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The head of the New Zealand Catholic church has asked the Vatican for permission to launch an investigation into the handling of complaints about a priest who groomed a teenage girl.
A series of stories by Stuff has since unravelled the Auckland diocese’s handling of the case. This includes bishop Patrick Dunn’s original plans – all later reversed – not to tell school communities attached to Raass’ parish, to allow Raass to say mass after his arrest, and to bail him to a presbytery attached to another primary school despite bail conditions prohibiting contact with under-16s.
Dunn also told parishioners Raass’ offending was merely “inappropriate text messaging”, paid for a QC to represent Raass, and has not directly apologised to the victim’s family.