Serving priest ‘abused 18 boys’

A serving Catholic priest has been charged with abusing 18 boys, some of them at schools in Sydney and Newcastle.

Sixty-five-year-old John Sidney Denham faces 30 child sex charges relating to boys aged 11 to 17.

Police allege the priest abused the boys in the 1970s and early 1980s, while he was based at St Pius X High School in Adamstown in Newcastle, at the Charlestown and Taree parishes, and at Sydney’s Waverley High School.

The charges arose from an initial single complaint made in April.

Denham chose to remain in his cell when Central Local Court heard the matter this afternoon.

He made no application for bail. It was formally refused and the matter was put over until October 2.

Police say the Newcastle-Maitland Diocese of the Catholic Church has helped them with their investigation, which is continuing [source].

Another source here

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