Housemaster Abused Boys at Orphanage Run by "Nuns and Priests from Hell"

BBC News
October 10, 2016

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-37552277

Allegations against James McCann went before a jury in a trial of the facts

A housemaster has been found to have abused children decades ago at a Catholic orphanage, run by the "nuns and priests from Hell".

James McCann, 80, who worked at the St Francis Boys' Home, Shefford, Bedfordshire, in the 1960s, was found unfit to plea due to ill health.

But a trial of the facts found 42 of 50 charges of physical and sexual assaults on 25 boys to be proven.

The judge granted McCann an absolute discharge on all of the counts.

For more on this story and other local news

The allegations against McCann, of Suffield Court, Swaffham, Norfolk, related to an 11-year period between 1963 and 1974.

The jury at the Old Bailey found 30 counts of actual bodily harm to be proven, plus 12 of indecency.

All 25 victims had at least one proven count, the court heard.

Judge Rebecca Poulet QC told jurors that "the only course of action in the circumstances" was an absolute discharge.

St Francis Boys' Home closed in the mid-1970s

Earlier, John Cahill, 74, admitted six indecent assaults against children.

Cahill, of Chandos Court, Bedford, an ex-scoutmaster at the home, was jailed for three-and-a-half years in May for abusing the boys aged between 10 and 15 in the 1960s.

At Cahill's trial, prosecutor Matthew Walsh said the home was run by the "nuns and priests from Hell".

Two priests facing abuse accusations, Fr John Ryan and Fr Wilfred Johnson, died before the police investigation started.

Analysis by Nic Rigby

Since our first news story about St Francis Boys' Homes in May 2013, dozens of ex-residents have spoken about the abuse at the home from the 1950s to 1974.

The victims told me the main thing they wanted was for the public to believe their stories after years of indifference from the authorities.

The old boys, known as a Shefford Scruffs, said their lives felt "ruined" or "haunted" by their experiences.

Now that the trials have brought the abuse to public attention, the police officer who pursued the investigation, Mark Ross, hopes they can "find a sense of closure".

Judge Rebecca Poulet QC ruled Mr McCann was not fit to stand trial and that jurors must decide the facts alone

The church and boys' home were built in the 1870s