Cardinal Desmond Connell complained to the Dublin Archdiocese Commission of Investigation last month that complaints or allegations made against almost all of the 46 priests chosen by it as its representative sample, were made when he was Archbishop of Dublin, The Irish Timeshas learnt.
It has also transpired that the commission employed a statistician to help it make sure the sample was representative of the period under investigation.
The commission is investigating the handling of complaints in the archdiocese between January 1st, 1975 and May 1st, 2004.
Cardinal Connell was archbishop of Dublin from March 26th, 1988 to April 6th, 2004. It is believed a list of the priests named was supplied by the commission to the cardinal last July.
Cardinal Connell requested a copy of the statistician's report last summer and refused to make a submission to the commission or meet its representatives, as invited, when his request was denied. The refusal by the commission is believed to have been on the grounds that no one else had seen the report.
In mid-December, the cardinal expressed shock to the commission that it had been in negotiation with his successor Archbishop Diarmuid Martin about how to ascertain whether diocesan documents, discovered to the commission by Archbishop Martin, were privileged or not, without the cardinal being informed first by the commission.
It is believed the cardinal asserted the documents were privileged to him, not Archbishop Martin, and that he had not waived that privilege.
Privilege in law is intended to allow for complete frankness between lawyer and client and protects communications between a legal adviser and his client from disclosure, provided that they are in fact confidential and that legal advice is being sought. The cardinal is also understood to have said he was not aware until November last that Archbishop Martin had sworn an affidavit of discovery the previous June detailing for the commission all 66,583 documents relevant to its inquiry, including those 5,586 over which the cardinal claims privilege.
He claimed it was mid-November last before he became aware of a previous order of discovery, dealing with relevant documents, made by the commission on Archbishop Martin in June 2006. The cardinal believed he should have been told by the commission in advance of this order of discovery.
He is understood to have told the commission that, in the circumstances, it had failed him in this, particularly where the privileged documents were concerned.
Relations between the commission and the cardinal are understood to have became particularly strained last month, with the commission rejecting all of his allegations of being treated unfairly. The commission told the cardinal that it has powers to look at all documents it deems relevant to its investigation, including those which it may later decide are covered by privilege.