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Chapter 6 — Christian Brothers

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Assessment of evidence

242

The Statute of Limitations (Amendment) Act, 2000 was also cited by the Congregation as a significant factor, in that it granted extension of time for bringing claims for damages in respect of sexual abuse in circumstances that did not apply to other forms of abuse including physical abuse. One of the conditions for getting an extension was making a complaint to the Gardaí.

243

In their final Submission for Artane, the Christian Brothers stated: it is likely that complainants were aware of the possibility of this requirement being incorporated into the pending legislation. Indeed ... many complainants went to the Gardai at the suggestion of their legal advisors.

244

The Submission went on to state: A substantial number of the other allegations of sexual abuse which were made to the Commission (including allegations where the complainant ultimately chose not to give evidence) were first made to the Gardai around 1999/2000 also and it is not unreasonable to infer that some of these complainants may have been influenced by the prevailing perception as to what they would have to allege so as to be eligible to make a claim for compensation.

245

Matters affecting weight and transparency of evidence were not confined to complainants. On the respondent side, some members and ex-members of the Congregation were reluctant to speak openly and frankly about their memories of the industrial schools in which they worked. They were reluctant to criticise the Congregation or their colleagues, and the defensive attitude which was adopted by the Congregation in its Opening Statement was mirrored by some of the respondent witnesses.

246

These and other considerations were relevant in assessment of evidence, but the occasions of determining facts that were merely asserted on one side and denied on the other, with no accompaniment of documentary or circumstantial material or corroboration, were greatly reduced by the Committee’s method of investigation.

Impact of allegations on respondents

247

The Committee was satisfied that some allegations of abuse were false. A small number were not the result of contamination or exaggeration but were deliberately manufactured for the purposes of compensation or to cause maximum damage to the Christian Brothers.

248

Respondents spoke to the Committee about the impact that allegations of sexual abuse had on their lives.

249

One Brother had an allegation of sexual abuse made against him which was never pursued by the complainant. This Brother had come in to the Investigation Committee to answer this charge, but was not given an opportunity to do so because of the failure of the complainant to attend, and expressed his distress at having the allegation hang over him for four and a half years.

250

Another Brother described an allegation of sexual abuse that was made against him as ‘hurtful’. He went on to say that there had never been an allegation against him in all of the subsequent 40 years that he had been a teacher. ‘Yes, I feel deeply hurt that these allegations come from a period in my life where I literally cared for the uncared for’.

251

After two years, a decision was made by the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) that no prosecutions would take place. He spoke of the impact the allegations had: This has had impact not alone on me ... But it has impacted on me and my family. It has impacted also on a true and loyal staff, that any one of those could find themselves where I am today. This has got to be stopped. How I don’t know, but it will have to be halted.

252

This man was reinstated to his teaching position shortly after the DPP’s decision, when the Board of Management of his school declared itself satisfied, after an investigation, that this be done.

253

Another Brother described the experience of being accused of wrong-doing in 1997, some 40 years after he had left the Institution: It was eight years of torture and disappointing because I felt I had dedicated myself when I was in Artane to the people there and done great work and I was the same in every school I was in and this was a horrible way to finish my career.

254

This former Brother was in his mid-60s when these allegations were put to him. He was married with two children. Eventually, some seven years after the initial interrogation, the DPP made a decision not to prosecute.

255

Allegations of sexual abuse are difficult to verify. Length of time and the inherent secrecy of the act make it hard for complainants to prove their case, even on the ‘balance of probabilities’. To prove such a case beyond reasonable doubt, as is required by the criminal law, is even more difficult. In the same way as it is difficult to prove abuse, so it is also difficult to prove that abuse did not occur.

256

In one case before the Committee a Brother was reinstated on the strength of a DPP decision. Counsel for the Congregation stated that there was ‘an infrastructure put in place ... to determine what is the correct thing to do’.


Footnotes
  1. The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome, commonly known as the Pope.
  2. B. Coldrey, Faith and Fatherland. The Christian Brothers and the Development of Nationalism, 1838–1921 (Dublin: Gill and Macmillan, 1988), p 22.
  3. There are currently 122 schools in the Christian Brother network in Ireland, according to the Marino Institute of Education website.
  4. Constitutions (1923).
  5. The general assembly of representatives from the Congregation of the Christian Brothers.
  6. Commission of Inquiry into the Reformatory and Industrial School System Report, 1936 (the Cussen Report) (Dublin: Stationery Office).
  7. A Visitor was a Congregational Inspector who reported back to the leadership of the Congregation. See Supervision/Visitations below.
  8. An association where the main object is the well-being and improvement of a different group of persons, such as men, women and children, or more specially, priests, youths, church helpers, prisoners, immigrants, nurses, married people, couples, etc.
  9. Cn 653.
  10. You shall not commit adultery.
  11. You shall not covet your neighbour’s wife.
  12. Congregation of the Christian Brothers 1962, Chapter VIII ‘Chastity’, p 23 section 81.
  13. Const 8 of the 1923 Constitutions.
  14. Const 97 of the 1923 Constitutions.
  15. Congregation of the Christian Brothers 1962, Chapter XIII ‘Mortifications & Humilitations’, p 30 section 128.
  16. The Cussen Report 1936 – Commission of Inquiry into the Reformatory and Industrial School System, para 74.
  17. This is a pseudonym.
  18. There were three programmes broadcast by RTE in 1999 in the ‘States of Fear’ series: ‘Industrial Schools and Reformatories from the 1940s-1980s’, ‘The Legacy of Industrial Schools’, and ‘Sick and Disabled Children in Institutions’.
  19. Suffer the Little Children, by Mary Raftery and Eoin O’Sullivan, 1999, New Island.
  20. O’Brien Institute.
  21. This is a pseudonym.
  22. P394 Circular Letters 1821–1930
  23. Department of Education Annual Report 1925/1926.
  24. Report of the Department of Education for the School Years 1925–26–27 and the Financial and Administrative Year 1926–1927, p 83.
  25. Report of the Department of Education for the School Year 1924–1925 and the Financial and Administrative Years 1924–25–26, p 84.
  26. Rules and Regulations for the Certified Industrial Schools in Saorstát Éireann Approved by the Minister of Education under the 54th Section of the Act, 8 Edw VII., Ch 67, clauses 12 and 13 (see DES chapter).
  27. Rules and Regulations for the Certified Industrial Schools in Saorstát Éireann Approved by the Minister of Education under the Children Act, 1908.
  28. The Department submit this wording ‘education provision’ in other words the internal national school.
  29. Section 24 of The Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act 1997 provided:
  30. the rule of law under which teachers are immune from criminal liability in respect of physical chastisement of pupils is hereby abolished.
  31. With the removal of this immunity, teachers are now subject to section 2(1) of the 1997 Act which provides that:
  32. a person shall be guilty of the offence of assault, who without lawful excuse, intentionally or recklessly, directly or indirectly applies force to and causes an impact on the body of another.Teachers who physically chastise pupils may now be guilty of an offence and liable to 12 months’ imprisonment and/or a fine of £1,500.
  33. This is a pseudonym.