Offers of money lead to sexual abuse

Cornwall Standard Freeholder

02 November 2006

Terri Saunders

 
Local News - When Jody Burgess was just 12 years old, he picked up a few bucks here and there running errands for people in his northwest-end neighbourhood.

He would stop by an area gas bar and talk to the staff who worked there in the hopes one or two of them might need someone to go buy their lunch, something that could earn the boy a quick couple of dollars.

It was during one of those days, in between grabbing sandwiches from a nearby restaurant for the employees, he first met Jean-Luc Leblanc.

The man drove up on a motorcycle and began talking to Burgess about errands he needed done. The young boy quickly jumped when Leblanc offered him $20 to mow his lawn outside his home in a west-end trailer park.

On Wednesday, the now 37-year-old man told the Cornwall Public Inquiry the offer was hard to resist.

"Was that a lot of money to you back then?" asked Peter Engelmann, lead commission counsel.

"To me, it was," said Burgess.

That fateful meeting would be the first time Burgess would come in contact with a man who would go on to repeatedly sexually abuse him, his brother, his sister and one of his brother's friends over several years in the early 1980s.

Burgess said doing a few errands for Leblanc escalated over time into full-scale sexual abuse. As an employee of the Transport Canada Training Institute, Leblanc had the ability to expose Burgess, his siblings and their friends to things they'd never known - regular swimming trips, airplane rides and trips to a weekend cottage in Quebec.

As the sexual abuse escalated from touching and oral sex to even more serious acts, Burgess admits it was difficult to pull away from the man.

Every time he saw Leblanc he left with money in his pocket, money he wasn't getting from anywhere else.

Each time the abuse occurred, however, Leblanc issued a stern warning - not to tell anyone.

"We were told not to say anything," said Burgess. "We were afraid to tell."

In early 1986, Burgess, his brother and another boy, Jason Tyo, would tell police about the abuse they suffered at the hands of Leblanc. The man eventually pleaded guilty to two counts of indecent assault and received a suspended sentence and three years probation. In the 1990s, Leblanc was working as school bus driver in the Newington area when police began investigating allegations he was abusing children again. This time, Leblanc was sentenced to eight and a half years in prison as well as 10 years of restrictions following his release from prison.

Burgess told the inquiry Wednesday the justice system should deliver stiffer penalties for people like Leblanc.

"There should be tougher sentences," he said. "And victims should be offered more counseling."

The inquiry continues today.