CANADA
The Province
VANCOUVER — The Roman Catholic diocese that ran a school where former Vancouver Olympic CEO John Furlong once taught is denying allegations of abuse in a lawsuit filed by two women, questioning in a statement of defence whether one of the students even attended the school.
A cloud has hung over Furlong since last fall, when the Georgia Straight, a weekly newspaper based in Vancouver, published a story alleging Furlong physically and verbally abused students while teaching in Burns Lake, B.C., and Prince George, B.C., in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Furlong subsequently launched a libel lawsuit against the Georgia Straight newspaper and the reporter who wrote the piece, condemning the article as a hatchet job and denying he ever abused anyone.
Those allegations were amplified this past July, when Grace West and Beverly Abraham, who identified themselves as former students of Immaculata Elementary School in Burns Lake, filed separate lawsuits against Furlong alleging physical and sexual abuse while they attended the school.
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