Community is first of all a quality of the heart. It grows from the spiritual knowledge that we are alive not for ourselves but for one another.
Henri Nouwen
A group representing some survivors of abuse in faith-based care wants churches to come out and support the call for the setting up of an independent body to deal with all complaints of abuse. Survivors have told the inquiry into Abuse in Care that the new body, which must be separate from the state and…
Mike Subritzky is a team of one committed to helping heal the unknown number of male sexual assault survivors in Taranaki. Subritzky, a trained counsellor with a background in chaplaincy, runs Male Survivors Taranaki which falls under the national body Male Survivors Aotearoa. He says statistics show 1 in 6 men have been sexually abused but it’s…
Police investigating historical sexual offending allegations at Dilworth School in Auckland have identified over 80 additional accusers. An additional 33 charges have been laid against five men as part of Operation Beverly, Detective Senior Sergeant Geoff Baber said today in a statement. All five men, aged between 68 and 78, are already before the court after…
Police say a former Scout leader charged with historical sexual offences involving children over 40 years may have had other victims. The man was arrested in March and faces a total of 26 charges. They are: seven charges of unlawful sexual connection with a male aged 12-16; 17 charges of indecent assault on a boy…
A former school teacher has been sentenced over a historic indecent assault. Former Otago Boys’ High School maths teacher David Russell Bond, 69, appeared for sentencing before Judge Michael Turner in the Dunedin District Court on Thursday on a charge of indecent assault. His lawyer, Anne Stevens QC, said her client was no longer a…
Historical abuse suffered at the hands of some fellow students and staff at Dilworth School have been outlined to the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care. Neil Harding, who is 55, went to the Anglican boarding school in Auckland in 1977. A number of men are before the courts charged with indecent assault relating to historical abuse…
A former Christ’s College student sexually assaulted and abused by other students in the 1970s says it was “systematic deliberate abuse” designed to shame him. Jim Goodwin attended the Christchurch school as a boarder from 1970 to 1974 and told the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care in Auckland on Monday about the assault by…
A man has presented a harrowing testimony of being terrified as a boy for every day of school through two years, at the Abuse in Care inquiry. Known only as John, the 52 year said he was sexually abused 40 years ago at the Marist-run Xavier Intermediate School in Christchurch, between 1980 and 1982, by…
Evidence has revealed that the Marist Brothers knew one of their members was offending against children over decades, but didn’t prevent him from being around children. One of his victims, who asked to be referred to only as James, described his abuser, Brother Giles, as a “monster”. James says he was raped and abused by…
Witnesses at the Abuse in Care Royal Commission have recounted gruelling memories of being abused while in the care of churches. During the week and next week, the Commission is hearing from 25 survivors. The witnesses have agreed to go public with their stories of abuse and how they sought redress from churches. The focus…
A man abused while at a Catholic boarding school in the early 1950s says he is not convinced the church’s approach to dealing with abuse has changed at all. The 81-year old Mr F did not tell anyone of the abuse he suffered for 49-years. On Tuesday he gave evidence to the Royal Commission of…
A former Catholic boarding school student who was abused by a priest says the Catholic Church repeatedly tried to minimise his abuse and deny that it was criminal offending. The former student, now aged 81, was sexually abused by Father Fred Durning in 1953 when he was a 13-year-old student at St Patrick’s College in…