FULL STORY:


A Toronto jury has awarded a man sexually molested 50 years ago by a predatory priest, who taught and coached boys across Ontario for decades, $2.6 million in damages, a Canadian record for abuse by a cleric.

The Ontario Superior court judgement for Rod MacLeod, now 68, includes $500,000 in punitive damages against the Congregation of St. Basil, a Toronto-based Roman Catholic religious order, for the actions of deceased priest William Hodgson “Hod” Marshall when MacLeod was a high school student in Sudbury.

In alloting punitive compensation, the four-woman, two-man jury provided a written list of the particulars they considered when determining whether punitive damages were warranted and how much to award MacLeod.

The jurors wrote the Basilians had concealed Marshall’s behaviour to avoid “scandal,” were “grossly negligent” and “put children in harm’s way,” on the list delivered with their verdict.

Marshall taught in Windsor, Toronto, Sudbury and Saskatoon.

Mr. Justice Arthur Gans’ court heard during the three-week trial that Marshall admitted to a Basilian superior in 1996 that he’d sexually abused two or three high school boys every year during a 29-year teaching period. Fifteen years later, Marshall was convicted of indecently assaulting 17 minors and given a two-year sentence.
MacLeod, a former Canadian army captain, was a student in the 1960s at Sudbury’s all-boys St. Charles High School, then run by the Basilians. MacLeod testified Marshall abused him over four years at school, beginning when MacLeod was 13. About 50 instances of abuse occurred in empty classrooms, the priest’s residence near the school and away from the school grounds, the jury heard.

MacLeod said he was pleased a benchmark for punitive damages for abuse by a member of the clergy was set.


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