A retired French cardinal has offered to hand himself into the police after he admitted to abusing a 14-year-old girl nearly four decades ago.
Cardinal Jean-Pierre Ricard, who stepped down as Archbishop of Bordeaux in 2019, issued a statement confessing his guilt and expressing regret for the harm he had done to the victim.
He said: “Thirty-five years ago, when I was a parish priest, I behaved in a reprehensible way with a young girl aged 14.
“My behaviour has inevitably led to grave and lasting consequences for this person.”
