Order of Australia recipient and Newcastle priest Fr Peter Brock was yesterday charged with 22 offences dating back to the 1970s. Fr Brock who is a high profile priest and music conductor is accused of repeatedly taking a young boy to a house and watching on as several men sexually assaulted the teen in what was described yesterday as a "pedophilic smorgasbord," The Newcastle Herald reports.
He faces 18 counts of indecent assault, two acts of indecency and two counts of buggery.
A statement of facts tendered to Newcastle Local Court alleged Fr Brock had groomed the boys by introducing them to "strip jack poker" where they finished in various stages of undress.
Fr Brock, 63, is alleged to have repeatedly abused one of them while the boy and Fr Brock played the game on the floor of "counselling rooms" in two Hunter presbyteries over a two year period.
The court was told that in the mid-1970s, when the boy was aged 15 and two years after he was first abused, Fr Brock took him to a Newcastle house on at least six occasions and watched on as several men sexually assaulted the teen after plying him with alcohol.
It is alleged that during each visit, Hamilton dentist Ashleigh Edward Jarrold, 56, was also present and assaulted the youth on two of those occasions.
The court heard on one occasion Jarrold and an unidentified man had assaulted the boy in a bedroom while Fr Brock watched pornography in another room.
Jarrold, of Donald Street, Hamilton, also faced court yesterday charged with 12 counts of indecent assault and one act of indecency, relating to one of the brothers and two other victims aged 13 and 14.
The court heard Jarrold and Father Brock were always present at the house during the visits however "on each occasion, a number of different males were present."
Other allegations against Fr Brock include allegedly abusing the boys while on a camping trip.
Jarrold is further alleged to have assaulted two other boys in the late 1970s.
Magistrate James Swanson granted both men conditional bail, including that a $5,000 surety be posted and that they report to police three times a week.
Neither man was required to enter a plea yesterday and both will reappear in Newcastle Local Court on November 26, The Herald says.
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(Source: CTHN)