Teacher exonerated at Mount Cashel abused kids in B.C. until at least 2009, lawsuit alleges
CBC
A young man from British Columbia alleges Joseph Burke — a former Christian Brother once convicted of abusing boys at a Newfoundland orphanage in the early 1970s — sexually assaulted him numerous times from 2007 to 2009.
The man, known as John B. Doe in court documents, says Burke was his teacher at Vancouver College, a K-12 private school run by the Congregation of Christian Brothers.
According to Doe's sworn affidavit, he endured several assaults during his Grade 8 and 9 years, including instances of forced masturbation. All the incidents happened in Burke's classroom, Doe says.
"I have been struggling with the effects of this abuse my whole adult life," Doe wrote. "While I am determined not to have these events define who I am or how I live my life, my reality is that these events have damaged my mental health [and] impacted my ability to learn, study and work."
Burke has not responded to the allegations set forth in court documents, which are part of a proposed class action lawsuit against several parties, including Burke himself.
The lawsuit takes aim at Vancouver College, St. Thomas More Collegiate in Burnaby, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Vancouver and several Christian Brothers who were shuffled out of the notorious Mount Cashel Orphanage in St. John's, N.L., during the 1970s.
The lawsuit alleges the archbishop and the schools must have known that six Christian Brothers were accused of — and in some cases, admitted to — assault against boys in St. John's, before being shipped to the Vancouver area.
When the Mount Cashel scandal broke open in 1989, all of the men named in the most recent lawsuit were teaching at Vancouver College or St. Thomas More. That included Joseph Burke, Edward English, Edward French, Douglas Kenny, David Burton and Kevin Short.
All six were convicted of the historic crimes at Mount Cashel.
Where Burke differs, however, is that his indecent assault convictions were eventually overturned by the Supreme Court of Canada in 1996 due to inconsistencies in witness testimony.
The physical assault conviction remained, but Burke was granted an absolute discharge by a judge in Newfoundland and Labrador after his other convictions were tossed.
"It would obviously be in the public interest for a person of his calibre to return to the teaching profession," wrote James Gushue, Newfoundland and Labrador's former chief justice, in his sentencing decision.
An absolute discharge meant the offence only stayed on Burke's criminal record for one year. Sometime after that, he was hired back by Vancouver College.
John B. Doe wants to know how that was possible.
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