Conviction overturned: helped but not harbored by Catholic priest Fr Sean O'Connell
In an earlier blog, I published a copy of my baptism certificate signed by the late Father Sean Patrick O'Connell of St Paul's church in Coburg, beside the former prison.
Shortly before I was born, Fr O'Connell had been convicted of harboring an escaped prisoner. Fr O'Connell made an appeal and the conviction was overturned.
For people who started the gossip about police, it is a fascinating story.
Even more significant, the story shows us that the church explained their philosophy of forgiveness and redemption to the judge and to the media in 1977. Journalists traveled out to Coburg to meet Fr O'Connell and the story appeared in news reports all around Australia.
In Melbourne, the story and the philosophy was published on the front page of the newspaper under the heading "I'd do same again, says cleared priest".
The public and the court had the opportunity to ask Fr O'Connell how the church would handle a more dangerous criminal, for example, somebody convicted for abuse. Nobody asked these questions.
These observations don't exonerate institutions for their failings. However, if the wider public had this opportunity to examine the philosophy in 1977 then society at large has to share some responsibility for failing to scrutinize religious institutions.
The Age, 14 January 1977 gives us a view into Australian society and prison life in 1977, with letters about police tactics and abuse inside the prison.
Police behavior is the real scandal
Police go gay to lure homosexuals
The recent arrests of homosexuals by police in the Black Rock - Sandringham area and the type of "poofter bashing" mentality underlying them is cause for serious public concern.
...
Peeping-tommery
It was with some humor that I read the report of policemen baiting homosexuals at Black Rock. ...
...
Deplorable crime
The Minister for Social Welfare, Mr Dixon, confesses he is unaware whether or not a pack rape victim in J Division of Pentridge needed medical attention ("The Age," 6/1).
The victim endured these rapes for three successive nights without any restraint from those supposed to be in authority. Is Mr. Dixon concerned enough about such serious lapses of supervision to investigate the causes and reasons why such deplorable crime can exist in Pentridge?
Such victimisation between prisoners reads like the worst excesses of the early penal times of Tasmania.
Do we need another Elizabeth Fry to reform the prisons of the Hamer Government?
(Mrs.) LORNA BYRNE (Forest Hill)
The last letter is rather similar to my own email from 2013 resigning from the ALP over very similar cases of abuse in the concentration camps for asylum seekers.
The chief of the prison resigned to pursue a PhD. The same newspaper interviewed him too. On 19 April 1977 they published it prominently at the top of page 3 with the headline "Pentridge shouldn't be escape-proof, says its former chief".
Pentridge prison is not escape-proof - and should not be escape-proof - according to the prison's former superintendent, Mr. John Van Groningen.
...
"If they knew the prison really was escape-proof, prisoners wouldn't be able to lie in bed at night and dream of how they could get out," he said.
"I'm serious. The vast majority of prisoners have these sorts of dreams and I believe they are healthy and therapeutic for them.
It looks like the prisoners had a lot of respect for the former jailmaster. People threw copies of the newspaper over the walls for prisoners to read the interview. Three weeks later, dreams came true when somebody threw a rope over the wall and three prisoners escaped.
According to reports, one of the escapees, James Richard Loughnan, broke both of his legs and hid behind the church beside the prison while his fellow escapees, Allan Martin and Peter Dawson, made their getaway.
The reports don't tell us if the prisoners were wearing uniforms or if the sirens were activated to warn the community about an escape. Therefore, Fr O'Connell may not have had any hints that an escape had transpired or that the man he was about to meet was one of the suspects.
Fr O'Connell was leaving in his car and he came across Loughnan on the ground. Loughnan claimed he had been injured in a traffic accident and asked for transport to get medical assistance. Fr O'Connell obliged.
During the ride in Fr O'Connell's car, Loughnan asked to make confession. Fr O'Connell, like all Catholic priests, is unable to tell anybody what was said during confession. Nonetheless, it seems that he did come to realize he was transporting an escaped prisoner.
On 11 May 1977 The Age published a photo of Loughnan being carried into court by police.
A few weeks later, the magistrate's court convicted Fr O'Connell for harboring an escaped prisoner. Fr O'Connell's punishment was a six month good behavior bond. The punishment seems bizarre as a priest is already meant to be a model of good behavior for everybody else.
Catholic Church defends right of priests to keep confidences
15 June 1977
The Roman Catholic Church yesterday defended the right of its priests to keep confidences after a Coburg priest was found guilty of harboring a Pentridge escaper.
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"I was simply acting as a priest helping a man who was injured with no thought of harboring or breaking the law."
Nonetheless, Fr O'Connell lodged an appeal in the County Court. The judge decided that Fr O'Connell had not offered the prisoner shelter, therefore, the transport by car to a hospital could not be enough to justify a conviction for harboring. Fr O'Connell was liberated from the obligation of good behavior.
I'd do same again, says cleared priest
16 August 1977
A Roman Catholic priest cleared of harboring a Pentridge escaper said last night he would act exactly the same way if the situation arose again.
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Father O'Connell, 36, of St. Paul's Church, Coburg, yesterday won an appeal in the County Court against a conviction and six-month good-behavior bond for harboring an escaper on May 9.
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"People have to trust us. It's a trust which has been won over years and years. I felt that principle was at stake," he said.
He said he had taken confession from Loughnan and was therefore bound not to tell the police of his whereabouts.
A few weeks later, another news report appeared about escape dreams.
SM told jail had a sex hideaway
13 September 1977
A secret cubby-hole discovered at Pentridge was used for private homosexual acts and to hide contraband goods, Melbourne Magistrates Court was told yesterday.
The court was told the hole was behind a false wall in a stationary cupboard.
...
"We needed a place to go to where nobody would see us," ...
Read more about the police rumors.
The Catholic Church teaches us that God forgives. Artificial Intelligence doesn't.
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