Victor Killoran (Father Victor KilloranC.R.)
priest with Resurrectionists Fathers (CR – also known as Congregation of the Resurrection). Ordained 1947. CONVICTED 1990 for sex abuse of a boy and girl in Kitchener, Ontario. Sued 2008 – allegations relate to abuse at Scollard Hall, North Bay, Ontario.
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The following information is taken from Canadian Catholic Church Directories of the dates indicated (CCCD), the 1980 Ontario Catholic Directory (80ON) and media (M)
Not listed in directories after 1993
1993: Resurrection Manor, Westmount Rd., North Waterloo, Ontario (CCCD)
1992, 1991:2 Richgrove Drive, Weston, Ontario (416-244-5055) (Archdiocese of Toronto) (CCCD)
1990: convicted (M)
1985-1985: Pastor, Blessed Sacrament, Burford, Ontario (Diocese Hamilton) (CCCD)
1980: St. Mary, Kitchener (56 Duke St. West) (also Fathers D.R. Doran, L.J. Schwan C.R., V.J. Stanisic C.R. , W. Graf., F. Ayers C.R.) (’80 ON)
1973-74: Our Lady of the Seven Dolours – St. Mary, Hamilton, Ontario (Pastor Father H. B. Gehl C.R.) (CCCD)
1971-72: St. Jerome’s High School, Kitchener, Ontario (Superior Father B.C. Hayes C.R; Principal Father J.P. Theis C.R.) (CCCD)
1968-69: St. Jerome’s High School, 100 Duke St. West, Kitchener, Ontario (CCCD)
1967: St. Jerome High School, Kitchener, Ontario (in Diocese of Hamilton, Ontario) (CCCD)
1959: Scollard Hall, North Bay, Ontario (in Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie) (also at Scollard Hall at the time was Father Magnus Fedy – “sup”) (CCCD)
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2008: Stories goes to grave: Plouffe; Bishop says full story of abuse allegations may never be known
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Ending the silence; Plaintiffs detail years of abuse by priests
The Sudbury Star http://www.thesudburystar.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=878278
2008
By Carol Mulligan
At 65, Greg O’Connor has accomplished a great deal in his lifetime. He earned a degree in biology. He graduated at the top of his class in the former Cambrian School of Nursing. He serves as deputy-mayor of Mattawa in the Township of Calvin.
But O’Connor lowered his head Monday and wept as he recounted the impact the sexual abuse he said he suffered more than 50 years ago by a Roman Catholic priest in North Bay has had on his life.
O’Connor is one of six plaintiffs represented by Ledroit Beckett Litigation Lawyers of London, Ont., who are suing the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie for $4.5-million each for sexual misconduct they claim to have suffered as children by priests employed by the diocese.
A seventh plaintiff is suing the Roman Catholic Diocese of London for the same amount for abuse he claims he suffered by one of its former priests in Tecumseh.
Some of the plaintiffs are also suing the religious order of the Congregation of the Resurrection, whose priests taught at Scollard Hall in North Bay, where plaintiffs allege some of the abuse was committed.
Lawyer Robert Talach of Ledroit Beckett is representing the seven plaintiffs as well as four others, who earlier filed $4.5-million lawsuits against the Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie. Those lawsuits are in the discovery process.
None of the allegations has been proven in court.
O’Connor and five other plaintiffs attended a news conference Monday at the Radisson Hotel.
Several family members and friends of the plaintiffs sat in the audience. Some cried as they watched their loved ones address reporters.
The plaintiffs all sat at a table at the front of the Notre Dame Room at the hotel, behind photographs of themselves at the age they were when they said they were abused by their priests.
O’Connor said he was an altar boy as a child, went to church twice on Saturday and three times on Sunday, and “the priest was next to God” in his staunch Roman Catholic family.
He attended a Catholic elementary school and loved it, but when he went to high school, he said his teacher-priest, Father Magnus J. Fedy, took advantage of some of his friends as well.
“I came to hate the priest, I came to hate my religion,” said O’Connor, whose first marriage ended badly. His ex-wife and four children from that union do not speak with him today, he said.
O’Connor was joined at the table by three men from Sudbury who allege they were abused by priests as children.
Sudbury businessman Thomas Miller, 59, lived as a boy in North Bay near Scollard Hall.
Although Miller didn’t attend the school, he played on the school grounds and was provided with access to the school gym, the showers and roof by Father Victor Killoran.
Miller alleges he suffered fondling, masturbation, oral sex and anal penetration by the priest for four years, from the time Miller was eight.
Killoran pleaded guilty and was convicted in 1990 in of sexual abuse against a boy and girl in Kitchener-Waterloo.
Two Sudbury men, Raymond Carriere and R.D. Sabourin, were 14 and 15 respectively when they said they were sexually abused by Father Rene Hebert on camping trips.
Their families reported the abuse to church officials at the time, and Carriere said a meeting was held 35 years ago with then Bishop Alexander Carter at Christ the King Church about the charges.
Carriere, 50, said the boys and their parents were led to believe police would be in attendance at the meeting, but they weren’t.
“From that meeting, we waited,” he said, but the diocese never acted on their complaints.
Carriere’s mother attended Monday’s news conference and said she asked a bishop in another community what the families should do.
Carriere and his mother both said she was told to “go to church and pray and try to forget this.”
Sabourin said when they were told police would be at the meeting, “we felt something would happen.
“There was a lot of support for Hebert at the time, but we were not taken care of at all,” he said.
Hebert died Dec. 30 and a memorial mass was said in his honour Saturday at St. Jean de Brebeuf Church. There was a full house at the service and more than a dozen priests participated in his memorial mass.
Anita Contant, 60, of North Bay is another of the plaintiffs. She alleges she was befriended by both Fedy and Killoran, and they abused her for three years from the time she was eight.
Contant says she was subjected to fondling, oral sex and digital penetration.
Wayne Thibert, 51, lives in Crystal Falls near Field, but lived in Tecumseh near Windsor in the early 1970s when he says he was abused by Father Lawrence Paquette.
His family moved north eventually, and Paquette visited him “and was able to commit his final acts of abuse upon Wayne,” said Talach.
One plaintiff, Kevin Bishop, did not attend the news conference because he lives a long distance away.
He alleges he was sent to Vita Way Farm in Powassan, south of North Bay, in 1986. There, he says he was sexually “brutalized” by Father John Fisher at the farm Fisher founded as a rehabilitation centre for troubled youth.
Fisher would later win the Ontario Medal for Good Citizenship, but was charged in 1989 with sex offences.
A man who wishes to be identified as J.G., now 40, alleges that Father Gerald Roy was his parish priest and school chaplain in Field when he engaged in a two-year period of fondling and mutual masturbation with him.
Roy was sentenced in 2001 to 2 1/2 years in a federal penitentiary for sexual assaults against four altar boys beginning in the early 1980s.
Article ID# 878278
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Alleged victims accuse priests of sexual abuse
NorthernLife.ca
BY LAUREL MYERS
Father Rene Hebert was a priest at L’Annonciation parish in Sudbury and enjoyed working with the youth, so much so that he took the boys on camping trips. But these trips weren’t about singing around the campfire and honing the boys’ outdoors skills. Hebert fed the boys alcohol and took advantage of their innocence.
R. D. Sabourin was a victim of the priest’s deviance. Fifteen at the time of the sexual abuse, Sabourin walked roughly a dozen miles out of the bush one night to get away from a man he trusted, to inform his parents.
A meeting was held with the Bishop, assurances were given and prayers were encouraged, but nothing ended up happening to Father Hebert.
“My parents were told to go to church, pray, and forget it ever happened,” Sabourin said, his eyes brimming with tears as he recounted the incident.
Now, 36 years later, after struggling to move forward while putting his past behind him, Sabourin is married with three children of his own. It’s his children who have brought the abuse victim to speak out about his abuse.
“I’m worried about my children,” he said. “I want to make sure our children, my nieces and nephews, are safe.”
Sabourin was one of seven people gathered at a press conference Monday at the Radisson Hotel in Sudbury to announce seven civil lawsuits against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie, the Roman Catholic Diocese of London and the Congregation of the Resurrection in Ontario. The lawsuits named six priests – Hebert, Magnus J. Fedy, Victor Killoran, Gerald Roy, Lawrence Paquette and John Fisher – on allegations of sexual misconduct. Roy is the only priest still alive.
Half of the men have been criminally charged or convicted in the past, according to Thomas Talach, litigation lawyer from the Ledroit Beckett law firm in London, Ont.
“We are here today to expose the crimes of… six priests…who have violated the very essence of what they represented,” Talach said in his opening statement. “It is their own victims who, following decades of struggling with the impact of that evil, have found the strength to come here today to set the record straight.”
Talach said the reasons for the press conference were to empower the victims, to reach out to other victims, and to create positive change for the future.
The lawyer explained why the allegations had just been brought to light, so long after the incidents took place.
“Many times the victim, taught from an early age that a priest and the church can do no wrong, blames themselves for the abuse. They cannot tell their parents for they feel it is more likely the charming and loved priest will be believed over a child. If believed… the news of abuse… can shake and even shatter an entire family’s religious faith… which leads a victim to vow they will take their secret to the grave. It takes decades for that secret to finally surface.”
The claim for each case is approximately $4.5 million. However, Talach said that is not reflective of what the individual will receive. “No amount of money can compensate someone for the loss of their innocence, their youth and their religious belief,” the lawyer said.
Though the accused priests were all Roman Catholic, Talach said it should not be mistaken as an attack on the religion.
“In these cases, we’ve had brave and honourable priests come forward to assist,” he said. “But we want this diocese (the Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie) to deal with it. It is not acceptable to transfer the priest, it is not acceptable to bury their pasts and it is not acceptable to leave them in the field.”
Bishop Jean-Louis Plouffe, a bishop for 21 years at of the Diocese, admitted the allegations caused him a great deal of concern.
“I want people to trust their priests,” he said. “These are things (I’d) rather not have to deal with, however, they’re there and (I) have to look at it very carefully, especially with the priests being dead, (I) have to make sure all light is shed on this so (I’m) able to assess it.”
The Bishop said once more information is available about the claims, the Diocese will be able to chart the proper course of action.
To avoid further situations like this from happening, the Bishop explained the Diocese has invested a great deal into training and sabbaticals for their priests.
“Sabbaticals allow the priests to grow as humans and to become better integrated pastors. We’ve had workshops to help them understand… the proper professional behaviours and also the limitations in carrying out their ministry.”
As for Sabourin, the events of his childhood have continued to shape his adult life. Though he admitted he doesn’t often attend church anymore, he still has his faith in God.
He raised his three children as Catholic and though they all have their first communion, none have confirmation.
“My children were raised Catholic to a time one of them was told he had to do community service at his church for his confirmation and that was it, I stopped it there,” he said.
When the abuse took place, Sabourin faced an added hurdle to overcome – his father was related to Father Hebert.
“I was more embarrassed to tell my parents,” he said. “I told my dad a long time ago something happened but I told my dad what really happened (about) two weeks ago.”