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24 October 2016

Ballarat’s Children: ‘superiors ignored my urgings to set up child-abuse inquiry’

A detective who helped build the case against one of the country’s most notorious pedophiles has ­revealed he urged his superiors to establish a taskforce to properly investigate the scourge of clerical sexual abuse and how he lament­ed the general lack of resourcing by the force.
Former detective sergeant Blair Smith said he was shocked to learn the extent of pedophilia within Catholic institutions when it first came across his desk in 1993, sparking years of “a total fight” with the church.
Mr Smith, who was part of a small Victoria Police unit investig­ating domestic violence and sexual assaults, has spoken publicly for the first time in The Australian’s podcast Ballarat’s Children.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/in-depth/royal-commission/ballarats-children-superiors-ignored-my-urgings-to-set-up-childabuse-inquiry/news-story/24750a6de51671f2d6864b571c635e1d