A priest who served in Parkes in the 1980s has been found dead in his home as the Anglican church prepares for a hearing into child sexual abuse allegations against him.
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Reverend Campbell Brown, aged 80, died in Newcastle last Sunday.
The royal commission is to hold a public hearing in 2016 into child sex allegations involving the Anglican Church in the Hunter region.
Two years ago, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse heard evidence that Reverend Brown had ‘‘made an implied admission of guilt’’ about sexually assaulting a boy at Lismore’s North Coast Children’s Home in the early 1960s.
Reverend Brown made the admission in 2005 to the then Grafton diocese registrar Reverend Patrick Comben, who was defrocked earlier this year for his failure to act on child sex allegations.
Former Grafton Bishop Keith Slater was defrocked for failing to act when allegations against Reverend Brown and fellow Newcastle clergyman Allan Kitchingman were raised with the Anglican Church in 2005.
While the NSW Police Sex Crimes Squad in Sydney was advised of some allegations against Reverend Brown in 2006, it was not told about the implied admission of guilt.
Reverend Brown was expected to be defrocked after a church professional standards board hearing planned for the near future.
He was born in 1935, was a parishioner at St Stephen’s Church at Adamstown in the 1940s, attended Morpeth theological college, and was a priest in the NSW north coast region until returning to Waratah in 1966. He was a priest in Parkes from 1982 to 1989 and at Mudgee between 1993 and 1997.
Reverend Brown returned to Newcastle by 2006 and attended Christ Church Cathedral. More recently he was an organist at Raymond Terrace.
Anglican Bishop Greg Thompson said his thoughts and prayers were with Reverend Brown’s wife and family.
“They need our comfort and care in this season of grief and bereavement,” he said.
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