CANADA
Huron Bullet News
HEATHER BOA Bullet News GODERICH – David Woodall says he did not put his hands down the pyjamas and touch the penises two young boys during a church sleepover in Clinton two decades ago.
So when he received an email in March 2008 from a man who accused the minister of touching his and another boy’s penis, saying he would go the church and the police if he weren’t paid thousands of dollars, “I was actually flabbergasted. I felt like I was going to have to somehow deal with [the complainant] and what he had to say,” Woodall told the jury during the third day of a trial in Superior court in Goderich.
Woodall, 56, faces a number of charges related to sexual assaults on two male complainants who were young boys when a youth group sleepover was held at the Ontario Street United Church – which is now Clinton United Church – between 1991 and 1993. He was the church’s minister from 1985 to 1994. The two complainants, now in their early 30s, cannot be identified.
Woodall started two youth groups at the church: one for boys and girls in Grades 9 to 13 and one for boys and girls in Grades 7 to 8. Depending on the size of group and the year, there were as many as five adults involved. During sleepovers, the church followed the Camping Association of Canada’s standard of one adult per four youth.
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