Ottawa pedophile arrest: The Church of England Newspaper, April 23, 2010 p 6.

John Gallienne (in red) with members of the St John the Evangelist Church choir in Ottawa

First published in The Church of England Newspaper.

The choirmaster at the center of one of the most notorious cases of pedophilia in the Anglican Church of Canada has been re-arrested by police in Kingston, Ontario and is being held on charges of indecent assault.

John Gallienne, (65), of Ottawa was arrested on April 16 for allegedly assaulting a boy between 1980 and 1982. The former choirmaster at St. George’s Cathedral in Kingston, Gallienne pleaded guilty in 1990 to 20 sex crimes against 13 choirboys from the church. Two of his victims later committed suicide.

In an account of the Gallienne case, author Judy Steed wrote in Our Little Secret: Confronting Child Sexual Abuse in Canada, in a chapter entitled, “Kingston: Corruption in the Cathedral” that Gallienne was popular and well-respected member of the Cathedral staff.

She reported that two years after the Cathedral engaged Gallienne, in 1976 Henrik Helmers quit the boys’ choir, telling his parents he had been molested. Helmers took his life a few months later. Helmer’s parents informed the Cathedral of the charges, and were assured Gallienne would be watched.

In 1985 Gallienne molested a choir boy on a trip. The boy told someone outside the church, who informed the police. Gallienne confessed to the assault but expressed remorse for his actions and was allowed to seek counseling for what the dean said was “a one-time thing.”

In 1987 Tim Franks, who had been molested by Gallienne, went to the police about his abuse. Franks latter committed suicide, and Steed noted that Gallienne led the choir for the funeral service.

Gallienne was released from prison in 1994 after serving four years of a six-year sentence. The Diocese of Ontario and the cathedral reached an out of court settlement in 1995 with 11 of the victims and agreed to pay £1.4 million. In 1994, Gallienne was convicted of abusing a choirboy at St. John’s Anglican Church in Victoria, B.C., where served as choirmaster in the early 1970’s.

Shortly before his release from prison, the Bishop of Kingston, the Rt. Rev. Peter Mason visited Gallienne and formally notified him that he was banned from serving in a leadership position in the diocese or participating in a church music programme. When Gallienne moved to Ottawa on his release, Bishop Mason told the Kingston Whig-Standard Bishop John Baycroft of Ottawa had extended the ban on Gallienne to his diocese as well.

“Leadership is not a right, it’s a privilege,” Bishop Mason said. “John Gallienne can belong to a church. He can get up on a Sunday morning. He can go to church. He can pray to God. He can participate in the life of the church as a member. He can belong to a Bible study.”

“But as for leadership, particularly leadership where he can exercise leadership over people and potentially take advantage of them, that is not a right, that is a privilege and the two are completely different,” he said.

However, in 2004 the Kingston Whig-Standard reported the Diocese of Ottawa had lifted the ban, and Gallienne was active in the music ministry of St. John the Evangelist Anglican Church in Ottawa. The parish website stated it was “blessed with the talents of John Gallienne as assistant organist.”

In a statement given to The Church of England Newspaper, a spokesman for the Diocese of Ottawa said that in 2004 the Bishop Peter Coffin conferred with his chancellor and agreed to allow Gallienne to participate in the music ministry of St John the Evangelist Church, but “we tightened the leash.”

In addition, “St. John’s operates Circles of Support and Accountability (COSA) in which teams of volunteers work with released sex offenders. Gallienne was a member of one of those circles,” the diocese said.

The diocese weighed the risks of Gallienne’s reoffending, noting “these circles are funded by the Correctional Services of Canada chaplaincy branch and studies show that sex offenders who participate in COSA have significantly lower rates of reoffending than those who do not participate,” the spokesman said.

“The current charge that Gallienne faces is said to have occurred 30 years ago and, as The Ottawa Citizen reported today, there is no indication that Gallienne has broken the law since his release from jail 16 years ago,” the diocesan spokesman said.

The parish website currently notes that Gallienne “is our endlessly patient leader” of its recorder ensemble.

A Canadian study published in October 2009 in the Journal of Forensic Psychiatry & Psychology found that the recidivism rate for sexual crimes for pedophiles was 22.8 per cent, for violent crimes 33.9 per cent, and for all crimes 45.6 per cent, while a 1993 American study published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology found that 42 per cent of offenders committed a subsequent sex crime or violent crime.