Cardinal George Pell was brought to the hearing from prison in a police van
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The lead prosecutor arguing to sustain the conviction of Cardinal George Pell struggled Thursday in presenting the Crown’s case. Christopher Boyce struggled to answer questions from the three-judge appeal court, accidentally naming the alleged victim on a live stream of proceedings.
Following the conviction of Pell on five counts of sexual abuse of minors last December, judges at the Supreme Court of Victoria have been hearing an appeal against the jury’s unanimous decision. After extensive arguments from the defense on June 5, the prosecution put its case in favor of the decision Thursday.
The prosecution’s case against the appeal centers on upholding the sole witness and alleged victim in the case whom, Boyce insisted, was not a “liar” or a “fantasist,” while conceding that the witness had changed the dates and years of the alleged attacks over the course of the case and no longer agreed with the prosecution’s own assertions.
Boyce repeatedly found himself either struggling to articulate his own argument, or lost for words under judicial questioning, at one point conceding that “It’s not good enough for me to say what I said before,” and that “rehearsing the platitudes may not be all that helpful.”
An account of the two-day hearing from the Catholic Register
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