One of the 'paedophile priests' died yesterday

Published: January 14, 2011 at 1:54pm

One of the men who stands accused of violating boys in his care at a children’s home, Brother Joseph Bonett, died yesterday of cancer-related complications.

This was even as his lawyers, Gianella Caruana Curran (criminal proceedings) and Therese Commodini Cachia (human rights case) petitioned the Constitutional Court for a ban on all discussion or reportage of the paedophilia case.

This case has been dragged out so tortuously that two of the accused have ended up evading justice: one by escaping to Italy and the other, now, by dying (not deliberately, of course).

The remaining two don’t know how far they can push their luck, but they might be able to push it just far enough, what with all these delaying tactics.




13 Comments Comment

  1. Jo says:

    Doesn’t the fact that the case is being dragged out for so long make one belief that these priests are in the wrong? If I was innocent I would like the case to be over in the shortest possible time and my innocence proved beyond doubt.

  2. David Buttigieg says:

    A real case of justice delayed, justice denied.

  3. He was only 63 and, apparently, died at the Dar tal-Kleru in Birkirkara.

    I think it was in bad taste to show that the Church was looking after him in their home for priests and that the members of the Missionary Society of St Paul mourned his loss.

    Just for the record he wasn’t a priest but a ‘brother’.

  4. anthony says:

    I really pity the remaining two.

    It certainly must be most nightmarish to know that so many people with a hot line to heaven are lobbying for your early demise.

  5. ciccio2011 says:

    The Divine justice is working faster than that on Republic Street.

  6. joemario says:

    just for the record, he was still under accusation, thus ‘alleged’ is more accurate than ‘one of’.

  7. Josephine says:

    It is true that the accused must have died a horrible death, but – were he to have been found guilty – it would have been preferable to have had him spend the rest of his days behind bars, rather than in the relative “comfort” of his own environment..

  8. JoeM says:

    Mors omnia solvit.

    For all intents and purposes, Brother Bonett has always been and will remain, innocent. Proceedings against him will now have to stop.

    Stop whipping a dead horse, for justice’s sake!

    • Fairy Liquid says:

      That’s interesting reasoning, JoeM. History is replete with outrageous despots who died before they faced justice. Not that I am comparing Brother Bonett to an outrageous despot – but arguments have to be taken to extremes to test their veracity. So, taking your argument to its logical extreme, Adolf Hitler is an innocent man because he killed himself to avoid capture and so never stood trial. His men, too, were innocent – at least those legions of them who evaded capture and the Nuremberg trials. And death, as you put it in Latin, solved everything for their victims. I don’t think so. Do you?

      • JoeM says:

        Unfortunately for the victims, that’s how criminal law works. To quote another Latin term: Dura lex, sed lex.

        [Daphne – I don’t think Fairy was alluding to the law, JoeM. Try telling anyone that Hitler was innocent because no court found him guilty.]

    • La Redoute says:

      If all proceedings have to stop, doesn’t that also include the media ban aimed at stopping any sort of public debate about his involvement in the abuse of boys who were in his care?

      Not that the Maltese court is in any position to ban discussion anywhere but in Malta, of course.

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