Bishop of Broome Christopher Saunders to leave diocese for six months amid police and Vatican investigations

The Vatican has sent a veteran Australian Catholic Bishop at the centre of separate police and church investigations on six months of “sabbatical leave” to be spent outside his outback diocese.

Bishop of Broome Christopher Saunders voluntarily stood aside in March, after it emerged he was the subject of a two-year police investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct.

No charges have been laid, and Bishop Saunders has strenuously denied the allegations.

At the same time, the Vatican launched its own, separate investigation into the Bishop’s administration of the Broome Diocese, which he has led since 1995, and which has been hit by a series of scandals.

Bishop Saunders has remained in Broome throughout the investigation, and…