Child porn charge ‘nullified’

A child pornography charge against a priest was nullified in an Ottawa court Wednesday, meaning it’s as if the charge never existed.

James Jordan, 65, a member of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, was alleged to have possessed child porn in Kenya when he was doing missionary work there in 2008.

Because the alleged possession occurred outside of Canada, the Attorney General’s consent was required before charges could be laid, Crown prosecutor James Cavanagh told the court.

“The Attorney General’s consent was not obtained … and the legal result is that the information before the court is a nullity,” Cavanagh said. “As there is no proper information before the court, the proceedings are at an end.”

He also said new evidence had emerged that raised “serious issues” with the prosecution, “including the Crown’s ability to establish that the accused had exclusive possession of the computer on which child pornography was found.”

Senior Crowns had reviewed the file and determined there was not a reasonable prospect of conviction, Cavanagh said.

Jordan had been working as a missionary in Kenya from 2006 and was named director of the Oblates’ mission in Karen, a subdivision of Nairobi.

Jordan had been living under bail conditions since his July 2009 arrest that required him to surrender his passport and banned him from possessing computers and accessing the Internet.

— With files from Aedan Helmer