OPP charge retired priest in 1950s sex assault 

Man accuses elderly Cornwall-area cleric 

Ottawa Citizen

15 September 2007

BY ANDREW SEYMOUR

A retired Cornwall-area priest is facing criminal charges after being accused of sexually assaulting a young boy more than five decades ago.

Father Lucien Lussier, 84, was charged by the OPP on Tuesday with three counts of indecent assault on a male after a man came forward to police last month alleging he had been sexually assaulted by the priest in the 1950s.

According to police, the alleged incidents occurred in Alexandria and area between 1954 and 1960 while the boy visited Father Lussier in OPP Sgt. Kristine Rae said the alleged assaults started when the boy was young and continued into his teenage years. She would not elaborate on the nature of the alleged assaults.

Attempts to reach Father Lussier at his Cornwall home yesterday were not successful.

Bishop Paul-Andre Durocher of the Alexandria-Cornwall Archdiocese also did not re-turn messages for comment yesterday.

According to church records, Father Lussier was ordained on March 27, 1955.

In 1963, he began work with the St. Lawrence Roman Catholic Church in Curry Hill before stints across eastern Ontario at Catholic churches in Glen Robertson, Martin-town, Dalkeith and Moose Creek.

In the late 1990s, he spent time in Massachusetts before returning to Cornwall in 1999. It is not clear what his du-ties included during the years when the alleged assaults occurred.

Police said Father Lussier was released on an undertaking and is scheduled to appear in Alexandria court on Nov 7.

aseymour@thecitizen.canwest.com