Hearings resumed at 0930 hours (9:30 am) this morning, Thursday, 15 January 2009. Assistant Crown attorney Lorne McConnery is back to resume cross examination. (Coalition)
I have posted two items I promised to post long ago: (i) the two part scan of a record album cut when the now deceased convicted paedophile Ned Hansen was organist and choirmaster at Trinity Anglican Church in Cornwall back in the early to mid 60s, and (2) the now infamous Pelletier-Griffiths memo. There are comments required regarding what seem to be a number of outright errors and spin in the latter. I started work on that moons ago and had to set it aside. I doubt that I will get it wrapped up before the Première’s inquiry ax drops end month, but I will take a boo, see where it’s at and how much needs doing to finish it. I believe it’s necessary to put some facts out to put this memo into context.
So, those new posting are
02 April 1997: Memo Crown Robert Pelletier to Director of Crowns for the Eastern Region, Peter Griffiths
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The transcript is posted. It is an absolute must read.
Were you watching yesterday? I do hope people were tuned in. How can I possible recap the day?
Did you watch McConnery’s hands? At crucial times fidgeting like mad? I think perchance his hands betray him?
And Helen Daley (Citizens for Community Renewal)? Have you ever heard the likes of it? At times I thought I saw fangs. Other times I swear I heard the scratch of long sharp finger nails.
Just wicked.
The vitriol that spewed from that woman’s mouth. The animus.
The woman outdid herself yesterday. She lost it completely. Her disdain for Perry Dunlop was palpable. She got so carried away with herself that she was stymied when McConnery didn’t fall instantly into line and agree right off the bat with her outrageous Perry-bashing theories and suppositions.
What is her problem? Her client presumably wants institutional reform. Seems in their minds Perry is at the heart of the institutional problems which need reform.
But, …..Perry is long gone. Problem fixed. The reformed institutions should be able to on with their business. Daley and her clients should be rejoicing.
What exactly is the problem here?
What is the Citizens for Community doing in there? I am still puzzling over that one.
Anyway, by day’s end at 6 pm I had had it with the lot of them. Never have I heard such vitriol. Never.
McConnery has shown nothing but disdain for Perry Dunlop. And Daley couldn’t contain herself trying to further her anti-Perry wild theories.
And along came poor Frank Horn (Coalition) who had been unable to find the documents he needed to make what was probably a good point, that being that there were others aside Ron Leroux who allege seeing different prominent persons at Ken Seguin’s and/or Malcolm’s cottage.
Too too bad isn’t it that Glaude denied the Coalition standing back at the beginning? In his mind the CCR was a voice for the community and the Coalition hadn’t proved its need for standing as a separate entity.
All legal semantics at the least, with the strong perception of preferential options for some parties and bias toward others.
Anyway, only one point for now. I have to watch and listen 🙂
(1) Eighteen months downstream Justice Normand Glaude has finally acknowledged that he has yet to rule on the admissibility of Ron Leroux’ muddled and prematurely ended testimony.
Eighteen months!
For eighteen months Glaude has turned a blind eye and ear to all those who gleefully proclaim that Ron recanted this, that and the other thing on the stand.
I have frequently said that Ron was in such a state he should never have been allowed to take the stand. At the very least he should have been pulled when it was quickly apparent that he didn’t know whether he was coming or going. But, no. The gathered throng left him there and was happy to milk the situation for all it was worth.
A reminder here that David Silmser bowed out after his cross-examination had started. What he endured while on the stand is a story in itself. But I must say that Dave was sharp. Too sharp for Charlie’s stand-in lawyer.
Anyway, for a variety of reasons which some day I will address, and after his own lawyer had him classed as a mental basket case (he was not), Dave stepped down.
In that scenario it took no time for the gathered throng to jump up and down about the status of Dave’s testimony. Those who had yet to cross-examine were weeping and wailing and gnashing their teeth. They wanted their chance at him. They wanted to shake him about little and undo his testimony.
The outcome of that one was a Let’s Pretend David Silmser is on the Stand game. In short that entailed the gathered throng pretending Dave was on the stand – they carried on with the questions they would have put to him and, with the aid of documents, provided the answers they thought they would get.
None of that with Ron Leroux. No weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth because not a single soul had a chance to cross-examine Ron Leroux. Lead commission counsel Peter Engelmann had done the job for them.
No one objected that Ron didn’t quite seem to know what he was saying from one minute to the next – recanting one minute, un-recanting the next. No objections. They were quite happy. And were later quite happy to extrapolate one section of the muddle and ignore the other.
The end result of Glaude’s failure to rule on the admissibility of Ron’s evidence or decide how to deal with it was that for eighteen months the word has been out and about that Ron Leroux recanted this that and the other thing. He did not. His testimony was a muddled mess. With Englemann’s persistent nudging he got Murray MacDonald off Ken Seguin’s property. That was it. And, as I mentioned before, I spoke to Ron a few months ago and he told me – on tape – that yes, he did see Murray MacDonald in Ken Seguin’s backyard.
So, there you go.
Regardless, for 18 months the gathered throng and media have run wild with Ron Leroux recanted this, Ron Leroux recanted that, Ron Leroux recanted the other thing.
Glaude was silent. No ruling. He let the gathered throng stack the record, never once interrupting with a “Wow. Wow.” Or “No. No. No. I haven’t ruled on that yet”
Now, at the 11th hour, after McConnery said “Hasn’t [Ron Leroux] come to this hearing and admitted he lied?” the commissioner has spoken – he acknowledges he has to come to some conclusion. But, note, he didn’t specifically say he would rule on the status of Ron’s testimony.
MR. HORN: — Mr. Silmser but do you think that when Mr. Leroux was the one that made these old allegations against a clan of paedophiles, he was the first person who was courageous enough to say something? Did you look at it that way?
MR. McCONNERY: I never found anything in what Ron Leroux said that made me think he was a courageous gentleman coming forward. Hasn’t he come to this hearing and admitted he lied?
THE COMMISSIONER: He came here and testified and he said certain comments that withdrew some of what he said before —
MR. McCONNERY: Okay.
THE COMMISSIONER: — and that’s subject to me coming to some conclusion as to whether or not that’s accepted.
MR. McCONNERY: Fair enough; sorry.
THE COMMISSIONER: M’hm. It’s getting a little late; so let’s just calm.
Let’s just calm?
Indeed!
So, after they “calm” what will come of this?
Not much I fear. All are happy with the mythical status quo: Ron recanted.
I will for sure blog on my other notes of yesterday. It will be done. If not today, over the weekend. Too important not to get done.
Enough for now,
Sylvia
I was a member of Trinity Church choir in the early 60s with ES Hansen and am on the album.
Shocked to read the above and want to know more.
Moved from Cornwall in 65
Neil Morton