Today’s the day. 10 am(Tuesday 09 October 2007).
Perry Dunlop will be back in the Weave Shed courtroom coliseum to face the hungry pride. We’re back where we were on 17 September 2007. This time, one way or the other, there will be resolution.
I shudder at the thought….
I had a lot of time to think over the weekend. Cooking and baking and doing clean up is quiet time – the hands are busy and the mind is free to wander.
Some thoughts:
(1) Who gave Justice Glaude the run down on Cornwall? It wasn’t Perry and Helen Dunlop. It wasn’t Carson Chisholm. So, who was it?
Who but Perry and Helen primarily know the Cornwall sex abuse scandal in depth from the perspective of the allegations of a paedophile ring and cover-up?
There’s no one. So, who gave Glaude the run down? Was it someone or persons from the office of the Attorney General, a party implicated in the cover-up?
Was it perhaps someone or persons from the Cornwall Police Service, a party heavily implicated in the cover-up?
Might it have been someone or persons from Correctional Services, another party heavily implicated in the cover-up?
Or, was it perhaps someone or persons from the Diocese of Alexandria-Cornwall, another party heavily implicated in the cover-up?
Then again, was it someone from the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP), who, yes, are also implicated in the cover-up?
Perhaps he had a little chat with someone of his judicial colleagues, a number of whom are also implicated in the cover-up? Perhaps Justice Colin McKinnon? And/or Justice Chadwick? And/or Justice Platana? And/or Justice Lennox?
Was it all of the above? Or just some of the above? Or all of the above and then some?
He had to talk to someone to get his bird’s-eye view of the scandal, didn’t he? So, who did he rumble it with if not Perry and Helen Dunlop? And if not Carson Chisholm?
I believe he didn’t even see fit to chat things over with Garry Guzzo, a reputable man in the eyes of the legal world – lawyer, former MPP, and even a former district court judge who once took the bench in Cornwall.
So, who got Justice Glaude’s judicial ear? If he arrived in Cornwall in need of convincing, who did the deed? I suppose before or after his arrival matters not – someone somewhere convinced the Commissioner of the Cornwall Public Inquiry – without hearing a word from the victims – that the “rumour” and “innuendo” swirling around Cornwall on his arrival are false.
He’d get that take on the scandal from the AG’s office, and Cornwall Police Service, and Correctional Service, and the OPP, and the diocese, wouldn’t he? He’d get that from anyone who’s anybody in those particular institutions. To a gender inclusive man they hold the party line: No ring and no cover-up. He certainly wouldn’t get that from the Dunlops, or Carson. And I’m quite convinced he wouldn’t get it from Garry Guzzo either.
(2) Why did Justice Glaude choose the likes of John Liston, Dr. Peter Jaffe, Dr. David Wolfe and Father John Loftus to “frame” his inquiry. True enough he had to drop Father Loftus from the list – too much damning information on the Jesuit. But he stuck with Liston and Jaffe, two “experts” who, witness their participation in the Task Force on health screening protocols see same-sex abuse of boys through a decidedly biased feminist anti-male lens. And he stuck with Dr. Wolfe, who sees paedophilia as a “sexual orientation,” which of course if taken as fact in Canada would mean a carte blanche for paedophiles because we can’t “discriminate” against anyone based on their “sexual orientation” nor can we do or say anything which might be construed as “inciting hatred” against anyone based on their “sexual orientation.”
(3) Since Perry Dunlop was to become the focus of his inquiry why did Glaude not call someone with expertise on the trials and tribulations of whistleblowers?
(4) Since the object of the exercise seems to be to, at least in part, affirm Glaude’s foregone conclusion that the rumour and innuendo swirling around Cornwall on his arrival are false, why no expert to buttress his foregone conclusion? Someone with expertise on paedophile rings and the lengths such paedophles will go to cover-up for themselves and each other? Particularly when the members are prominent men in the community?
(5) Lies, deception and half-truth were used to force Perry and Helen Dunlop into the Weave Shed and onto the stand.
Will the same hold true for Jacques Leduc?
Is, for example, Justice Glaude remotely interested in learning what prompted a married lawyer to study canon law? And why the faculty of canon law waived its pre-requisites to take him in? And who did the waiving? And what role Bishop Eugene Larocque may have played in opening the canonical doors for Leduc? And why he deems an out of court settlement fair game, even if it means an “alleged” clerical paedophile continues to have unfettered access to children and parents are left in the dark? And why a supposedly reputable lawyer would receive a signed gag order in an envelope and not check inside to ensure that all is in order? And how often he visited Ken Seguin’s waterfront home? Or Malcolm MacDonald’s porn strewn cottage on Stanley Island? An how many pay-offs he’s orchestrated?
(6) Is Justice Glaude vaguely interested in forcing Father Charles MacDonald to testify? Does he have any desire to find out what or who prompted “Charlie” to enter the priesthood? And when Father Charlie decided he was “homosexual”? And how Charlie managed to stay in the seminary with such outrageous marks? And what Charlie defines as “consenting” and at what age he considers males to be “adults”? And was he engaging in homosexual relationships when it was illegal to do so? And why he wanted to pay-off David Silmser? And how much money out-of-pocket did he put into the pay-off? And the nature of his friendships with Bishop Eugene Larocque, Claude Shaver, Malcolm MacDonald and Ken Seguin to name but a few. And on and on and on.
(7) Is Justice Glaude vaguely interested in forcing Father Paul Lapierre to testify? Does he have an inkling of desire to find out about Lapierre’s connections to Killer Gagnon? Or hear what Lapierre has to say about Father Don Scott? and Father Hollis Lapierre? and Father Kenneth Martin? and the Viatorian priests? and what was going on with the students at the Classical College?
If Justice Glaude felt obliged to first deceive and then flex his judicial muscle to force the Dunlops to take the stand I think it goes without saying he should do likewise for the “alleged” paedophiles of Cornwall, don’t you?
Will he force Bishop Eugene Larocque to take the stand? Will he threaten Larocque with contempt of court if he refuses?
There are any number of “alleged” paedophiles out and about who have lots of answers to lots of questions. They just have to have their arms twisted with a subpoena and be threatened with contempt of court should they decline.
Will it happen? No. Highly doubtful.
The burning question is: why not? The institutional response went out the window long ago.
Anyway, I’m off to Cornwall this morning. Have to go. I’ll be back this evening and will blog my thoughts on the day’s events. I don’t expect it will be a pleasant day. The members of the pride await, licking their collective chops. I pray I am wrong, but my gut says it will be bloody. They’re out for Perry’s blood, and one way or the other they’ll get it.
Pray hard for Perry. You Roman Catholics get your beads out and say a few Hail Mary’s. All you non-Catholics pray your hearts out.
Storm the gates of Heaven!
And, finally, if you’re within driving distance of the Weave Shed, hop in your car and get down there. 709 Cotton Mill Street, Cornwall. Right down by the seaway.
Enough for now,
Sylvia
(cornwall@theinquiry.ca)