed Australia’s highest court clearing him of child sex crimes Tuesday and said his trial had not been a referendum on the Catholic Church’s handling of the clergy abuse crisis.
Pope Francis’ former finance minister Pell had been the most senior Catholic found guilty of sexually abusing children and spent 13 months in prison before seven High Court judges unanimously dismissed his convictions.
“I have consistently maintained my innocence while suffering from a serious injustice,” Pell said in his first public statement since he was convicted in December 2018. It was released before he left prison and was taken to the Carmelite Monastery in Melbourne where he was greeted by a nun.
Francis appeared to refer to Pell’s acquittal in his morning homily, saying he was praying for all those unjustly persecuted.
Pell said: “I hold no ill will toward my accuser,” a former choirboy whose testimony was at the core of the 78-year-old cleric’s prosecution.
The High Court found there was reasonable doubt surrounding the testimony of the witness, now the father of a young family aged in his 30s, who said Pell had abused him and another 13-year-old choirboy at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Melbourne in the late 1990s.
“My trial was not a referendum on the Catholic Church; nor a referendum on how Church authorities in Australia dealt with the crime of pedophilia in the Church,” Pell said.
“The point was whether I had committed these awful crimes, and I did not,” he added.
Continue to article: https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/australian-court-dismisses-cardinals-sex-abuse-convictions-70011543?cid=clicksource_4380645_4_heads_hero_live_headlines_hed
