CANADA
Edmonton Journal
BY BRENT WITTMEIER, EDMONTON JOURNAL
EDMONTON – Evidence given by residential school abuse survivors in closed-door hearings should never see the light of day, the lawyer in charge of abuse settlement process says.
Dan Shapiro, chief adjudicator of the Independent Assessment Process, says Canada will be courting a potential “privacy disaster” if it doesn’t destroy the 800,000 audio recordings, transcripts and other documents associated with 38,000 claims of sexual abuse, physical abuse and other heinous acts.
Destruction is the only way to show “proper respect” to aboriginal Canadians who were abused and victimized at Canada’s residential schools, Shapiro said Thursday, following a presentation at the University of Alberta’s access and privacy conference.
“The records contain some of the most intimate, private information,” Shapiro said. “Even the perception that their information will be made public can cause great harm emotionally and revictimize those individuals and create ripple effects in their communities.”
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.