Bishop: Sex abuse still denied
By SAM PAZZANO, COURTS BUREAU
The bishop for a Northern Ontario diocese admitted yesterday the diocese still denied Father Thomas O'Dell had sexually abused boys even 10 months after Ontario's highest court upheld the priest's convictions for sodomizing a boy with a crucifix.
And Bishop Jean-Louis Plouffe testified at a civil trial his diocese never apologized to victim John Doe, now 33, or his family for the "callous and depraved" sex attacks.
"I don't think so because I don't think it (apology) was ever asked of me," Plouffe told Doe's lawyer, Peter Downard.
Plouffe, his diocese and O'Dell admitted his criminal convictions for the civil proceedings in January. The admissions came 13 months after the appeals court dismissed O'Dell's appeal and he started serving a 30-month sentence in a Kingston penitentiary.
O'Dell was also convicted of acts of gross indecency against two brothers in the early 1980s. He admitted he attached the brothers' genitalia to a rope- and-pulley system under the guise of "spiritual and personal growth."
Doe -- who cannot be identified because of a court order -- is suing the Roman Catholic diocese and O'Dell. He's seeking almost $4 million in damages for the sexual assaults inflicted from 1981 through 1986.
Downard accused Plouffe of "embarking on an exercise of assessing O'Dell's credibility" after the criminal courts and Court of Appeal found him guilty.
"The law is a human institution and sometimes they fail," replied Plouffe, who added while he "doesn't know" if O'Dell did it he was convicted and "we accepted the verdicts."
The defence argues the damages sought are excessive, remote and beyond the statute of limitations. The trial continues Tuesday.
By SAM PAZZANO, COURTS BUREAU
The bishop for a Northern Ontario diocese admitted yesterday the diocese still denied Father Thomas O'Dell had sexually abused boys even 10 months after Ontario's highest court upheld the priest's convictions for sodomizing a boy with a crucifix.
And Bishop Jean-Louis Plouffe testified at a civil trial his diocese never apologized to victim John Doe, now 33, or his family for the "callous and depraved" sex attacks.
"I don't think so because I don't think it (apology) was ever asked of me," Plouffe told Doe's lawyer, Peter Downard.
Plouffe, his diocese and O'Dell admitted his criminal convictions for the civil proceedings in January. The admissions came 13 months after the appeals court dismissed O'Dell's appeal and he started serving a 30-month sentence in a Kingston penitentiary.
O'Dell was also convicted of acts of gross indecency against two brothers in the early 1980s. He admitted he attached the brothers' genitalia to a rope- and-pulley system under the guise of "spiritual and personal growth."
Doe -- who cannot be identified because of a court order -- is suing the Roman Catholic diocese and O'Dell. He's seeking almost $4 million in damages for the sexual assaults inflicted from 1981 through 1986.
Downard accused Plouffe of "embarking on an exercise of assessing O'Dell's credibility" after the criminal courts and Court of Appeal found him guilty.
"The law is a human institution and sometimes they fail," replied Plouffe, who added while he "doesn't know" if O'Dell did it he was convicted and "we accepted the verdicts."
The defence argues the damages sought are excessive, remote and beyond the statute of limitations. The trial continues Tuesday.
