George Pell: ABC gatekeepers ignore story that doesn’t quite fit their narrative on the Cardinal. By Chris Mitchell.
The ABC was criticised last week for not covering the latest corruption revelations from the Vatican linking the demotion of powerful Sardinian-born Cardinal Angelo Becciu to the transfer of $1.1m cash to Australia, a transaction three Italian newspapers and The Times of London tied to the failed Victorian pedophile case against Cardinal George Pell. …
The ABC’s gatekeepers on the Pell story, Media Watch host Paul Barry and Pell pursuer Louise Milligan, made clear on Twitter last week that they believe there is nothing newsworthy in the latest chapter in the decades-long saga. Milligan expressed displeasure journalists were even covering the story.
The idea Pell could in fact be the victim here just does not fit the preconceived narrative at the ABC, which struggled in April even to report fairly and accurately the unanimous 7-0 High Court overturning of Pell’s conviction. Several senior staff at the time tweeted that the High Court decision did not mean Pell had been found innocent. It most certainly did.
It appears that Pell was asked to clean up the Vatican’s finances, and in so doing uncovered some shady practices. A man apparently high up in the shady practices, Cardinal Angelo Becciu, sent money to Australia (fact) — apparently to encourage a child molestation case against Pell (supposition). The resulting case was always nonsense, and only got so far due to the media’s political enthusiasm for getting Pell, and people feeling the “spirit of the times” — like the repressed memories cases in the 1980s.
For those who have followed the Pell saga there is another point: allegations Pell was being targeted by Vatican enemies for his role in trying to sort out the church’s financial troubles actually predate his formal charging by Victoria Police.
Pell was charged on June 28, 2017. Pell biographer Tess Livingstone, an editorial writer at this newspaper, wrote here a year before that on June 8, 2016: “Cardinal Pell’s secretariat is engaged in a battle with the powerful Secretariat of State, after Italian Bishop Angelo Becciu, the number two official in that office, suspended an external audit of Vatican finances by international accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers …” …
This newspaper reported Pell on Tuesday denying he had received any money from the church for his defence. Viv Waller, the lawyer for the accuser in the Pell trial, has also denied her client received any money. …
Investigators of Vatican finances have long been concerned church bank accounts have been used to launder money for the Italian mafia. It’s high stakes stuff. …
Bolt, Pell’s high-profile defence counsel Robert Richter QC and legal academic Mirko Bagaric, dean of law at Swinburne University, have all called for an investigation of the latest claims, at the very least by AUSTRAC, the federal government’s anti-money laundering agency. Yet the ABC news channels seem incurious.
The ABC, of course, only chooses to publish news that helps the left.
