Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1494707
14 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 12 MARCH 2023 NEWS Content warning: This story is about child sexual abuse. It may contain graphic descriptions and strong lan- guage, and may be confronting and disturbing. If you need help, please see support services. 'Luca' Luca was one of numerous siblings, and since it was the 1950s in Malta and his mother had mental health issues, his parents struggled to provide adequate care. Luca was approximately 10 when he and several of his brothers were placed in a Catholic orphanage. When he was 13, Luca and his brothers were placed on a boat bound for Australia as part of the Catholic migration scheme, and sent to a boys' home run by the Christian Brothers. " "There was no schooling for us be- cause we couldn't even speak English. So for the first three weeks we stood in school just like dummies… I'd never had no schooling whatsoever after that." The Brothers who looked after Lu- ca were frequently cruel and dealt out harsh punishments for the slightest misdemeanours. If Luca made a mistake while working, which happened often since he'd never been on a farm before, he was viciously beaten. When Luca was 15 years old, Brother Daniels fetched him from his dormi- tory, took him into another room and instructed him to kneel on the ground where he was forced to hold his arms out in a crucifix position. "I thought he was going to get me to pray or some- thing. He made me kneel down and he put my pyjamas and he tied them around my head, around my eyes. And I felt somebody grabbing my two arms like that. And then he lift my shirt up and he dropped my pants down and he masturbated on my back." Following the abuse, Luca ran away from the home, but was found by the police and returned to the home where he received a beating. Back at the farm Luca continued to work hard for no pay. In addition to physical violence, he en- countered racism from the clergy and slowly began to learn English, to avoid the punishments he received for speak- ing Maltese. "I said to Brother Superior, I said 'How come I don't get no mail?' He said 'How can you get mail yourself from dead par- ents?' And I couldn't tell my brothers, I didn't want to break their heart. I kept it to myself." In the early 1990s he discovered his mother was still alive in Malta and had been told the boat carrying Luca and his brothers had sunk and she had lost her sons. He also discovered his father had died two years before. Realising the Christian Brothers had lied about the death of his parents, Luca mourned his father and made several trips to visit his mother in Malta before she too passed away. With no education, Luca spent his adult life working manual labour jobs. He continues to suffer from depression and insomnia, has considered suicide and has been married several times. Hav- ing never previously disclosed the abuse, it wasn't until he had a breakdown that his current wife realised something was wrong and helped him seek counselling. 'Valentin' After disembarking in Western Aus- tralia when he was 5, Valentin and his sister went to live in a Catholic orphan- age run by the Sisters of Mercy. Two years later, Valentin was removed was placed in a home run by the Christian Brothers where he discovered a cul- ture of violence that still haunts him to this day. In addition to physical abuse, Valentin was sexually abused by one of the Brothers in his dormitory. "One night Brother Flanagan came to my bed. I was crying because I had wet my bed. He knelt down beside my bed and started to rub my hair and my stomach. Then his hands went down my pyjamas and he played with my penis." After being moved from a dorm into a smaller room sharing with only one oth- er boy, Brother Flanagan started coming to his room. "Every now and then he would put my hand on his penis and he told me to play with it while he was ly- ing over me… He would give me lots of lollies. He told me not to say anything to anyone, this was our secret." Unable to bring himself to disclose Brother Flanagan's nightly visits, Valentin complained to his father about the physical abuse. Eventually his father removed Valentin from the Christian Brothers' home and brought him home to live with him. After finishing school, Valentin found work as a labourer while attending voca- tional college to improve his literacy. He lacked self-esteem, had poor communi- cation skills and, confused by Brother Flanagan's attention, started engaging in sexually inappropriate behaviour. Valentin went to see a doctor at 18 who referred him to a psychiatrist. He was diagnosed with anxiety and depression related to childhood trauma and pre- scribed medication, which he has con- tinued to take for most of his adult life. It wasn't until his thirties that he first disclosed the sexual abuse to a counsel- lor. In the late 1990s, Valentin was offered $2,000 as part of a class action against the Christian Brothers, a figure he found insulting and refused to accept. "I said, 'My car's worth more than that'." Ten years later he was awarded a compen- sation payment of $30,000 through To- wards Healing and a further ex gratia payment of $45,000 from the Redress WA scheme. "I'm getting better all the time now. Like I've even gone off the medication. But I still keep to myself, you know. I'm sort of like a loner." 'Tumus' Placed in an orphanage at 4 because his parents had a large number of chil- dren and found it impossible to look af- ter them all in their small house, at 10 he was sent to Australia as a child migrant, with several of his brothers. "I was told... As Dery Sultana's Who Would You Tell? documentary on the abuse endured by the Ellul brothers in the Maltese-Australian child migrant scheme premieres earlier this week, MaltaToday reproduces the stories of persons, all first generation Maltese child migrants, who had testified to the Royal Australian Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. Real names of individuals have not been used. Compiled by Matthew Vella In toxic age of poverty and abuse, Maltese child migrants suffered untold cruelty all their lives "One night Brother Flanagan came to my bed. I was crying because I had wet my bed. He knelt down beside my bed and started to rub my hair and my stomach. Then his hands went down my pyjamas..."