The trial of a Catholic priest accused of indecently dealing with a student at an exclusive Brisbane boy’s school has heard victims were photographed together.

March 7, 2019

A Catholic priest accused of groping a Brisbane schoolboy and coercing him to strip nude for photos also forced students to touch each other, a court has heard.

On trial is Michael Ambrose Endicott, 75, who pleaded not guilty to eight historical charges of indecent treatment a child under 12 and a child under 16 while he worked at Villanova College.

He is accused of intimately touching a student at the school and coercing him to strip nude for photos over a six-year period between 1975 and 1981.

The witness, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court the alleged victim confided details about the abuse while they were housemates in the 90s.

(The alleged victim) said the boys were made to commit sexual acts on each other while Endicott photographed them, the witness told the Brisbane District Court trial on Wednesday.

“I (also) got the impression on more than one occasion that something had happened anally.”

The witness said she was only the second person the alleged victim had told about his experiences.

He felt sadness and guilt as the recollections flooded back to him during the following weeks, she said.

“He talked about the abuse going on for a number of years.”

Endicott was a priest in charge of pastoral care and religious education of children during the 1970s, the court has heard.

Prosecutors believe the abuse of the alleged victim began on a school hiking trip in 1975.

Endicott allegedly asked him to take off his clothes and pose for photographs after taking him to a secluded area along a creek.

Three years later, Endicott again coerced that boy to strip naked and pose for photographs after luring him into the school’s flag tower.

Endicott is also accused of touching his genitals during an excursion.

The following year at a school sports afternoon, the priest took the boy, who was by then a teenager, into a change room and told him to strip naked and shower while he took photos, prosecutors allege.

Other witnesses, who were students at the school in the 70s, told the court that being photographed by Endicott became a “badge of honour” and they were asked to either strip or reveal much of their bodies during the private sessions.

The trial continues.