Documentary record Bound by Fear
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Other Christian institutions & contexts Catholic Clonmel, County Tipperary, Ireland · 2002

Ferryhouse: Ryan Report records a convicted Brother and dormitory access given to outsiders

Record class

Institutional event

Evidence status

Official finding

Authority role

Rosminian Brothers and Fathers with custodial and pastoral authority over residents and care-leavers

Organization

St Joseph's Industrial School, Ferryhouse, Rosminians (Institute of Charity)

Spiritual nexus

The convicted Brother's victim was a care-leaver still under the order's pastoral authority at its aftercare centre — the industrial-school relationship carried forward. The dormitory findings show the same authority operating as gatekeeper: the religious staff controlled who reached the children at night.

  • Institutional obedience or isolation
  • Pastoral or clerical authority

Evidence structure

Proceedings

  1. 2009-05-20 · statutory inquiry finding recording a 2002 criminal conviction

    Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse (Ryan Commission), Ireland — statutory inquiry; Irish criminal courts. The Ryan Report recorded that a Brother it names 'Br Sergio' 'was convicted of sexual assault in 2002' for offences committed in the early 1990s against a former Ferryhouse resident at a Rosminian aftercare centre, and that on being confronted he 'admitted his guilt and was immediately removed'. The report separately found that 'Br Leone' and 'Fr Lucio' had permitted an outside layman access to boys' dormitories, and that 'Fr Paolo' told the Committee he was uneasy about what was going on but did not act.

Documented coercion mechanisms

  • continuing religious authority over a care-leaver at an aftercare centre
  • control of dormitory access

Primary record

Sources

official statutory inquiry report inquiry report Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse, 'Report' (Ryan Report), Vol. II, ch. 3 (Ferryhouse), paras 200–214 (20 May 2009).

The statutory inquiry records the 2002 conviction, the admission of guilt, and the dormitory-access findings.

Related record

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