Accused paedophile barrister asked Cambodian woman to help find 'virgins'

In January, prominent barrister Mark Dennis was arrested at Sydney Airport and charged with possessing child abuse material. Weeks later, before entering a formal plea, he was found dead in his home.

An ABC investigation has uncovered Dennis's longstanding relationship with celebrated children's charity Sunrise Cambodia, where he was chairman from 2018 to 2020.

The revelations have prompted an examination of Sunrise's child protection history, raising questions about the culture of orphanages across the country.

Warning: This article contains references to child sexual abuse and suicide.

When Akara* was working at the Cambodian orphanage Sunrise, she noticed the charity's chairman, Australian barrister Mark Dennis SC, always liked spending time with "pretty girls" when he visited.

"He was always playing with the girls," she said. "He liked girls."

Her relationship with Dennis was professional, so she was surprised to receive a text message from him a few years after leaving Sunrise.

Mark Dennis: If I send a full video will you delete it after watching?

Akara didn't answer the question directly, but he persisted.

Mark Dennis: Ok I send and you can watch tonight — hope you enjoy 😂😂😂💦💦💦🍆🍆

Less than two hours later, he sent a link to a Dropbox file– the thumbnail showing an unmade bed. It was a video of him having sex with a Cambodian person.

He called her. She did not answer. He kept asking.

Akara stayed positive but said she did not want any more videos.

Mark Dennis: Do you know any Cambodian girl who speaks English and wants to find a husband?

Mark Dennis: I prefer virgin of course 😂🥰

She said she could not help him, but he kept pushing.

Mark Dennis: Any time you can help me in any way let me know — happy to reward you 😂😂😇😇

Mark Dennis: Ok you can come and watch me if you want 😂😂

Mark Dennis: Next time I find out your day off you can watch me have sex with a virgin — just for curiosity ok? 😂😂😂

Mark Dennis: I pay you $300 watch one hour 😂😂

The chat ended with Akara sending a dog-barking emoji — one final effort to make him stop.

The ABC has reviewed the metadata to verify the text messages were sent from the same number Dennis used for his legal work.

Akara said she had no idea why Dennis sent the messages and did not report them to Sunrise or police.

"I feel horrible," she told the ABC. "I'm still thinking 'Why, why, why'. It's disgusting."

In January, Dennis was charged with possessing and transmitting child abuse material, but he was found dead in his home before facing trial.

The ABC has revealed Australian and Cambodian national police are still jointly investigating Dennis's network, including his links to Sunrise, in a cross-border investigation codenamed Operation Queenstown.

Dennis sponsored a handful of children at Sunrise over many years, regularly visited these and other children in the orphanage, and maintained close relationships with some children he met through Sunrise once they left as adults.

Former Sunrise employees have alleged inappropriate behaviour by Dennis, including sexual harassment of an employee, excessive touching of teenage girls and entering children's dormitories.

None of these allegations were reported to Sunrise. A spokesperson for Sunrise said police had informed the charity that no current or former Sunrise child had been identified as one of Dennis's victims.

"We take child protection extremely seriously. Sunrise operates under Cambodian, Australian and international child protection standards, is independently audited, and any concern raised by a child or graduate is followed up thoroughly."

Now, documents obtained by Background Briefing and ABC Investigations reveal that Sunrise was made aware of allegations of misconduct, including against two former Sunrise employees and one current employee.

The claims include one historical allegation of rape by a former employee against a Sunrise girl, after being given a "final warning" for sexual misconduct years earlier.

Sunrise declined to comment on what action was taken in response to this for privacy reasons but added that some allegations that had been made to the ABC did not align with its records.

The revelations have prompted former Sunrise staff to come forward with historical concerns about the celebrated charity's policies and culture, and wider reflection across the industry about how all charities balance fundraising with child safety.

Maggie Eno, a co-founder of Cambodian children's charity M'Lop Tapang, speaking generally, said the ABC's investigation raised awareness across all charities about unsafe practices, which "goes on a lot sadly", and questioned the future of orphanages in Cambodia.

"We're not post-Khmer Rouge anymore, where there really genuinely was so many orphans. The need is not there. The need is for family-based care, community-based care," she said.

Social worker Rob Madsen, who worked as Sunrise's operations manager from 2008-2012, said there needed to be an independent investigation run by Cambodian experts into Dennis's role at Sunrise.

"There's been a significant intrusion by an alleged offender," he said. "There needs to be an arms-length investigation. If there are potential victims, those victims must be identified and provided support."

Madsen was excited to join Sunrise Cambodia in 2008, a high-profile Australian charity celebrated for helping disadvantaged children.

He had spent the previous 15 years working with government agencies and non-government organisations in child protection, and his skills were embraced by the charity's founder Geraldine Cox.

"You have strengths to bring to Sunrise that have never been offered before, and I know the children will benefit from what you have to give," Cox wrote to Madsen.

However, upon starting as operations manager, Madsen was quickly disturbed by some of what he saw.

He said a busload of tourists came to see the children, who performed dance shows, in what he described as a "revolving door" of visitors and sponsors who felt entitled to take children outside the orphanage.

"I was shocked," Madsen said. "Australians have come to Cambodia for the sole purpose of harming children, sexually abusing a child."

Madsen introduced new rules for visitors, staff and sponsors — designed to limit and supervise adult interactions with children, and record and investigate any allegations of wrongdoing.

Sunrise said it used standard guidelines provided by the Cambodian government prior to Madsen's arrival but acknowledged "more extensive" policies were developed at that time.

Madsen's framework was tested in December 2008, when an Australian sponsor emailed Cox about an interaction with a young girl who told her a Sunrise employee was a "bad man" because of something that happened in the bedroom.

"I am very concerned that he may be a paedophile or at least acting improperly … I will leave the matter in your capable hands," the sponsor wrote.

"As a primary teacher with 20 years' experience, I feel I know when children are telling the truth."

The following day, Cox responded that she was having "this looked into privately".

"But find it difficult to believe that [staff member] is guilty of anything along the lines of your message. He is a dedicated father [Sunrise term for employee] of 43 girls and has been with us for over 10 years."

In response, Madsen initially wrote to Cox saying that he thought the sponsor was "clearly overstepping her perceived role as sponsor".

He suggested the staff member not be left alone with children "so as he is not placed in a position of further accusation".

Then, Madsen said he did eventually put the staff member on watch, and when the same person was accused of sending pornographic material to a young teacher the following year, he was sacked.

Asked about this account in a series of questions, Sunrise did not respond.

Not long after, Sunrise faced a bigger crisis when a 16-year-old girl alleged she had been raped by the charity's long-term bus driver.

According to reports compiled two months after the alleged incident, the bus driver dropped the children at school but asked one girl to stay behind, then drove to a quiet plot of land, and allegedly raped her.

The girl fell pregnant and underwent an abortion. She reported what happened to Sunrise and the police. The bus driver was terminated by Sunrise but disappeared to evade police arrest, according to the documents.

This same bus driver had a history of multiple allegations of sexual misconduct towards children at Sunrise, detailed in the documents.

An incident report, written by Madsen, said the bus driver was given a "final warning" in 2004 for "abnormal sexualised behaviour" towards children, including "flirting and watching girls undress in the toilet".

"I cannot hide my feeling of anger and frustration over this, and the fact that such behaviour was not taken more seriously at the time."

Madsen wrote the staff member should have been "instantly dismissed", and he was worried the "mild action … may very well come back to bite".

He also warned Sunrise was at risk of "being exposed in the media" and said there had been "clearly a number of serious gaps" with previous management of this staff member.

"I am confident though, that we are now doing all we can to ensure the best possible protection of our children."

Sunrise said historical allegations the ABC asked it to comment on did not reflect the "substantial safeguarding measures, oversight mechanisms, and continuous improvements that Sunrise has implemented to protect children and promote their wellbeing".

Sunrise reported another case — of sexual assault by a child — to authorities, but a subsequent decision raised questions about its attitude towards offenders.

For decades, Sunrise sent Cambodian students on exchanges to private schools in Australia.

The opportunities were highly sought-after among the children, and only a handful of students were selected through a competitive process.

In 2010, a teenager was chosen to study at a prestigious boys' college in Australia despite the boy admitting to "penetrative, forced sex with a female child" in Cambodia two years earlier.

"The police were informed of the abuse," Madsen wrote to the board. "A brief record kept in the file at [Sunrise]."

However, Madsen said the boy did not undergo a psychological assessment before being selected and warned that choosing the boy sent the wrong signal to other children.

"We, by our actions, also give other children a clear message that in life, we can indeed do wrong — break rules of life and law, and in fact be rewarded without consequence."

Sunrise did not respond to specific questions about Madsen's email or the case.

Sunrise staff members have not just raised historical concerns.

The ABC has obtained a resignation letter written by a senior employee in 2020 raising concerns about another Sunrise employee, who remains employed by Sunrise at the time of publication.

In the letter, the resigning employee told Cox and other managers that this employee should not stay in his current position because "his behaviour is against child protection policy".

"He takes children to his house and he sleep in the same bed," the senior employee wrote. "And he likes to bring the children that he likes outside."

The allegation was that this man had unprofessional boundaries with children.

The ABC has spoken with two additional sources who also made claims against the same employee but did not report these to management.

Sunrise said an investigation into the 2020 letter found the bed-sharing claim was unsubstantiated but confirmed the employee had taken children to his home on multiple occasions with other people and had "shown favouritism in taking children on outings".

"[The employee] was warned about this behaviour by Sunrise management at the time," a spokesperson said. "Sunrise therefore does not accept any suggestion that the concerns about [employee] were simply disregarded."

Sunrise also released a statement on behalf of the employee, saying he "strongly rejects any suggestion of inappropriate conduct".

Sunrise was founded by Cox in the 1990s on land gifted to her by then-Cambodian prime minister Hun Sen as an orphanage for children with nowhere to go.

Cox has spoken publicly about how her infertility morphed into a maternal instinct for the children under her care.

"I feel about these children as though they are my own," she said in the documentary My Khmer Heart. "It's very difficult for me to make people understand that these are my children."

However, many of the children living at Sunrise — like other orphanages in Cambodia — have living biological families.

Madsen said he was surprised by the number of children in Sunrise who were not orphans, but had living parents or relatives.

This became apparent during his first Khmer New Year on the job, when the orphanage cleared out as children returned to stay with their families.

"That was the first light globe moment to me," he said. "And the question that came to me is, 'What's going on? They've got family?'"

Madsen hired case workers to track down family members.

The team discovered a "harrowing" case of a young girl who was incorrectly classified as an orphan. Her mother was found, but died suddenly before they could be reconnected.

"She didn't get the chance to be reunited in any sense with her mum. She went to [her] mum's funeral," Madsen said.

UNICEF has long warned about how institutional care could harm child development. Madsen said it was also cheaper to support families to send children to school while living at home, and pushed for more families to be reunited.

Sunrise acknowledged paperwork was often incomplete or missing, but said this was often out of their control, and they did their best to reunite families.

"This is the reality of life in Cambodia," Cox said.

Sunrise said helping children return to live with family, known as reintegration, has always been a priority, and that many children live in the centre due to abandonment, family violence or other factors that make it unsafe to return home.

Reports obtained by the ABC show poverty alone has also been a reason that children lived in Sunrise in the 2010s, with reports detailing parents struggling with harsh living conditions or low-paid jobs in garment factories and food markets.

"She [mother] wants to live together with the child, but she is afraid that the child cannot have a bright future if the child lives with her," one stated.

The reports also detail experiences of some Sunrise children who suffered emotionally from family separation.

"She sometimes misses her mother until she cries at night," one report stated. "He misses his mother and wants to visit his mother," another said.

Yi Soksan, who worked at Sunrise in management roles from 2010 to 2018, said Cox accepted reintegration was necessary but felt this was sometimes difficult because she had formed emotional bonds with the children.

"We don't want to hurt her [Cox], but sometimes we have no choice," he said. "She doesn't want kids back to the family."

In an email sent shortly before he left in a management restructure in 2012, Madsen said some children were made to "jump through hoops" to leave Sunrise.

"Unless there is a serious risk of abuse or neglect, I see no reason why Sunrise Children's Villages should deny the rights of this family to live together.

"To deny such rights will certainly open Sunrise to some serious criticism."

Cox said families had always been reconnected when it was safe.

"What you describe as the feelings of former staff members may well come down to nothing more than a difference of opinion as to approach and emphasis, as can happen in any workplace."

Sunrise said residential care was no longer its core program and children who continued to live there were referred by the Cambodian government or facing "imminent danger".

It said it complied with all Cambodian government regulations and had passed its last three audits with 100 per cent compliance.

"Reintegration must be carried out with great care, as once custody is handed over, we can no longer intervene," it said.

Sunrise said its child protection policies "have evolved significantly … as have international standards and practices across the NGO sector" and has sought to draw a distinction between current and prior leadership.

But in the past, Sunrise, like many other charities, promoted connections between sponsors and children to drive donations.

Meeting minutes from 2018, sent to directors including Dennis, show efforts to raise funds by increasing communication from children to donors through emails, photos and drawings.

Around Christmas and birthdays, children were asked to write letters "thanking them" for presents and asking for more money.

Sponsors also received annual reports with photographs of individual children, along with personal details, such as their weight, age, height and the "best thing you did last year".

"He always behaves like girls," one sponsor report stated about a child in 2019. "He always makes up his body very similar to the girls in girl dressing."

Other reports included a 10-year-old girl's history of sexual abuse, and another child's experience of domestic violence.

Responding to questions about whether this breached the children's privacy and created an unhealthy dynamic between sponsors and children, a Sunrise spokesperson said this practice was "immediately stopped and new child privacy policies were applied" under current leadership.

"Child histories are now strictly confidential, even among staff and children. However, children are of [course] free to speak about their own background."

M'Lop Tapang co-founder Maggie Eno said fundraising was difficult, but there should be "zero contact" between children and sponsors.

"They're not friends. They're not uncles or aunties. They are strangers to that child," she said. "They have a power dynamic over that child, and they don't have the right to be playing with that child."

She said the charity sector in Cambodia had come a long way in the past two decades, but she was surprised that child sponsorship was still being used.

"It's just inconceivable that a sponsor and a child would even know each other, " she said. "In 2026, I just can't really fathom the idea that that still goes on, to be honest."

Former Sunrise director Peter Winkler, who said he had not been involved since 2015, said children "should never be used as attractions for fundraising or tourism".

"My understanding is that SCV [Sunrise] has not kept up with the times."

Winkler, who now advocates to end residential care in Cambodia, said the Dennis case should be handled transparently and had broader lessons for all donors.

"Australian-funded charities working overseas are, in many ways, a reflection of Australian values, and we have an obligation to undertake due diligence."

Listen to Dark Menace, a three-part investigative podcast from Background Briefing and ABC Investigations, via the ABC Listen app or wherever you get your podcasts.