Marist Brother Gregory Sutton fled from Australia but was eventually brought to justice

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 		Broken Rites Australia helps victims of church-related
sex-abuse.

By a Broken Rites researcher

Marist Brother Gregory Joseph Sutton must rank as one of Australia's most publicised child-sex offenders. Throughout 1996, his name appeared frequently in newspapers. The reports described how police hunted for him in the United States and then extradited him to Australia, where he pleaded guilty to numerous offences against boys and girls.

Brother Gregory Sutton (born in Australia on 19 March 1951) taught at Catholic primary schools in New South Wales in the 1970s and 1980s.

According to his own admissions, he committed numerous sexual assaults on boys and girls, aged between 9 and 11, who were under his supervision. The offences ranged from touching and rubbing genitals to full sexual intercourse with a 10-year-old girl. The assaults took place in classrooms, in his monastery bedroom, in the playground, in cars, a caravan, bushland and in the children's homes.

Sutton often assaulted two children at once, forcing them to engage in sex acts with each other. He indecently mauled some pupils in front of their classmates.

He assaulted one boy on his eleventh birthday as "a present".

The police brief in the Sutton case stated: "In all these matters, the accused had the complete trust of the family of the young victims and took advantage of his position as a teacher and a Marist Brother."

According to Sutton's own admissions, the sexual assaults occurred at:

  • a Marist primary school (later re-named Marist Sacred Heart) in Mosman, Sydney, in 1976;

  • Marist Brothers, Eastwood, Sydney in 1978;

  • St Thomas More primary school in Campbelltown, Sydney, in 1984; and

  • St Carthage’s primary school in Lismore (northern NSW) between 1985 and 1987.
In 1989, one of Brother Sutton's victims (a girl) reported his offences to police but Sutton (then aged 38) fled from Australia a few weeks later before police could interview him. He settled in the USA, where he stayed for seven years.

Sutton's references from Australia helped him to obtain employment in Catholic education in the US. He was now a lay teacher, as distinct from a Marist Brother. He eventually became principal of a Catholic school (St Dismas School in Florissant, Missouri), holding this job for two years.

After Australian police issued arrest warrants for Sutton in 1992 and 1993, they suspected that he was in the US and asked the US authorities to find him.

US deputies learned in February 1994 that he was living in St Louis, Missouri.

He was arrested there and, after a court battle in the US, was extradited to Australia.

The extradition made news in Missouri (e.g., in the St Louis Post Despatch, 16 August 1995). He was named in metropolitan daily papers throughout Australia and also in the newspapers of the towns where he had taught. In 1996 the Lismore Northern Star, published frequent reports on the Sutton case, as well as photographs of Sutton.

By late 1996, aged 45, Sutton was in jail in New South Wales, serving a sentence of 18 years maximum (with the minimum term eventually fixed at 12 years, after which he would become eligible for parole).