Brian Houston, the founder of Hillsong, has returned to court for final submissions in his trial on a charge of failing to report his father Frank Houston’s sexual assault of a child.
Brett Sengstock, the victim, is also in court 2.5 in Sydney’s cavernous Downing Centre, the home of the lower-level district courts.
Outlining the prosecution’s written submission, Gareth Harrison appearing for the Crown said that the main area of dispute in the case was that Brian Houston had “no reasonable excuse” for not reporting his father, Frank Houston’s pedophile crimes to the police.
“The Crown submits that the reason was that the accused was trying to protect the reputation of the Church and his father.”
At the heart of the Crown’s case is that Sengstock “Never told the accused that he did not want [the abuse] reported to the police.” In any case, “Mr Sengstock’s attitude had nothing to do with the accused motivation in the Crown’s submission.”
The Crown built a circumstantial case for a cover-up by Brian Houston. A culture of cover-up in the Australian Christian Churches or Assemblies of God (the denomination’s name at the time) was a “surrounding circumstance”: that formed the centrepiece of their case.
Brian Houston had given the National Executive of the church information that led them to make him to be the only conduit between the victim and some of the key complainants, the crown suggested. He failed to tell them that Sengstock had said he was wavering on going to the police.
While the executive minutes were not clear, the Crown suggested it was Brian Houston was the executive member who had obtained legal advice on whether the executive should report Frank Houston to the police. The Crown suggested it was ; the logical inference that Brian Houston had lied to the executive.
Rather than being a only failure to manage a conflict of interest, the Crown submitted the National Executive decision to put Brian Houston in charge of communicating with Frank Houston and Brett Sengstock was a result of Brain Houston limiting the information he had given them.
The church culture of dealing with scandal in-house meant that Brian Houston could tell committee members of his two churches explicit details, confident they would not go to the police.
The Crown also submitted that Penstock was under pressure from his great Aunt Barbara Taylor, the minister that his mother had first told Sengstock’s story. She was heaping on pressure for the church to act but to keep it in-house.
The Crown submitted that Brians Houston’s public statements to the media and in sermons were vaguer, only responding to the spread of rumours. Using the term “serious moral failure” rather than describing Frank Houston’s activity as child sexual abuse had the “intent of concealing the true extent of Frank Houston’s behaviour”.
In a 2002 sermon, the term “a very serious moral accusation’ concealed what George Aghajanian, the Hillsong General Manager, had told Brian Houston in a detailed account about his father . It was an example of Brian Houston “giving little bits and pieces of information. “These phrases have the intent of concealing the true extent of Frank Houston’s behaviour.”
“But why say anything in the sermon?” Magistrate Garrett Christofi asked.
“The cat was coming out of the bag,” Harrison responded.
“But why help it out of the bag?” The magistrate asked.
“We know the rumours were building,” Harrison said. The sermon was “evidence of the rumours getting too much.”
“He limited [the description] because he had to conceal what Frank Houston had done, and that theme runs through all the sermons and public announcements. He was restricting the information because that was what he had to do.”
“But what was the serious moral failure?” Magistrate Christofi asked. People would be asking this as they had coffee after church. The truth would have come out.”
In a large congregation, you had to be a little euphemistic. There were children there.”
“There was no evidence put of what your honour just said. Harrison replied. “The language used in the sermon is designed to fool the people, to conceal,” said Harrison going on to criticise Brian Houston for not using the word victim or mentioning that there was one.
The Crown concluded its case by declaring Brian Houston a liar. “He refused to admit that part of his role was to protect the church, he said it was his job to care for it.
“He said he had told Pastor Barbara Taylor at their first meeting the full details, but Taylor said he did not. It is beyond belief that she would have forgotten that graphic detail.”
Of their accusation of untruthfulness, “the Crown submits that the same is true of all the public announcements.”
The Crown highlighted what it considered weak point in Brian Houston’s testimony. “He was asked if he considered scandal would have been chased if [franks Houston’s crimes] were made public. He refused to accept that. He was not being honest.”
“He did not tell the national executive that money was paid [to Sengstock]. He would not admit that he did not tell them – of course, it would be in the minutes [if he had]. He was not being honest.
Beyond a reasonable doubt.
The core of the defence statement has been in the words reasonable doubt, with the prosecution told that they needed to establish Brian Houston had no reasonable excuse for failing to report Frank Houston’s sexual abuse beyond reasonable doubt.
Referring to a change in the law since the events on trials, Philip Boulten SC, Brian Houston’s defence barrister, said ‘“You know if it happened now, there is a specific carve out my client would be acquitted like this (clicks fingers).”
Section 316 of the Crimes Act now specifies that if an adult child sexual assault victim says that they do not wish the offence to be reported, that does provide a reasonable excuse to people who come into a knowledge of the offence.
“That is translatable back into when this happened is my submission. We say the Crown has taken on too much a burden.” Boulten noted that the prosecution case was built on saying every time that Brian Houston’s recollection differed from somebody else’s, then that was enough to call him a liar.
Boulten pointed to problems the evidence the victim Brett Sengstock had given about whether he wanted to report to the police. “Sengstock gave evidence in a very confusing way as to what his attitude was in the charge period 1999 to 2004.
“There can be absolutely no doubt that in the charge period, Brett Sengstock did not wish a word of this to be published. This is why he was devastated when his mother said what she said to Mr Mudford [the Pentecostal evangelist who insisted that it should be pursued.]
“He was entrenched {in not wanting action to be taken] when he was pursued by Mr Mudford. The he was pursued by Barbara Taylor his auntie, he was further entrenched.
“He was concerned that the church might rake through things … he was concerned that he might be portrayed as someone with inappropriate sexual attitudes.”
Boulten pointed to the law’s concern to give sexual assault victims control of the flow of information. “The complainant should be in charge of whether the police take action against their perpetrator.”
He pointed out that the defence of “reasonable excuse is not qualified”. No matter the seriousness or scale of the offending. In particular, “there is no requirement for the person charged under section 316 to interrogate the reasoning of the victim.”
“The fact that others might be disappointed inn the church, or as someone who brought discredit upon it, or exposed as a sexual deviant does not affect his control over the flow of the information. A reasonable excuse defence that [needs to be denied by] proof beyond reasonable doubt.”
The discussion turned to whether mixed motives might dilute a reasonable excuse defence.
“You can have more than one reason” [not to report to the police], Boulten said.
“An excuse can be reasonable and convenient?” Asked magistrate Christi.
“Yes,” replied Boulten. “My client was Frank Houston’s son. None of us like the idea that our father would be exposed as a pedophile. He was his (Brian’s) spiral role model.
“My client is a human being.
“Just because it was convenient for it not to be prosecuted, my client is not without reasonable excuse. Brett Sengstock said he did not want it to be reported.”
Carefully pointing out that Sengstock did not try to give false evidence or lie, Boulten pointed out inconsistencies between his evidence and his mother’s diary account of when he told he of the sexual abuse.
Turning to the question of whether Brian Houston was a reliable witness or a liar Boukten said, “An important plank of the evidence put forward [by the prosecution] is that my client was the chief architect of a churchwidje cover-up for four years. Your Honour should be very cautious about this because the evidence is so flimsy.”
Bolton took the court through areas where witnesses differed with Brian Houston, especially on the topic of whether Brett Sengstock had wanted to report Frank Houston to the police. Barbara Taylor had a story from Sengstock’s mother about him going to a chamber magistrate or in Sengstock’s version a solicitor.
“Likely he sat in a lawyer’s office but backed out,” said Boulten. “The fact that Mr Sengstock thought about talking to a lawyer, but did not talk to a lawyer, but did nothing is a given. It helps the accused. It is the foundation stone of our case.”