CANADA
GlobalPost
The Canadian Press
VANCOUVER – The man who organized the Vancouver Olympics says he’s been cleared by police of sexual-abuse allegations brought by a former student, though the RCMP says the file remains open.
The allegations against John Furlong surfaced following a newspaper article published last fall, suggesting he physically and verbally abused First Nations students at Burns Lake, B.C., while teaching at a Catholic school there in the late 1960s.
This past July, Beverly Abraham and Grace West filed separate lawsuits against Furlong alleging sexual abuse, and a third lawsuit was filed last month by a man who said he, too, was sexually abused.
Furlong said in an interview with Global News that police gave him a letter in April saying they found nothing to substantiate allegations by one of the complainants, identified as Abraham in a letter to Furlong that was posted online. According to the letter, the police would not be sending a report to Crown counsel.
“We are done with this,” said Furlong. “I’m not going to put another second into this. I’m going to move on, as I’ve said by escalating this case and exposing this and try to get on with my life.”
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.