The Catholic Church has been forced to apologise to outraged parents who only learned their parish priest had been convicted of sex offences through a story on Stuff.
Sosefo Sateki Raass quit the priesthood after pleading guilty to indecent communication with a person under 16 in March 2019. He was sentenced to 100 hours community service. But not until Stuff reported his offending this month did his parishioners, and the board and parents of two schools in his pastoral care, learn why he’d left.
One parent of a Marist student said he was “irate” that the church had once again opted to cover up, rather than be open about offending by its priests.
Raass admitted possessing semi-nude photographs of a teenage girl, which she had sent to him over Facebook. He was initially stood down, then applied to be laicised.