The former Bishop of Broome, Christopher Saunders will face court today, charged with 19 offences, after being arrested at his Kimberley home.
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00:00 Bishop Christopher Saunders is 74 years old and for decades he's been one of the best
00:07 known figures up here in the Kimberley region.
00:09 He was actually ordained a priest here in Broome in 1976 and for the almost 30 years
00:15 has actually been the bishop, so responsible for this very large area that takes in nine
00:20 parishes, very remote.
00:22 Many of those parishes are actually former Catholic missions, so the Catholic Church
00:25 is very influential here in the local Aboriginal communities.
00:29 It was about four years ago Ruby that allegations first surfaced early 2020 of sexual assault
00:36 allegations made by several young Indigenous men.
00:40 Now Bishop Saunders has always denied any wrongdoing.
00:44 Subsequently there have been several different both WA police investigations and internal
00:49 Catholic Church investigations.
00:53 The initial police investigation was closed about two years ago without any charges being
00:58 laid.
00:59 Things kicked off again late last year with a fresh criminal investigation.
01:04 Things came to a bit of a head late yesterday afternoon here in Broome just as a tropical
01:08 storm was about to sweep through town.
01:12 Police went into Bishop Saunders' property in suburban Broome, brought him out, put him
01:18 into a police van and he was arrested.
01:20 We've since been able to confirm that he is facing 19 criminal charges.
01:25 They are three counts of indecently dealing with a child, two counts of sexual penetration
01:30 without consent, that is of an adult, and the remainder are unlawful and indecent assault
01:37 charges.
01:38 So Erin, what's happening in Broome today?
01:43 Well we're here at the Broome courthouse.
01:46 We were expecting Bishop Saunders to appear at about nine o'clock this morning.
01:51 That appearance has been delayed.
01:52 We understand he did spend last night in police custody.
01:55 The initial decision was made by police to deny him bail.
01:59 That however we presume will be reconsidered at this first scheduled court appearance,
02:04 which we understand is due now at 11.30 WA time.
02:09 It's not expected he will be entering a charge at this stage, but we have to wait and see
02:13 whether police will apply to actually deny him bail and what his legal representation
02:20 will be.
02:21 There's been a very shocked reaction here in the local community, Ruby.
02:27 It's been many, many years of speculation, tabloid headlines, and to get to this point
02:35 with criminal charges being laid in some sense, some people are sort of not as surprised,
02:42 but there have actually been local people turning up here at the courthouse that have
02:45 been watching this case very, very closely.
02:47 As I said, he's a very high profile.
02:49 He's been quite an influential and powerful figure here in the Kimberley region.
02:53 So there's a lot of interest here in the local community, and I guess more broadly in terms
02:57 of the Catholic Church.
03:00 He's quite a senior cleric to be facing such serious charges.
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