In 2009, a senior clergyman in the Australian Catholic diocese of Maitland-Newcastle, Father Thomas Brennan, was convicted of making a false written statement, saying that he could not remember a series of child sex-abuse complaints (in the 1970s) about other clergy. Brennan was the Vicar-General of the diocese (that is, the second-highest ranking clergyman in the diocese) from 2005 until he was charged in August 2008. Bishop Michael Malone told the media in August 2008: "As the Vicar-General, he's my right-hand man and is very close to me. He's the bishop when I'm away." And now in 2018 the Maitland-Newcastle diocese has admitted that, as well as covering up other clergymen's crimes, Father Brennan himself committed child-sex offences.
http://www.brokenrites.org.au/drupal/node/110
http://www.brokenrites.org.au/drupal/node/110
