Former Boarding School Disciplinarian Jailed for Child Sex Offences

An elderly former staff member of a Queensland Catholic boarding school, once accused of being part of a suspected paedophile ring with his son, has been jailed for unrelated child sex crimes committed decades later.

James Michael Crisp, 87, a former “head of discipline” at St Teresa’s College, Abergowrie, was sentenced in the Maroochydore District Court last month to six months in prison for rape, indecent treatment, and maintaining an unlawful relationship with a young girl between 2009 and 2014.

Crisp was named in a 2023 internal church report, Connections at St Teresa’s, which detailed allegations of a network of sex offenders linked to the school in the 1990s. The report alleged that Crisp and his son, David Justin Crisp, targeted some of the same victims, but James Crisp was never charged over the historic abuse.

David Crisp, 57, a former dormitory master at the school, spent more than 30 years on the run before being arrested and jailed in May for child sex offences committed at St Teresa’s.

Of seven men named in the church report, four, including both Crisps, have now been convicted of child sex crimes. Only David Crisp has been jailed for offences at the school.

The report raised concerns of “multiple alleged/potential perpetrators” who were professionally connected, helped each other secure jobs, and allegedly shared victims. It named former principal James Doran, a convicted serial child sex offender, as having a close relationship with the Crisp family. Doran died in prison in 2018 while serving a 13-year sentence for offences at other schools.

Survivor accounts contained in the report describe assaults by James Crisp, David Crisp, and Doran, including violent rapes and physical punishments of a sexual nature. In one case, the Catholic Church paid $85,000 to settle a complaint from a former student, and other allegations were referred to police as recently as 2022.

Townsville Catholic Education chief executive Jacqui Francis has acknowledged that past handling of abuse allegations at St Teresa’s was “totally inadequate”.

“We acknowledge historical abuse and the pain and suffering that past students have been subjected to,” she said. “No student or family should be subjected to this pain.”

James and David Crisp are expected to be released from prison around the same time early next year.