CANADA
The Globe and Mail
SUNNY DHILLON
VANCOUVER — The Globe and Mail
Published Friday, Jul. 26 2013
John Furlong, the former Vancouver Olympics CEO accused of physically and sexually abusing students when he was a physical education teacher decades ago, says the allegations are untrue and he never engaged in any “inappropriate contact.”
Mr. Furlong, the public face of Vancouver’s 2010 Games whose motivational style made him a star on the speaking circuit, issued the denial in a document filed in B.C. Supreme Court on Friday. Earlier this week, Beverly Mary Abraham and Grace Jessie West filed lawsuits alleging Mr. Furlong molested them when they were students at Immaculata Roman Catholic Elementary School in Burns Lake, B.C., more than 40 years ago. The allegations have not been proven.
The allegations that Mr. Furlong physically abused several aboriginal students first surfaced in September in the alternative weekly newspaper, Georgia Straight. He has vehemently denied any wrongdoing. He filed a lawsuit against the newspaper and the article’s author in November. The document filed Friday pertains to Mr. Furlong’s lawsuit against the newspaper. He has not yet filed a response to the lawsuits from Ms. Abraham and Ms. West. The document says Mr. Furlong was well-liked by students when he was at Immaculata and no reports of abuse, physical or verbal, were ever filed. “This is because no such abuse, physical or verbal, ever happened,” the document said.
Ms. Abraham, 55, said she attended Immaculata in 1969 and 1971. Her notice of civil claim said she was molested approximately 12 times when she was about 11 years old. She said the touching occurred in the gym, typically after class. She said Mr. Furlong would order her to stay behind and then close the gym door. Ms. West, 53, said she was molested about once a week. She said in her notice of civil claim that she told her father about the abuse, and he confronted Mr. Furlong and the principal or senior administrator.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.