Hearings resume at 0900 hours (09:30 am ESt) this am, Tuesday, 25 November 2008.
Detective Inspector Tim Smith will resume his testimony.
Painful this is. Disturbingly painful. Smith seems to be an expert at making on the spot character judgements, i.e., Shaver was honest and therefore was not part of a conspiracy and therefore there was no conspiracy, the former bishop of Cornwall Eugene Larocque was honest in his interview, and Jacques Leduc was a good canon lawyer, and one of David Silmser’s sex abuse allegations against Charlie wasn’t credible because it was out of character for Charlie to be violent (“nowhere, in anybody that we ever spoke to, was there every any violence with Father Charlie”)!!
The latter floors me. Simply floors me.
It was not a good day for watching and listening. Not a good day at all. I got the sense that in as much as he said he believed 2/3 of David Silmser’s allegations in fact Smith had little time for Dave, and no sense of what Dave had been through with police officers and investigations by the time Smith happened along for an interview.
I also got the sense that for all his talk about all the sex abuse investigations he has done Smith does not fully understand the almost stereotypical impact of same-sex sexual abuse on boys, and that he certainly failed to understand David Silmser. In fact, truth be known, I actually got the impression of a degree of animosity toward Dave, or, if not animosity something closley akin to it.
If you can believe it Smith actually found it “suspect” that Dave still wanted to see Charlie charged after the #$32,000 pay-off.
Yes, he used the word “suspect.” Despite the fact that Smith knew Dave had been illegally paid off he, a police officer, actually found Dave’s desire to see justice done through the courts as “suspect.”
That I think is downright bizarre! Not that Dave wanted to see Father Charlie charged, but that a lead investigator questioned the motives of an “alleged”victim who, despite being hushed and illegally gagged by “the church,” still wanted to see his “alleged” clerical abuser charged and convicted.
I have the transcript posted. I don’t have time to pull out quotes right now, but read it through, particularly the sections dealing with David Silmser, and John MacDonald, and then on to the nonsense about consensual sex, and then to Smith’s disgusting analogy of sexual abuse/assault to fun on the football field.
Disgusting stuff in there. Coming from an OPP Detective Inspector.
Just like the guys fooling around playing football?
Really?! That’s all it was for those other three young lads? No more than getting groped and pawed by team mates on the football field. Just a little silliness on Father Charlie’s part. Part of the game. No more than a case of “wrestling and fooling around, having a good time.”
This is the mindset of the lead investigator in a 1994 sex abuse investigation?
I wonder what those three “alleged” victims feel like hearing their allegations against a Roman Catholic priest reduced to no more than a little fun out on the football field?
I could not believe my ears.
That’s how sexual predators tend to rationalize their sexual overtures. I don’t expect to hear that rationale coming from the mouth of a man who is supposed to be a seasoned investigator.
I wonder if Smith thinks a priest giving an 11-year-old boy wedgies is all just plain good fun too? You know. Like football. Just a little silliness. Part of the game. No big deal.
I wonder if it would all still be as A-OK if a male football player having a little fun on the field grabs a female team member in the crotch? Would that still pass as plain old fun on the football field?
What if Charlie grabs a female teenage altar server in the crotch? Or slides his hand up her thigh? Is that just plain good clean fun?
Would Smith rationalise those manouevres for Charlie? For any male?
If not, why not?
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I have to head out this morning unexpectedly. Hopefully will manage to catch some of the hearings.
Must call it a day.
Enough for now,
Sylvia