Former Marist College Canberra teacher Brother "Kostka" Chute will face a hearing over alleged historic sexual abuse offences against young boys after losing his second bid to bring proceedings to a halt.
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John William Chute, 86, may not have to attend the hearing due to ill health and instead watch via an audio visual link from his nursing home.
Chute is facing 16 offences relating to six alleged victims at Marist College Canberra in the 1970s and 1980s.
In 2017 Chute was found unfit to be tried, the court hearing he suffered from Parkinson's disease and dementia, and had been found unfit to plead in the NSW District Court.
The ruling meant he would instead face a special hearing, under the ACT's mental health laws, and even if found guilty would likely avoid conviction.
His lawyers argued the special hearing - similar to a trial - should not go ahead due to his declining physical and mental health, the change in testimony of an alleged victim in another case and the "inadequate" police investigation.
But in the ACT's Supreme Court on Monday, Justice David Mossop dismissed the second application for a permanent stay on the case, paving the way for the special hearing to proceed.
The court heard Chute was physically and mentally unable to maintain a meaningful conversation and was expected to be transferred to a high dependency unit of a nursing home within a year.
It was submitted his physical and mental condition had further deteriorated over 2018 and early 2019 and that he would be a "virtually passive participant in the trial" unable to give or receive proper legal instructions.
The judge alone trial in the ACT Supreme Court will likely begin this week.
Justice Mossop is considering whether Chute will be able to watch proceedings via audio visual link from his nursing home due to poor health.
A police statement of facts, tendered in court at his committal in 2017, said the abuse against one of the alleged victims began when Chute touched the boy's genitals from behind as the child patted the teacher's labrador at school one day in 1980.
Later that year, Chute allegedly touched the same boy's genitals over his pants as they sat in chapel.
On another occasion he inappropriately touched the child beneath his underwear in the monastery, court documents said.
A second alleged victim claimed Chute had fondled his genitals after giving him a bear hug when he returned a borrowed cassette tape to his office in 1985.
