Justin Welby let convicted sex offender work at cathedral

John Roberts, 90, was convicted in 2020 of nine charges of indecent and sexual assault against three victims

Welby told Roberts he could continue practising but to make sure he was not alone with parishioners, writing to him that “for obvious reasons you are more vulnerable to unfounded accusation [sic] than others”.

The archbishop has apologised and said he regrets his handling of the incident, but claims that he did not have all the information.

Roberts, 90, was finally brought to justice in 2020 when he was convicted of nine charges of indecent and sexual assault against three victims. He was convicted again this year in relation to a further victim, and three years were added to his jail term, making a total of 12 years.

Craig Freedman, 51, who has waived his right to anonymity, was abused by Roberts in the 1980s, resulting in the original 1989 conviction, but said the church swept the crimes under the carpet.

Craig Freedman was abused as a child by Roberts, but says the church put him down and discredited him. Freedman, 51, says that Welby should leave the post of Archbishop of Canterbury immediately.

He told The Times that there should be a full inquiry into the actions of church officials, including those of Welby. The archbishop has said he will formally complete his duties on January 6, but Freedman said he should go now: “The suffering has been emotional, physical and mental. Even though in 1989 I proved my innocence and his guilt, they chose to put me down and discredit me.”

Welby announced his resignation after a damning report into Smyth, a prolific child abuser who died in 2018 and was never brought to justice. The Makin review found that Welby, 68, and senior colleagues had a “distinct lack of curiosity” to ensure that allegations into Smyth were properly followed up by police. Four other priests have had their permission to serve suspended.

Richard Scorer, the head of abuse law at Slater and Gordon, said of the Roberts case: “At the very least Justin Welby appears to have exhibited the same lack of curiosity and concern which we saw recently revealed in the Smyth case”.

The Roberts case was “one of the most egregious failures that I’ve seen”, he added.

Scorer, and David Greenwood of Switalskis Solicitors, who both acted for victims of Roberts, are both calling for an external independent review to examine the church’s conduct.

Roberts was convicted in 1989 of the indecent assault of Freedman for which he was fined £500 and required to sign the sex offenders register. The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IISCA) was told he was allowed to remain at St Peter’s Church in Woolton, Liverpool, because David Sheppard, then Bishop of Liverpool, considered it was a miscarriage of justice.

Roberts was based at St Peter’s Church in Woolton, Liverpool.

Roberts was promoted to become a canon of Liverpool cathedral in 1995 and, after his retirement in 2002, was given permission to carry on providing ministry and undertaking church services.

He was not supposed to carry out one-to-one sessions although IISCA found these lines were consistently crossed or blurred. In 2007 he administered at services where children were present.

Welby, who became dean of Liverpool that year, said he was told of the conviction and that Roberts and his colleagues believed it to be unjust, but that he never knew the details. He said that Roberts was doing “valuable” work with refugees and warned him not to be alone with worshippers.

Giving evidence at Roberts’s criminal trial in 2020, Welby was asked whether he was told the 1989 conviction involved a sexual act on the boy, who was aged 15 and in care, and that Roberts had told him he loved him, kissed him and touched him. According to a transcript obtained by The Times, Welby replied: “No. I would certainly remember that.”

Justin Welby accepted Roberts’s denials of sexual assault of a vulnerable man and banned the victim, who he said was angry and aggressive, from Liverpool cathedral

Welby told the court that “safeguarding was something that concerned me deeply” and was “something we talked about a great deal”. He told Roberts to follow the rules he set for himself, which “is not to see anyone vulnerable, and certainly not young people, in private, but to find public places where you could be observed but not overheard”.

In 2011 a vulnerable man, who had sought support at the cathedral, claimed that Roberts had inappropriately touched him during a home visit and made unwanted advances. Welby wrote to colleagues that the complainant had past drug and alcohol abuse problems and that he had banned him from the cathedral when he became abusive and threatening to staff.

Welby told the complainant that Roberts’s account was “totally different to yours” and in the absence of independent evidence no more could be done.

Privately he wrote to Roberts that the complainant had made abusive phone calls and “in light of his behaviour today we accept your account”. He said that dealing with pastoral matters was risky when it involved “potentially troubled people”, again urging Roberts not to see people alone as “for obvious reasons you are more vulnerable to unfounded accusations than others”.

The complainant later wrote to Welby that his attitude was of “casual indifference” and sarcastically congratulated Roberts that his “repeated, deeply unprofessional and sexual advances in my own home have managed to slip under the radar”. He added: “It seems Welby looks after his own over there at the cathedral.” In 2020 Roberts was convicted of sexual assault in relation to the incident.

In 2019 Welby told IISCA — which did not fully investigate the Roberts case because of the police investigation and sub judice issues — that he regretted his handling of the 2011 allegation, adding: “With the benefit of hindsight … I would not have permitted [Roberts] to be on my staff.”

Lambeth Palace said in a statement that Roberts’s crimes were “an appalling breach of trust and have damaged the lives of his victims and the survivors. The Church [of England] must always be accountable and learn lessons from its handling of these cases.”

It said the archbishop followed the process at the time, notifying colleagues of the 2011 complaint, but “regrets the handling”. The complainant’s threats towards members of staff “affected his judgement and handling. He has apologised for his response, and has said publicly that had he known the full detail of John Roberts’s 1989 conviction, he would have handled it differently. At no stage did he conceal information”.

Greenwood said: “This scandal is a mirror image of previous cases in which bishops have protected convicted clergy and reintroduced them into risky positions, failing to heed the abuser’s previous behaviours.” He said that the inaction of Welby and other bishops should be publicly scrutinised.

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