Vancouver school board ordered to release severed pages of sex scandal report
VANCOUVER — The Vancouver board of education must release additional information from a report about student safety that it ordered in 2006 amid revelations about a sex scandal at a westside high school in the 1970s and 80s, B.C.’s information and privacy commissioner ruled Thursday.
Elizabeth Denham said she did not accept the board’s argument that release of the information would cause “financial and other harm” and ordered it to produce seven pages within 30 days. Other parts of the 17-page report would continue to be protected for privacy reasons, she added.
The report was prepared by Victoria lawyer Don Avison, who was hired to review student safety and make recommendations after teacher Tom Ellison was charged with sex offences involving several students who attended his Quest outdoor education program at Prince of Wales high school.
Ellison was convicted in 2007 and given a two-year conditional sentence.
After Avison completed his review, the board released his recommendations only, saying the rest of his report must be withheld for privacy reasons. In response to freedom-of-information requests, it delivered the full report to The Vancouver Sun and the B.C. College of Teachers but almost every page was blacked out.
The college was seeking information as part of disciplinary investigations involving three Quest teachers: Ellison, Dean Hull and Stan Callegari. Hull and Callegari were never charged criminally, although Hull admitted in a deal signed with the college in 2008 that he had sex with a student while a Quest teacher.
Ellison quit teaching in 1988 but Hull continued to teach in Surrey and Callegari in Vancouver until they were dismissed in 2004 and 2005 respectively.
After its investigation, the college took disciplinary action against Ellison and Hull to ensure they would never teach again, but said it couldn’t complete its investigation of Callegari until it sees a copy of the Avison report.
Callegari does not currently hold a B.C. teaching licence.
Vancouver school superintendent Steve Cardwell issued a statement Thursday saying the district is reviewing Denham’s order and considering its options. Earlier, the board had claimed solicitor-client privilege in refusing to release the report, noting Avison is a lawyer, but that argument was rejected in a ruling last June.
Paul Fraser, then acting commissioner, said the purpose of solicitor-client privilege is to ensure that anyone seeking legal advice is able to communicate freely with a lawyer. “The point of privilege is not simply to shield certain kinds of statements from disclosure,” he added. |
發表於 2011-2-4 00:08
|