Pope to Rule on Cleric Dismissal

By Carol Mulligan
Sudbury Star
October 27, 2012

http://www.thesudburystar.com/2012/10/27/pope-to-rule-on-cleric-dismissal

The Basilian Fathers of Toronto are awaiting a reply from Pope Benedict about whether the Holy Father will grant a former Sudbury cleric his request to be dismissed from the priesthood and from his religious order.

Rev. William Hodgson (Hod) Marshall was released from Kingston Penitentiary in early October after serving part of a two-year sentence. Marshall was convicted in June 2011 in Windsor of 17 counts of sexual assault against 16 children and one woman in Toronto, Windsor, Cambridge and Sudbury. Six of the victims are from Sudbury.

Marshall, 89, ser ved as a priest and educator for 21 years in Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie. He taught at St. Charles College from 1961-70 during which time at least two parents complained to school and Basilian officials that their sons were sexually abused by Marshall.

At the time, St. Charles was an all-boys school, although it is co-ed today.

Marshall was transferred from St. Charles in 1970, returning three years later as principal and serving another five years at the school.

Rev. Timothy Scott, spokesman for the Basilian Fathers, said the head of the order visited Marshall while he was in prison and requested he ask to be dismissed.

Canon or church law enacted in 2002 doesn't give the order the authority to defrock priests, Scott said this week. Only the Vatican does.

As far as Scott knows, Marshall has not yet received a reply to his letter to the Pope, which was written a few months ago.

Whatever the outcome, the Basilian order has made it clear it will provide Marshall with a place to live out his remaining years.

Even if the Pope grants Marshall's request, the order will still give him residence at one of its homes for retired priests.

Marshall hasn't functioned as a priest "in any way, shape or form" for some time, said Scott.

Being dismissed "would be a kind of further sanction" against the wayward priest.

But a London-based lawyer representing several of Marshall's victims in civil lawsuits against him and the Basilian fathers said that is not true.

Rob Talach said Marshall receives a pension for being a priest, is in receipt of Canadian Pension Plan and Old Age Security benefits, and may even have a teacher's pension.

Talach questions if the Basilians have a mandate to spend their funds on Marshall.

Remember that Marshall is not alone there. Convicted sex offender Father John O'Keefe, out of Ottawa, is likely in the same facility.

Scott said his order is doing what it thinks is best in what is, admittedly, a horrible situation.

Talach said if it weren't for pressure from him to defrock Marshall, the order would not have acted as it has.

At a news conference in Sudbury last week, Talach spoke on behalf of two Sudbury men whom Marshall sexually assaulted and two men sexually assaulted by Rev. Bernard Cloutier, who is serving time in a federal penitentiary for those crimes.

Talach asked the Basilian order and the Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie, for whom Cloutier worked, to defrock the convicted priests and make funds available so victims could receive psychological counselling and other assistance to repair their lives.

Scott said the Basilians do offer counselling to victims, at least until lawyers get involved in cases.

Talach asked for resources to help his clients, without prejudice, but the vicar general for the Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie, Rev. Robert Bourgon, said last week it doesn't work that way.

In instances where his diocese has offered help to victims before lawsuits were settled judgments were larger than they would have otherwise been.

In the case of Marshall, whom Scott calls indigent, "it's better for all concerned" if the Basilians take him in.

Old and in very poor health, "if he's on the street, he's going to end up in a hospital bed somewhere. I don't think (that's) in anybody's interest."

Still, Scott said he knows "victims have suffered immensely and I understand how it can gall them that (Marshall) is ... not spending the rest of his life in prison.

"But the sentence was determined by the courts ... we don't have any" say in that, he said.

As painful as these cases are, they date back decades, said Scott. Two more criminal charges against Marshall that haven't been heard yet date back to 1960.

"What you've got is situations 50 years old. Now, these people have carried around this pain, and sadness, even guilt ... for an immense amount of time. It's hard to know what the best thing to do is under the circumstances, other than to say to them, 'You need to tell us how to proceed.'

"But, thanks be to God, the only cases this father is facing are all ... long, long before I was even in the priesthood."

As far as Scott knows, this is the first instance in which the Basilians have asked a priest to seek to be dismissed.

Talach speculated the Basilians are paying Marshall's legal bills.

He accused the order of being more concerned about Marshall being homeless, when that isn't true, than they are about his victims being homeless, "which is a real and pressing danger for some of them."

Contact: carol.mulligan@sunmedia.ca