Father Peter Lewis Comensoli

Peter Lewis Comensoli (not to be confused with the current Archbishop of Melbourne, Peter Andrew Comensoli) was born around 1939 and educated in Catholic schools around Wollongong. He was ordained as a priest in 1965 at the age of 26. He would go on to minister in parishes in the Wollongong Diocese.

It is reported that throughout his service in Wollongong, Father P.L Comensoli was a well known and popular parish priest. However, in 1997, the Royal Commission into the New South Wales Police Service in Final Report Volume V: The Paedophile Inquiry, describes how due to the inaction by the Catholic hierarchy in Wollongong, Father Comensoli (with his partner in crime, Brother Michael Evans – Principal at Edmund Rice College) were allowed to sexually abuse boys  for numerous years within the Wollongong Diocese even after many complaints have been made against them. This all changed, however, in 1993 when a revealing story was published in the local newspaper, The Illawarra Mercury, which led NSW Police interviewing and charging Father Comensoli after receiving many more allegations of sexual abuse by Father Comensoli. In October 1994, Father Peter Lewis Comensoli (then aged 55) was sentenced to 24 months jail (18 months minimum) in the Sydney District Court after pleading guilty to the indecent assault of altar boys who were 10 and 17 years old, respectively. The offences occurred in his presbytery between 1979 and 1982. Both incidents involved the same behaviour - Father Comensoli would playfully wrestle with the boys, touch and grasp the boys’ genitals, show them pornographic images, provide them with cigarettes and alcohol and use grossly sexual language.

We invite former victims of Father Peter Lewis Comensoli to tell us confidentially what information they may have, and we will explain what options are available to help with these cases.

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