Disgraced Bishop's 15-Month Child Porn Sentence Doesn't Reflect Seriousness of His Crime...

By Andrew Seymour
National Post
January 4, 2012

http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/01/04/disgraced-bishops-15-month-child-porn-sentence-doesnt-reflect-seriousness-of-his-crime-child-rights-activist/

Raymond Lahey is released from jail Wednesday after pleading guilty to possessing child pornography.

The 15-month sentence given to Bishop Raymond Lahey for possession of hundreds of images of child pornography — some that showed naked young boys wearing rosary beads and crucifixes — does not properly reflect the seriousness of the crime, a leading children's rights activist said Wednesday.

Ontario Court Justice Kent Kirkland said the former Roman Catholic bishop of Antigonish, N.S., would be given two-for-one credit for the eight months already served since he pleaded guilty in May. As a result, Lahey will not spend another day behind bars and is now on probation.

Rosalind Prober of Beyond Borders said what Lahey, 71, did was help fuel a market that sexually abuses and tortures young children.

"These are real children in these images," Ms. Prober said from Winnipeg. "They are not drawings. If you look at this sentencing from the perspective of the victims — the children in those images he had — there is a real disconnect between the crime and its ramifications on young lives. If the children in those images could have stood in the courtroom perhaps the sentence would have been tougher."

Lahey's public image was stellar just a few years ago: former parishioner Ashley Fleury said Wednesday he was well-respected and well-liked.

On Aug. 7, 2009, he concluded a historic settlement with victims of sexual abuse. It was hailed as a model of how the Roman Catholic Church should deal with all those betrayed by its priests; the victims' Halifax lawyer, John McKiggan, called the deal at the time "extraordinary and unprecedented," not just for Canada but for the worldwide Church.

Then on Sept. 26, Lahey resigned without explanation. What he did not reveal was that 11 days before, he was found with child pornography on his laptop while going through Ottawa's main airport. He was charged on Sept. 25 with possession and importation of child pornography.

Police discovered 588 child pornography images along with 63 videos and several stories with themes of slavery.

The child pornography made up only a small percentage of the approximately 155,000 pictures of pornography he had on the computer.

During an earlier court appearance, Lahey told Judge Kirkland he had an "indiscriminate" addiction to online pornography but didn't seek help because of his high-ranking position in the church.

Lahey said he secretly wanted to be found out, so it was a "blessing in disguise" when customs agents stopped him at the Ottawa airport in September, 2009.

Lahey wasn't a risk to reoffend against a child, Dr. John Bradford, an Ottawa forensic psychiatrist, testified in court.

Dr. Bradford was confident that Lahey was not a pedophile. He added Lahey, who has been involved in a 10-year romantic relationship with another man after a number of one-night stands, imagines himself in a "submissive role" in his sado-masochistic sex fantasies.

However, Dr. David Palframan, a psychiatrist at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario in Ottawa, said in an interview Wednesday he has treated victims used in child pornography and no one should underestimate the devastating impact of the experience on those children.

"It's terrible for them. Their relationship with people they trusted in utterly destroyed. And how do you trust anybody after that? Then they are worried about their pictures being seen everywhere. And finally, how do you grow up to have a normal sexual life if this is the way it starts?"

He said medicine at this point has little to offer offenders and there is high rate of recidivism among those who use children for the object of their sexual fantasies.

"Once people have found what turns them on sexually, that's what they want to do. And it's very hard to change their minds about it. Sexuality happens at an almost cellular level in the body. It's a really serious problem."

Ms. Prober said no one would make child pornography if there wasn't demand, she said, and what people like Lahey do is create the demand.