Alain Seguin finally gets a chance to explain the pain of chilling attacks

Cornwall Standard Freeholder
Terri Saunders

Wednesday, October 18, 2006 - 10:00

Local News - In November 2004, Alain Seguin sat in the public gallery of the provincial government legislature at Queen's Park in Toronto and heard words he'd been fighting to hear for several years. Premier Dalton McGuinty ordered a commission of inquiry to delve into the institutional response to decades of child sexual abuse in the Cornwall area.

On Tuesday, Seguin once again heard words he'd been waiting to hear for years, but this time, they were his words as he took the witness stand at the Cornwall Public Inquiry.

"I'm pleased that people are willing to listen," said Seguin, following nearly a day's worth of testimony. "I hope people will continue to listen and continue to understand what has happened in our community."

What happened to Seguin is no secret. For years, he has been at the forefront of the movement to bring the commission to town; to investigate the history of child abuse in the community; to figure out ways to ensure children are not abused in the future.

Robert Sabourin was an arts and photography teacher at St. Lawrence High School and Seguin was introduced to him through some of his high school friends. Seguin was just 12 years old.

"Was he a teacher of yours?" asked Peter Engelmann, lead counsel for the commission.

"No, he was not a teacher of mine," said Seguin. "But I guess that depends on what you think he would have been teaching me."

Seguin said Sabourin befriended him and his family and soon, the young boy was spending lots of time with the charismatic teacher.

Sabourin would take Seguin on excursions and photography trips all over eastern Ontario. The outings almost always involved some form of sexual abuse.

Seguin said he remembered a time when Sabourin took him to Ottawa where Sabourin was serving as a photographer for the Alexandria-Cornwall Roman Catholic Diocese during the inauguration of Archbishop Adolphe Proulx.

Seguin said he sat in the front row of the church during the ceremony, and he remembers being assaulted by Sabourin as the event was ongoing.

"He sat down next to me and put the camera in my lap," Seguin said, "but his hand was underneath the camera."

"He fondled you in the church?" asked Engelmann.

"He fondled me right there in the church," said Seguin, "with all of his friends around."

The abuse also occurred in Sabourin's office at the school and continued for two years, but it would be a long time before Seguin would tell anyone his secret. In time, he told his wife and eventually went to police.

Sabourin pleaded guilty to multiple counts of sexual abuse and in April 1999 was sentenced to two years less one day in jail. Seguin told the inquiry he was dismayed at being left out in the cold regarding Sabourin's journey through the justice system. He was not present when his abuser pleaded guilty nor when he was handed a jail sentence for his crimes.

He said in the years since he was abused he struggled to maintain relationships and even had difficulty raising his own children. Seguin said he was disturbed by a psychological report prepared by a psychiatrist at the Royal Ottawa Hospital which defined his abuse as a "homosexual relationship with a high school teacher."

"Is that how you would have described what was happening to you?" asked Engelmann.

"Do you know many 12-year-old homosexuals?" Seguin responded. "I was not a willing participant in a homosexual relationship. I was molested by an adult."