Cardinal George Pell, convicted paedophile

[Lion IRC]

Gee, for a cohort who allegedly want to protect the reputation of the RCC and conspire to cover up their crimes, these guys sure aren't following the script according to the conspiracy playbook

Gerald Ridsdale - pleaded guilty
Gerard Byrnes - pleaded guilty
Desmond Gannon - pleaded guilty
Richard Cattell - pleaded guilty
Kevin O'Donnell - pleaded guilty
Neil Byrne - pleaded guilty
Greg Carter - pleaded guilty
Michael Aulsebrook - pleaded guilty
Wilfred Baker - pleaded guilty
Francis Cable - pleaded guilty
Edward Dowlan - pleaded guilty
Charles Barnett - pleaded guilty
Robert Best - pleaded guilty
Rex Brown - pleaded guilty
Brian Cairns - pleaded guilty
John Denham - pleaded guilty
John Keane - pleaded guilty
Albert Taylor - pleaded guilty
Terence Goodall - pleaded guilty
John Haines - pleaded guilty
Martin Harmata - pleaded guilty
Edward Mamo - pleaded guilty
Victor Rubio - pleaded guilty
Murray Moffat - pleaded guilty
John O'Sullivan - pleaded guilty
Paul Pavlou - pleaded guilty

...it's hard to find cases where the defendant denies being a pedophile.

WAIT - here's one
George Pell
Repeatedly denies accusations.
Has never faced corroborated testimony by multiple accusers.
Has never been linked to incriminating forensic evidence.
Has been subjected to allegations which subsequently were found to be false.
Forcefully prosecutes the Church's purge of atheists and pedophiles masquerading as priests.

Hmmm. Come on all you rational skeptics. THINK!

 

[Lion IRC]

Folks around here who say...you weren't there at the trial, you didn't hear the 'evidence'.

Well, there's no trial transcript, but it was a public court and the main prosecution evidence (such as it is) can be found in Louise Milligan’s book Cardinal. And attendees at the trial have made it clear that the evidence given by the alleged victim was just as described in her book(s).

It's a pity that lawyers have legal attorney/client privilege. They can't be forced to reveal what they hear in the privacy of the confessional err.. I mean in counsel. Same goes for the psychiatrist who might know whether or not a heroin addict accuser is fantasising about sex with a priest or transferring their repressed rage onto the public face of the RCC in Australia.

 

[bilby]

Folks around here who say...you weren't there at the trial, you didn't hear the 'evidence'.

Well, you weren't, and you didn't.

Well, there's no trial transcript, but it was a public court

Not true. Some evidence was given in closed court. Only the court officials, the jury, the lawyers, the defendant and the witnesses know what was presented.

and the main prosecution evidence (such as it is) can be found in Louise Milligan’s book Cardinal.

No, it can't (see above).

And attendees at the trial have made it clear that the evidence given by the alleged victim was just as described in her book(s).

If they have revealed evidence given in closed court, then they are in contempt.

It's a pity that lawyers have legal attorney/client privilege. They can't be forced to reveal what they hear in the privacy of the confessional err.. I mean in counsel. Same goes for the psychiatrist who might know whether or not a heroin addict accuser is fantasising about sex with a priest or transferring their repressed rage onto the public face of the RCC in Australia.

It's a pity you don't take your own advice. Forcing lawyers or psychiatrists to reveal their conversations with their clients would lead to far worse outcomes both in law and psychiatric health. Come on Lion, THINK!

 

[DBT]

Gee, for a cohort who allegedly want to protect the reputation of the RCC and conspire to cover up their crimes, these guys sure aren't following the script according to the conspiracy playbook

Gerald Ridsdale - pleaded guilty
Gerard Byrnes - pleaded guilty
Desmond Gannon - pleaded guilty
Richard Cattell - pleaded guilty
Kevin O'Donnell - pleaded guilty
Neil Byrne - pleaded guilty
Greg Carter - pleaded guilty
Michael Aulsebrook - pleaded guilty
Wilfred Baker - pleaded guilty
Francis Cable - pleaded guilty
Edward Dowlan - pleaded guilty
Charles Barnett - pleaded guilty
Robert Best - pleaded guilty
Rex Brown - pleaded guilty
Brian Cairns - pleaded guilty
John Denham - pleaded guilty
John Keane - pleaded guilty
Albert Taylor - pleaded guilty
Terence Goodall - pleaded guilty
John Haines - pleaded guilty
Martin Harmata - pleaded guilty
Edward Mamo - pleaded guilty
Victor Rubio - pleaded guilty
Murray Moffat - pleaded guilty
John O'Sullivan - pleaded guilty
Paul Pavlou - pleaded guilty

...it's hard to find cases where the defendant denies being a pedophile.

WAIT - here's one
George Pell
Repeatedly denies accusations.
Has never faced corroborated testimony by multiple accusers.
Has never been linked to incriminating forensic evidence.
Has been subjected to allegations which subsequently were found to be false.
Forcefully prosecutes the Church's purge of atheists and pedophiles masquerading as priests.

Hmmm. Come on all you rational skeptics. THINK!

There is no natural law that says that all pedophiles must plead guilty. There is nothing to say that there cannot be an exception to the rule, even if there was such a rule.

Cardinal Pell may be in denial, such things do happen. He may be delusional. He may have a sense of entitlement because of his high position and standing.

It may be that his high position magnifies the enormity of his charge, so does not let him admit to what he has been convicted of.

There are many possibilities.

 

[bilby]

Gee, for a cohort who allegedly want to protect the reputation of the RCC and conspire to cover up their crimes, these guys sure aren't following the script according to the conspiracy playbook

Gerald Ridsdale - pleaded guilty
Gerard Byrnes - pleaded guilty
Desmond Gannon - pleaded guilty
Richard Cattell - pleaded guilty
Kevin O'Donnell - pleaded guilty
Neil Byrne - pleaded guilty
Greg Carter - pleaded guilty
Michael Aulsebrook - pleaded guilty
Wilfred Baker - pleaded guilty
Francis Cable - pleaded guilty
Edward Dowlan - pleaded guilty
Charles Barnett - pleaded guilty
Robert Best - pleaded guilty
Rex Brown - pleaded guilty
Brian Cairns - pleaded guilty
John Denham - pleaded guilty
John Keane - pleaded guilty
Albert Taylor - pleaded guilty
Terence Goodall - pleaded guilty
John Haines - pleaded guilty
Martin Harmata - pleaded guilty
Edward Mamo - pleaded guilty
Victor Rubio - pleaded guilty
Murray Moffat - pleaded guilty
John O'Sullivan - pleaded guilty
Paul Pavlou - pleaded guilty

...it's hard to find cases where the defendant denies being a pedophile.

WAIT - here's one
George Pell
Repeatedly denies accusations.
Has never faced corroborated testimony by multiple accusers.
Has never been linked to incriminating forensic evidence.
Has been subjected to allegations which subsequently were found to be false.
Forcefully prosecutes the Church's purge of atheists and pedophiles masquerading as priests.

Hmmm. Come on all you rational skeptics. THINK!

I think Pell is a lying cunt who thought that he could get away with his crimes if he simply denied them, because his close friends and confederates all have the same blind spot that you are demonstrating here, and so told him that they didn't believe the courts could possibly convict him.

You should be asking yourself why you are defending this guy. Surely you can't really believe that all people who deny crimes that other criminals admit are therefore innocent? Come on, Lion, THINK!

 

[atrib]

WAIT - here's one
George Pell
Repeatedly denies accusations.

.... until he is convicted, at which time he confesses his guilt. And admits he was "seized by some irresistible impulse" to plant his erect penis into a young boy's anus and mouth. I'm just telling you what the guy said.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

WAIT - here's one
George Pell
Repeatedly denies accusations.

.... until he is convicted, at which time he confesses his guilt. And admits he was "seized by some irresistible impulse" to plant his erect penis into a young boy's anus and mouth. I'm just telling you what the guy said.

Oh, so all of a sudden we're OK with taking convicted pedophiles at their word? They're the paragons of honesty which society should strive to emulate?

 

[DrZoidberg]

George Pell
Repeatedly denies accusations.

Our jails are full of people like that.

Has never faced corroborated testimony by multiple accusers.

That's nice. As long as you just corner kids one and one I guess we're free to rape as many as you want. You really didn't think this through.

If there's enough accusations made by enough kids over time that adds up. You can argue that one or possibly two of the accusers are crazy. But over 20 kids have fingered him for doing stuff to them. That's why he was convicted. For this to be a conspiracy people needed to put their kids in a potential harms way, hope that their kids will be in on it when they grow up. Or perhaps it's a conspiracy among kids who have been his altar boys, after the fact? Again... what possible legal evil might he have done to these kids to make them want to incriminate him for something as serious as this? I can't think of much.

Has never been linked to incriminating forensic evidence.

Considering the nature of the crime, not strange.

Has been subjected to allegations which subsequently were found to be false.

That doesn't take away from the overall charge. People missremember things. It's normal. It's the number of accusations that does it. It's in the statistics. You're treating all these accusors as if they're the same person.

Forcefully prosecutes the Church's purge of atheists and pedophiles masquerading as priests.

How doesn't that make him look more guilty? He looks like he's trying very hard to mitigate any suspicions against him by openly being very aggressive against it. It's the oldest trick in the book. So old it's a trope, at this point.

Hmmm. Come on all you rational skeptics. THINK!

Mmmm... I think the skeptics are the only ones doing the thinking right now.

 

[DrZoidberg]

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.

I disagree. There's an old Christian saying, if you push things into the darkness it'll grow and fester like a rot. Better to bring things out into the light. I think the Catholic church's stance on homosexuality pushes gay priests towards pedophilia. If a gay man can't be gay in the open he'll start getting attracted to that which he can get. Which in the case of the catholic church will be altar boys. I think if the Catholic church would be fine with gay priests, the gay priests could be open about it and they could fuck each other and will leave the boys alone. The actual psychological condition pedophilia is extremely rare. I think there's a lot of gay priests who aren't pedophiles who have molested young boys simply out of desperation. Or rather, that's what the research suggests should happen.

The Catholic church has just created the perfect storm. If we wanted to maximise child molestation, this is the best way to do it.

1) Make homosexuality a sin and tell people that their sexuality should be under their control. Since it isn't, it creates massive guilt in people.
2) Have priests celibate. Pretend that normal people are able to be celibate.
3) There's an incentive for gay men to become Catholic priests. Since we're only homosexual or heterosexual if we act on it, and heterosexuality is the cultural norm, a gay man, who has massive guilt about his sexuality can "become" straight if he joins the clergy.
4) Give Catholic priests the charge of children. If we can't get what we want, we'll start to covet what we can get. This is just normal.

Allowing celibate gay men free access to young boy is like letting a sober alcoholic be the night guard at a alcohol warehouse without CCTV. It's just a really really bad idea.

And not to be too conspiratorial, but this could be by design. In the ancient world there was no such thing as forensic evidence that could stick in court. Priests had little, if anything to risk by molesting boys. If we have a clergy with a lot of gays in it and we give them unlimited power that might lead to some of them coming up with the whole altar boy concept, just so they could molest them. It wasn't that long ago child rape wasn't seen as a big deal in the west. Elevating children as something sacred to protect and care about is a fairly new thing, that came after the rise of modern medicine and child mortality dropping off. So the whole priests having access to altar boys, might have been a thing to keep priests out in the provinces happy and loyal to the church. A large part of running any operations is managing real-politik.

It's no secret that the top echelons of the Catholic church fucked courtesans throughout the ages. John Knox famously wrote a damning report about the papacy. The funny thing about what he wrote is that John Knox didn't seem to have a problem with the pope having orgies with prostitutes. What he objected to was that the pope didn't have the common decency even to try to hide it. I think he referred to pope Paul III, I think? An entire wing of the Lateran palace is where the pope housed his personal courtesans. This annoyed John Knox during his visit.

 

[Lion IRC]

Zoidbergs post #19 is interesting.

He seems to be saying the more Pell pleads his innocence, the more guilty he appears.
Seems like Pell can't win.
Plead not guilty - must have done it.
Plead guilty - ta da! He did it

 

[DrZoidberg]

Zoidbergs post #19 is interesting.

He seems to be saying the more Pell pleads his innocence, the more guilty he appears.
Seems like Pell can't win.
Plead not guilty - must have done it.
Plead guilty - ta da! He did it

That's not what I said. Don't make a straw man of my argument. It's got nothing to do with him claiming innocence. What I said was that he's been taking a hard line against pedophiles in the Church right from the start of the pedophile scandal, and been one of the loudest voices. This is after the fact of him molesting boys. It's a bit suspicious. Not enough for me to say he's guilty on that alone. But everything taken together, doesn't look good for Pell.

But this isn't why I think he's guilty. I think he's guilty because of the sheer number of children who have accused him. One or two can be explained away. But not the long list, it's now become. And if it is a conspiracy it's one of the longest running plots in history. He has been continually accused since 1961. At some point it becomes silly to hold on to your guns and claim innocence.

I think he's claiming innocence because he's got nothing to gain from admitting to it. I also think his admission is at this point is unnecessary. There's enough circumstantial evidence, and then some, to convict. I think it's good he was acquitted earlier, (even though we now know he was probably guilty) because then the case was a bit light. But as the accusations add up, it goes beyond reasonable doubt. Where it's at now. I think the court has been very careful and conservative in their judgement. I think it's a solid ruling.

 

[ruby sparks]

WAIT - here's one
George Pell
Repeatedly denies accusations.

.... until he is convicted, at which time he confesses his guilt. And admits he was "seized by some irresistible impulse" to plant his erect penis into a young boy's anus and mouth. I'm just telling you what the guy said.

Can you link to a report of that?

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Zoidbergs post #19 is interesting.

He seems to be saying the more Pell pleads his innocence, the more guilty he appears.
Seems like Pell can't win.
Plead not guilty - must have done it.
Plead guilty - ta da! He did it

That's not what I said. Don't make a straw man of my argument. It's got nothing to do with him claiming innocence. What I said was that he's been taking a hard line against pedophiles in the Church right from the start of the pedophile scandal, and been one of the loudest voices. This is after the fact of him molesting boys. It's a bit suspicious. Not enough for me to say he's guilty on that alone. But everything taken together, doesn't look good for Pell.

But this isn't why I think he's guilty. I think he's guilty because of the sheer number of children who have accused him. One or two can be explained away. But not the long list, it's now become. And if it is a conspiracy it's one of the longest running plots in history. He has been continually accused since 1961. At some point it becomes silly to hold on to your guns and claim innocence.

I think he's claiming innocence because he's got nothing to gain from admitting to it. I also think his admission is at this point is unnecessary. There's enough circumstantial evidence, and then some, to convict. I think it's good he was acquitted earlier, (even though we now know he was probably guilty) because then the case was a bit light. But as the accusations add up, it goes beyond reasonable doubt. Where it's at now. I think the court has been very careful and conservative in their judgement. I think it's a solid ruling.

We're living in the age of conspiracy theories. For those so inclined this one is a doozy and therefore so true, particularly for those loyal to Pell, his church and his ilk. And it's worth noting that Pell and his power cult have been getting away with this behavior for centuries. So it's only to be expected that he's going to resist, it's actually a behavior that has been heavily selected for over many generations. His kind have been fearlessly coming and going from this club, and many entered into it for just this reason. Pushback is normal.

 

[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.

I disagree. There's an old Christian saying, if you push things into the darkness it'll grow and fester like a rot. Better to bring things out into the light. I think the Catholic church's stance on homosexuality pushes gay priests towards pedophilia. If a gay man can't be gay in the open he'll start getting attracted to that which he can get. Which in the case of the catholic church will be altar boys. I think if the Catholic church would be fine with gay priests, the gay priests could be open about it and they could fuck each other and will leave the boys alone. The actual psychological condition pedophilia is extremely rare. I think there's a lot of gay priests who aren't pedophiles who have molested young boys simply out of desperation. Or rather, that's what the research suggests should happen.

...

That doesn't hold up, though. The only real thing which seems to distinguish the child abuse in the Catholic Church from the child abuse in other organizations is the size of the institution and the lengths to which they've gone to cover it up.

As I mentioned earlier in the thread, there's an average of ten coaches and other officials convicted of child molestation in minor hockey leagues in Canada every year. There's no celibacy requirement for working in a minor hockey league and they can all leave practice and drive straight to any number of gay bars in their area without any issue, but yet the abuse of children within the organizations continue. The Southern Baptists encourage their priests to be married, yet they have their own child abuse scandal, so celibacy isn't some kind of causal factor there.

Organizations which work with children are used by pedophiles to get them their victims. Not requiring celibacy and not condemning homosexuality don't seem to impact that. The Catholic Church doesn't appear to be somehow special or different from all the rest, aside from how far they've gone to cover it up and the increased reach they have within vulnerable populations. Blaming it on the gays because of the attitude towards them within the institution while ignoring the same behaviour within other institutions which don't have this same attitude seems like just another case of blaming the gays for something which doesn't have to do with gayness.

 

[atrib]

WAIT - here's one
George Pell
Repeatedly denies accusations.

.... until he is convicted, at which time he confesses his guilt. And admits he was "seized by some irresistible impulse" to plant his erect penis into a young boy's anus and mouth. I'm just telling you what the guy said.

Can you link to a report of that?

Yes.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/disgraced-cardinal-george-pells-lawyer-claims-abuse-was-plain-vanilla-sexual-penetration

 

[Keith&Co.]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/disgraced-cardinal-george-pells-lawyer-claims-abuse-was-plain-vanilla-sexual-penetration

"suggesting that one assault was only “fleeting” and claiming the victims would have showed signs at home if they were “truly distressed”"

Fleeting... Fleeting.... Okay, my idea of 'fleeting' is that someone says 'the parking lot was painted last weekend,' and I get an urge to say 'your mom is a parking lot' or 'your mom is a weekend.' Depending on my blood sugar level, I might say it out loud.

The effort required to stick one's wee-wee into someone else's goes-inza (or goes-outza) is not fleeting, what with having to schedule the time, lock the doors, remove multiple layers of clothing, all while continuously talking down the obvious severity of the event and/or promising divine retribution if the altar boy opens his pie-hole.

Hell, I have fleeting impulses to stick my wee-wee into women multiple times a day, but never even get as far as asking if they are amenable to such interaction, mostly because of my vow.
And I only vowed chastity to my wife, not celibacy before God.

Fuck the fleeting.

 

[Lion IRC]

atrib is ignorant of a standard legal process. Defense lawyers aren't accidentally incriminating their client during pre-sentence hearings.

Once a jury has given their verdict the defense lawyer can't just ignore it and proceed as if the jury got it wrong. During the pre-sentence hearing Pell's lawyer has a professional obligation to argue for a more lenient sentence.

Those arguments cannot include telling the judge that his client is innocent.

So he was saying, (even if my client did it, which he denies) the (supposed) crime is at the lower end of spectrum of offending when considering the nature of such acts.

When the law says "punishable by 5-10 years" or "this offence carries a maximum penalty of 10 years", that is to give judges the ability to punish one pedophile more severely than another.

People might have a philosophical objection to the idea that there is a severity spectrum for child sex abuse - that 'taking pictures' is not as bad as 'fondling' and fondling is not as bad as forced fellatio, and forced fellatio is not as bad as anal penetration. But Robert Richter is one of the highest paid lawyers in Australia and he wasn't straying into uncharted legal territory when he stated that the crime being sentenced was at the very low end of the severity spectrum.

ETA - Using the term 'vanilla' was bizarre. But that's what happens when middle aged men try to sound cool and use dope urban slang. So stop throwin' shade at the dude. He is hundo P woke.

 

[ruby sparks]

Can you link to a report of that?

Yes.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/disgraced-cardinal-george-pells-lawyer-claims-abuse-was-plain-vanilla-sexual-penetration

That was his lawyer's plea for reduced sentencing at the sentencing hearing. It seems the lawyer must plea 'as if' (or in the light of or only in reference to) the verdict. Apparently it is not an admission or confession of guilt and won't be brought up at or affect any appeal, if there is one.

 

[DrZoidberg]

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.

I disagree. There's an old Christian saying, if you push things into the darkness it'll grow and fester like a rot. Better to bring things out into the light. I think the Catholic church's stance on homosexuality pushes gay priests towards pedophilia. If a gay man can't be gay in the open he'll start getting attracted to that which he can get. Which in the case of the catholic church will be altar boys. I think if the Catholic church would be fine with gay priests, the gay priests could be open about it and they could fuck each other and will leave the boys alone. The actual psychological condition pedophilia is extremely rare. I think there's a lot of gay priests who aren't pedophiles who have molested young boys simply out of desperation. Or rather, that's what the research suggests should happen.

...

That doesn't hold up, though. The only real thing which seems to distinguish the child abuse in the Catholic Church from the child abuse in other organizations is the size of the institution and the lengths to which they've gone to cover it up.

As I mentioned earlier in the thread, there's an average of ten coaches and other officials convicted of child molestation in minor hockey leagues in Canada every year. There's no celibacy requirement for working in a minor hockey league and they can all leave practice and drive straight to any number of gay bars in their area without any issue, but yet the abuse of children within the organizations continue. The Southern Baptists encourage their priests to be married, yet they have their own child abuse scandal, so celibacy isn't some kind of causal factor there.

Organizations which work with children are used by pedophiles to get them their victims. Not requiring celibacy and not condemning homosexuality don't seem to impact that. The Catholic Church doesn't appear to be somehow special or different from all the rest, aside from how far they've gone to cover it up and the increased reach they have within vulnerable populations. Blaming it on the gays because of the attitude towards them within the institution while ignoring the same behaviour within other institutions which don't have this same attitude seems like just another case of blaming the gays for something which doesn't have to do with gayness.

I think these people are recruited from different groups of people. The threshold to cross to become a hockey coach is very low. Basically anybody with a "passion" for hockey and who are fine with a low or no salary can become one. It makes it easy for the pedophiles. Becoming a Catholic priest is a huge undertaking. It requires years of dedication and study. I think if a persons goal is to molest children becoming a Catholic priest to do it, is a lot of work. It may be that pedophiles or homosexuals become priests because they hope the church will help them NOT commit these acts. But because the psychological methods the Catholic church uses to control people is based on erroneous theories of the human mind, it will have the opposite effect.

I forget the study. But I've seen research to show that in countries where homosexuality is illegal, they have big problems with gays molesting children. There's child prostitution. In liberal countries where gays are allowed to get on with it and aren't shamed for the proclivities these problems largely disappear. They become rare events. That's not gay bashing or gay shaming. That's just what happens when you force normal and otherwise well adjusted people to live a lie. Children will always be vulnerable to desperate people.

And it's not just gays. The Catholic church produces broken people. Everybody who has grown up Catholic has bizarre shame based hang-ups around sex. The weirdest kinky girls I've ever had sex with have all been Catholic. I do not think that's a coincidence. It's as if the Catholic church is designed to create sexually dysfunctional people. All that shame is not healthy for anyone. Imagine growing up in an entire Catholic culture? How fucked up would those people all get?

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

It may be that pedophiles or homosexuals become priests because they hope the church will help them NOT commit these acts. But because the psychological methods the Catholic church uses to control people is based on erroneous theories of the human mind, it will have the opposite effect.

Never considered it that way. The problem, obviously, is that the behavior is widely tolerated and protected by RCC clerics. There has to be another dynamic operating which is perhaps just as genuine, perhaps that you don't want to rat out your pals. Because RCC priests have no children with which to identify, I think there is a lot of psychological objectification happening, no different than soliciting a hooker. The hooker isn't your daughter, so it's just another thing for your gratification.