George Pell: high court to decide today if disgraced cardinal's appeal will go ahead

The Guardian ^ | 11th March 2020

[naturalman1975]

The disgraced Cardinal George Pell’s future could be decided by Australia’s highest court this week, but he won’t be there to see it.

The full bench of the high court will hear his legal team’s final bid for his freedom in Canberra on Wednesday.

The 78-year-old was jailed for six years last year for sexually abusing two choirboys at Melbourne’s St Patrick’s Cathedral, shortly after being appointed archbishop of Melbourne in 1996.

He was convicted by a jury in 2018 of the rape of one 13-year-old choirboy and sexual assault of another. The first boy gave evidence against Pell while the second died in 2014.

Pell maintains his innocence.

Victoria’s court of appeal last year upheld the verdict in a 2-1 ruling.

The high court has not formally granted Pell’s application for appeal, instead referring it “for argument”.

That means after the hearing, which is scheduled to continue on Thursday, the court may refuse the application for special leave, or approve it and either allow or dismiss the appeal.

Pell’s lawyers are arguing the appeal on two grounds.

First, they say the court of appeal majority – the chief justice Ann Ferguson and president Chris Maxwell – made an error in finding Pell was required to prove the offending was “impossible” in order to raise reasonable doubt against the surviving boy’s evidence. (The third judge, Mark Weinberg, found in favour of Pell’s appeal.)

Second, they argue the majority found there was a reasonable doubt as to the existence of any opportunity for Pell to have offended, so they made an error in concluding the guilty verdicts were not unreasonable.

They want Pell’s convictions on five charges to be quashed, which would mean he is released from prison immediately.

[naturalman1975]

I am praying for justice.

My position has consistently been that I do not believe Pell is guilty of these offences, and that I do not believe he received a fair trial - which I will remind people was held in secret - because the Australian community had been so poisoned against him before the case proceeded that it was almost possible for him to do so in front of a jury - and in Victoria (unlike most of Australia) judge only trials are not permitted.

But if he's guilty he deserves to rot in prison and then burn in hell.

At the end of the day, whatever is decided by the High Court, many people will feel an injustice has been done.

I just hope and pray that whatever we think, justice is done. Whether we can know or not.

[pbear8]

You will hear the result before we do, could you please post what the High Court says? Thank you.

[naturalman1975]

I will update as soon as I can after any announcement.

There may not be one for some time - they do not have to rule straight away.

[Prince of Space]

So in Australia the accused has to prove their innocence? Or are those judges merely whackadoodles?

[E. Pluribus Unum]

They always use the word “disgraced” when they want to bully you into believing their lies.

[naturalman1975]

So in Australia the accused has to prove their innocence?

No - at least not in principle. You are supposed to be entitled to the presumption of innocence, and to be considered innocent until proven guilty.

Or are those judges merely whackadoodles?

Not whackadoodle, but the Defence is arguing (and I personally think they have a case speaking as an amateur observer) that in this case, in their efforts to be fair to the alleged victim the Appeals judges inverted the burden of proof. It will be up to the High Court to decide whether they feel that happened or not.

[SamuraiScot]

They always use the word “disgraced” when they want to bully you into believing their lies.

Correct. And The Guardian is an old British, Kremlin-loving Communist rag. Cardinal Pell is a conservative and longtime pro-family hero who has been railroaded by the active homosexual predators, pro-aborts, and God-haters who are parasites on the Church in Australia. Like Alinsky-ites everywhere, the accusers falsely accuse their opponents of the crimes they themselves have been committing.

The British legal system, which the Aussies inherited, has huge leeway for crackpot judges and, unlike America, has very little respect for jury trial. With the addition of women to the bench in Oz, decisions relying on judges' personal feelings and indifference to rules of evidence seem to have multiplied exponentially.

Even The Guardian admits that evidence was presented showing it would have been physically impossible for Cardinal Pell to do what he is alleged to have done. But the paper leaves out the fact that no complaints were made against Pell until decades after they supposedly occurred. It was only when radio ads were trolling for plaintiffs against Catholic clergymen--raising the prospect of huge rewards and no statute of limitation on complaints--that the two physically impossible allegations against the Cardinal were made.