Cardinal George Pell is reportedly under police investigation after a new accuser came forward with fresh allegations of child abuse.
The revelation Victoria Police had been secretly probing the 78-year-old during his successful High Court appeal against child sex convictions comes just days after he was released from prison.
Police are yet to approach Pell or his legal team over the fresh allegation – which is understood to date back to the 1970s, according to the Herald Sun.
Cardinal George Pell is reportedly under police investigation after a new accuser brought forward fresh child abuse allegations Pictured: Pell arrives at the Seminary Of The Good Shepherd in Sydney on Wednesday
George Pell leaves Barwon Prison on Tuesday after his child sex convictions were quashed
A man who now works in a professional role reportedly made the accusation.
A spokeswoman for the cardinal said on Monday night: ‘In any police matter there should be due process through the proper channels.’
Daily Mail Australia does not suggest the new allegations are true – only that police are reportedly investigating.
Cardinal Pell was not told of the fresh investigation until Monday, the paper reported.
It comes ahead of the airing of an interview between the 78-year-old and Sky News Australia presenter Andrew Bolt – in which Cardinal Pell said he ‘wouldn’t be entirely surprised’ if police attempted to prosecute him again.
In a preview for the interview, Bolt also asked the cardinal whether he was ashamed of the church and how it dealt with child sex abuse scandals.
‘Yes. There are two levels. One is the crimes itself and then the treating it so inadequately for so long,’ Cardinal Pell said.
‘It’s like cutting out a cancer. I think, please God, we’ve got rid of it.’
Cardinal Pell said he condemns ‘these sort of activities’, adding he has seen the damage it has done to victims.
‘One of the things that grieves me is the suggestion that I’m anti-victim, or not sufficiently sympathetic,’ he said.
In another part of the interview, Cardinal Pell accused the ABC of a ‘betrayal of the national interest’ after being asked by Bolt whether he was concerned by the broadcaster’s role in his ‘persecution’.
Pope Benedict XVI with Cardinal George Pell in July 2008 at an inter-faith meeting in Sydney
‘I believe in free speech,’ Cardinal Pell said. ‘I acknowledge the right of those who differ from me to, you know, to just state their views.
‘But in a national broadcaster, to have an overwhelming presentation of one view and only one view, I think that’s a betrayal of the national interest.’
The interview, which will air on Tuesday at 7pm, also sheds light on Cardinal Pell’s experiences in jail – where he befriended a number of inmates, including a convicted murderer.
Cardinal Pell (pictured in St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican City in 2013) has always maintained his innocence. He was not told of the reported fresh investigation until Monday
The cardinal won his appeal bid to the High Court on Tuesday and walked free from Barwon Prison, near Geelong, after more than 400 days behind bars.
He travelled from Melbourne to Sydney on Wednesday – stopping briefly at a petrol station to buy a phone charger and newspapers.
During the pit stop, the cardinal told media he was ‘very pleased’ to be free.
He apologised for not dressing better, saying he wasn’t expecting company on the trip.
The 78-year-old travelled from Melbourne to Sydney on Wednesday – stopping briefly at a petrol station (pictured in forecourt)
‘Before you arrived, it was better here,’ he told media at the service station when asked about life behind bars, before adding his prison experience was ‘not too bad’.
He also asked reporters to adhere to social distancing and not get too close to him.
Cardinal Pell arrived at the Seminary of the Good Shepherd in Homebush in Sydney’s west, at about 9pm on Wednesday.
Following the overturning of his child sex convictions, Cardinal Pell released a statement saying the serious injustice he suffered had been remedied.
‘I hold no ill will to my accused, I do not want my acquittal to add to the hurt and bitterness so many feel; there is certainly hurt and bitterness enough,’ he said on Tuesday.
The 78-year-old said his trial was not a referendum on the Catholic Church or how Australian church authorities dealt with paedophilia.
The 78-year-old spoke candidly about the church’s failings following his release from prison in a sit down interview with Sky News Australia presenter Andrew Bolt. Pell is pictured in 2008
‘The point was whether I had committed these awful crimes, and I did not,’ he said.
In December 2018, a jury found Cardinal Pell guilty of five charges, accepting evidence of one complainant that the then-Archbishop of Melbourne had sexually abused him and another 13-year-old choirboy at St Patrick’s Cathedral in 1996.
One of the choirboys died in 2014, prompting the other to bring the allegations to police.
In an initial trial, a jury was unable to reach a verdict. The second jury was unanimous in its decision. An appeal to Victoria’s Court of Appeal last year was unsuccessful.
Cardinal Pell has always maintained his innocence, a fact noted in the High Court’s 26-page decision.