Mount Cashel Christian Brothers "These are the debts of the province. The damages are damages that these people have been living with,"

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The provincial government has reached a $750,000 dollar settlement with a former resident of Mount Cashel orphanage for alleged abuse suffered when he was a child.

Lawyer Will Hiscock of Budden and Associates says while those type of cases are normally settled quietly, because it involves public money, the matter was listed in government Orders in Council.

Hiscock says his client was a small child when he first went to police in 1975 to outline the abuse he'd suffered. The information from the subsequent police investigation then helped to form the basis of the Hughes Inquiry.

Hiscock says part of their argument was that government ought to have known about the abuse and acted on that information.

Hiscock says the settlement comes after six long years. Something he says he and his client fully expected. He says government did its due diligence and really put them through their paces.

Hiscock says his client has struggled his whole life and will never get over the abuse he suffered as a child, but they are satisfied with the settlement and the fact that his client won't have to go through a trial.

18 similar cases remain outstanding.

Government settles with Mount Cashel resident from 1970s

The Telegram 16 -11-2016

The provincial government has settled a $750,000 lawsuit with a former Mount Cashel resident.

 It’s believed to be the highest government payout to a sexual abuse survivor in the province, said lawyer Will Hiscock of Budden and Associates.

The figure was disclosed in an Order in Council approving the transfer of funds to Justice and Public Safety to settle the file, initiated in 2010.

The former orphanage resident gave a statement to the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary in 1975, but was placed back in the orphanage and remained there until the 1980s, Hiscock said. He had reported abuse by several Christian Brothers.

“It was an exceptionally strong case on liability,” Hiscock said. “Government did a real service by taxpayers by settling it rather than go to court.

The settlement may draw out others who have never taken legal action.

Besides 18 cases reported to be before government, there are even more that haven’t reached the stage of statements of claim.

Roughly 20 years ago, the provincial government settled a block of cases from the 1970s and ’80s, handled by various prominent lawyers, so the high dollar figure of the recent case would reflect inflation.

In total there have been some 130 settlements involving allegations of abuse suffered at Mount Cashel at a total amount of about $29.2 million, according to a Justice spokeswoman.

The current lawsuits are separate from a civil case against the Roman Catholic Episcopal Corp. of St. John’s — those cases are from a much earlier era dating back to the late 1940s and mainly were ineligible for action against the provincial government because of a previous legal decision. The case, which the The Telegram has covered almost

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exclusively, is back in court in December. 

 

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"These are the debts of the province. The damages are damages that these people have been living with," Hiscock said. 

"At the end of the day, it's a question of whether those costs, those tremendous costs, should be borne by the children who were victimized, or by the administrators who allowed it to take place."

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