2018: Here is just a partial list of serial child sex offenders set free by the Canadian justice system.
Canada has freed serial molesters, child torturers, child rapists, child pornographers and even child murderers, sometimes with horrific consequences
https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/here-is-just-a-partial-list-of-dangerous-and-serial-child-sex-offenders-set-free-by-the-canadian-justice-system
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2014: Sex offender case a ‘colossal waste of money’: Tory jail critic
https://globalnews.ca/news/1322063/sex-offender-case-a-colossal-waste-of-money-tory-jail-critic/
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Unanimous Supreme Court decision ends six-year FOI ordeal
https://globalnews.ca/news/1288734/unanimous-supreme-court-decision-ends-six-year-foi-ordeal/
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Updated: Here’s the sex offender map Ontario didn’t want you to see
After fighting in court for six years only to get shot down by three unanimous decisions involving a total of 13 judges, Ontario’s corrections ministry gave Global News a database of sex offenders by postal code last week, shortly after a Supreme Court ruling ordered them to do so.
The province claims it doesn’t know, or can’t say, how much that legal fight cost taxpayers.
“It is unbelievable to me,” Cavoukian told Global News. “Why would they then waste taxpayer dollars to appeal it to the Supreme Court of Canada, knowing that the likelihood of success was very limited, given the previous two decisions, and the fact that we’ve been given deference by the lower courts?
Ontario, Alberta and Quebec have licensed the most child marriages in the last 18 years, said professor Alissa Koski, who researches the practice in Canada.
“There was no risk to personal privacy, so privacy was not an issue. There was no public safety issue here.”
I wonder what we'd see if could overlaid the PDRC's child in care deaths by region map and the map of group and foster homes in Ontaro with this map..
https://globalnews.ca/news/1313399/heres-the-sex-offender-map-ontario-didnt-want-you-to-see/
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2012: When Robert Horsburgh confessed to having sex with his foster daughter more than 30 years ago, then-Dufferin Children’s Aid Society (CAS) executive director Gary Putman saw no reason to inform police.
In those days, reporting illicit sex wasn’t something CAS workers did, Putman told The Banner.
“I have no regrets in what I did. I did exactly what would have been expected in that time, given that situation,” Putman said.
(and isn't that the problem and always been the problem [and how very catholic of him] some things are always wrong despite what decade it is)
Although Horsburgh, who grew up in foster homes, had committed illicit sexual intercourse with a foster daughter — a criminal offence that was repealed in 1988 — Putman said CAS had yet to establish protocols to work jointly with police.
https://www.orangeville.com/news-story/1481994--no-regrets-for-not-reporting-sex-with-foster-child/
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2020: Orleans-area youth group home worker faces sex-related offences involving minor
A youth group home worker based in Orleans is facing sex-related offences in relation to a minor, according to Ottawa police.
Shelby Wilson, a 21-year-old, who was previously employed at a group home in the Orleans area, was arrested on Friday, following complaints received by police earlier this month.
READ MORE: Woman charged with sex assault of minors worked at group home at time of alleged offences
https://globalnews.ca/news/6491236/orleans-youth-group-home-sex-offences-minor/
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2007: Kids see group homes as 'gateways to jail': child advocate.
Almost half of Ontario's young offenders in detention for minor crimes came through the child welfare system, a report from the Office of Child and Family Service Advocacy shows.
The trend is a concern for child advocates across the country and Ontario Child Advocate Judy Finlay said many of the province's young people are beginning to think of group homes as "gateways to jail."
"We're taking them out of very difficult family circumstances, bringing them into state care and then we're charging them for their behaviour. It's very concerning to me," Finlay said.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/kids-see-group-homes-as-gateways-to-jail-child-advocate-1.675937
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2020: Disgraced Ottawa child-protection lawyer pleads guilty to molesting six-year-old girl.
https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/0410-lawyer/wcm/de3df15e-9aa8-47de-95f8-6a29f928a2cf/
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Shedding light on the troubles facing kids in group homes.
https://www.thestar.com/news/insight/2015/07/03/kids-in-toronto-group-homes-can-be-arrested-for-being-kids.html
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Toronto group homes turning outbursts from kids into matters for police.
https://www.thestar.com/news/insight/2015/07/03/toronto-group-homes-turning-outbursts-from-kids-into-matters-for-police.html
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Drugs, theft, alcohol and inappropriate relationships alleged at Children’s Aid group home
https://globalnews.ca/news/5334666/drugs-theft-alcohol-abuse-alleged-childrens-aid-group-home/
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Two teens' harrowing stories of Ontario group homes.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2016/03/14/two-teens-harrowing-stories-of-ontario-group-homes.html
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2013: She thought she was finally home.
Shunted about in the care of the Catholic Children’s Aid Society from the time she was six years old, bounced around more than 22 different foster homes in the previous two years alone, the young teen was relieved when they placed her in the Scarborough home of Howard Smith and his family.
He was a rising star at the TTC, she was given her own room in their four-bedroom house and was initially treated as well as the couple’s two children. She thought she was safe at last.
But in reality, the 14-year-old had been placed in a hornet’s nest. And by the time the CCAS finally heeded her pleas and rescued her, she was 15 and pregnant with Smith’s child.
https://torontosun.com/2013/01/29/catholic-childrens-aid-society-failed-teen-impregnated-by-foster-dad/wcm/934e92f3-a164-45dc-b3d1-85e9a660ab32
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2019: Victim says a “sex cult” was run out of an Ontario foster home for years and Children’s Aid Society knew.
Global News is reporting that an Ontario county Children’s Aid Society failed to detect or act on the systemic abuses of countless vulnerable children in several foster care homes over a span of 8 years.
https://thepostmillennial.com/a-sex-cult-was-run-out-of-an-ontario-foster-home
https://nypost.com/2019/06/12/childrens-aid-society-in-canada-turned-a-blind-eye-to-sexual-abuse-report/
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2019: In a rare legal case, Toronto teen gets green light to sue children’s aid for negligence.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2019/08/23/in-a-rare-legal-case-toronto-teen-gets-green-light-to-sue-childrens-aid-for-negligence.html
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Three CAS cases settled.
When it was filed in 2013, the civil suits totalled $14 million ($2.8 million per plaintiff).
Each plaintiff initially claimed $350,000 for pain and suffering, in addition to $1 million each for loss of future earnings and another $1 million for punitive damages. They sought $100,000 in future care costs, plus $100,000 for special damages and $250,000 for aggravated damages.
Two outstanding plaintiffs will be addressed shortly, Bonn said.
“We continue to work on those,” he said. “We intend to mediate those.”
The suit directed at the CAS also targets four former foster parents, two are now serving prison terms for sexual abuse of children placed in their care. A third convicted predator’s case is now before the Ontario Court of Appeal.
“Like most of these issues, they’re difficult all the way through and deal with unpleasant issues, but the fact that we’ve been able to reach some form of agreement means that each side is able to live with it at some level,” Bonn said Tuesday.
Bonn filed the claims on behalf of the five female plaintiffs, now in their late teens and early 20s.
“With litigation done, it would bring an end to this piece of their involvement with the CAS,” Bonn said.
All complainants listed claim the Prince Edward County CAS (PECCAS) is liable for the abuse each of them suffered while in the care of PECCAS.
The County society is now part of the newly-amalgamated Highland Shores Children’s Aid Society, which also spans the societies of Hastings and Northumberland counties.
Mark Kartusch, the society’s executive director, was also tight-lipped about the settlement.
“I can’t disclose any of the details,” he said Tuesday. “However, we do hope this helps these youths move forward.”
Kartusch wouldn’t go as far as viewing the settlements as a form of closure for the plaintiffs.
“How does one ever have closure?” he said. “We believe in these young people and their future and want to support them in that.”
Before the 2013 merger, PECCAS was subjected to an extensive government probe which revealed a bevy of damning findings.
The investigation led by the Ministry of Child and Youth Services in Dec. 2011 – following a rash of child sex abuse charges against County foster parents – showed the agency was rife with significant internal conflicts recklessly placing vulnerable children in homes not properly screened and some cases not screened at all for months.
Kartusch said the agency has found better footing since the findings triggered amalgamation.
“I think we’re moving forward but will not forget the past,” he said.
Some concerns linger.
“I’m concerned that this may cause people to lose confidence in fostering or foster families,” he said, adding few bad apples aren’t representative of the whole bunch.
The 2013 statement of claims alleged “PECCAS is responsible, in fact and in law, for its own negligence and breaches of its statutory and fiduciary duties as well as for the negligence and breaches of duty committed by its servants, agents and employees,” states the claim, a copy of which was obtained by The Intelligencer in April 2013.
One statement of claim states, “PECCAS caused (the plaintiffs) permanent and extensive injuries and losses” ranging from alcohol and substance abuse to inability to trust, impairment of mental health, nightmares of abuse, suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts.
“They (plaintiffs) have incurred medical expenses and will continue to require therapy and medical attention,” the 2013 statement of claim adds.
Two of the former foster parents initially targeted in the claim were Walter Joseph Holm, 46, and his wife, Janet Holm, 49.
They pleaded guilty to several charges, including possession of child pornography, sexual assault and invitation to sexual touching and were sentenced in November 2011 to four- and three-year prison terms respectively.
Three of the five plaintiffs, now ages 21, 23, and 19, are linked to the Holms. It’s not known if they were the three of five now concluded.
Justice Geoff Griffin blasted the Holms for turning their home into a “sexual cult” while fostering 25 teenagers over the course of nine years.
The three plaintiffs further implied that PECCAS was “vicariously liable for the actions” of the Holms.
https://www.intelligencer.ca/2014/10/21/three-cas-cases-settled/wcm/3fd07287-3f2a-1755-7386-1c8c2353c943
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Crown Ward Class Action (Children who suffered abuse before and while they were Crown wards, including in foster care and foster homes, and while in the care of the Children’s Aid Society (“CAS”)).
https://kmlaw.ca/cases/crown-ward-class-action/
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2017: While the civil suit has been "dragging on forever," the lawyer says a trial date is now set for roughly a year from now, on May 7, 2018.
It would be unusual for it to reach that stage, however, as most cases of this nature are settled out of court WITH TAXPAYERS MONEY...
"If it goes to trial I think this will be the first case against a CAS in Ontario," Merritt says. "I am not aware of any other civil cases against Ontario CASs that have gone to trial."
Carl Chadbourne, the foster home operator who abused Vincent, was convicted in the early 1990s on multiple counts of sex assault — involving Vincent and other boys in his care — and sentenced to an 18-year jail term.
https://www.thesudburystar.com/2017/05/20/a-sudbury-boys-stolen-childhood/wcm/91375975-998c-50f6-1641-60a9cd66ae30
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2009: "Evil Edith" Sanders and her house of horrors are dead and gone, but the police that frequented the home and social workers who ignored allegations of child abuse in her home have finally paid a price for their neglect.
On the eve of a trial into horrendous abuse suffered by children at Ms. Sanders's London, Ont., home over a period of four decades, the agencies targeted in a negligence lawsuit have agreed to pay a substantial settlement.
In return, the three plaintiffs - elderly women who were part of an endless line of children that Ms. Sanders systematically abused, tortured and pimped out - have ended their lawsuit against the London Police Service and the Children's Aid Society of London and Middlesex.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/suit-settled-in-horrific-case-of-child-abuse/article4290587/
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EXCLUSIVE: Convicted group home owner moves operations to Oshawa.
The man at the centre of an in-depth CityNews investigation into illegal group homes is now accused of moving his operations to Oshawa.
Authorities in Oshawa believe Winston Manning is in breach of probation and say more charges are pending, adding that vulnerable people have been put in danger.
https://toronto.citynews.ca/2019/07/10/group-home-owner-moves-operations-to-oshawa/
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Drugs, theft, alcohol and inappropriate relationships alleged at Children’s Aid group home.
https://globalnews.ca/news/5334666/drugs-theft-alcohol-abuse-alleged-childrens-aid-group-home/
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2010: Cornwall sex abuse victims given large settlements
Some victims of the Cornwall sex abuse scandal are receiving large financial settlements after decades of allegations that a cover-up of a pedophile ring existed in the eastern Ontario city, CTV Ottawa has learned.
The sex abuse scandal was uncovered in the early 1990s. A public inquiry ended in December 2009 after four years. The inquiry found the Catholic Church, police, the Ontario government and the legal system all failed to protect children from sexual predators.
Now, Ontario's attorney general has confirmed to CTV that several financial settlements have been reached with victims, and more lawsuits are outstanding.
The Project Truth inquiry into a pedophile ring cover-up and sex abuse allegations in Cornwall ended in December 2009.
Alleged victim Steve Parisien says the public has a right to know about large settlements paid out to sex abuse victims.
Although confidentiality agreements could mean taxpayers will never learn the true cost of the settlements, a former MPP predicts the payouts will total tens of millions of dollars.
"I would look at somewhere between $70-100 million," said Garry Guzzo, a former Conservative MPP who blew the whistle on the scandal and pushed for a public inquiry.
"It's a lot of money coming from very few taxpayers, and the people of the Catholic Church are taxpayers."
While sources have told CTV the payouts are in the millions, alleged victim Steve Parisien says some individuals are getting less than $20,000.
"I think parishioners and taxpayers have a right to know how much has been paid out," he said.
A lawyer representing dozens of the victims wouldn't reveal how much money was paid. However, he confirmed several settlements have been reached with the Catholic diocese, the Ontario government and other Catholic organizations.
There are also several cases in the works against the Children's Aid Society.
https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/cornwall-sex-abuse-victims-given-large-settlements-1.521190
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Judge certifies $600-million class-action lawsuit on behalf of former residents of Ontario's training schools. An Ontario Superior Court judge has certified a class-action lawsuit seeking $600 million in damages against the Ontario government on behalf of former residents of the province's training schools.Dec 4, 2018.
https://globalnews.ca/news/4731951/ontario-training-schools-survivors/
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The priest's confession: What the Catholic bishops knew - The Fifth Estate.
https://youtu.be/IX-rDwCsUCU
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Doctors Without Boundaries - the fifth estate.
https://youtu.be/xifx_Iatlgs
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Scout's Honour - Sexual abuse in the Boy Scouts - the fifth estate
https://youtu.be/K-1GO1WcsEE
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2011: Bad teachers: Ontario's secret list. By Kevin Donovan Staff Reporter.
Here are some of the people licensed in Ontario to teach your children and report the suspected abuse and neglect of children.
A teacher who disciplined students by warning they would “spend time with a pedophile” and if the behaviour got worse it “would be without vaseline.”
READ MORE:
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2011/09/29/bad_teachers_ontarios_secret_list.html
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Could you spot a pedophile? Here are the warning signs.
SOME child molesters jump out of bushes and molest your child on the way home from school.
But more likely, he is your friendly neighbor or attentive shopkeeper.
He could be a charming relative or the son of a friend who is all too willing to babysit your children.
The pedophile in your midst may be the schoolteacher, the bus driver, the youth worker or the lay preacher at your church.
The Australian Royal Commission into institutionalized child sex crimes, running since April, has entered a new round of hearings and a concurrent inquiry is continuing into child sex offences in the Catholic Church's NSW Hunter Valley diocese.
Child-related workers
While pedophiles can work anywhere, they do find ways to be around children as often as possible.
It may not be their principal profession, such as a teacher or priest, but a voluntary or weekend position as a sports coach, camp counsellor, school bus driver, daycare worker, Boy Scout leader, church or secular youth worker can provide the contact with children they need.
Some well-known pedophiles have placed themselves as teachers or leaders of artistic bodies such as dance schools, where they have surrounded themselves with adoring and aspiring performers.
Andrew Manners was a convicted pedophile who had committed offences against minors in Queensland in 1998. He was on parole and prohibited from working with children when he surfaced in 2002.
Manners turned up as a fill-in teacher at his mother's Scottish dance school, where he was spotted by an observant parole officer.
Former performing arts schoolteacher, Peter Gerard Boys, was also a band leader of the musical troupe the Marching Koalas in the NSW Hunter Valley region when, aged in his 40s, he began having a sexual relationship with four of his students.
He was convicted and sentenced to eight child sex offences against girls aged 10-16 years, and on his release from prison is believed to have subsequently married one of the girls who had come of age during his incarceration.
Watch out for teacher adoration beyond the bounds of a normal crush, accompanied by "secret" phone calls and special individual attention.
The every-man
When looking out for a child sex offender, don't be fooled by a person's appearance, outward respectability or importance in the community.
Pedophiles are almost always men, more often married adult males and they work in a very wide range of occupations, from unskilled work up to corporate executives.
What to look out for is someone who relates better to children than to adults, and has either very few adult friends or whose friends might also be sex offenders.
Signs to watch for: pedophiles usually prefer children in one specific age group, such as infants and toddlers, children between six and ten years old, or "tweens" and young teenagers up to the age of 16.
Pedophiles can be bisexual but more commonly will prefer children or the one gender, males or females.
https://www.news.com.au/national/could-you-spot-a-paedophile-here-are-the-warning-signs/news-story/a0502e8c3edd265972204ce6fb435982
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A Letter to Justice LeSage about the Ontario College of Teachers
C4A Editorial, Whistleblowers in Canada / By Ian Bron
Some of you may be aware that we have been following the case of Ontario teacher Jim Black. Jim spoke out about the Ontario College of Teachers reinstating of teacher with criminal records – records that involved sex with minors. He did this before most people knew it was a problem, and he was punished by the OCT for his effort. Last year, however, public outcry became loud enough that the government forced the OCT to conduct an independent inquiry of its mandate and functions (read a fuller explanation of his role on the OCT website).
We put together a letter for Mr. LeSage and sent it to him directly – avoiding the filter of the OCT. In the past, the OCT has prevented us from commenting on Mr. Black’s case in their magazine, Professionally Speaking.
Besides the letter below, I also encourage you to read the summary of Mr. Black’s case on our Cases and Issues page.
=====================================================
7 February 2012
Hon. Patrick J. LeSage CM, OOnt, QC
1 First Canadian Place
100 King Street West , Suite 1600
Toronto ON M5X 1G5
Re: Ontario College of Teachers review of investigation and disciplinary procedures and outcomes and dispute resolution program
Dear Mr. LeSage:
I am writing you to provide input into your review of the Ontario College of Teachers procedures and programs. Canadians for Accountability is an organization created by a group of grassroots whistleblowers and accountability activists. Our mission is to advance integrity and accountability and to help and advocate for whistleblowers in all parts of our society.
We are interested in your inquiry as we have been approached by a number of Ontario teachers with concerns about the OCT’s handling of complaints regarding unethical behaviour at schools and at the College itself. Some of them fit our definition of whistleblowers and have faced reprisals – in one notable case, by the College.
One case in particular caught our attention: that of James Black, an award winning teacher who spoke out and was punished for doing so. Mr. Black was contacted by the Ontario Ministry of Education in 2004 and asked to provide a critique of the Ontario College of Teachers. As his experience there was troubling, he produced a four-page report that was very critical of the College – notably in its allowing sexual offenders back into the classroom – and recommended some significant changes. Following this, he reports a series of escalating reprisals. He retired in 2006 and made his report more public. This resulted in media attention, which in turn led to disciplinary action by the College.
Mr. Black went through a Kafka-esque pseudo-legal nightmare, charged with vague offences and threatened with fines and suspension – despite the fact that he had retired. Principles of natural justice were ignored and in July 2009, Mr. Black was fined $1000 and suspended from teaching for 24 months – despite the lack of clear evidence. His name and case was published in the College magazine Professionally Speaking, which is circulated to some 220,000 teachers. Nowhere in the description of his case does it mention that the complaint was laid by an individual convicted of sexual offences against students, and the standard of proof described is a travesty.
The case against Mr. Black has the hallmarks of a personal vendetta and the quality of the investigation and disciplinary process appalling. We attempted to intervene on his behalf, but were ignored. And, as far as we can determine, no action has been taken to address the problems that Mr. Black reported. Even when the more recent investigations were done validating Mr. Black’s concerns, his case was not re-examined.
You can find a summary of Mr. Blacks case on our website at http://acac.onefishcreative.ca/acac/issues-and-cases/#jb. I have attached a letter which we sent to the College: it summarizes our concerns about his case.
We are also familiar with another case, a teacher in southern Ontario who has blown the whistle on four teachers. One was ultimately convicted of theft in a very public prosecution, yet had been fervently defended. The whistleblower, meanwhile, faced reprisals for speaking out. Interestingly, the teacher who was prosecuted – Wes McConnell – was never disciplined by the College.
See http://www.lfpress.com/sports/columnists/morris_dalla_costa/2011/03/16/17645961.html for the London Free Press story.
Based on these cases and others we have observed, it is our opinion that the OCT is deficient in performing its functions in respect to investigative and disciplinary processes and decisions.
Part of the problem, we feel, is that the College is a self-regulating body with no oversight. Canadians for Accountability is opposed to such bodies on principle as we feel all bodies should have oversight – especially those where professionals may be judging their colleagues and inappropriate influence is possible. We would like to see the Ontario Ombudsman have the authority to investigate and make findings against the College as a precaution against such potential abuses.
http://acacanada.ca/2012/03/23/a-letter-to-justice-lesage-about-the-ontario-college-of-teachers/
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2011: Soft-porn writing teacher resigns from watchdog.
The former head of the discipline committee of the Ontario College of Teachers (OCT) is facing professional misconduct charges for his role in co-authoring a sexually explicit novel for teens.
Jacques Tremblay resigned his position as chair of the OCT’s disciplinary committee, a position that involves overseeing sexual assault cases, in 2011 after his part in writing a soft porn novel titled “The Sexteens and the Fake Goddess” was exposed in a Toronto Star investigation.
The book “is a lurid tale of striptease, breast fondling, bum grabbing, orgasms, drugs and blackmail,” reported the Star’s Kevin Donovan in the exposé.
The cover of the book depicts the backs of a boy and a girl naked from the waist up looking at a silhouette of the CN Tower.
The other authors of the book are identified as Tremblay’s wife, Marie-Ange Gagnon, and Frederic Tremblay.
Following Jacques Tremblay’s resignation the OCT launched an investigation into the situation, although the teachers’ watchdog had earlier maintained that Tremblay’s writing did “not have an impact on his ability to act in the public interest.”
Tremblay himself had argued that his book was “entirely separate” from his work at the College and service to the public, saying the book was meant to “empower teenagers, to encourage them to be strong and resist or avoid peer pressure.”
However, in an article on his website Tremblay says the purpose of his novel is to help teens “find their inner voice” which will affect their “future sex life” because “having higher self-esteem below the belt leads to better sex.”
He also warns teens that having negative attitudes about sex could have a “direct impact on orgasm.”
https://mychristiandaily.com/teen-sex-novel-lands-former-ontario-teachers-disciplinary-head-in-hot-water/
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2009: Why it’s so hard to fire bad teachers.
From 2009: Most principals would rather hide or transfer incompetent teachers than try to oust them.
https://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/why-its-so-hard-to-fire-bad-teachers/
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2011: Ontario’s top teacher watchdog has quit.
Jacques Tremblay, who the Star reported was a writer of soft porn replete with questionable administrator-teacher-student conduct, resigned Tuesday. He was the chairperson for five years of the Ontario College of Teachers’ disciplinary panel, which sits in judgment on hundreds of teachers accused of misconduct.
In the novel, main character Leila Montana is introduced as a “young teen” just starting high school. She is also joining a group called the Sexteens’ Select Society.
As she awaits initiation into this mysterious alliance, the book describes her appearance as follows: “Her half-open shirt divulges the roundness of her gorgeous bosom. Leila’s particularly short skirt exposes her barely fleshy buttocks.”
There are several other detailed references throughout the book about the bodies of Leila and other girls.
Taking an oath to the mysterious society, Leila promises to “develop my teenage life at my own rhythm inspired by the aphrodisiac cult, which is based on the power of love and the emancipation of my sexuality.”
On the day after the initiation, “Leila wakes up and feels a new energy swelling within her. . . . Despite her efforts, however, Leila can’t remember what really happened. She is peaceful and undisturbed by this lapse of memory. Meanwhile, Leila feels a very light, but quite pleasant, tingling on her upper right buttock.”
(Nothing at all creepy about this is there and everything about this little scenario is perfectly normal, right?)
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Date rape drugs facts: It’s Not Just Roofies Anymore.
Date rape drugs are drugs used to assist in a sexual assault, which is any type of sexual activity a person does not agree to.
These drugs can affect you very quickly and cause victims to become weak, confused, and even pass out. You may not remember what happened while you were drugged.
The most common date rape drugs -- also called "club drugs" -- are flunitrazepam (Rohypnol), also called roofies; gamma hydroxybutyric acid (GHB), also called liquid ecstasy; and ketamine, also called Special K.
These drugs may come as pills, liquids, or powders.
Alcohol may also be considered a date rape drug because it affects judgment and behavior and can be used to help commit sexual assault.
The club drug "ecstasy" (MDMA) has also been used to commit sexual assault.
Protect yourself by not accepting drinks from others, not sharing drinks, watching your drink, and by avoiding creepy societies and having a non-drinking friend with you to make sure nothing happens.
If you suspect you have been exposed to a date rape drug or have been sexually assaulted, call 911 and get to an emergency room immediately.
Date rape drugs can also cause seizures and even death.
Adverse Effects of Club Drugs
Uncertainties about the sources, chemicals, and possible contaminants used to manufacture many club drugs make it extremely difficult to determine toxicity and associated medical consequences. Nonetheless, we do know that:
Coma and seizures can occur following use of GHB.
Combined use with other drugs such as alcohol can result in nausea and breathing difficulties. GHB and two of its precursors, gamma butyrolactone (GBL) and 1,4 butanediol (BD), have been involved in poisonings, overdoses, date rapes, and deaths.
Rohypnol may be lethal when mixed with alcohol and/or other CNS depressants.
Ketamine, in high doses, can cause impaired motor function, high blood pressure, and potentially fatal respiratory problems.
https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/chairman-of-teachers-discipline-committee-resigns-over-blue-teen-novel
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2011/10/05/top_teacher_watchdog_who_wrote_porn_resigns.html
https://www.thespec.com/news-story/2221198-soft-porn-writing-teacher-resigns-from-watchdog/
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2012: Why bad teachers don’t get fired in Ontario.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/why-bad-teachers-dont-get-fired-in-ontario/article4249405/
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2015: Ontario College of Teachers Cases of Teacher Sexual Misconduct.
Teacher sexual misconduct in Ontario was examined by using cases reviewed by the Ontario College of Teachers between 2000 and 2013. Despite the impetus by key stakeholders to develop appropriate policies to circumvent teacher-student sexual relationships, this phenomenon is still not well understood. The current study found that around 92 percent of perpetrators are men. The results indicate that male perpetrators who abuse elementary school-aged males are more likely to have multiple victims and longer offending careers. This study found less intrusive sexual behaviour, fewer multiple victim perpetrators, and shorter offending careers in more recent cases. This suggests that the government-commissioned report published in 2000 may have raised awareness and shaped this issue in a positive way. Practitioners, policy-makers, and the public are provided with a comprehensive picture of the perpetrators, victims, and the nature of abuse to engage in meaningful discourse and implement program and policy.
https://www.cais.ca/uploaded/Research/Current_Resources/Sexual-Misconduct/Ontario-College-of-Teachers-Cases-of-Teacher-Sexual-Misconduct.pdf
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Project Spade arrests by the numbers
In Canada:
40 teachers (no surprises here)
9 doctors and nurses (no surprises here)
32 volunteers (volunteers for who?)
6 law enforcement personnel (no surprises here)
9 faith leaders (priests and pastors)
3 foster parents (big surprise it wasn't more)
Ontario: 50
Rest of Canada: 58
United States: 76
International: 164
https://www.macleans.ca/general/huge-child-porn-ring-busted-toronto-police-say-348-arrested-in-project-spade/
https://www.toronto.com/news-story/4219011-toronto-police-s-project-spade-results-in-international-child-porn-arrests/
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/almost-350-suspects-nabbed-in-huge-child-porn-bust/
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Ontario portrayed as pedophile paradise in U.S. ruse to capture predators
A website set up by Homeland Security promoted the bogus firm Precious Treasure Holiday Co., which promised to arrange illegal encounters in Ontario for pedophiles. October 10, 2011.
U.S. authorities have defended their online portrayal of Ontario as a haven for child-sex tourism, saying the ploy helped them catch four predators.
A controversial website set up by the Department of Homeland Security promoted the bogus firm Precious Treasure Holiday Co., which promised to arrange illegal encounters in Ontario for pedophiles.
Four people — two Germans and two Americans — fell for the sophisticated ruse and signed up for a trip.
A pamphlet that came with the website offered one night hotel accommodations in Canada and travel under the guise of “boyfriend and girlfriend going to gamble at casino.”
The pamphlet said transportation to Cleveland, meals and “condoms, lube, etc. . . ” were not included in the travel package.
But it was the use of Canada as a safe haven for sex tourism that raised questions about how the country was portrayed in the sting.
“Canada made for a more plausible scenario,” Brian Moskowitz, the special agent in charge of the investigation, told Postmedia News shortly after the indictments were announced.
“It was never our intent to take anyone to Canada and no children were involved. It was merely part of a scenario that we built.”
He said that Canada wasn’t used in the scenario over any perceived weaknesses or legal vulnerability.
Canadian authorities, such as those in Windsor, across the river from the Detroit offices of Homeland Security where Moskowitz is based, are alerted whenever such a sting is underway to prevent them from wasting resources on chasing the American operation, he said.
Homeland Security first set up the website in 2009. It remained online in several reincarnations until it was finally outed in March as a government sting by The Smoking Gun website.
“Sex tourism is a scourge and must be combated with every available resource,” Moskowitz said in a release when the convictions were announced in early September.
“These cases show international borders are no longer a hindrance for predators.”
The two German men convicted in the sting paid up to $1,600 to have sex with girls and boys between the ages of 10 and 13. One, a 49-year-old doctor from Stuttgart, was allegedly found with lingerie, sex toys, bondage ropes, straps, a mask, lubricant, 17 condoms as well as four stuffed unicorns and a paint-by-number set, Homeland Security said.
Two Ohio men also pleaded guilty to sex trafficking offences and possession of child pornography as a result of the sting. In one case, a 38-year-old man tried to organize a sexual encounter with an eight-year-old girl. In the other case, a 25-year-old man wasn’t legally allowed to enter Canada because he was on parole for a molestation conviction, Homeland Security said.
https://nationalpost.com/news/ontario-portrayed-as-pedophile-paradise-in-u-s-ruse-to-capture-predators
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2019: Children’s aid society was told months ago its lawyer had argued a 14-year-old girl is a ‘sexually mature young woman’ on its behalf.
The head of a Northern Ontario children’s aid society was told five months ago that his agency’s lawyer stated in court documents in an ongoing sexual abuse lawsuit that a 14-year-old girl is not a child but a “sexually mature young woman,” the Star has learned.
Bill Leonard, executive director of Kenora-Rainy River Districts Child and Family Services, acknowledged to the Star this week that the plaintiff in the case had contacted him last October over the statement.
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2019/03/27/childrens-aid-society-was-told-months-ago-its-lawyer-had-argued-a-14-year-old-girl-is-a-sexually-mature-young-woman-on-its-behalf.html
https://www.narcity.com/ca/on/many-ontarians-horrified-by-toronto-lawyers-claim-that-14-year-olds-are-sexually-mature
https://www.thespec.com/news/canada/2019/03/24/a-14-year-old-girl-is-a-sexually-mature-young-woman-not-a-child-children-s-aid-society-lawyer-argues-in-sex-abuse-suit.html
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2018: Children’s Aid executive facing 20 charges in child abuse case.
https://www.countylive.ca/former-cas-executive-director-charged/
https://globalnews.ca/news/4182170/childrens-aid-executive-charged/
https://inquinte.ca/story/former-cas-director-committed-to-stand-trial-in-superior-court
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2019: Teen ‘sexual cult’ in Ontario foster home known to Children’s Aid Society, victim says.
Stories from an eastern Ontario foster home show that teens were being taken advantage of and nothing was being done to stop it.
In an Ontario foster home: children were allegedly forced to watch pornography, encouraged to drink and perform sexual acts in front of adults from the community.
Stories from an eastern Ontario foster home show that teens were being taken advantage of and nothing was being done to stop it.
Story continues below M.K. had been previously sexually abused when she arrived at the Holms’ as a foster child, hoping to find a safe, stable home. Instead, her stay turned into a nightmare. The couple groomed her under the guise of trying to heal her. They dressed her up, made her watch porn, and eventually she was sexually assaulted by Joe.
https://headtopics.com/ca/teen-sexual-cult-in-ontario-foster-home-known-to-children-s-aid-society-victim-says-6350386
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2019: In a rare legal case, Toronto teen gets green light to sue children’s aid for negligence.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2019/08/23/in-a-rare-legal-case-toronto-teen-gets-green-light-to-sue-childrens-aid-for-negligence.html
https://globalnews.ca/news/5360057/teen-sexual-cult-ontario-foster-home-childrens-aid-society/
https://nypost.com/2019/06/12/childrens-aid-society-in-canada-turned-a-blind-eye-to-sexual-abuse-report/
https://www.intelligencer.ca/2014/10/21/three-cas-cases-settled/wcm/3fd07287-3f2a-1755-7386-1c8c2353c943
https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/0410-lawyer/wcm/de3df15e-9aa8-47de-95f8-6a29f928a2cf/
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2012: When Robert Horsburgh confessed to having sex with his foster daughter more than 30 years ago, then-Dufferin Children’s Aid Society (CAS) executive director Gary Putman saw no reason to inform police.
In those days, reporting illicit sex wasn’t something CAS workers did, Putman told The Banner.
“I have no regrets in what I did. I did exactly what would have been expected in that time, given that situation,” Putman said.
(and isn't that the problem and always been the problem [and how very catholic of him] some things are always wrong despite what decade it is)
Although Horsburgh, who grew up in foster homes, had committed illicit sexual intercourse with a foster daughter — a criminal offence that was repealed in 1988 — Putman said CAS had yet to establish protocols to work jointly with police.
https://www.orangeville.com/news-story/1481994--no-regrets-for-not-reporting-sex-with-foster-child/
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2013: She thought she was finally home.
Shunted about in the care of the Catholic Children’s Aid Society from the time she was six years old, bounced around more than 22 different foster homes in the previous two years alone, the young teen was relieved when they placed her in the Scarborough home of Howard Smith and his family.
He was a rising star at the TTC, she was given her own room in their four-bedroom house and was initially treated as well as the couple’s two children. She thought she was safe at last.
But in reality, the 14-year-old had been placed in a hornet’s nest. And by the time the CCAS finally heeded her pleas and rescued her, she was 15 and pregnant with Smith’s child.
Now 35 years later, Smith, the retired TTC general superintendent for surface routes, has pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a girl between 14 and 16 and having illicit sexual intercourse with a foster daughter between April 26, 1978, and July 13, 1978.
In the downtown courtroom, his victim sat huddled in the corner of the first row, her frail body bent in on itself as she shook with sobs. She has lost so much to this man and finally, after so long, he was admitting to what he did to her.
But not to everything.
Smith, 61, was also charged with rape, but that count on the indictment is to be withdrawn at his sentencing as part of the plea agreement, though Crown attorney Jonathan Smith hastened to clarify outside the courtroom that “there’s no suggestion that it was consensual.”
And still, she wanted that rape conviction most of all.
“But it doesn’t matter what I think,” she said bitterly when she learned the plea bargain would stand despite her objection. “What matters to them is getting it done and over with.”
If she feels let down, it is nothing new.
At 49, she has been on disability for the last decade with post-traumatic stress disorder and other ailments she traces back to a foster father stealing her virginity while she was in his care. “Everyone thinks he’s a pillar of the community. Everyone looks at him and sees Mr. Wonderful,” she explained in an interview. “I’m the one who sees the wolf in sheep’s clothing. He’s what my nightmares are made of.”
The assaults began after he was injured in a car accident and they were home alone together. “I couldn’t move, I was frozen,” she wept as she recalled the sexual assaults.
Her CCAS worker ignored her pleas to be moved. “Nobody would believe me over Mr. TTC inspector at the time,” she recalled. “They told me it was either there or the street.”
That quickly changed when they discovered she was pregnant. The CCAS yanked her out of Smith’s house and placed her in a home for unwed mothers. Court heard that the shameful child welfare agency never reported Smith to the police.
They failed her at every turn. She says her social worker even warned her that if she listed Smith as the father on the baby’s birth certificate, they’d ensure her daughter was given to him. Terrified, she agreed to list paternity as “unknown” because no one was going to take away her baby.
“I raised the child of a man I absolutely despised. But she was my lifeline. I got to love someone who loved me back. Without her, I wouldn’t have seen my 16th birthday.”
If they hadn’t done enough, she says a CCAS supervisor laughed at her in 1998 and told her she couldn’t bring charges against Smith because there was a statute of limitations. It was only while talking to a lawyer friend three years ago that she learned there is no such thing.
So in April 2010, she went to the police and DNA tests confirmed the horrible story that for so long no one would believe — that Smith got her pregnant when she was his 15-year-old foster child.
She has never been the same since.
“For two years I used to take two showers a day with bleach, I couldn’t get him off me,” she wept. “I was just a 14-year-old kid and he took my entire life.”
Smith is to be sentenced March 7.
https://torontosun.com/2013/01/29/catholic-childrens-aid-society-failed-teen-impregnated-by-foster-dad/wcm/934e92f3-a164-45dc-b3d1-85e9a660ab32
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2016: Ontario to improve levels of care for youth in group homes, CAS custody.
TORONTO – Ontario is promising to improve standards of care for nearly 16,000 young people in foster and group homes, youth justice facilities and mental health residential treatment following a scathing report from an expert panel.
The report focuses on a scattered system with no common standards of care for the children or set qualifications for staff who look after them in institutions that “need significant security controls” because of gangs and peer-to-peer violence.
“There is an urgent need to address the existing and longstanding challenges in the current model of residential service delivery,” concludes the government-appointed panel. “Change has been very slow. It is time to shift gears.”
The experts say there are significant variations in the use of secure isolation or solitary confinement at youth justice facilities, and warns the government will have to make a sustained effort to mitigate its impact and develop alternatives.
https://globalnews.ca/news/2728296/ontario-to-improve-levels-of-care-for-youth-in-group-homes-cas-custody/
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2017: Unannounced visits mean no time to prepare.
Hockley applauds plans to put an end to the practice of letting group homes know that an inspection is coming.
"The reality is, by holding announced visits, you're allowing the staff time to prepare an ideal environment that meets standards," she said.
"This allots time for staff to take the locks off the refrigerator, to put fruit in the fruit bowl, to take out youth belongings that have been locked up, such as shoes. Keep in mind these are all real examples given from members of the youth panel.
"By holding unannounced visits, you're not giving them that opportunity to prepare. And instead, you are getting to witness first hand the true state of the residences in which children and youth reside."
Hockley said she was once in a foster home where "unauthorized" adults would be allowed to sleep over, and some people would be allowed to sleep on the couch. She said she alerted the Children's Aid Society to the issue, but had to stay at the home for weeks until she could be placed elsewhere.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/programs/metromorning/group-homes-foster-care-unannounced-visits-reforms-residential-care-1.4218888
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2017: While the civil suit has been "dragging on forever," the lawyer says a trial date is now set for roughly a year from now, on May 7, 2018.
It would be unusual for it to reach that stage, however, as most cases of this nature are settled out of court WITH TAXPAYERS MONEY...
"If it goes to trial I think this will be the first case against a CAS in Ontario," Merritt says. "I am not aware of any other civil cases against Ontario CASs that have gone to trial."
Carl Chadbourne, the foster home operator who abused Vincent, was convicted in the early 1990s on multiple counts of sex assault — involving Vincent and other boys in his care — and sentenced to an 18-year jail term.
- It wasn’t until he had his own child, relatively late in life, that Keith Vincent realized what had been lacking so much in his own youth — and, indeed, most of his adulthood.
"In 2007 I had a son, who is now 10," says the 59-year-old Sudbury native, presently residing near Windsor. "When he began to be old enough to know who I was, and specifically that I was his dad, he would do things that I would never do. If he was on top of something, on a tree or on a car, he would jump and just automatically know that I would catch him."
Vincent himself never had that confidence in people — not in his alcoholic parents, whose home he ran away from as young as 12, and especially not in the operator of a North Bay group home, who repeatedly abused him both sexually and psychologically.
He survived the horrors of his early teen years but struggled in any relationship that came later. "Whenever someone got close to me, where I thought I was going to get hurt, I’d get up and run," he says. "I’d move, I’d move, I’d move."
When he saw his son showing implicit trust, it was a turning point.
"I started realizing what had happened to me," he says. "Before that, I was just in denial, or survival, whatever you want to call it. But when he started to do that, I knew then that there was something wrong with me. I’d never had that (feeling of safety), even with the authorities who were there to protect me, namely the Children’s Aid Society."
Carl Chadbourne, the foster home operator who abused Vincent, was convicted in the early 1990s on multiple counts of sex assault — involving Vincent and other boys in his care — and sentenced to an 18-year jail term.
That afforded some degree of justice and validation, but little in the way of compensation, says Vincent, and certainly did not erase the deep wounds inflicted by the abuse.
"The sad part about an abused person is we see through our eyes, looking out," he says. "We know our scars; we know our past. Anybody looking at you doesn’t see it, but you don’t know that — you think they can see something, that there’s some ability they have to recognize that."
Vincent struggled mightily as an adult. "I’ve lost marriages, I’ve spent time in jail," he recounts. "I’ve been to Homewood (Health Centre in Guelph) for depression and suicide attempts."
The survivor is now seeking therapy for his issues and he’s also seeking $3 million in compensation through a civil suit filed against the Sudbury-Manitoulin Children’s Aid Society, which he alleges was negligent in placing him in an abusive foster environment and keeping him there, despite multiple attempts to inform his case worker and others of the harm he incurred.
Chadbourne and the province are also named in the suit, although lawyer Loretta Merritt admits it’s unlikely the former group home operator would have much money and the province, while it could still face a default judgement, didn’t defend the suit so is not a direct target.
None of the allegations made in the suit has been proven in a court of law, except in the sense that the transgressions attributed to Chadbourne were affirmed in the earlier criminal case.
The local CAS was invited by The Star to comment on the legal matter but no response had been received by deadline.
In its statement of defence, however, the agency argues it was not aware of abuse at the North Bay facility, which was called Northhome Lodge and listed at the time as "an acceptable residential service facility."
The CAS admits to placing Vincent at the home for a couple of years in the early 1970s, but contends "the plaintiff did not disclose and neither was information received that the plaintiff was mistreated at the group home facility."
Vincent says it was hard to get a private audience with his social worker, as Chadbourne would make a point of being present to intimidate the boys from speaking candidly, but insists he did speak many times about the hell he was experiencing.
"I tried to tell everybody under the sun — from the Children’s Aid Society to the police to my school teacher, my guidance counsellor, my parents, my aunts, my uncles," he says.
He also ran away "in excess of 30 times from North Bay," he says, on a couple of occasions hitch-hiking all the way to his uncle’s home in Toronto. "But when I woke up Chadbourne would be standing over top of me. He’d grab me by the hair, throw me on the floor of the car, and curse and beat me all the way home."
Once back at Northhome, the fosterer would "put me in a room, shave my head, and leave me in there for two or three days in my underwear," he says. "That’s the kind of s— he did."
Actually it wasn’t even the half of it. According to the statement of claim, Chadbourne forced Vincent to take showers with him and routinely subjected him to "sodomy and other forms of sexual assault."
Vincent says he was the first victim of Chadbourne at Northhome but far from the last. When he was interviewed by police in 1992 about his experiences at the facility, he learned "16 kids had the same story," he says. "They weren’t there at the same time, but they all had the same story."
Vincent doesn’t know the other victims but says part of his reason for pursuing a civil case and speaking about it publicly is to empower those other survivors to get help, and to heal.
"They might not know what they’re entitled to, specifically in terms of therapy," he says. "I’m hoping this story hits enough kids who were in Northhome Lodge, and are suffering somewhere now, to speak out and not keep this hidden."
That he can speak out publicly himself is a new thing for the abuse survivor, as his identity was earlier protected by a publication ban and he couldn’t talk openly to the press even if he wanted to.
On May 5, however, the Crown agreed to lift that condition so he would have the freedom to tell his story.
"It’s newsworthy and, I think, quite interesting, that the court has set aside the publication ban," says his lawyer. "Complainants often want publication bans (at the time of a trial) but they aren’t often consulted, and they in effect amount to gag orders for some people who may want to speak about it — if not then, later."
Merritt has represented many sexual abuse victims in her practice, but says this case is unique in the degree of the abuse.
"Keith’s is one of the worst cases I’ve been involved with," she says, noting the criminal sentence for Chadbourne speaks to that. "It’s rare to see a term of 18 years, and the sentences often don’t reflect the severity of the impact."
The case is also somewhat unusual in being "really founded in negligence by the CAS," she adds.
While the civil suit has been "dragging on forever," the lawyer says a trial date is now set for roughly a year from now, on May 7, 2018.
It would be unusual for it to reach that stage, however, as most cases of this nature are settled out of court WITH TAXPAYERS MONEY...
"If it goes to trial I think this will be the first case against a CAS in Ontario," Merritt says. "I am not aware of any other civil cases against Ontario CASs that have gone to trial."
jmoodie@postmedia.com
TRENDING IN CANADA
https://www.thesudburystar.com/2017/05/20/a-sudbury-boys-stolen-childhood/wcm/91375975-998c-50f6-1641-60a9cd66ae30
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2019: Dunnville foster parent charged with sex offences
Ontario Provincial Police have laid charges against a foster parent in Dunnville after a sexual assault investigation involving a person under the age of 16.
Haldimand OPP began their investigation Nov. 18 after receiving information about the allegation involving the minor.
As a result, the foster parent, a 59-year-old man, has been charged with sexual assault on a person under 16 years of age, sexual interference and invitation to sexual touching under 16 years of age.
https://torontosun.com/news/crime/former-foster-parent-from-central-ontario-charged-with-multiple-sex-offences
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2009: Why did 90 children die?
Ninety children known to Ontario's child welfare system died in 2007, according to the latest report from the chief coroner's office – a number the province's new child advocate says is shocking and should trouble us all.
Equally disturbing, says Irwin Elman in his first annual report to the Legislature today, is the government's refusal to share detailed information on these deaths with his office.
By Laurie Monsebraaten SOCIAL JUSTICE REPORTER
https://www.thestar.com/life/health_wellness/2009/02/23/why_did_90_children_die.html
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Between 2008/2012 natural causes was listed as the least likely way for a child in Ontario's care to die at 7% of the total deaths reviewed (15 children) while "undetermined cause" was listed as the leading cause of death of children in Ontario's child protection system at "43%" of the total deaths reviewed (92 children).
http://www.mcscs.jus.gov.on.ca/sites/default/files/content/mcscs/images/195633-19.jpg
http://www.mcscs.jus.gov.on.ca/english/DeathInvestigations/office_coroner/PublicationsandReports/PDRC/2013Report/PDRC_2013.html
“It is stunning to me how these children... are rendered invisible while they are alive and invisible in their death,” said Irwin Elman, Ontario’s advocate for children and youth. Between 90 and 120 children and youth connected to children’s aid die every year.
Irwin Elman says he still wants inquests for every child who dies while in care of child welfare.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/thunder-bay/irwin-elman-11-youth-review-1.4421690
https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/2018/11/19/eliminating-the-ontario-child-advocates-office-a-mistake.html
https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/04/01/news/ontario-child-advocate-wonders-whether-doug-ford-just-made-your-children-invisible
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2009: "Evil Edith" Sanders and her house of horrors are dead and gone, but the police that frequented the home and social workers who ignored allegations of child abuse in her home have finally paid a price for their neglect.
On the eve of a trial into horrendous abuse suffered by children at Ms. Sanders's London, Ont., home over a period of four decades, the agencies targeted in a negligence lawsuit have agreed to pay a substantial settlement.
In return, the three plaintiffs - elderly women who were part of an endless line of children that Ms. Sanders systematically abused, tortured and pimped out - have ended their lawsuit against the London Police Service and the Children's Aid Society of London and Middlesex.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/suit-settled-in-horrific-case-of-child-abuse/article4290587/
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Ontario 2007: Nearly half of children in Crown care are medicated.
Researchers have found that not only were psychotropic drugs prescribed to a clear majority of the current and former wards interviewed, but most were diagnosed with mental-health disorders by a family doctor, never visited a child psychiatrist or another doctor for a second opinion, and doubted the accuracy of their diagnosis.
A Toronto Star investigation has found Ontario’s most vulnerable children in the care of an unaccountable and non-transparent protection system. It keeps them in the shadows, far beyond what is needed to protect their identities.
“When people are invisible, bad things happen,” says Irwin Elman, Ontario’s now former and last advocate for children and youth with the closure of the Office.
In Ontario the CAS has turned themselves into a multi-billion dollar private corporation using any excuse to compel parents into submitting to a fake drug testing to justify removing children or keeping files open keeping that government funding flowing.
While the same time they've taking the thousands of children to specific CAS approved doctors who are all to happy to prescribe medication based on the workers assessments of the child's condition..
That's why there are no follow ups with qualified medical and psychiatric doctors and not because the CAS lack the funding, staff or attention span to care properly for the children.
(Another case of "The results they wanted when they wanted them..")
A disturbing number, the network's research director, Yolanda Lambe, added, have traded the child-welfare system for a life on the street.
"A lot of people are using drugs now," she said. "There's a lot of homeless young people who have been medicated quite heavily."
Marti McKay is a Toronto child psychologist was hired by a CAS to assess the grandparents' capacity as guardians only to discover a child so chemically altered that his real character was clouded by the side effects of adult doses of drugs.
"There are lots of other kids like that," said Dr. McKay, one of the experts on the government panel. "If you look at the group homes, it's close to 100 per cent of the kids who are on not just one drug, but on drug cocktails with multiple diagnoses.
"There are too many kids being diagnosed with ... a whole range of disorders that are way out of proportion to the normal population. ... It's just not reasonable to think the children in care would have such overrepresentation in these rather obscure disorders."
“There are lots of kids in group homes all over Ontario and they are not doing well — and everybody knows it,” says Kiaras Gharabaghi, a member of a government-appointed panel that examined the residential care system in 2016.
Psychotropic drugs are being prescribed to nearly half the Crown wards in a sample of Ontario children's aid societies, kindling fears that the agencies are overusing medication with the province's most vulnerable children.
According to documents obtained by The Globe and Mail under Ontario's Freedom of Information Act, 47 per cent of the Crown wards - children in permanent CAS care - at five randomly picked agencies were prescribed psychotropics last year to treat depression, attention deficit disorder, anxiety and other mental-health problems. And, the wards are diagnosed and medicated far more often than are children in the general population.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/nearly-half-of-children-in-crown-care-are-medicated/article687480/
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Ontario 2014: "Use of 'behaviour-altering' drugs widespread in foster, group homes."
Almost half of children and youth in foster and group home care aged 5 to 17 — 48.6 per cent — are on drugs, such as Ritalin, tranquilizers and anticonvulsants, according to a yearly survey conducted for the provincial government and the Ontario Association of Children’s Aid Societies (OACAS). At ages 16 and 17, fully 57 per cent are on these medications.
In group homes, the figure is even higher — an average of 64 per cent of children and youth are taking behaviour-altering drugs. For 10- to 15-year-olds, the number is a staggering 74 per cent.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/12/12/use_of_behaviouraltering_drugs_widespread_in_foster_group_homes.html
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What’s worse is that the number of children prescribed dangerous drugs is on the rise. Doctors seem to prescribe medication without being concerned with the side-effects.
Worldwide, 17 million children, some as young as five years old, are given a variety of different prescription drugs, including psychiatric drugs that are dangerous enough that regulatory agencies in Europe, Australia, and the US have issued warnings on the side effects that include suicidal thoughts and aggressive behavior.
According to Fight For Kids, an organization that “educates parents worldwide on the facts about today’s widespread practice of labeling children mentally ill and drugging them with heavy, mind-altering, psychiatric drugs,” says over 10 million children in the US are prescribed addictive stimulants, antidepressants and other psychotropic (mind-altering) drugs for alleged educational and behavioral problems.
In fact, according to Foundation for a Drug-Free World, every day, 2,500 youth (12 to 17) will abuse a prescription pain reliever for the first time (4). Even more frightening, prescription medications like depressants, opioids and antidepressants cause more overdose deaths (45 percent) than illicit drugs like cocaine, heroin, methamphetamines and amphetamines (39 percent) combined. Worldwide, prescription drugs are the 4th leading cause of death.
https://dailyhealthpost.com/common-prescription-drugs/
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Standards of Care for the Administration of Psychotropic Medications to Children and Youth Living in Licensed Residential Settings.
Summary of Recommendations of the Ontario Expert Panel February 2009.
http://www.children.gov.on.ca/htdocs/English/documents/specialneeds/residential/summary_report.pdf
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2007: Kids see group homes as 'gateways to jail': child advocate.
Almost half of Ontario's young offenders in detention for minor crimes came through the child welfare system, a report from the Office of Child and Family Service Advocacy shows.
The trend is a concern for child advocates across the country and Ontario Child Advocate Judy Finlay said many of the province's young people are beginning to think of group homes as "gateways to jail."
"We're taking them out of very difficult family circumstances, bringing them into state care and then we're charging them for their behaviour. It's very concerning to me," Finlay said.
The report, which was obtained by CBC News, lays much of the blame on group homes that rely too heavily on police to resolve problems that could be handled by staff.
Kids have been charged for everything from refusing to read a book or hitting someone with a tea towel, Finlay said. One group home in Ontario called police 400 times in a single year.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/kids-see-group-homes-as-gateways-to-jail-child-advocate-1.675937
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2017: Sexual, physical abuse 'rampant' at Ontario training schools, suit alleges.
TORONTO -- A man who says he was badly abused at one of Ontario's now-defunct training schools is spearheading a proposed class-action against the province that seeks $600 million on behalf of other children and youth sent to the provincial facilities.
In his unproven statement of claim, Kirk Keeping, 64, alleges the schools were festering cesspools of sexual, physical and psychological abuse perpetrated by unsupervised and unqualified staff on hapless kids.
"The training schools contained a toxic environment in which degrading and humiliating treatment of children in the Crown's care was the norm," the claim states. "Physical, sexual and psychological abuse was rampant, and residents of training schools were systematically denied their dignity and basic human rights."
The provincial training schools for boys and girls aged eight to 16 operated between 1931 until they were finally shut down in 1984. Those sentenced to the facilities were children found begging on the streets, runaways, truants, those deemed "incorrigible," those convicted of petty offences, or those who, for various reasons, had inadequate adult supervision. Once there, they became wards of the Crown and were cut off from any family support.
While the idea was to provide support, correction and vocational training for troubled youth, the claim alleges the reality was far more sinister -- one of "fear intimidation and brutality."
Staff forced children to beat up on other children or meted out physical punishment themselves. Youth were thrown into solitary confinement in shackles, not allowed to go to the washroom, were forced to scrub floors with toothbrushes or sleep on floors, and were forced into sexual acts, according to the claim.
Attempting to report the abuse would lead to retaliation in the form of longer sentences, the claim alleges.
Keeping, of Thunder Bay, Ont., was an unmanageable runaway when a judge in 1968 sent the 15 year old to Pine Ridge in Bouwmanville. During his two years there, he was sexually abused by a woman in the kitchen where he was given work and later, on a dairy farm, he says, by a man.
"I've held it inside myself for going on 50 years and it's been a long time," Keeping, now a father and grandfather, told The Canadian Press from Thunder Bay. "I grew up in a time when things like that were kept in the closet and you were ashamed -- you didn't want people to know things like that."
He said he lived in fear for a lot of years -- even after he left Pine Ridge -- and still suffers from nightmares and post-traumatic stress disorder.
The suit filed last week in Ontario Superior Court in Thunder Bay, has yet to be certified as a class action or proven in any court.
"I just feel it's time," Keeping said. "It's time that people understood what happened to us young boys in that training school."
Among other things, the claim states, the provincial government knew or ought to have known what was happening in the schools but failed to do anything about the situation.
It seeks $500 million in general damages and another $100 million in punitive damages, alleging the province was negligent, failed in the expected standard of care, and breached its duty toward its young charges.
"The Crown conducted its affairs with wanton and callous disregard for the class members' interests, safety and well-being," the claim states.
Attorney General Yasir Naqvi said he couldn't discuss a lawsuit that is before the courts but expressed sympathy for the victims.
"As a parent and as an Ontarian, my heart goes out to all the children who suffered those abuses," Naqvi said on Tuesday. "Those parents entrusted their children to those institutions and those type of abuses should never have happened."
According to a report from former Quebec judge Fred Kaufman in 2002, Ontario reached settlements with survivors of three schools -- St. Joseph's, St. John's and Grandview -- decades ago. Former premier Dalton McGuinty formally apologized to some of those students in 2004.
The new suit seeks to represent those who attended 12 others in places such as Oakville, Galt, Lindsay, Port Bolster, Bowmanville, Simcoe, Hagersville, Cobourg and Guelph.
https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/sexual-physical-abuse-rampant-at-ontario-training-schools-suit-alleges-1.3718044
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‘Justice is long overdue’ for training school survivors, says MP who spent three ‘painful’ years at one.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2018/01/19/justice-is-long-overdue-for-training-school-survivors-says-mp-who-spent-three-painful-years-at-one.html
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2016: Survivors of Ontario 'training schools' say their suffering is being erased by redevelopment project
Clarington is set to refurbish and repurpose the Jury Lands, home for more than 50 years to a correctional facility for children who were deemed 'unmanageable'
CLARINGTON, Ont. — Survivors of a shadowy chapter in the history of Canada’s prison system say the legacy of the alleged abuse they endured as children is being ignored, if not erased.
They point to a recent decision by the town of Clarington, Ont., to refurbish and repurpose the Jury Lands, most commonly known as the site of Camp 30 — a prisoner-of-war camp for captured high-ranking Nazis during the Second World War.
For more than 50 years, it was also the site of the Pine Ridge Training School — a correctional facility for children, mostly boys, aged eight to 18 who were deemed “unmanageable.”
The schools — about a dozen in Ontario — were shuttered in the early 1980s.
Wikipedia: The revitalization plan will see the site, located about 75 kilometres east of Toronto, transformed into an economic centre, complete with offices, restaurants and shops.
But the plan is not sitting well with some of those who allege they suffered horrific physical and sexual abuse in the hands of their minders.
“It’s not fair that this real estate company is going to put all this money into it and glorify what it wasn’t,” said Steve G., of Markham, Ont., who, on his lawyer’ advice, did not want his last name used.
“I’d have every boy’s name or girl’s name on that wall somewhere,” he said in a recent interview.
Steve G. said he was sent to Pine Ridge as a young teen after being caught breaking and entering. He said he had a “difficult” childhood: his parents separated when he was young, his mother was a “partier” and he was forced to steal to provide for his sister.
When he first arrived at the school, Steve G. recalls looking at the white picket fence, which he would jump over in a number of escape attempts in the coming months.
Then came “the hole,” a solitary confinement cell where he would spend days at a time — his feet shackled, his wrists cuffed.
Wikipedia: “It was a caged room — three walls of concrete and bars. I had a bed, toilet, sink, that was it,” he said. “That was your introduction to training school.”
Once, he was sent to “the hole” after an escape attempt in which he caught poison ivy.
“I had blisters all over me. I couldn’t move. And the hole temperature was about 110 (Fahrenheit, or 43 Celsius),” he said. “I remember it was so friggin’ hot. And I was sittin’ there at the sink, filling it up with water and splashing myself.”
The emotional and mental abuse was even worse, he said.
“They’re trying to ruin you. Break you down.”
Steve G. also alleges that he was sexually assaulted twice after he was transferred from Pine Ridge to the Sprucedale Training School in Hagersville, Ont.
He had escaped to Toronto, where he overdosed, and then was taken to he hospital, where he was eventually picked up by a couple of guards from the school, he said.
They allegedly put him in a pickup truck and drove out of the city.
“They beat me, they sodomized me, they did what they wanted with me,” he said, adding that he doesn’t remember all of the specifics because he was recovering from the overdose.
Steve G.’s allegations of sexual and physical abuse have not been tested in court. He said he is in the early stages of launching a lawsuit against the province.
As an adult, Steve G. said he’s struggled with alcohol and drug addictions. He’s had seven convictions, some for drinking and driving, and, on several occasions, he’s attempted suicide, he said.
They beat me, they sodomized me, they did what they wanted with me
But in the last few years, Steve G. said he’s turned his life around. He’s started going to church, is more open about his past, and he’s in a happy, stable, long-term relationship.
But he said he’s upset that Pine Ridge will only be recognized for its role in the Second World War, while the hundreds of children who were allegedly abused there will be forgotten.
Loretta Merritt, a lawyer who has represented hundreds of training school survivors in civil court, said only one person has been convicted related to abuse at Ontario’s network of secular training schools.
In January 2000, Raymond Arthur Elder, a former supervisor at White Oaks Training School in Hagersville, was found guilty of two charges, including gross indecency and breach of trust. Both charges related to oral sex acts which Elder had admitted to, and which involved one victim.
Elder was acquitted on nine other charges. He did not respond to requests for comment.
Sanford Cottrelle was at White Oaks, a training school for younger boys, when Elder was working there as a housemaster.
Google Maps: He was interviewed by police years ago about his time at the school, but was never called upon to testify at Elder’s trial.
“(Elder) would get a hold of me and he would nibble on my ear,” Cottrelle alleged in an interview.
He also alleged he was beaten by a staff member when he was on his way to bed. The attack came out of nowhere, he said.
“I don’t know what it was, if it was because I was a native kid or what,” Cottrelle said.
Since leaving the schools, Cottrelle says life hasn’t been easy. He’s been through the prison system, where he said he heard about more cases of abuse from inmates who had attended training schools in the province.
For much of his life, he says he’s had suicidal thoughts, starting from the time he was at White Oaks.
Merritt said that many of the training school survivors are now in prison, some for violent crimes.
“I’ve been in most of the maximum-security facilities in this province, with some guys who have criminal records that go on for 10 pages,” she said.
Catherine Classen, a clinical psychologist at the University of Toronto who specializes in therapy for people who have experienced trauma, called Ontario’s training school legacy a “tragedy” on several fronts.
It was a caged room — three walls of concrete and bars. I had a bed, toilet, sink, that was it. That was your introduction to training school
“If we actually would address the impact of trauma in childhood, of abuse in childhood, we would empty our prisons,” she said.
“So many of these behaviours really are about these people trying to cope in the best way they know how, and we never really help them figure out better ways of coping.”
Sometimes, Classen said, trauma survivors can be so consumed by what they experienced, they relive it in real time, through flashbacks.
Merritt said that’s something she sees in her clients in prison.
“I see the 12-year-old who was beaten and sexually abused and had no one and nowhere to turn. That’s who I’m meeting with,” she said.
“That’s where they go, when they talk to me. They go back to that child they were and they talk about what happened to them.”
Merritt said her clients that have taken the province through the civil courts have received payouts that range from tens of thousands of dollars to just over $100,000.
Representatives from the Office of the Attorney General, Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services and Ministry of Children and Youth Services declined to comment on the training school system.
https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/survivors-of-ontario-training-schools-say-their-suffering-is-being-erased-by-redevelopment-project
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2018: Lawsuit arising from alleged abuse at Ont. training school certified as class action.
TORONTO -- A lawsuit against the Ontario government arising from alleged sexual and physical abuse at the province's now-defunct training schools has been certified as a class action.
The provincial government did not oppose certification of the suit, launched by Kirk Keeping, a man who alleges he was badly abused at one of the schools.
"This is an important milestone for the boys and girls from the training schools," Keeping said in a statement. "We have all lived with this for years and we are glad this case is moving forward."
Related Stories
Training school survivor haunted for decades: What happened to James Forbes?
https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/training-school-survivor-haunted-for-decades-what-happened-to-james-forbes-1.3798782
Police to try to find out what happened to Ontario training school boy
https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/police-to-try-to-find-out-what-happened-to-ontario-training-school-boy-1.4178610
The $600-million claim, which has not been proven, takes in 13 of the facilities on behalf of "all persons who were alive as at Dec. 8, 2015, who resided at any of the training schools between Jan. 1, 1953, and April 2, 1984, during the time periods set out for each facility," according to the certification order from Superior Court Justice Danial Newton in Thunder Bay, Ont.
Keeping, in his mid-60s, alleges the schools were festering cesspools of sexual, physical and psychological abuse perpetrated by unsupervised and unqualified staff on hapless kids.
"The training schools contained a toxic environment in which degrading and humiliating treatment of children in the Crown's care was the norm," the claim states. "Physical, sexual and psychological abuse was rampant, and residents of training schools were systematically denied their dignity and basic human rights."
Newton set out six questions to be answered at trial. They include whether Ontario failed to protect the children and youth from "actionable" mental or physical harm and whether the province is liable for any harms done them.
Toronto-based lawyer Jonathan Ptak said about 21,000 people are survivors of the schools.
"We are pleased that the case now has been certified as a class proceeding, so that we can now litigate this case on the merits," Ptak said in a statement.
The certification decision obviates the need for a two-day hearing that had been scheduled for next week.
The reform schools for boys and girls aged eight to 16 operated between 1931 until they were shut down in 1984. Those sentenced to the facilities were children found begging, runaways, truants, those deemed "incorrigible," those convicted of petty offences, or those who, for various reasons, had inadequate adult supervision.
While the idea was to provide support, correction and vocational training, the claim alleges the reality was far more sinister -- one of "fear intimidation and brutality."
Staff forced children to beat up on other children or meted out physical punishment themselves. Youth were thrown into solitary confinement in shackles, not allowed to go to the washroom, were forced to scrub floors with toothbrushes or sleep on floors, and were forced into sexual acts, according to the claim.
Attempting to report the abuse would lead to retaliation, the claim alleges.
One survivor, Rick Brown, has told The Canadian Press that he believes a supervisor at the Brookside training school in Cobourg, Ont., may have beaten one of his young classmates James Forbes to death in 1963. Police recently said they were looking at opening an investigation.
The suit seeks $500 million in general damages and another $100 million in punitive damages, alleging the province was negligent, failed in the expected standard of care, and breached its duty toward its young charges.
According to a report from former Quebec judge Fred Kaufman in 2002, Ontario reached settlements with survivors of three schools -- St. Joseph's, St. John's and Grandview -- decades ago. Former premier Dalton McGuinty formally apologized to some of those students in 2004.
The new suit seeks to represent those who attended schools in places such as Oakville, Galt, Lindsay, Port Bolster, Bowmanville, Simcoe, Hagersville and Guelph.
https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/lawsuit-arising-from-alleged-abuse-at-ont-training-school-certified-as-class-action-1.4205620
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2017/12/08/they-say-they-suffered-cruel-and-sadistic-abuse-as-kids-at-ontario-training-schools-and-the-province-paid-them-to-keep-quiet.html
https://www.ctvnews.ca/w5/it-felt-like-a-prison-for-kids-w5-investigates-allegations-of-abuse-at-ontario-training-schools-1.4327718
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2020: Child abuse a big concern during COVID-19 outbreak.
Agencies that serve abused children are bracing for an increase in abuse cases as they reduce their services because of COVID-19.
With governments calling for people to stay home, and schools and some social support services closing, many who work with abused children are worried.
For some children, home is not a safe or healthy place.
https://www.ottawamatters.com/national-news/child-abuse-a-big-concern-during-covid-19-outbreak-2186077
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