Page:Pell v The Queen.pdf/35

Kiefel CJ

Bell J

Gageler J

Keane J

Nettle J

Gordon J

Edelman J

Q. Would he be robed or unrobed?

A. I've seen him both ways. For instance, after he'd gone to the sacristy and disrobed and he'd be in his normal clerical garb."

100 It is by no means evident that Mallinson was departing from his evidence that, on the occasions when Mallinson saw the applicant in his robes, Portelli was always with him. It may be observed that Mallinson acknowledged that the applicant was a stickler for protocol and conservative in terms of church liturgy and tradition.

101The honesty of the opportunity witnesses was not in question. Portelli and Potter each gave evidence that Portelli accompanied the applicant to the priests' sacristy after solemn Mass on 15 and 22 December 1996. There appears to have been agreement that, in light of Potter's apparent infirmity, notwithstanding the grant of leave to cross-examine him, the prosecutor was not required to comply with the rule in Browne v Dunn. This understanding did not apply to Portelli. Portelli's evidence in this respect was unchallenged.

102 So, too, was the evidence that Catholic church teaching requires an archbishop to be accompanied while in a church, at least while the archbishop is robed, unchallenged. And the evidence that it was Portelli's role as the applicant's master of ceremonies to ensure that this requirement was complied with was unchallenged. Whatever is made of Nathan's and Mayes' evidence of the applicant coming into the choir room in the Knox Centre, it was not evidence of the applicant being unaccompanied while robed in the Cathedral. Bonomy's evidence is a slim foundation for finding that the practice of ensuring that the applicant was accompanied while he was in the Cathedral was not adhered to. It provides no foundation for excluding the reasonable possibility that Portelli's actual recall of accompanying the applicant to the priests' sacristy after solemn Mass on 15 and 22 December 1996 was accurate.

103 There was a powerful body of evidence of the applicant's practice of greeting congregants on the Cathedral steps following Sunday solemn Mass and that, while the length of this "meet and greet" varied, it occupied at least ten minutes. The applicant's practice in this respect contrasted with that of his predecessor, Archbishop Little. Portelli served as master of ceremonies for both