No legal impediment to release of Pell report, says Victorian Attorney-General
No legal barriers prevent the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse publishing in full its findings into the conduct of George Pell, the Victorian government says.
Attorney-General Jill Hennessy has written to her federal counterpart, Christian Porter, informing him there are no investigations by Victoria Police or planned prosecutions that require the previously redacted findings to remain hidden.
Cardinal George Pell arriving at the Seminary of the Good Shepherd in Sydney after being freed.Credit:AAP
The advice puts renewed pressure on the federal government to make public the royal commission findings examining Cardinal Pell's knowledge of child sexual abuse by Catholic priests when he was in the Ballarat diocese; the epicentre of clerical abuse in Australia.
"The removal of redactions is entirely a matter for the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse," a state government spokeswoman said.
"The government is not aware of any impediments to the unredacted versions of these reports being tabled and published at this time."
The release of 60 pages of redacted royal commission findings is the next step in the saga of Cardinal Pell, who was this month acquitted in the High Court over the alleged sexual assault of two 13-year-old choirboys when he was Archbishop of Melbourne.
The section of the royal commission final report detailing Cardinal Pell's time in Ballarat and when he might have first learned that paedophile priests like Gerald Ridsdale were preying on children in the diocese was suppressed to prevent any findings from having a prejudicial impact on the criminal proceedings against him.
Cardinal Pell was convicted in December 2018 by a County Court jury of five historical child sex offences and the verdict upheld by a majority decision of the Victorian Court of Appeal.
When the High Court overturned that decision, ruling unanimously that the verdict was not open to the jury on the evidence and ordering that his conviction be quashed, Premier Daniel Andrews immediately called on the federal government to authorise the release of the royal commission findings.
In response, Mr Porter wrote to Ms Hennessy asking whether there were any matters still before police or the Office of Public Prosecutions that would prevent the findings being released.
Cardinal Pell, who provided testimony to the royal commission from Rome, has steadfastly denied knowing when he was in Ballarat about the sexual abuse of children by Ridsdale and other priests or that paedophile priests were moved from the diocese in response to complaints against them.