Whakatakinga - Introduction

1.         The Inquiry has identified some of the key factors that caused or contributed to the abuse and neglect that occurred, and was able to continue, at Marylands, Hebron Trust and the orphanage. These factors relate, sometimes concurrently, to societal, relational, institutional, individual, whānau and community circumstances, that allowed abuse and neglect to occur for decades.

Ngā āhuatanga o te pāpori i whakakaha ake i ngā mahi tūkino me ngā whakangongotanga       
The societal factors that enabled the abuse and neglect to occur

2.         The wider societal context created the environment that enabled abuse and neglect to occur, including:

›      impunity and the impact of (misplaced) high trust in ‘people of God’ and faiths.

›      societal views of ableism and racism, which we now know mirrored those of the Order and its institutional practices.

›      societal ignorance of sexual abuse and attitudes to sexual abuse.

Te whakawātea hara me ngā whakaaweawenga (kino) nā runga i te whakapono marika ki ngā ‘tāngata o te Atua’ me ngā whakapono/hāhi          
Impunity and the impact of (misplaced) high trust in ‘people of god’ and faiths

3.         The power, authority, deference, respect and impunity enjoyed by the Catholic Church and those who represent it, meant that for many in society, it was unthinkable that abuse could be taking place in institutions like Marylands and Hebron Trust. For example, the diocese bishops at the time assumed as ‘men of God’ the brothers could do no harm. This trust permeated throughout the entire Christchurch community, country and abroad, and was held even by those who were not associated with the church, such as State agencies.

4.         This attitude caused many problems. Institutions like Marylands and Hebron Trust could be set up without proper oversight. The State simply accepted that a Catholic Order like the Brothers of St John of God would come to Aotearoa New Zealand to do good work and would not cause harm.

5.         This meant that the Order and those who represented it, operated seemingly with minimal accountability from the State or the wider church. From the outset, the Order apparently felt free to operate differently from other care providers at the time. For example, on establishment, the Bishop of Christchurch felt able to request a law change to set Marylands up in a way that suited the Order’s purposes. Later, Marylands sought State funding in excess of that provided to other, comparable care providers.

6.         Liz Tonks from the Network of Survivors of Abuse in Faith-Based Institutions and their Supporters (the Network), said:

“State agencies and unsuspecting Catholic parents trusted this church and gave over their care of their children to this institution at Marylands and many other places across New Zealand. Their trust has been devastating, has had devastating consequences for a significant number of the children placed in the care of the church.”^[901]

7.         This high level of trust meant that offending was less likely to be detected. The brothers were highly respected and trusted by the Christchurch community and throughout Aotearoa New Zealand.^[902] As a result, they were largely left to run their own affairs. On behalf of the Network, Dr Murray Heasley said:

“The Catholic Church is a comfortable environment for paedophiles. A lot of offenders seek situations where they can have access to children and where they have authority. So they have access, they have authority and they have the cover of a very respected profession.”^[903]

8.         Monitoring and oversight was almost non-existent and when victims reported abuse, whether to teachers, social workers, police or parents, they were less likely to be believed. Many boys disclosed to people in a position to intervene but were not believed and the abuse continued. As a result, abusers from the Order, representing the church, operated with impunity. When one victim told his parents about the abuse, he was “told to stop lying” and “hit for it because I was told priests do not touch little boys”.^[904] One survivor said:

“I never told my parents. I did not think my parents would believe me. I do not think anyone would have believed me. The brothers were respected in the community. They would have been believed over us boys.”^[905]

9.         This wider power and authority of the Catholic Church and the Order was also used by some members of the Order as a way to control victims. Boys were told by the brothers that the abuse was their secret and that if they did disclose the abuse, no one would believe them. Steven Long was threatened by Brother McGrath and feared the consequences of disclosing the abuse:

“Brother McGrath would always threaten me to keep my mouth shut, and told me that no one would believe me if I said anything. We always knew that there would be repercussions for doing so, as we had all seen what Brother McGrath did. He put the fear into us all.”^[906]

10.      Mr ES, a Hebron Trust survivor, was also told that he would not be believed if he reported the sexual abuse:

“On the second time Brother McGrath called me into his office, Brother McGrath sodomised me. After this, he threatened me again, saying that if I told anyone about what had happened, he was in with the police, and no one would believe me.”^[907]

11.       Darryl Smith was seven years old when he was raped by Brother Keane. Darryl recalls being told: “don’t tell anyone not even your parents and if you do, they will not believe you anyway.”^[908]

12.      The power, authority and respect enjoyed by priests and religious leaders in the Catholic Church extended to Brother McGrath’s work at Hebron Trust. Brother McGrath commanded respect in the community. He wrote letters to judges in support of youth in his care, signing them as “Bernard McGrath, O.H.”^[909] The abbreviation ‘O.H.’ stands for “the Hospitaller Order of the Brothers of St John of God”.^[910] He attended Family Group Conferences as a support person, and supervised youth justice clients on remand, or while they were carrying out community work at Hebron.^[911]

13.      The trust and respect given to the church, the Order and Brother McGrath as a religious youth worker and a father figure to troubled young people was a key tool in abuse being able to occur.^[912]

Ko ngā waiaro o te pāpori ka kitea i te āria o te tinana pakari i taua wā  Society’s attitudes reflected the ableism of the time

14.      Ableism creates an ideal type of the perfect body and perfect mind to which all must strive. The closer one is to these ideals, the greater privileges they enjoy. Societal attitudes, reflecting ableism, disableism, audism, discrimination and ‘othering’, led to the large-scale institutionalisation of people into disability, Deaf and mental health care settings, including special schools.^[913]

15.      These views underpinned the legislation and the policy behind institutionalisation. Families were not properly supported to provide home care, and the State’s education department had not developed suitable local options for children who needed additional education or learning support. This led to State and private placement of disabled children into institutions and special schools where they were exposed to abuse.

16.      Disabled children’s developmental needs were not considered important. Their specific health, educational, and social needs were not understood and were neglected. Local schools and teachers had not been equipped and trained to educate them, and families of non-disabled children generally didn’t want disabled children in their school.

17.      We’ve heard from several parents who placed their sons at Marylands as their children were not adequately supported by mainstream schools. Ms IO felt that her son was being denied an education and that she had no other choice but to move her disabled son to a specialist boarding school. She said:

“From 6 – 7 1/2 years my son attended a School. They had difficulty dealing with him so advised us that he couldn’t continue there because he was taking up too much of the teacher’s time.

I knew I had to put my son into boarding school, or he would never have grown up and learnt how to fit into society. The education system, being what it was at the time, wouldn’t have taken him any further because he was viewed as being disruptive in class and taking teachers time away from ‘normal’ children.”^[914]

18.      Bill McElhinney’s son was at a special needs unit within a mainstream intermediate school before it was decided that his son’s needs would be better supported elsewhere:

“[T]he school wasn’t happy handling him due to the amount of medication he had to take, and the final straw came when he jumped from one bench to another and broke his nose. That’s when he moved to St John of God, Marylands.”^[915]

Te kaikiri, te korenga o rātou i whakamana i te ahurea, te reo me te whānau 
Racism, disregard of culture, language and whānau

19.      The discriminatory and negative attitudes, particularly towards Māori students, reflected the widespread discrimination in society:

“Back then, discrimination against Māori was pretty bad so Dad used to pretend he was Italian. We weren’t encouraged to advertise our Māori identity.”^[916]

20.     These attitudes contributed to an increasingly large number of Māori being taken into care by the State and, when placed in care, led to targeted abuse and cultural neglect. Brother Graham described the brothers’ training:

“[T]here was no education on the indigenous / first nations peoples of either New Zealand or Australia. Unfortunately, this was the norm in previous decades, not only in religious formation but throughout society generally. There was no training on the cultural needs of any other groups either.”^[917]

21.      There is no evidence that the Department of Education took steps to ensure that students would be provided with culturally appropriate education at Marylands.

22.     Targeted abuse within the Order reflected what was occurring in wider society, including racial slurs, violent punishments for use of te reo Māori or Pacific languages, and punishments for any public displays of cultural importance.

“Māori children specifically they hated with a passion. European children were treated with a wee bit of respect, but the Māori children were treated like dirt.”^[918]

Ngā waiaro ki te hara taitōkai
Attitudes to sexual abuse

23.     Society was largely unaware of sexual abuse of children, stemming from the taboo that surrounded the topic. It was considered distasteful to talk about. State agencies and others in decision-making positions did not understand issues around sexual abuse.

24.     There was also less awareness of the sexual abuse of boys, and it was often perceived as something that didn’t happen to males.

25.     The expectation in Aotearoa New Zealand was that abused men were not expected to suffer any ongoing hurt and were told to ‘harden up’. We know that boys and men deal with sexual abuse differently, with some data indicating that it takes on average 21 years before males disclose abuse.^[919] There were no specific services supporting men who had been abused in Aotearoa New Zealand until the 1990s.

26.     Some survivors believe that it was very difficult for boys and men to talk about sexual abuse, particularly when the perpetrator was a man, because of the negative perception of homosexuality. Shame around male sexual abuse and societal attitudes towards male vulnerability has further impacted the number of male survivors being able to discuss the sexual abuse they experienced.

27.      There were institutional factors within Marylands and Hebron Trust that enabled abuse to occur and created barriers to disclosure:

›      Cultural factors such as the imported culture of abuse, what we now know as ableism, racism and an internal culture within the Order of excess, secrecy and reputational protection.

›      The exploitation of beliefs, religious teachings and the fear of God.

›      Organisational factors including the lack of qualified staff.

›      Environmental factors, such as the isolation both physically and emotionally.

›      The lack of oversight and monitoring by both the State, the wider Catholic Church and the Order.

28.     In many ways, the attitudes of the Order mirrored those of wider society.

I haria mai te ahurea tūkino tangata ki Aotearoa Niu Tīreni nei e ngā parata o te Rangapū o Ahitereiria 
Order’s Australian brothers brought their culture of abuse to Aotearoa New Zealand

29.     The Order’s Australian brothers likely brought their culture of sexual abuse with them when they set up in Christchurch in 1955. All five of the first brothers transferred from Australia to work at Marylands were accused of sexual abuse.

30.     Trevor McDonald, Mr DA and Mr AL were all sexually abused by Brother Lebler within the first year of opening. Mr AL was also sexually abused by the first Prior of the school, Brother Berchmans.

Te ariā tinana pakari i roto i te Rangapū
Ableism within the Order

31.      The Order had a lack of respect for the evolving capacities of the boys and the voice of the boys, their whānau, hapū and iwi.

32.     Boys were placed in a segregated learning environment with a lack of trained teachers. What we now know as ableism permeated the institution and meant there were low expectations around educational outcomes. There was no ongoing assessment or support provided for the boys’ individual educational needs. Education was not based on a full development of personality but on training.

33.      The abusive brothers within the Order often targeted the most vulnerable children and young people.

Te Kura o Marylands me te whare whakapani 
Marylands School and the orphanage

34.     At Marylands and the orphanage, offending was typically against young disabled boys, often when they were at their most vulnerable. Trevor McDonald recalls being sick in bed with the mumps when he was sexually abused by Brother Sebastian.

35.     Mr AL told us that he witnessed a boy with Down syndrome aged 6 or 7 being raped by the Prior, Brother Berchmans:

“Under the stairs, the brothers kept extra plates and other kitchen or donated items. One day, I came in from the shower room because I had been at rugby league practice. Brother Berchmans was in there with a young Down syndrome boy. The boy was only about 6 or 7 and he had his pants down, he was crying. Brother Berchmans was sexually abusing him, sodomising him.”^[920]

36.     Māori students, who were a small minority group at Marylands, often experienced targeted cultural abuse. This was sometimes linked to other types of abuse, including sexual abuse.

37.      The brothers were not educated about te ao Māori, tikanga Māori or about the cultural needs of any other groups. As was common at the time, neither the State, the Catholic Church nor the Order ensured this training was required or occurred.

38.      Boys experienced racial discrimination and cultural neglect. Mr AL recalls being locked in a shed all day at the orphanage because he was Māori:

“One day, we were put into a shed because we were Māori. We just had to stand there all day until the nuns said we could come out. It was a big shed, bigger than a house, that they store potatoes in. They never told us why, they just told us to ‘get in there you black buggers’.”^[921]

Te tarati o Hebron
Hebron Trust

39.     The culture at Hebron Trust was different from the culture at Marylands School, as most of the staff at Hebron Trust were lay people. The organisation was also informal, although it was largely centred around Brother McGrath.

40.     At Hebron Trust most of the victims of abuse were street kids, many of whom were rangatahi Māori who were in State care or were homeless, with little or broken connection to whānau, hapū and iwi.

41.      Tamariki and rangatahi Māori made up a large proportion of those that were cared for by Hebron Trust. Many were particularly vulnerable due to their personal circumstances, characterised by violence, poverty and at times a lack of whānau, hapū and iwi connection or support. This led to isolation, homelessness and a reliance on drop-in or residential housing services, such as Hebron Trust.

42.     Brother McGrath was given a lot of freedom to run Hebron Trust as he liked, and he had significant power and influence, which increased over time. By at least 1989, Brother McGrath was firmly in charge of the whole group, and was referred to by the other staff as ‘the boss’.^[922]

43.     Brother McGrath’s targeting of Māori and Pacific young people through Hebron Trust was calculated and predatory. Brother McGrath worked to gain access and trust within this community of Māori and Pacific young people in Christchurch while working with Te Roopu Awhina, a drop-in centre for homeless young people and other networks.

44.     Brother McGrath records that when he first started at Te Roopu Awhina, he felt he was a ‘stranger’ in the midst of the young people there who kept to themselves, talked among themselves, and greeted each other in te reo Māori. However, on 28 November 1986 the co-ordinator, Kupa Ngaira, informed Brother McGrath that the young people had had a meeting and wished to welcome Brother McGrath into their ‘family’. A pōwhiri was held a few days later.

45.     Brother McGrath isolated Hebron Trust residents by targeting those with substance abuse issues. He would act as their advocate throughout the youth justice process, while at the same time continuing to supply them with drugs and alcohol.

46.     Justin Taia, a Māori survivor who lived on the street as a teenager told us Brother McGrath would invite street kids to his house for food or a bed. Justin was sexually abused by Brother McGrath “hundreds of times”, usually under the influence of drugs and alcohol:

“Before the first rape, and before many of the other ones, Brother McGrath put some sort of drug in my drink, which made me dizzy. He also gave me a lot of alcohol (beer, Jack Daniels and Coke) and pills, like rivvies (Rivotril) as a bribe to get me to do what he wanted and to lower my inhibitions, or as a reward afterwards. He would be nice to me afterwards too, letting me drive his van and things like that.”^[923]

47.      Justin was later placed at Hebron Trust by the Children and Young Person’s Court where he was supposedly receiving drug and alcohol treatment. However Justin stated he received no such treatment and that “throughout this time Brother McGrath was actually giving me drugs and alcohol on a regular basis, in order to abuse me”.^[924]

48.     Targeting by Brother McGrath (in the same way the vulnerability of children at Marylands had been targeted) and the abuse that occurred at the is a particular affront to Māori values and tikanga.^[925]