Cardinal George Pell, convicted paedophile

[Angra Mainyu]

From where do you derive your claim that "the previous jury was very probably (no official record, but very probably) 10-2 in favor of acquitting"?

I saw it in several different media outlets, some clearly biased towards Catholicism - which does not make their reporting likely false per se -, but some that did not appear to be so. Let me search for that again.

The only information we have is that the first jury did not reach a verdict. We have no information on whether the majority were for acquittal or for conviction, or whether they were equally split.

Let us say so. That increases the probability that he is guilty. Nevertheless, given the sort of evidence the jury used to convict, it is improbable that it was beyond a reasonable doubt on the basis of the information available to them. Moreover, the case made by the defense attorney - before he came up with the absurd 'vanilla' defense - strongly supports innocence. Additionally, the other alleged victim not only did not come forward, but probably denied having been abused by Pell, until his death.

Under Australian law, it is a very serious offence for any juror to reveal the details of jury deliberations, so I am not sure how you could possibly assign any probability to any possible distribution of opinions in the first jury. It's information that is very deliberately kept out of the public domain.

I base my assessment on reported leaks. But I will re-check that, because even though I found several sources, perhaps they're tainted by the first one. Let me take a look.

By the way, why do you think they did not reach a verdict, if there was conclusive evidence?

 

[Angra Mainyu]

I saw it in several different media outlets, some clearly biased towards Catholicism - which does not make their reporting likely false per se -, but some that did not appear to be so. Let me search for that again.


Let us say so. That increases the probability that he is guilty. Nevertheless, given the sort of evidence the jury used to convict, it is improbable that it was beyond a reasonable doubt on the basis of the information available to them. Moreover, the case made by the defense attorney - before he came up with the absurd 'vanilla' defense - strongly supports innocence. Additionally, the other alleged victim not only did not come forward, but probably denied having been abused by Pell, until his death.

Under Australian law, it is a very serious offence for any juror to reveal the details of jury deliberations, so I am not sure how you could possibly assign any probability to any possible distribution of opinions in the first jury. It's information that is very deliberately kept out of the public domain.

I base my assessment on reported leaks. But I will re-check that, because even though I found several sources, perhaps they're tainted by the first one. Let me take a look.

By the way, why do you think they did not reach a verdict, if there was conclusive evidence?

I found the 10-2 claim on several sites, but I now tracked the claim back to the original source, which is indeed biased towards Catholicism:

Yes, that was the case. The original source taints the rest of the reports:

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/...cond-trial-against-cardinal-george-pell-99978

The verdict came after a five-week retrial, after a jury in an earlier trial failed to reach an unanimous verdict. In October 2018, multiple sources close to the case told CNA that the first trial had ended with the jury deadlocked 10-2 in favor of Pell.

So, maybe they lied. Then again, maybe they did not. Still, this reduces significantly the chances of a 10-2 for Pell, and as a result, increases the chances that he is guilty, though it does not address the rest of the issues.

 

[bilby]

I found the 10-2 claim on several sites, but I now tracked the claim back to the original source, which is indeed biased towards Catholicism:

Yes, that was the case. The original source taints the rest of the reports:

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/...cond-trial-against-cardinal-george-pell-99978

The verdict came after a five-week retrial, after a jury in an earlier trial failed to reach an unanimous verdict. In October 2018, multiple sources close to the case told CNA that the first trial had ended with the jury deadlocked 10-2 in favor of Pell.

So, maybe they lied. Then again, maybe they did not. Still, this reduces significantly the chances of a 10-2 for Pell, and as a result, increases the chances that he is guilty, though it does not address the rest of the issues.

Given that only the jurors could possibly know, and that they are subject to severe penalties if they tell anyone else, it's very easy for CNA to make up any shit they like, and to attribute it to 'multiple sources close to the case'. They can be sure that nobody is going to be able to rebut or fact-check their claim without themselves risking legal sanction.

I wouldn't trust this 10-2 claim any further than I could throw a brick chimney by its smoke.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

And what's the big deal about conflicting testimony from witnesses? That's precisely what jurors have to deal with. Maybe Lion has never been on a jury and it sounds like that's a good thing based on his observations in this thread about juries.

Another way to look at this is to be 100 percent certain that even if cardinal Pedo didn't commit anal rape he absolutely certainly knew that this abuse was widespread among his peers and did absolutely nothing about it. "Hey, Judge, I didn't pull the trigger, I provided the gun, loaded the gun, witnessed the crime, paid off people to keep it all secret so I'm innocent."

 

[Angra Mainyu]

I found the 10-2 claim on several sites, but I now tracked the claim back to the original source, which is indeed biased towards Catholicism:

Yes, that was the case. The original source taints the rest of the reports:

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/...cond-trial-against-cardinal-george-pell-99978

The verdict came after a five-week retrial, after a jury in an earlier trial failed to reach an unanimous verdict. In October 2018, multiple sources close to the case told CNA that the first trial had ended with the jury deadlocked 10-2 in favor of Pell.

So, maybe they lied. Then again, maybe they did not. Still, this reduces significantly the chances of a 10-2 for Pell, and as a result, increases the chances that he is guilty, though it does not address the rest of the issues.

Given that only the jurors could possibly know, and that they are subject to severe penalties if they tell anyone else, it's very easy for CNA to make up any shit they like, and to attribute it to 'multiple sources close to the case'. They can be sure that nobody is going to be able to rebut or fact-check their claim without themselves risking legal sanction.

I wouldn't trust this 10-2 claim any further than I could throw a brick chimney by its smoke.

Do you know where I can find information about the severe penalties? I have not been able to find anything after spending a reasonable amount of time searching for them.

ETA: Never mind; I found the information.

 

[Lion IRC]

This verdict risks setting a precedent whereby you can summon up a decades old 'recollection' NAMBLA homoerotic fantasy of being a choirboy getting drunk on altar wine and getting forced to have oral sex with a tall dark stranger, who is a priest of course, then use that (internalised homophobia) years later to weaponise an uncorroborated accusation against any Church authority figure.

I would love to know whether Pell's anonymous accuser was ever attracted to the idea of joining the priesthood.

 

[bilby]

This verdict risks setting a precedent whereby you can summon up a decades old 'recollection' NAMBLA homoerotic fantasy of being a choirboy getting drunk on altar wine and getting forced to have oral sex with a tall dark stranger, who is a priest of course, then use that (internalised homophobia) years later to weaponise an uncorroborated accusation against any Church authority figure.

I would love to know whether Pell's anonymous accuser was ever attracted to the idea of joining the priesthood.

View attachment 20376

You do know that slanderous insinuations don't actually have any effect on the fact that Pell is guilty, right?

The rule of law isn't perfect, but it's a bloody sight better than the theocratic shit you are attempting to promote.

The church has spent the last six centuries trying to place itself above secular law. Every success along the way has been a disaster for humanity. It's way past time that the church stopped getting special treatment, and a greater presumption of innocence than the laity.

Your arguments here would carry some weight, had you advanced them in defence of Jimmy Saville or Rolf Harris. But you didn't. You are here arguing in favour of Pell not because you are concerned that the evidence may not be compelling - indeed, you don't know what the evidence even IS - but because he is a high ranking member of your favourite team.

If you can show me solid evidence of your similar arguments in favour of acquittal for Rolf Harris, then I will gladly apologise to you.

But I don't think you can show me any such impassioned pleas on Mr Harris's behalf, made by you at the time of his conviction in 2014.

You don't care about (in)justice; You care about the image of your church. That's despicable.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Wow. A Catholic blaming the victim and making up lies to disparage someone who was raped by a priest.

I’m shocked. SHOCKED!!! I tell you.

 

[Lion IRC]

Tsk tsk
Logic 101
I can't blame a victim unless I think there was a victim.

Speaking of logic, did you see how bilby said my arguments would carry weight if I applied them to secular abuse cases - which out number clerical abuse by orders of magnitude? How is that not an egregious failure of clear thinking?

 

[bilby]

Tsk tsk
Logic 101
I can't blame a victim unless I think there was a victim.

Speaking of logic, did you see how bilby said my arguments would carry weight if I applied them to secular abuse cases - which out number clerical abuse by orders of magnitude? How is that not an egregious failure of clear thinking?

Would carry some weight. (And I don't for a minute accept your claim that such cases outnumber clerical abise cases - do you have a citation from an unbiased source that shows these 'orders of magnitude' of which you speak?)

That is, you would at least not be hypothetically supporting only those defendants who you felt some fellowship with, while ignoring similar cases where the defendant shares fewer of your interests or beliefs.

 

[ruby sparks]

I found the 10-2 claim on several sites, but I now tracked the claim back to the original source, which is indeed biased towards Catholicism:

Yes, that was the case. The original source taints the rest of the reports:

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/...cond-trial-against-cardinal-george-pell-99978

The verdict came after a five-week retrial, after a jury in an earlier trial failed to reach an unanimous verdict. In October 2018, multiple sources close to the case told CNA that the first trial had ended with the jury deadlocked 10-2 in favor of Pell.

So, maybe they lied. Then again, maybe they did not. Still, this reduces significantly the chances of a 10-2 for Pell, and as a result, increases the chances that he is guilty, though it does not address the rest of the issues.

The BBC only reported a hung jury, but yes, one can find articles in many places that say 'it was reported' to have been 10-2 in favour of acquittal, for the first jury, in September.

 

[couch_sloth]

Even if the first trial was 10-2 in favor of acquittal, that doesn't mean most of those jurors thought Pell didn't molest those boys

 

[Angra Mainyu]

Even if the first trial was 10-2 in favor of acquittal, that doesn't mean most of those jurors thought Pell didn't molest those boys

No, it would mean they thought the available evidence did not show beyond a reasonable doubt that it did. Some or all of them may have thought he was probably guilty, or probably not guilty, etc. (assuming the jurors understood the evidentiary rules).

 

[Lion IRC]

One thing's for sure. Every single one of those jurors knew that George Pell was the public face of the Catholic Church in Australia - a man hated for his conservative Christian views on abortion, homosexuality, etc.

They also knew that, despite the furious media witch hunt, and all the money spent on high paid Royal Commission lawyers going after church leaders, there really haven't been any high-profile scalps. They went after a cardinal in South Australia but he was acquitted. The most notorious clergy pedophile cases were 30, 40, 50 years old. The alleged offenders and their accusers and were all dead now and a new generation of church leaders all have plausible deniability.

The public square lynch mob mentality was/is intensifying and a jury selection (voir dire) process is supposed to deliver us 12 impartial, rational, clear thinkers, (like bilby and phands,) who aren't swayed by preconceptions about the definition of the word "priest", and don't have a Lone Avenger sense of justice. But even if you took Lion IRC and bilby off the jury, how does a fair jury exercise impartiality when it's one person's word against another's? Why do different courts, judges, juries reach different verdicts on the exact same set of facts? Why aren't juries 100% unanimous in every case if they all have the same evidence/facts?

Answer - because their judgment is frequently based on opinion.

 

[bilby]

One thing's for sure. Every single one of those jurors knew that George Pell was the public face of the Catholic Church in Australia - a man hated for his conservative Christian views on abortion, homosexuality, etc.

They also knew that, despite the furious media witch hunt, and all the money spent on high paid Royal Commission lawyers going after church leaders, there really haven't been any high-profile scalps. They went after a cardinal in South Australia but he was acquitted. The most notorious clergy pedophile cases were 30, 40, 50 years old. The alleged offenders and their accusers and were all dead now and a new generation of church leaders all have plausible deniability.

The public square lynch mob mentality was/is intensifying and a jury selection (voir dire) process is supposed to deliver us 12 impartial, rational, clear thinkers, (like bilby and phands,) who aren't swayed by preconceptions about the definition of the word "priest", and don't have a Lone Avenger sense of justice. But even if you took Lion IRC and bilby off the jury, how does a fair jury exercise impartiality when it's one person's word against another's? Why do different courts, judges, juries reach different verdicts on the exact same set of facts? Why aren't juries 100% unanimous in every case if they all have the same evidence/facts?

Answer - because their judgment is frequently based on opinion.

Ah. So you are saying that you don't know whether Pell was guilty or not, but that his previous history of being a total arsehole who tried to impose his vile beliefs on an unwilling public, and his refusal to protect the vulnerable from his paedophile subordinates, may have made him sufficiently hated as to bias a jury against him.

Well, I guess that's possible. If only someone had warned him that people reap what they sow, perhaps he could have been less of a cunt, and therefore more popular.

We will, of course, never know whether that was actually a factor, or whether the evidence against him was so compelling that public opinion of him was irrelevant to the verdict.

But either way, it's probably no bad thing that he goes to jail.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

One thing's for sure. Every single one of those jurors knew that George Pell was the public face of the Catholic Church in Australia - a man hated for his conservative Christian views on abortion, homosexuality, etc.

They also knew that, despite the furious media witch hunt, and all the money spent on high paid Royal Commission lawyers going after church leaders, there really haven't been any high-profile scalps. They went after a cardinal in South Australia but he was acquitted. The most notorious clergy pedophile cases were 30, 40, 50 years old. The alleged offenders and their accusers and were all dead now and a new generation of church leaders all have plausible deniability.

The public square lynch mob mentality was/is intensifying and a jury selection (voir dire) process is supposed to deliver us 12 impartial, rational, clear thinkers, (like bilby and phands,) who aren't swayed by preconceptions about the definition of the word "priest", and don't have a Lone Avenger sense of justice. But even if you took Lion IRC and bilby off the jury, how does a fair jury exercise impartiality when it's one person's word against another's? Why do different courts, judges, juries reach different verdicts on the exact same set of facts? Why aren't juries 100% unanimous in every case if they all have the same evidence/facts?

Answer - because their judgment is frequently based on opinion.

Have you ever been on a jury that passed a verdict? Have you ever gone through the selection process?

 

[Lion IRC]

No.
But I've watched Bull and LA Law and Boston Legal and Ally McBeal and Suits and Perry Mason
So therefore I'm...WAIT!
What does my jury duty eligibility have to do with George Pell's trial?

 

[DrZoidberg]

This verdict risks setting a precedent whereby you can summon up a decades old 'recollection' NAMBLA homoerotic fantasy of being a choirboy getting drunk on altar wine and getting forced to have oral sex with a tall dark stranger, who is a priest of course, then use that (internalised homophobia) years later to weaponise an uncorroborated accusation against any Church authority figure.

I would love to know whether Pell's anonymous accuser was ever attracted to the idea of joining the priesthood.

View attachment 20376

I think you've got it backwards. The fact that the Catholic clergy and monks are full of homosexuals has been the worst kept secret since the inception of the Christian church. It's an inheritance from Roman society, which in turn was an inheritance from Greek Pagan society. Pagan Roman society was incredibly homophobic. The only honourable way for a homosexual man to conduct himself was to join a cult as a priest or other functionary. Pagan temples were often supported by prostitution. So temple prostitutes could be gay. According to Roman logic the person getting penetrated is the only gay one. The guy fucking the manly hairy ass was apparently straight as an arrow. But I digress.

Most priests were not gay. But in the temples they were at least tolerated. Roman Paganism had an odd hang up about chastity. They both venerated sexual virility as well as chastity. Christian Rome kept the hang up about chastity, but dropped the sexual virility thing.

When Rome became Christianized the temples switched symbols and it was pretty much business as usual. The transformation of the Roman empire from a pagan culture to a Christian culture was a very slow and gradual process. The pope only passed the bull to close the church/temple brothels in 500 AD. The practice of church prostitutes went on for a long time after they were Christian. Just an example of gradual Christianisation.

The early Christian church was obsessed with sex, and especially chastity. Not having sex at all was seen as the ideal. The churches and monasteries still recruited homosexuals but now they were supposed to be abstinent, and the issue was considered dealt with and swept under the rug. Not to mention how handy it was that chaste priests didn't have off-spring, which meant that property was kept in the church.

Over time the church softened their stance on chastity, because the emperor worried it might have a negative impact on the birthrate and thereby the effectiveness of the Roman army. But the stance on chaste priests did not change. If you were gay in the Christian Roman world it was the priesthood or monastary that was the way to go. If you could afford it. Otherwise you were pretty screwed... or rather not screwed.... or rather... you get it.

I think priests having sex with altar boys has been going on since the foundation of the Catholic church. Until I see some compelling argument against it, I'll keep believing that.

There's been quite a few academic books written on the Catholic church and homosexuality. I read a great one a while back. But I was unsure what it was called, so I refrained from posting a link. But the information is out there. And of course not remotely controversial among academics. Only among lay people.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Ya, the two topics of priests being gay and priests having sex with altar boys aren't actually related topics. Homosexuality and child molestation are different things.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

No.
But I've watched Bull and LA Law and Boston Legal and Ally McBeal and Suits and Perry Mason
So therefore I'm...WAIT!
What does my jury duty eligibility have to do with George Pell's trial?

You've just demonstrated the accuracy and predictive power of Dunning Kruger.

I think priests having sex with altar boys has been going on since the foundation of the Catholic church. Until I see some compelling argument against it, I'll keep believing that.

There's been quite a few academic books written on the Catholic church and homosexuality. I read a great one a while back. But I was unsure what it was called, so I refrained from posting a link. But the information is out there. And of course not remotely controversial among academics. Only among lay people.

Within its own confines and sphere of control RCC clerics have great power. Hell, they tortured and murdered people for centuries to preserve that power. All that has happened recently is that they are no longer able to control and terrorize as broadly, they've lost a lot of control and power beyond their cult per se. So you are correct. I would only add that it is continuing as we speak.

When I was growing up we had to kiss the Abbot's ring during certain functions. Talk about a power and control trip. Sick, sick stuff. But at least I escaped having to suck a sacred dick or be anally raped.