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	Conspiracy Theory "Preposterous": Lawyer By Trevor Pritchard Standard-Freeholder February 25, 2009 http://www.standard-freeholder.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=1450294 The idea there was a long-running conspiracy to cover up sexual abuse allegation in Cornwall was an "obvious absurdity," the attorney for an alleged sexual abuser told the Cornwall Public Inquiry Tuesday. Michael Neville, the lawyer for Rev. Charles MacDonald, was among the parties who delivered his final submissions yesterday. In 1992, former altar boy David Silmser went to Cornwall police alleging that he was sexually abused by three men, including MacDonald and former probation officer Ken Seguin. MacDonald was charged by the Ontario Provincial Police in 1996 with abusing Silmser and two other boys. Eventually, MacDonald would be charged with abusing eight boys in all. But the charges were stayed in 2002 after a judge ruled the retired priest's right to an expedient trial had been violated. In his closing remarks, Neville blamed former city cop Perry Dunlop, a well-known local crusader for abuse victims, for fomenting the clan theory. He said the only basis for Dunlop's claim that a ring of pedophiles conspired to cover up sexual abuse allegations was the October 1996 statement of alleged victim Ron Leroux. "It is preposterous and without any evidentiary foundation that Mr. Leroux's fanciful clan existed, let alone controlled the justice system," said Neville. Neville also argued that Dunlop - who spent seven months in jail for refusing to testify at the inquiry - would have been a key witness at the proceedings. "Parties here, many maligned by him . . . had questions for him, and wanted answers from him," Neville told inquiry commissioner Normand Glaude. "He was more than a distraction. He is a large measure of why you, and all of us, are here." The inquiry, which heard its final witness in January, had a mandate to explore how institutions handled allegations of historical sexual abuse. In his recommendations, Neville said that sexual abuse allegations should only be passed along to employers if the nature of employment involves "real, ongoing contacts" with children and if they have been investigated by a senior police officer. "Some genies never go back in the bottle," Neville said. Giuseppe Cipriano, a lawyer for Seguin's estate, said that when people accused of being a pedophile have to prove their innocence, it can lead to what he called a "moral panic" in the community. "It is cold comfort to that person that he is presumed innocent in the eyes of the law, but his peers . . . have labeled him a pedophile," said Cipriano. Seguin committed suicide in 1993. He was never charged with any criminal offences. However, after his death, the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services received nearly two dozen complaints from people who were allegedly abused by the former city probation officer.
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