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	Vigilante Cop's Crusade Hampered Pedophile Investigation, Inquiry Hears The Canadian Press February 25, 2009 http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5jgwG8B8--DOr4jVrLwEAZC-UYm7g CORNWALL, Ont. — The unearthing historic sexual abuse allegations in eastern Ontario, rumours of powerful men involved in a pedophile ring and the derailed investigations and prosecutions that followed all begin and end with Perry Dunlop, a public inquiry heard Wednesday. While the former police constable set in motion the events that saw 15 people charged, any subsequent failings were largely of the vigilante officer's own making, a provincial police lawyer told the Cornwall inquiry. When Ontario Provincial Police began probing child sexual abuse allegations brought forward by Dunlop, his refusal to co-operate with the force seriously impeded the Project Truth investigation, said lawyer Neil Kozloff. "Dunlop's stated purposes of 'doing it for the kids' and 'doing it for the victims' were really excuses for his campaign of self-promotion and self-aggrandizement characterized by a callous indifference to the work of the police and the courts," Kozloff said in his submissions. "The unfortunate consequence of his negligence was great harm to the proper administration of justice and to the community of Cornwall." Beginning in 1992 with an allegation that a former altar boy had been sexually abused by a priest and probation officer, Dunlop sought to root out more alleged pedophiles. As people came forward with allegations of sexual abuse spanning decades, Dunlop became convinced it was the work of high-profile local officials operating a clandestine pedophile ring, the inquiry has heard. Provincial police launched the Project Truth investigation in 1997 and ordered Dunlop to provide information gathered in his own off-hours investigation, to stop interviewing alleged victims and potential witnesses, and to stop spreading allegations through the media of a pedophile clan. "Perry Dunlop chose to break every one of those rules repeatedly," Kozloff told the inquiry Wednesday. He became an "impediment" to Project Truth and the provincial police were never "able to deal effectively with rumours, innuendoes, half-truths and outright lies that originated with Mr. Dunlop and his group," Kozloff said. Of the 15 men charged, only a bus driver was convicted. Four died before their cases came to trial, four were acquitted, four had the charges against them withdrawn, and two had the charges against them stayed over delays. It is unfair to judge a police investigation solely on the outcome in court, said Kozloff, who nevertheless went on to quote at length from various court decisions slamming Dunlop and blaming him for delays. Project Truth concluded there was no evidence to support the pedophile clan theory, a conclusion that was confirmed "for all time" on June 28, 2007, Kozloff said. It was on that day Ron Leroux, who had told Dunlop he witnessed a clan of pedophiles who wore robes, burned candles and sexually abused young boys during weekend meetings in the 1950s and early 1960s, told the inquiry that he fabricated the story. Dunlop refused to testify at the inquiry and was jailed for seven months on civil and criminal contempt convictions. Kozloff defended the integrity of Project Truth, but said if there were any shortcomings in how the force dealt both with Dunlop and with the sheer volume of complainants, much has changed since then. "Hindsight is an excellent tool to assist us in developing better policies and procedures," Kozloff said. "Hindsight is not an appropriate tool to judge either the conduct of an individual or an institution." The inquiry's mandate is to examine how local and provincial institutions handled allegations of sexual abuse decades ago. The inquiry also heard Wednesday from the Children's Aid Society, who said the response to allegations of child sexual abuse may seem deeply flawed with the benefit of hindsight, but the problems of the past have largely been corrected. "There were many things done or not done in the past that when you look at them today seem illogical and primitive," said Michele Allinotte, representing the agency's local branch. "(But) long before inquiry began, many of the problems discussed in evidence here had been addressed and corrected." The Cornwall inquiry has spent three years and $40.8 million investigating decades-old institutional responses to sex abuse allegations. The Children's Aid Society of the United Counties of Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry is just one of many institutions at the centre of the probe to tell the inquiry: that was then and this is now.
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