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I do not remember at what age I was introduced to two important principles traditionally embodied in the legal system of England. It may have been in a lesson about Magna Carta. Somewhere along the line in my education, I imbibed two key ideas about the administration of justice in this country. The first principle states that everyone is deemed to be innocent unless proved guilty. The second principle is that if a person receives a verdict of not guilty in a court setting, then this decision, whether made by jury or judge, is taken to be the final word on the matter. Because of the double jeopardy idea, it is not possible to keep trying again and again, using the same evidence but with different juries, to find someone guilty of a crime. I am sure that there might have been some push-back in my class, putting forward the notion that guilty people might get away with crimes through having a good lawyer. Whatever our feelings about the justice system in particular cases, most people accept that it generally works well. One special feature of the justice practised in the UK is that we are entirely free of political interference. The moment judges anywhere in the world become pawns to a political system, left or right, that is a moment when these societies begin to deteriorate, to become a cesspit of instability caused by an arbitrary use of power. We can be grateful for our British system of justice. This has been honed over many centuries to provide us with access to a fair and reliable system of interpreting and operating the law.
The political manipulation of justice is something that I met in Greece during the 60s. Individuals were thrown into jail for having incorrect opinions or being seen as some kind of threat to the right-wing junta. This political oppression affected me directly, but not in the sense that I feared for my own personal safety. My problem was that although my studies took me into making contact with all social groups, there were some well-connected individuals who feared any contact with someone from abroad. Even carrying a letter of introduction signed by the then archbishop, Michael Ramsey, could not penetrate these barriers of fear and self-protection that some had built around themselves. Opinions were things that you kept very private in case the wrong person was listening to your conversation. Then your job and even your freedom could be under threat.
The memory of living in a country where the legal system was exercised in an arbitrary way is something that I have retained over the years. In this country my dealings with the police and the justice system have been, thankfully, infrequent. The few encounters with the justice system have never caused me any sense of anxiety about the fundamental soundness of the institution, even though I realise that is not the experience of all. Justice in Britain seems to work most of the time. It came as something of a shock to me to realise that one place where arbitrary justice is sometimes found today is in the Church of England. In Friday’s Church Times there was an important article written by Peter Selby, a former Bishop of Worcester and Bishop to HM prisons. He has noticed that recent cases in the Church have indicated a less than robust concern for the basic principles of justice that every child in school used to be taught. His main concern is the case of Fr Griffin but the Christ Church saga is also noted. The principle of innocent until proved guilty was evidently ignored in the careless collecting of a ‘brain-dump’ of unsubstantiated gossip by an official in the Diocese of London. The way this information had been collected gave those targeted by this rumour and gossip no opportunity to challenge the information gathered about them. There was, in short, no way to establish their innocence. A fundamental principle for the maintenance of justice was thus being denied.
Peter Selby also reminds us about the case of Martyn Percy, where there also seems to be a complete breakdown of some of the principles of normal legal protocol as enshrined in English law. The Dean has been faced with accusations which total over 40 in number. Up till now every one of these has been examined and rejected in turn by individuals of high legal standing from within the State or Church’s legal system. We do not need to remind the reader that nowhere in the Christ Church process have we witnessed the normal assumptions of innocence. Indeed, we see the opposite. Neither the College nor the Diocese of Oxford have shown any respect for this or, indeed, the other principle that a declaration by a judge of effective innocence of a crime marks the end of a legal process. I confess myself baffled by the fact that the ruling of the top judge, Dame Sarah Asplin, should seem to be ignored and the same viciously restrictive protocols are still applied to Percy as though he is an acute safeguarding risk. These are reinforced by both Church and College. The most painful part of the whole process is the chronic lack of any sense of urgency. Surely as far as church processes are concerned, the ruling by Dame Sarah should have resulted in some immediate response by either the NST, the Oxford Safeguarding Team or even the Bishop of Oxford himself? Instead of decisions and action, we have witnessed agonising silence and paralysis within the system. This suggests that safeguarding protocols are simply not functioning properly in the diocese. A more accurate description might be to say that there is at present a situation of complete shambles. If the church authorities do know something about Percy’s behaviour that they have not yet revealed, then that might justify a delay. In the absence of anything new, the effect of delay is deeply corrosive to any building up of trust between bishop and the people of the diocese. Might one suggest that part of the problem is that both persecutory entities, the Church and the College, have been employing the same legal firm, Winckworth Sherwood to pursue their agendas? This firm, at least, has a financial stake in creating delay and prolonging the processes for as long as possible. Let us hope that the Charity Commission will soon step in to end the charade of legal process that passes for justice in the topsy turvy world of Christ Church and the diocese of Oxford.
In viewing the two chronic legal situations unfolding in London and Oxford, we are left with many questions. Why should senior church people in London and Oxford act with so little regard for the legal rights of individuals, let alone follow the dictates of Christian charity? Surely there must be some around the respective bishops who realise that what has been going on in each place contravenes the principles of natural justice? As things stand at present, the dioceses of Oxford and London seem to be firmly on the wrong side of justice and, indeed, of history. How could anyone disagree with the President of the Tribunals in her remarks about the Percy case or the coroner in the Griffin case? The issues in each case are, of course, different. In one case sloppy bureaucracy seems to be to blame. In the other there seems to be a visible working out of personal animosities. In this latter case we find a deliberate unhelpful failure by the Bishop to support his Dean. He now seems to be ignoring the finding of the Church’s President of Tribunals that whatever one believes happened in that brief meeting between the Dean and his accuser, it was neither sexual in character ( as some – though not the accuser – implied ) neither did it constitute “ serious misconduct”. Might the Bishop tell us why he thinks this does not make a difference to the restrictions which were imposed before such expert analysis was brought into play. It is one thing for a college to complain about their Head of House; it is quite another for a diocesan bishop to collude with these charges and allow the imposition of an absurd and disproportionate list of prohibitions. Does Bishop Croft wish to go down in history as the bishop who used his power to attempt to enforce a legal process so demonstratively cruel and unjust? One is reminded, at this point, of the story in the gospels where Beelzebub was invoked as being behind Jesus’ power. Jesus makes the comment about a kingdom which cannot stand when it is divided. The Bishop’s failure to offer any support for the Dean has dealt a divisive and traumatising blow against his whole diocese. Will this act of apparent malevolence be the event for which Bishop Steven will be most remembered in future decades?
Bishop Selby gives us two examples of senior church leaders ignoring natural justice and, in the process, doing much damage to the wider Church. I am still looking for someone outside the immediate circle of these two bishops who is prepared to interpret their actions in a more generous way than has been done so far. In the Percy case, I am aware of the cluster of College clergy and dons prepared to make outrageous assertions in their position of opposing the Dean. Does anybody really believe that Percy is another Peter Ball, a comment ascribed to one Christ Church canon? So far I have read nothing to indicate that anybody in the Church is actively supporting these two bishops and the way they have been behaving. Two clergymen have been denied access to the normal protocols of justice. One has taken his own life in a tragic suicide. In the Oxford case, Dean Percy still hangs on after three years of almost constant vicious persecution. The persecution is partly college initiated but there is an unseemly sight of a group of Cathedral clergy also involved in this cruelty. If there is indeed another story to be told about Percy’s malfeasance, it has not reached the public domain. When all we are offered is silence and absurd rumours, we are forced to come to our own conclusions, ones which are not favourable to the Bishop or Percy’s enemies.
This blog has many times had cause to question the administration of justice in the Church of England. The ability to trust the authority of bishops and authorities in the Church is an important prerequisite for the population outside church membership if they are ever to consider the claims of Christ. If the existing servants of the Church are regarded as unreliable or, worse still, dishonest, then it is hard to see anyone wanting to join local congregations. Many future generations of children in France are unlikely to find a sense of safety in the Catholic fold after the recent exposures. The same situation will apply when there are increasing failures of justice towards clergy in our Church. Double standards in the Southwark diocese with regard to Jonathan Fletcher and Stephen Kuhrt has also left many of us perplexed. There is a sense that the church seems totally out of its depth, even in administering its own rules and protocols. Once again, we come back to the plea that independent oversight is needed to save the church from its own disastrous decision making. If the church cannot deliver consistent justice, it ceases to be a safe place either for its employees or its members.
Surely there must be some around the respective Bishops … No doubt there are. I presume there would be some who may be trying to bring justice and compassion to these issues. Probably there are others who, for whatever reason, are content to collude in wrong doing. For instance the Registrar of my Diocese is senior partner of a firm of solicitors acting for the Diocese. Initially they threatened me with legal action if I complained about the two persons who posed a risk to me and had safeguarding restrictions. When I emailed the DSA each time they breached their restrictions, my Bishop not only called it harassing his staff but the CEO made it a police charge. I have a copy of the police tapes of two interviews under caution. You can hear the police officer aggressively and repeatedly questioning me as to why I followed the 2018 parish safeguarding handbook and reported breaches immediately. The CEO made a police statement writing that I had made baseless and unfounded allegations against my former vicar. I had to answer this during the interviews and the statement was submitted as evidence against me in a criminal trial. This was despite the fact that at the second interview I brought the decision of a guilty verdict and a penalty against my vicar by a Bishop presiding over the cdm process. Although the Trustees of the Diocese have a copy of the police officer writing that the source of my complaint was the Diocese, the solicitors have issued further threats if I write to Diocesan officers or clergy. The number of people in the Diocese who are allowing this is staggering. . Yes there are many surrounding my Bishop who can see injustice, safeguarding failures, further abuse of a complainant etc, but this has afforded me no safety whatsoever and my problems are ongoing. The more extreme and tragic cases in the media are probably the tip of a very big iceberg. Those further victimised by Bishops and their solicitors can only call out”Is there a Christian in the Diocese “. So far no one has called back to me in the affirmative.
I am glad you have mentioned France. The scale of the abuse revealed by the CAISE commission (led by Jean-Marc Sauvé) has been on an industrial scale (between 215,000 and 330,000 cases). It puts the IICSA revelations in the shade (which is not to trivialise what has been exposed on this side of the Channel).
For a long time the saving grace of the RCC in France was the myth of ‘le bon curé’ (the Gallic equivalent to Chaucer’s poor parson). This character was supposed to epitomise genuine Christianity acted out in each parish/commune, whereas the prelates and commendators were so many parasites oppressing the poor. The revolution was made possible by the desertion of the lower clergy from the first estate and their alliance with the third (the Tennis Court Oath).
Well, the recent revelations have essentially exploded that myth. The RCC in France, even in its drastically attenuated state, has been exposed as malign from top to bottom. Of course abusers were only a minority of clergy and lay workers, but they were a very large minority (3,000 priests out of 115,000 during the period analysed by CAISE).
The current number of priests in France is about 12,000: it has halved in 20 years (there were more than 27,000 as recently as 1996). Only 7,000 of that total are aged under 75, and a large number of that rump are not far off that age. Who, now, would wish to take orders in France?
There is something about a call to religious life that has a way of attracting those who negate and pervert the principles they are supposed to espouse. Our Saviour had much to say about hypocrites, and when reading this piece and the news from France, Matt. 23 comes to mind.
It’s like bishops in the Episcopal Church. I have incontrovertible evidence in writing that my former priest, Bob Malm, lied under oath, but both the bishops of Massachusetts and Virginia refuse to even investigate, I’ve even contacted the presiding bishop. So TEC is corrupt top to bottom, and you may quote me on that,
For personal reasons I have been reluctant to read anything written by Bishop Selby but I do feel now that I have read it that his assertion that complaints need to be proven beynd reasonable doubt in order for something to happen has the potential to be extremely damaging for many survivors of abuse.
I have never had to evidence my abuse, and still nothing gets done, but I am aware of survivors who tell heartbreaking stories who cannot ‘evidence’ them because most abuse happens in secrecy and then the abuser mostly denies it. This does not mean the abuse didn’t happen simply that the abuser has ‘got away with it’ and the institution has permitted this. There are tragedies like Alan Griffin which are completely unacceptable, there are tragedies like Neil Todd which are completely unacceptable but action that is weighted on burden of proof is likely to fail many victims and will lead to further loss of life.
Yes. “Beyond all reasonable doubt” is fine in a court, or if someone is to be trotted off to the tower in chains. But it is simply untrue that you need forensic quality proof to ” have a word”. And Balance of Probabilities can get people millions in damages. It’s one of those convenient myths. Neither is it true that the accuser has to mount an investigation! The means to do that are in the hands of the Bishop, or perhaps the police, not the alleged victim. So, frankly, it’s simply untrue.