After four weeks in court, Cardinal George Pell's committal hearing ended on the eve of the most solemn day of the Catholic calendar — Good Friday.
He arrived and departed as usual, in a white car driven by a friend, which would pull up out the front of the Melbourne Magistrates' Court to allow police to form a ring of protection.
But the waiting media had waned over the weeks and just a lone supporter was left trailing him to the car as she carried a portrait of the Virgin Mary.
Journalists and the public were shut-out of the first 10 days of the hearing as the complainants gave their evidence in a closed court, which is standard practice in cases involving sexual offence charges.
The allegations
It means their evidence remains confidential.
But over the following weeks, details of the allegations made against Cardinal Pell emerged.
Among the offences, he is accused of sexual offending against two choir members at Melbourne's St Patrick's Cathedral in the late 1990s when he was Archbishop of Melbourne.
Cardinal Pell is also accused of committing sexual offences at a Ballarat pool and a cinema in the regional city during the 1970s, when he was a priest in the area.
A number of choir members, pool attendees and the cinema's projectionist were called to give evidence.
None had seen anything untoward.
A number of the charges were also dropped.
One of the complainants died before the hearing started and another was medically unfit to give evidence.
The police probe
The complainant's family members were also called to give evidence about when they had disclosed the alleged abuse.
Details of the police investigation that led to the laying of historical sexual offence charges were also revealed.
The court heard the police probe, called Operation Tethering, was set up in March 2013, before any complaints against the Cardinal had been received.
Detective Superintendent Paul Sheridan told the court it began as an "intel probe" to ascertain whether he had committed crimes that had gone unreported.
Defence barrister Robert Richter QC described it as an operation "looking for a crime because no crime had been reported".
Mr Richter asked the detective why investigating officers had put serious allegations made by complainants against a nun and teacher "on the backburner" while instead pursuing relatively "benign" allegations made against Cardinal Pell.
"They are supposed to look at serious sex offences … and they did absolutely nothing about the serious allegations that [two complainants] convey," he said.
"Instead … they single-mindedly just pursued Pell."
Detective Superintendent Sheridan rejected the assertion, telling the court there could have been a viable explanation.
The court was also told police planned to arrest and question Cardinal Pell when he returned to Australia from the Vatican to give evidence at the child abuse royal commission in December 2015.
The journalist
But he instead gave evidence to the commission via video link from Rome in February 2016 after it ruled he was too ill to return to Australia.
Over the course of the hearing, Mr Richter also accused Magistrate Belinda Wallington of bias.
He made an extraordinary application for her to disqualify herself from hearing the case, accusing her of a "biased view" of the evidence.
Ms Wallington denied the request.
Mr Richter earlier accused ABC journalist Louise Milligan of trying to "poison the public's mind" against Cardinal Pell by distorting her reporting of allegations made against him.
The award-winning journalist was grilled for a full day on her investigation which aired on ABC TV's 7.30 and detailed in Milligan's subsequent book.
Milligan told the court she stood by her work and completely denied the assertion she had tried to convince the public he was guilty.
Cardinal Pell is fighting historical sexual offence charges involving multiple complainants.
He strenuously denies the allegations.
Cardinal Pell's defence barristers and Crown prosecutors will return to court next month to make submissions before the magistrate makes a final decision on whether the case should go to trial.
An outcome is not expected for several weeks.
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