The Vatican welcomed on Tuesday the acquittal of Australian Cardinal George Pell, sentenced at first instance to six years in prison for sexual violence against two 13-year-old altar boys in the 1990s.
The Vatican welcomed the "unanimous verdict pronounced by the High Court against Cardinal George Pell, who clears him of all charges of assault on minors", in a press release. Earlier in the morning, Pope Francis had called to pray for those "who suffer for an unjust judgment", without naming the Australian priest.
No internal Vatican investigation
The ex-secretary of the Economy of the Holy See, aged 78, was sentenced in March 2019 to six years in prison for rape and sexual assault on two altar boys in 1996 and 1997 in Saint Cathedral -Patrick of Melbourne (south-east) of which he was the archbishop.
His conviction, confirmed on appeal in August, was finally quashed Tuesday by the Australian High Court, which acquitted him of five counts of sexual violence, for the benefit of the doubt. The former Vatican financier remains a priest, but his future role in the Church is most uncertain. He was last year discreetly removed from the highest instances of the Church. The Holy See has not, however, opened an internal investigation.
World
Australia: Sentenced for pedophilia, Cardinal Pell targeted by civil proceedings
World
Pedophilia: The Pope's Minister of Economy wanted to buy the silence of a victim
- Sexual assault
- Pedophilia
- World
- Child
- Australia
- Vatican