“The Clan”

To those who deny it exists: "rumour" and "innuendo" 

Sylvia’s Site   Blogging the Inquiry

  Excerpt from Ron Leroux Affidavit

13 November 1996:

"I have witnessed sexual improprieties, molestations, fondling, oral sex, intercourse (anal) between the above-named "clan " members and minors through the period of 1957 or 1958 to 1993. These sexual improprieties with minors (male) occurred at Cameron’s Point, Summerstown, Ontario; Birch Avenue, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, U.S.A.; Saltaire Motel, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, U.S.A. Lot 17, Concession 1, R.R.#1, Cornwall, Ontario; Malcolm MacDonald summer residence, Stanley Island, Ontario; Malcolm MacDonald’s Law Office, Pitt Street, Cornwall, Ontario and St. Andrews Parish House.

Saltaire Hotel, Fort Lauderdale

 Related articles and documents

13 December 1996: Carole Deschamps statement 

04 December 1996: Ron Leroux statement re allegations of sexual abuse 

13 November 1996: Ron Leroux Affidavit

 22 June 2007: Ministry stands by local Crown

21 June 2007:  Inquiry Witness Wanted To Help Former Police Officer

Witness says he ferried men to homes of alleged abusers; But at least one says the allegations are 'crazy'

17 August 2000: Schedule B of The Lawsuit - "Storm Tossed House: Pending Arrest of Pedophiles Expected to Implicate Bishop" 

10 February 1997: Robert Renshaw Affidavit  

05 December 1996: Gerald Renshaw statement  

12 September 1995: Her Majesty the Queen against Angus Malcolm MacDonald - lawyer for Father Charles MacDonald and former Crown attorney Malcolm MacDonald pleads guilty in Ottawa courtroom to charges of obstruction of justice. Judge B.W. Lennox gives him an absolute discharge.

January 1995: Milton MacDonald, father of Cornwall Crown Attorney Murray MacDonald and brother of former Cornwall Crown Attorney Malcolm MacDonald, is convicted   

Blogs      

22 March 2007 Blog: "Crumbs from the Table"    

21 July 2006 Blog:  None of this makes an iota of sense     

 Breach of Trust   http://radio.cbc.ca/news/cornwall/

Spring 1999An investigation by CBC National Radio news has found at least 50 people who say they were sexually abused by about 20 men in Cornwall, Ontario. The list includes Roman Catholic priests, church officials, and other professionals from the city's legal and business establishments. Those who have come forward says the pedophile ring has operated for more than forty years. Even after four separate investigations, police are only now scratching the surface.

A former insider, Ron LeRoux, has given CBC News details about how the group used its power to share the boys they forced into sex, and use its influence to hide the behaviour of members of the group. LeRoux met with a CBC reporter in a motel on the outskirts of an American city. He carries a gun. He says he's afraid for his safety now that he's broken the silence. LeRoux shows school pictures of the young boy he molested for years. He also displays photos of others who were involved a pedophile ring that has operated in Cornwall for more than 40 years. LeRoux calls it "a clan." He was part of it. He says it includes powerful community leaders: priests, lawyers, police officers, probation officers, and local businessmen.

LeRoux says the "clan" preyed on young boys - often from single parent families. Many were altar boys -- some ran into trouble with the law. Often, they were passed from one man to the next. One person whose identity can't be revealed because of a court order, tells CBC News about the first time he was abused: a neighbour who helped him out. Then it was a priest -- then a probation officer who passed him on to a lawyer. He says it happened right in the Cornwall police station. " I was kinda scared. I mean I was in the f***** room," he told CBC News. "It was his word against mine. I needed a lawyer. I was going to go to jail, the threat of going to jail - y'know. I guess I couldn't say no after a while."

LeRoux says he remembers many of the children. " I seen the photgraphs and he brags about them. 'Oh, I got this one, I got that  one.' I mean the drawer's full of it Police know about the photos," LeRoux says, "but they never asked for search warrants to collect that evidence."

Police repeatedly deny there is a ring. Ontario Provincial Police officer Klancy Grasman is part of the fourth police investigation into this in six years. Grasman says there's no evidence that there was any type of organized ring. LeRoux maintains that he's proof that police aren't looking hard enough. He says he has not been arrested, because he knows too much. "If they nail me," LeRoux says, "those other idiots are in more trouble than I am." He says if he talks, police will have to deal with the consequences of a scandal that reaches into the highest ranks of the law and the Catholic church. Meanwhile, some of the people interviewed by CBC News who say they were sexually abused, feel intimidated by the church. They say the church continues to pressure them to drop their cases.

One of the 50 people who have come forward with stories of abuse has told CBC radio he's been told he can only get further counselling if he agrees that anything he says to a counsellor can't be used in court. Another says his court case has been dragging on for years because of delays brought on by the church's lawyers and the courts. It took until 1992 for the first boy to speak out in this case. He called police to lay a complaint against a local priest and a probation officer. Instead he became tangled up in an agreement to buy his silence. Ron LeRoux says a deal was in the works which was supposed to make the complaint against the priest go away. "He was gonna get money, to pay this kid off," says Leroux. "And they were going to clarify a few things where he wouldn't be investigated."

The Roman Catholic church paid out $32,000. In exchange, a man known as D.S. was to release the priest, the bishop and the church from "any and all actions." He was never to discuss his abuse, or the settlement. The Children's Aid Society pursued the case anyway, after a local police officer handed over the original complaint. That led to a flurry of high-level meetings. Documents show that Cornwall's police chief met first with the Pope's representative in Ottawa and later with Bishop Eugene Laroque in Cornwall. Police continued to write memos back and forth on how to wrap up the D.S. file. When news of the deal leaked out, the cover-up fell apart. At first the bishop denied it was an attempt to stop a criminal investigation. "There was no attempt at cover-up," he said at a news conference. "Priests who are truly guilty of such actions must be stopped." Two weeks later the bishop held another news conference. He admitted part of the deal was to halt the criminal investigation. He called it morally unjust. Later police laid charges of obstruction of justice against the lawyer who brokered the deal. The lawyer pleaded guilty to the charge of interfering with a criminal investigation but he was given an absolute discharge.

Since those early days, dozens of people have come forward with new stories of abuse. Some are suing the church and again, there have been cash offers. One person has settled and others are thinking about it, as they wait to testify in criminal court about their sexual abuse.

Cornwall teacher sentenced for sex abuse 

CBC.CA  News - full story
Last Updated Fri, 04 May 2001 20:57:00 EDT
CBC News

CORNWALL, ONT. - A school teacher in Cornwall, Ont., has been sentenced to two years less a day for sexually assaulting four of his former students. Marcel Lalonde's sentence will be made up of 15 months in jail and nine months of house arrest. The 51-year-old was given two-for-one credit because he has already served 5½ months in custody. That means he will only remain in prison for four more months. Six of seven complainants who testified during last fall's trial were members of his home-room class during the period of abuse. The case is important because of a connection to an ongoing police investigation into widespread sexual abuse.

Judge Monique Metivier described the case as "an egregious breach of trust." The judge said sexual assault, especially against vulnerable teenage boys, is a violent crime. And with that, an unrepentant Lalonde was sent back to jail. The Lalonde case is important for a couple of reasons. It is a confirmation that sexual abuse did in fact occur in the community over a period of years, and it reveals a connection to a police investigation, code-named Project Truth. A number of Lalonde's victims are complainants in a case involving a key figure in Project Truth. So far, more than 20 men have been charged, some of them prominent citizens in Cornwall.

Copyright ©2006 Canadian Broadcasting Corporation - All Rights Reserved